Dining reservations on cruise with 2 embark points

[Voelfgar]

How difficult is it to make dinner reservations at the specialty restaurants for the first half on a cruise route that has 2 embark points. For example, W Med cruise on Epic you can embark in Barcelona on Sunday or Rome on Wednesday and making reservations for dinner on Wed thru Saturday?

[KeithJenner]

14 minutes ago, Voelfgar said:

How difficult is it to make dinner reservations at the specialty restaurants for the first half on a cruise route that has 2 embark points. For example, W Med cruise on Epic you can embark in Barcelona on Sunday or Rome on Wednesday and making reservations for dinner on Wed thru Saturday?

Should be no problem.

 

We have always boarded in Barcelona (where the majority of people board) and have never had any trouble with bookings. I can't talk from experience if you are boarding in Rome, but I've never heard of anyone having trouble.

 

Maybe they keep a specific number of reservations for each boarding port, which would mean that you aren't competing directly with people boarding in the other port. However, I think it is just that they don't actually sell out that quickly anyway.

[Voelfgar]

I forgot to include that I'd be boarding in Rome and have the SDP and considering also getting a romance package that likely will also include dinner in a specialty restaurant.

Edited January 18, 2019 by Voelfgar
added additional info

[fabnfortysomething]

I'd pre book online

the SDP should click in so can allocate one of your meals without pre paying 

[KeithJenner]

I should probably clarify that I was assuming that the OP was talking about reserving online (and therefore being a few days behind the Barcelona boarders). Rereading it now, I’m not so sure that is the case.

 

Anyway, I would certainly agree that booking online is best if you want to ensure that you get the bookings you want. I can’t say what the situation will be if you wait until boarding for those first few days. You may find that the Barcelona people have booked up some places.

[zqvol]

Unless you have a large party specialty restaurant reservations are not difficult to get. You can make them ahead of time if you want, or you can make them on board. Remember that only about 35% of available dining slots are made available pre cruise.

Edited January 18, 2019 by zqvol

[Sailing12Away]

Hi there, I was on the same sailing back in May. We embarked in Rome as well. Day one of the cruise for us we ate at Tempannyaki. We didn't have reservations, just walked up to the desk and asked how long the wait would be for 3 people. They said ~30 minutes, so we put our name down and sat on the couches just outside the restaurant with drinks until our time was up. This was around 6:30-7pm.

 

There's boards all over the ship with all the current reservation availability. Green means lots of openings, yellow is kinda full, and red means don't even bother if you don't have a reservation. Use that as a guide if deciding at the last minute where to go for dinner.