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Symphony of the Seas Western Caribbean Review 8/3/2019


Kelly04
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Just wanted to write a hopefully helpful review and try to answer any questions if anyone has them.
A little about me- I'm 33 and this was my 16th cruise (Most with RCCL). My husband and I traveled with his parents, his brother and sister and law, and their two sons (7 and 10). This was our first cruise as Diamond. We pre-purchased the drink package at $49 per day, the Escape Room at $20, and the Thrill Waterpark at Coco Cay for $79 per day.


Overall, we had a great cruise but after the Oasis last year, and being on the Symphony this year, I think we are ready to go back to a slightly smaller ship. While the Oasis of the Seas didn't seem incredibly crowded, there were a lot of crowds on the Symphony at certain times.  It didn't ruin our trip or anything, but it definitely felt like there were a lot of people on the ship most of the time (besides before 8 am).   Feel free to ask any questions! 

Pre-cruise: We flew in to FLL a day early and stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn South Brickell. It was about $125 for one night but there was a $25 valet parking charge. They have a very nice pool area and a decent gym, but it is not really within walking distance of any restaurants or shops. It was a short and relatively cheap Uber ride to the port.

Embarkation- Very fast. We had already signed in online and it took about 5 minutes from start to finish. We got to the port around 11:15 and were onboard and at the Park Cafe for lunch by 11:30.

Staterooms were ready by 1. We were in 8298 (oceanview balcony) which we felt was pretty convenient. It was relatively close to stairs and it was very close to Central Park. Made it easy to go to the Trellis Bar really quick and grab a glass of wine to drink on the balcony. Only on one night did we really hear any noise from Dazzles and it did not really bother us.

We ended up sailing away around 7:30 that night due to some Maintenance.  This worked out well because we usually miss the sail away getting ready for early dinner. We were able to catch it this time!

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Food- We ate in the main dining room each night. Anderson and Lucy were our waiters. Props to Kamlesh (beverage waiter), who made sure we always had a drink. On the Oasis last year, it was nearly impossible to get a drink during dinner so we had to go the casino bar and get them ourselves. Service was a bit hit or miss as some nights were very slow and others were pretty fast. It seemed to depend on if the large table next to us was there or not. The head waiter Angelica was really great with our nephew who has food allergies and made sure he was taken care of each night. Food was good for the most part (I am not picky). Almost all of the chocolate desserts (hazelnut chocolate cake, molten lava cake, warm chocolate cookie) were AMAZING!  

As for breakfast and lunches, we ate at the Solarium Bistro or the Park Cafe for breakfast and lunch. (Love the roast beef!).  We tried Johnny Rockets for breakfast one day and also tried El Loco Fresh for lunch.  We thought El Loco Fresh was pretty tasty, but it is very easy to over-eat there. You should see some of the plates people make! El Loco Fresh also surprisingly had some of the best desserts! Late night we tried out Sorrentos and the Promenade Cafe a few times. Sorrentos pizza always hits the spot and I think its improved in quality in the last few years.  

Activities- I saw this in a previous review and I will have to agree- I feel like Symphony had less activities scheduled in general than the Oasis or other ships we have been on. I think perhaps they rely more on the ship itself (zip line, flow-rider, water slides, etc). Would have liked to see more, but we were never really bored. I did miss the movies in the Aquatheater- I feel like they rarely did this on the Symphony.  We did the Escape Room (pre-purchased) and completed it in about 48 minutes I think. It was fun and worth the $20 we paid. Other than that, we just did the water slides a few times. We did try to make it a few things in On Air like Trivia or Finish that Lyric, but a lot of the times bingo tickets were being sold outside and everyone who bought a ticket seemed to stay for trivia. It made it really hard to participate in these activities unless you got there super early because they were so crowded. Our nephews enjoyed the flow-rider, zipline and the Ultimate Abyss. The younger one seemed to enjoy Adventure Ocean more than the older, but as the cruise went on both were fine going. My sister in law felt like they tended to make the "fun" activities after 10pm when parents have to pay $7 per hour. Smart on their part. 80's Parade is shown below as well as the results of our escape room. (Excuse my husband's face- he was being silly)

  

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Shows-  We saw Hiro on the first night and thought it was great, although I don't think it was a good as Oasis of Dreams. I prefer diving to the tightroping. It was still an entertaining and unique show.

Flight- It was just not my cup of tea. They included a lot of popular songs, but I don't know how a lot of it connected to theme of "Flight".  Still a talented cast, and the performances were good.  

1977- Ice skating is always fun to watch, so it was good. I didn't think the storyline was great, but it was entertaining. I definitely preferred the "Iskate 2.0" show which included well known songs and was a lot more modern.

Hairspray- Although we typically don't sit through the shows like this (did not make it through 10 min of Cats), we stayed for a while. We thought it was actually a pretty good show, but it was the last night and we didn't want to spend the whole night in the theater. My husband even liked it and he typically hates shows.  

Comedy Shows- We saw Simeon Kirkiles and Al Romas in the Attic.   Simeon is absolutely hilarious. We only saw 2/3 of Al Romas' set because a lady vomited a few times and they had to stop the show due to the loud noises the vacuum was going to make. Luckily, we got into a show later in the week and saw the full set. We also saw the two comedians at the Royal Comedy show in the Main Theater.

We also watched the Love and Marriage Game show, which is always fun.  
 

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Thanks for sharing  your cruise.  Great pictures. Waiting to hear your take on the ports. 

Glad your meals in MDR were good. After our Oasis  cruise, we've  decided that there  are enough  options  for  us to avoid  the MDR altogether. 

Nice info  on shows. We're Woodstock  generation ( buut not attendees; probably  2 out of a handful that didn't go, LOL) so lack of current tunes won't be an issue for us.

 

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Ports:
Roatan, Honduras- We booked a private tour through Victor Bodden. Although his company gets rave reviews, we would probably not book them again. Directions to his kiosk were easy enough and we met Kenny, our driver for the day. He seemed nice enough and took us to the sloth place for "priority hugs". The place itself was great (I think the monkeys were even more fun than the sloths) and cost an additional $5 per person in addition to the $25 each we paid for the van for the day. So, this when the day took a bad turn. At the end of the sloth tour when it came time to tip our animal tour guide my husband and I only had very large bills left, and apparently whoever left the tip for our family left a very low one (more on this later). We said we wanted to go to a beach club and Kenny took us to Paradise Beach hotel. There was a $20 charge for the beach club. The beach is nice, but the vendors are out of control and it is not relaxing at all. They do have some security guards on the beach that look like they mean business. We decided to move to the pool which was very relaxing and nice. We checked out the restaurant, but it was pretty expensive. We originally told Kenny we would stay til 1:30, and it was our understanding that he was our driver for the day and would stay (we did not leave anything in the van though). So it becomes 12:45 and we are all starving so we decide to look for Kenny. No one has seen him- no problem- maybe he left for a bit. It gets very close to 1:30 and no one can find him. Shortly after 1:30 another Victor Bodden employee shows up and says "Kenny isn't going to make it, I'll take you back". What I am unclear of is whether anyone from Victor Bodden would have come to get us, if we didn't have another one of their employees call around for Kenny. I have a feeling that Kenny talked to the sloth place guy and saw how low we tipped, and bailed on us. Which sucks, but I guess is sort of our fault. We all felt really embarrassed, but also pretty frustrated with the whole thing.
 

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Costa Maya, Mexico- I contacted Tropicante through Facebook and reserved 8 loungers there with the understanding we would be ordering food and drink. You have to walk out of the port itself to get a taxi which was an adventure in itself. We got to Tropicante really early and pretty much had it to ourselves for a few hours. The guy, I think his name is Charlie put some chairs in the water for us too, which was really nice. As you can see, they cleared the sea grass pretty well and the water was pretty clear. We got some buckets of beers (5 for $15 I think), a quesadilla, then called it a day. It was a relaxing day and I would probably go back there again.
 

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Cozumel, Mexico- Since we had the drink package, we decided to avoid all inclusive places like Mr. Sanchos. We originally thought the kiddos were coming with us, so we chose Paradise Beach for the inflatables. The kids and their parents did something else, but we still went. Paradise Beach is beautiful. The pool is amazing and heated- food and drinks are reasonable. You pay $3 to get in and get a chair, then you are supposed to spend $10 on food and drink per person. We also purchased the $18 fun pass which lets you use the inflatables, snorkeling gear, mats, kayaks, paddle boards. We had a lot of fun on the inflatables. We went early and again had the place to ourselves, but by 11 it started to get really crowded. We had a great day there and would definitely go back the next time we are in Cozumel.
**Right after dinner on this night, an in cabin announcement from the captain came on. He said there was a medical emergency and that we were headed back to Miami. We were so scared he was going to say Coco Cay was cancelled, but he ended up saying we were still on track. It was really weird going back to Miami. We didn't dock, but 2 coast guard boats came to meet us. I hope the person was okay.

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Edited by Kelly04
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Coco Cay- We pre-purchased the Thrill Waterpark on the absolute last day you could in the cruise planner for $79. This was the lowest price I had seen in a few months. I was just kicking myself for not buying it when it was $46 back in April. We got off the ship right at 8 and headed straight for the waterpark. They are now giving coupons for the tallest slide on daredevil's tower for a certain time slot, so the lines don't get so long. At the beginning of the day, there were barely any lines. Almost all day, there were no lines for the bottom two slides, the Manta Racers, or the blue vertical slide. The green slide had a moderate line most of the time, and the drop slides I believe had more lines. By the time we were all done with those slides, the lines for the raft slides were ridiculously long. My inlaws waited with their kids, but I just didn't think it seemed worth it. Wave pool was fun, but did seem kind of dangerous for kids as it gets really crowded and its deep at the front. I just think the waterpark is too small (not enough slides) for as many people that they have on these ships. Next, we decided to go the Oasis Lagoon pool and get some Coco Locos'. The pool area is an awesome addition to the island and next time I would skip the waterpark and just head there. We also went to the beach for a bit and to the swim out bar. The floating bar was really relaxing. They have the basic drinks and Coco Loco's. On the way back from the floating bar, we saw a pretty decent size shark of 4 feet right near us. We knew we might see one, but it really freaked us out. All in all Coco Cay is even more amazing now. Whether it is the water park, pool, or beach there is something for everyone. I really did feel like it was an (almost) perfect day.

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More Coco Cay: 

-Oasis Lagoon Pool

-Exit of the tallest slide on Daredevil's Tower

-Chill Island

-View from floating bar

-Conch we found.  

 

I wish I had taken more pictures of the pool, wave pool, etc. Sorry!

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9 hours ago, Cruisegirl6 said:

Thank you, question, there recently was another review and the person said the Symphony had alot of rusty spots, did you notice any?

No, I thought the ship looked amazing!  We definitely noticed all the rust on the Enchantment when she was right next to us though!  

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6 hours ago, maxy35 said:

We are sailing on Symphony in 6 weeks time (10-5-19) and we also have bought the thrill waterpark passes.  What were the queues like on the slides? Was the waterpark busy?

 

I suggest getting off right at 8am (or whenever they open up the gangway).  If you want to do the tall slide at Daredevil's Tower, get a coupon for a time slot right away (located at entrance of slide).  The lines aren't too bad from 8-9am.  After 9 am, the raft slides were over an hour wait.  My inlaws said that when it said an hour, it really meant about 1 1/2 hours.  The racing mat slides seemed to have very little wait, same for the Manta Racers at Daredevil's Tower.  The lines are bad, but it seems like kids find it worth it.  

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Disembarkation: We walked off with our luggage right at 8. Seriously took 5 minutes. No showing passports for U.S. passport holders-its all facial recognition. Getting an Uber was stressful as it is so crowded, but we managed.

 

Thanks for following along with my review! Again, feel free to ask any questions and I will try to answer them.  

I also have compasses from every day that I can scan and e-mail them if anyone is interested.  


 

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Thanks for your review! I saw a review or a post that said there was no food available 

after a certain hour, can you confirm that?  We have early dinner and I know my other half will be looking for something to eat later in the evening.

Thannks

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Great review.  We were on Symphony back in March with same itinerary except Nassau instead of CoCo Cay.

 

We'll be at CoCo Cay very soon on Navigator.  Interesting what you mentioned about the 'coupon' for the tallest slide. I assume this is included and you just go there and they assign a return time?  Is this the only slide for the assigned time?  I've heard there are very big lines for this one and another one as well (forget which slide).

 

Thanks for sharing.  Sounds like you had a great time.

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3 hours ago, frozenice12 said:

I saw a review or a post that said there was no food available after a certain hour, can you confirm that?  We have early dinner and I know my other half will be looking for something to eat later in the evening.


Sorrento's is open until around 3am, and Cafe Promenade is open around the clock.  

You can also grab pre-packaged sandwiches, salads, fruit cups, etc., from Park Cafe and store them in the fridge in your room.

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On 8/17/2019 at 11:08 AM, Cruisegirl6 said:

Thank you, question, there recently was another review and the person said the Symphony had alot of rusty spots, did you notice any?

 
I don't understand why everyone is so concerned about rust spots.... every ship in salt water will have rust spots.  

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9 hours ago, frozenice12 said:

Thanks for your review! I saw a review or a post that said there was no food available 

after a certain hour, can you confirm that?  We have early dinner and I know my other half will be looking for something to eat later in the evening.

Thannks

 We ate pretty late night (Midnight or later) at the Promenade Cafe and Sorrentos Pizza. According to the compass, they are both open until 3am  

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8 hours ago, LuCruise said:

Great review.  We were on Symphony back in March with same itinerary except Nassau instead of CoCo Cay.

 

We'll be at CoCo Cay very soon on Navigator.  Interesting what you mentioned about the 'coupon' for the tallest slide. I assume this is included and you just go there and they assign a return time?  Is this the only slide for the assigned time?  I've heard there are very big lines for this one and another one as well (forget which slide).

 

Thanks for sharing.  Sounds like you had a great time.

Yeah, it's just a ticket for a certain time slot.  On our sailing, this was the only sailing with assigned time slots.  Someone said after 2pm it was first come, first serve but I can't confirm that.  

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