Post-Voyage Recap - December 5 2021

[_tacocat_]

Long post alert!  Just finished putting my thoughts together after our 5-night voyage to Cozumel and Bimini on 12/5/2021.  We first booked in 2019 for Richard’s Birthday Bash July 2020 (cancelled), booked Barcelona September 2021 at the beginning of Covid (cancelled again), longer Caribbean itinerary on Valiant for December 2021 (cancelled yet again), then finally this one.  Had to pinch myself once we got on that it was finally actually happening!

 

Overall, we had an awesome time— there were some tiny annoyances over the whole trip, but not enough to stop me from booking two more voyages while onboard.

 

I just submitted a higher-level CC review, but figured this forum would appreciate more detail about the food, activities and overall experience.  Happy to answer any questions you have!

 

The Room

We stayed in 11011Z, an Even Bigger Terrace Cheeky Corner Suite.  Bed was comfy, room was spacious, and I didn’t bump my shins into the bed corners nearly as much as I had expected.  Had a couple issues up front (missing shampoo, pool towels and some booze and classes from the minibar setup), but we were able to get all of those resolved on the first night.  

 

We poked our heads into other Rockstar/Mega Rockstar suites before we disembarked, and I can now definitively say Cheeky Corners have the worst/weirdest laid out bathroom of all the suites.  Maybe just a tall person problem, and also probably TMI, but the TP holder kept jabbing me in the leg whenever I sat on the toilet.  Quick solution to that is to just take the roll off and the little metal flap falls towards the wall.

 

Because the room is all the way at the back, there was literally no breeze.  I didn’t think it would be that hot out in December, but the balcony was super uncomfortable in hot, stagnant air most of the time.  Other gripe (if you can even call it that) about the balcony was that the hammock was all the way around the corner, so we really didn’t use it.  Out of sight, out of mind...

 

Balcony on deck 11 was super private.  If you're on 8/9, the people at the Dock House basically have a full view of your balcony.  If you're on 14, anyone on the Deck 16 net can pretty much see right in too.  If you're going with an aft suite, I'd recommend decks 10-13. 

 

Location had its pros and cons – aft lifts were NEVER busy, and the suite was 3 rooms away from there.  Bed was oriented parallel to the ship, so the normal light rocking in the aft was actually kind of nice at night, rocking you to sleep.  Easy access to the Galley and the Dock (great to grab a quick cup of ice. Or plates of shrimp!)  It's far from Richard’s rooftoop, and a lot of the restaurants are on 5 and 6 fore—you can’t connect from aft to fore on those levels, so you have to cut across on the "through" decks. We usually did that on 7 or 15.

 

I would probably only book a Cheeky Corner or Suite Aft Suite in the future if it was the only suite available, but I would not go out of my way to choose any of these rooms.

 

Embarkation & Rockstar Perks:

Testing was a breeze, then we basically sat in a meat locker for 2 hours.  There were snacks and some soft drinks, but it would have been nice to enjoy a nice glass of bubbles there too.  We were able to board around 1:45, and we were whisked away directly to the Manor to meet with our Rockstar Agents (aka a concierge-type person) and enjoy some complimentary champagne.  Our agent was Luciana, and she was phenomenal.  She made sure we a) knew how to use the app and b) were able to book all our ressies and onboard activities before sending us on our way to our suite.  We were able to directly connect with her on the messenger part of the app and she was always super responsive.  She truly made us feel like VIPs!

 

The mini bar inclusion was okay, but I would have preferred a perk like 2 drinks per person per day or something like that.  The bar setup seems to change based on what they have in inventory and was apparently slightly different across all the rooms, but ours consisted of a half bottle each of Moet, rose, cabernet, chardonnay, Buffalo Trace, Johnny Walker Black, Tito’s, Bacardi and Casa Noble Reposado, a couple Heinekens, a couple Wynwood Stray the Courses EPAs, red bulls and diet RB, Kombucha, and bottles of tonic water and ginger beer.  We aren’t big two-ingredient mixed-drink drinkers, but we made it work.  Lots of mules.  Loooots of mules.  Every type of mule we could make.  You can get cans of soda at some bars and through room service (fee waived for all rockstar/mega rockstars).  We also figured out on day 4 that we could get juices like orange and pineapple from various bars too, so we leveled up our drinks after that.  Filing that in my brain for next time, and also bringing tiny bottles of bitters/other cocktail add-ins.

 

Richard’s Rooftop was great.  Our voyage was ~1,800 people, which I think is the highest capacity they had sailed with in the US so far.  When chair hoggers took over the regular pool deck or it got too loud, it was really nice to have a quiet oasis with abundant seating upstairs.  Pro tip for the roof – the outdoor smoking section is on the starboard (Z) side, and depending on the wind, the smoke travels into RR.  We usually set up camp on the port (A) side and had no smoke issues.  We didn’t know till we got on, but they had free champagne from 5:30-7 each night, so we generally hung out there before dinner every night.  The Rockstar Agents tend to float around up there during that time if you need anything.  We had to move dinner reservations a couple times, and they were super helpful in doing that.

 

It was also super nice to have a private area at Bimini.  It’s the furthest area from the DJ , so while you do still get a little untz untz untz from the EDM music playing, it’s pretty subdued.  As Rockstars, you also order lunch food from a server instead of waiting on line.  There was a bar with two bartenders only for Rockstars, which we didn’t fully appreciate until we tried to get a drink from one of the other bars and waited for 5 minutes without the line moving.  We ran back to the Rockstar bar to get our drinks and came back to the pool.

 

Fitness:

Classes book up super quickly.  People do cancel, so keep checking for availability.  Someone in my spin class said that she booked while she was on her way to class.  I did 2 spin classes and a barre class, and they were all really fun.  If you want to borrow shoes for spin class and have big feet, get there early – there are a limited number of pairs from EU size 45 and up. 

 

There are also a bunch of yoga classes (indoor, outdoor, vinyasa, slow flow, etc.), bungee fitness, bootcamp, HIIT, foam roller classes, and I’m definitely missing some.  They say there is a $10 no-show fee for not cancelling booked classes before 24 hours out, but I'm not sure how they track it because no one checked in for one of the classes I was in.

 

VHS is an 80s inspired workout class in the Manor, but we were having such a great day at the pool that we skipped it.  The outdoor track had two lanes, and everyone generally kept to proper running/walking/passing etiquette.  Gym looked really nice, but I didn’t use it other than group fitness classes.

 

Food:

We went to all of the sit down restaurants except for Test Kitchen.  Quick review of each of the restos that we ate at:

 

• Wake – was decent, but pretty much just a steak/seafood restaurant with things that you could get at any generic steakhouse on land.  I got the wedge salad, which has egg but doesn’t say on the menu, and my husband got the corn pudding, which looked pretty gross but he suffered through it.  His description was “corn flan.”  We both got filet mignon.  It was tasty, and the roasted garlic was a nice touch.  I’ve seen people complain that the steaks had no seasoning, but sometimes I just prefer my meat to taste like meat.  Desserts were really tasty (and small – welcome after such a large meal).  We got the baked Alaska and the lemon cheesecake.  Breakfast was good, but more "brunchy" than breakfast - our table neighbors got up and went to the Galley after their food came to get a more traditional brekkie.

• Pink Agave – didn’t really expect much, but was wowed by everything here.  We ordered almost everything on the menu—I think I’m missing some, but guac, corn, mole shrimp, chicken enchiladas, steak, pork, chocolate tacos, and bread pudding.  We also got the agua fresca cocktails with passion + mezcal and passion + tequila, which sounds weird but worked really well!  We had to go back the last night for more of those shrimp.

• Razzle Dazzle – also wasn’t wowed by the menu on paper, but the food was so so so good here.  Got the cauliflower, butternut squash raviolis (I detest butternut squash but ate all of them they were so tasty), pork schnitzel, black garlic bowtie pasta, and secret steak.  Could have done without dessert because I was so full already, but we had to get the rainbow churros and cookies and milk for the novelty of it.  Churros were delish, but I probably wouldn't bother with the cookies and milk again.  Breakfast was really tasty here too!  I've seen some complaints about the avo toast, but I had it twice and it was nice & spicy.  There was sriracha oil directly on the toast, then avo, sesame seeds, pepitas and radish.  Had enough flavor for me, but some pickled onions would have added a nice kick!

• Extra Virgin – all of the crew recommended the meatballs, so we had to start with that.  Got the soup too, didn’t love it but it was okay.  Charcuterie board was a nice transition into the main course.  I got the pappardelle ragu, and my husband got the porcini rubbed steak and the gnocchi.  The affogato was a nice pick-me-up of caffeine, and the sorbets were refreshing too.

• Gunbae – I hate communal dining.  Hate it hate it hate it.  If they had 2-tops (or like a tablemate matchmaking service), I would have liked this experience so much more.  Our tablemates were droning on and on about how this was so different (in a bad way) than any other line they’d been on, and how they think they got scammed buying street jewelry and tequila in Cozumel – Debby Downers, keep that ish to yourself, I just want to enjoy my dinner!  Chicken appetizer was super crispy Korean buffalo-ish chicken.  We both got the combo entree, which was short rib, pork belly, and shrimp.  Pork belly was a little meh, but the shrimp and beef were good.  Our server mentioned that traditional KBBQ is spicy, but they had to Americanize it a bit.  Wish we could have gotten a little more Korean flavor.  We left before dessert because I didn't want to ruin my vacay vibe with any political discussions, and we were going to be late for a show.

• Galley – hit or miss.  I think the initial concept was to truly be a food hall, i.e., you figure out what you want, you order it from that stall, you wait for it there, and you go find the rest of your party at the table.  The waiter service was a bit confusing, inconsistent, and impossible to course out for multiple people at the table.  Tacos and burgers were good, and the sushi was tasty to me, but I only eat veg sush.  Ramen was okay, breakfast was okay too.  Desserts and pastries were surprisingly disappointing because they all looked so good.  I have a huge sweet tooth, but most desserts were SO sicky sweet, and the pastries tasted stale.  Ice machines were regularly out of ice.  Biggest annoyance of the Galley was the lack of clarity around opening hours for each of the stalls.  Some were only open for breakfast and lunch, some just for lunch and dinner, and some were open all day, but you could only get certain items at certain points in the day (looking at you, roast beef sandwich from Diner & Dash that I never seemed to be there at the right time for…).

• Pizza Place – so good, but takes for. ever.  They are one of the few restaurants open late, so I had 1am pizza—white pie, extra roasted garlic—pretty much every night.  There are about 6 pizzas to choose from.  They are made to order and you get a buzzer for your order, so you can wander a bit while you wait.

• Lick Me Til Ice Cream – for better or worse, it’s not really on the way to or from anything, so we only made it there twice.  I was able to try the brown butter financier and key lime ice creams with two different types of cones.  Both were really good!

• Grounds Club – with everything that is included, it’s kind of annoying that espresso and tea drinks are not.  Nonetheless, I caved and got coffee twice.  They use Intelligentsia coffee across the ship, and I got the Angeleno, which is a vanilla latte-like iced drink

• Sun Café – Poke Bowls.  Probably my least favorite meal on the ship (but still not awful).  This was compounded by the fact that there were maybe 1 or 2 order tickets ahead of me when I ordered, and when I came back to check on it a while later, 10 tickets mysteriously worked their way in front of mine.  This happened at the Pizza Place a couple times, so I’m not really sure what’s going on with that.

• Dock House – The Dock House was one of the quickest, tastiest meals we had (many times).  They have grilled shrimp, chicken, or steak skewers, a mezze cart where you can grab Mediterranean salads and other cold bites, and you can order other hot appetizers like falafel or octopus.

• Beach Club – I wasn't sure I'd like anything on the menu, but the pork was to die for.  The items that stood out to me were really tasty pulled pork with grilled tortillas, grilled corn on the cob and the rum cake.  They do a second round of food ("light bites") at 3, including ribs, but I wasn't hungry at that point.

• Grab & Gos – there are a few Quickeze locations – two in the Galley, one in Pizza Place and one in the Dock, maybe more.  They have quick grab & go breakfast items in the morning and 3 types of salad, as well as charcuterie plates, trail mix, and veggie crudites in the afternoons.  It was great to grab a salad for a quick afternoon bite instead of being relegated to hamburgers.

 

The Ports:

• Cozumel – This was the first time I’ve been there, and don't think I need to get off the boat there again.  We had been booked on the three-reef snorkel, but we saw reviews of it saying they feed the fish (big no no!) and it basically being a hard sell for photos and tequila.  That didn't seem very on-brand with everything that VV is selling themselves as.  We cancelled and rebooked for the Coral Reef Restoration excursion.  Started off a little rough when we were hit up by the staff for cash to use a locker to store our belongings while we snorkeled (there was nowhere else to put our stuff), but it was overall a good time.  A marine biologist is working to propagate, nurse and plant coral in a little marine park.  It was kind of depressing at the end of the day because he told us that basically every dive shop and developer in Cozumel is destroying the region's big moneymaker/tourist draw: the reef.

• Bimini – complainers gon’ complain!  I saw terrible reviews about how loud it was, how cold it was, blah blah blah.  We had such a freaking blast here.  Air temp must have been in the 80s, and water temp in both the pool and ocean must have been high 70s.  That is not cold!  Food was really good – my faves were the pork and the rum cakes.  If you want a good seat, you do have to get there kind of early though.  We got off the boat around 8 and stuck around the beach club until about 4-4:30.  We skipped the bonfire because we had to get ready for dinner.

 

Shows/Onboard Activities/Entertainment

There needs to be more than 24 hours in a day.  There was SO much to do: pop up and scheduled music performances, free activities like cocktail hour with the hostess, games at the social club, karaoke, trivia, fitness classes, peoplewatching.  Not enough time in the day for all of that.

 

I can see where Never Sleep Alone rubs people the wrong way… if they take it seriously, as if it truly is a lady trying to sell you her sex seminar.  It’s a one-woman comedy show that was born in the East Village a while back, and Dr. A is (gasp) an actress, not a sex therapist.  I was in stitches for half the show, and almost lost it during the grand finale (IYKYK).

 

Duel Reality was so cool.  Again – VV sells their voyages as not your typical cruise ship entertainment.  This certainly fit that bill!  A little tense at times to watch some of the acts, but so exciting.

 

The Free Label Band was the house band at Sail Away, Never Sleep Alone and a few other events.  Decent covers of popular songs, and they were always interacting with the crowds.

 

VV rotates a few of their acts regularly.  We were at The Nerd’s last show, where he shows off a ton of tricks using his flash memorization skills.

 

Slam Allen and his blues band were the late night music in On the Rocks.  He always drew an overflowing crowd with a really good mix of sailors in attendance.

 

PJ Party – just that.  People put on their PJs and dance/party under the stars with a DJ.  So mad I didn't pack a Christmas-themed footie PJ onesie for this!

 

Scarlet Night – don whatever amount of red you like, and the whole ship is a party.  It starts in the roundabout (central staircase) and parades up to the pool with a DJ, dance show, and even dancing in the shallow end of the pool.

 

Grog Walk – $45 paid activity, but it’s a pub crawl across a few bars on the ship that eventually dumps you into the PJ party.  I thought it was cool to do on the first night because we met a ton of passengers and crew that we kept running into and got to know some of the restaurants/their cocktail programs better.

 

Shot for Shot – $35 paid activity, cocktail class with one of the ship’s mixologists that gives you some history behind each of the drinks and spirits, rationale and technique for creating each drink, and tips to level up your drink Instagram photos.  Rob The Hype officially turned my husband into an Instagram story monster now.

 

Miscellaneous Other Stuff

This has gotten way too long already, so here are my other quick thoughts.

 

Loves

• First and foremost, all of the crew really seemed to enjoy themselves, and happy crew leads to happy guests.  I’ve seen some folks on here/some of the FB groups say that it came off fake, but I felt all of my conversations with crew were really authentic.  VV specifically hires fun, outgoing people to engage with the crowd and create the fun atmosphere, in lieu of a traditional cruise director whose that constantly pressures you to spend more money.  The crew was pretty candid when chatting with us, especially when they had come from other cruise lines.  One person actually mentioned they're working on some tweaks on Valiant and future ships based on their experience so far with Scarlet to enable them to better accommodate passengers.  The VV crew is allowed to be themselves and have whatever hair color, piercings or tattoos they want, all the way up to the senior officers of the boat.  Betchya didn’t know the third officer of Scarlet has bright teal hair!

• I liked not getting nickeled and dimed for everything and not having to do mental tip/tax math on vacay with the all-inclusive drink and spa pricing.  I was a bit turned off at first by the upcharges for “treat yourself” items at some of the restaurants, but there is so much food waste already that they probably just don’t want people to order a slab of Wagyu or a seafood tower and only eat two bites.

• No one cares if you bring drinks from one venue to another – it’s essentially a closed ecosystem, so a drink is a drink to them, no matter where you buy it on board (or if you bring from your minibar).  Coming from CA by way of NY, the drink prices felt extremely reasonable, especially considering tip was included.  Bottle prices for wine also seemed very reasonable with not much markup (and again, tip included).

• I thought the pool was actually the perfect size for this ship.  I’ve been in Vegas party pools that are smaller and feel like sardine cans (and have arguably way more drunk sloppy people flailing all over the place).  This pool was not like that at all.  Once you’re in, it doesn’t feel small. Yes, you cannot swim laps in it, but I think VV is going for a more chill/hangout pool vibe vs. having to dodge aggressive mid-day lap swimmers.  I never made it to the athletic club round pool, but that always seemed to be more crowded because people could grab a seat in the water and enjoy the day from in the pool.  We were always able to find a chair or one of the daybeds at the end.  We snagged a daybed on the pool ledge once, and it was SO uncomfortable- squishy with no support, so it was difficult to prop yourself up if you wanted to read or eat.  Biggest complaint here is that there was no real entrance to the pool, so if you wanted to use the handrail, you'd have to climb over people/stuff to get in.  It would be great to have an actual entry point!

• The wifi was fine for FB, Instagram, iMessage, email and web browsing.  It proved really helpful for staying in touch with folks at home, as I had a family emergency on land during our first night.  I don’t think I’d ever trust the wifi’s reliability enough to work from the ship if I needed to do a pseudo-working vacay.

• The app (shocking, right?).  Once we figured out the trick to close all the other apps on our phones, it worked very well.  I only had one hiccup on the last night and deleted/reinstalled.  I liked the fact that you got push notifications from your phone instead of having announcements onboard or having to remember when and where you booked dinner.  When a show got cancelled, we got a notification and they added backup activities to the schedule in real time.  It would probably be worthwhile to have some sort of open house/orientation/app help session on day 1 to make sure everyone has the hang of it.

• Personal preference, but I liked that the layout of the ship forced you to explore a bit.  We got the hang of it by the middle of day 2.  I really appreciated that none of the ship passages felt like major thoroughfares with hoardes of people running from one place to another.

 

Mehs

• I've seen this mentioned a couple times, but the smokestack still rains soot on the aft deck with the net on 16, and it gets on all of your clothes if you sit on the daybeds up there.  The smoke cloud also ruined our one really nice sunset (wah)

• The crew can't seem to get a handle on passenger smoking on board.  People were vaping everywhere, but that smell dissipates quickly.  The bigger issue seemed to be people smoking cigarettes and cigars in their cabins or on their balconies, and the smoke wafted through the halls.  We called down once, but they said there wasn’t really anything they could do.  Seems to be a common issue from some of the FB groups.  Kind of gross and a fire hazard.  I wish they’d just do away with the passenger smoking areas and prohibit cigarettes and cigars on board- it seemed like there were maybe only ever 10-15 people in the smoking area.

• Worth reiterating – galley hours were weird (no tacos after lunch time, ramen only at breakfast, lunch and after 10pm), and there were limited late night food options.  Between 3-5pm, it also seemed like nothing was open in there.  Thankful for those grab & go salads then…

• Virgin needs to do a better job at vetting excursion providers.  I know they dropped a few due to vax requirements, but we heard complaints from a lot of folks for both Cozumel (3 snorkel tour, pub crawl) & Bimini (tram tour).

• Since the MerMaiden, it seems like there has been a really heavy contingent of travel agents.  Anywhere we went, TAs were either asking us about our experience so they could “give our feedback to their clients” (do your own job, please!), or caucusing with each other to dissect the VV onboard experience vs. that of other lines.  I’m hopeful that as the initial launch hype dies down, the omnipresence of TAs onboard will as well.

 

All in all, this was one of my favorite vacays ever, and I have been to much more exotic places than Cozumel and Bimini.  I think my husband and I are smack in the bullseye of their target demo, as a married elder millennial DINK couple in a coastal market with discretionary spending money, and we had an absolute blast.  Booked a back to back for next June and can’t wait to get back on!

 

Edited December 13, 2021 by _tacocat_
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[ceight]

Thanks for this review. It was awesome!! Also, you and your husband sound a lot like my husband and me.. 🙂 We’re def their target demo, DINKs, coastal, etc.

 

Quick question if you don’t mind - not sure if you rented shoes or are familiar with cleats on cycling shoes, but do you know what type they were? SPD?

 

I'm glad y’all had such an awesome time. Definitely gets me more excited for our B2B. 

[ociana]

Thank you for the review, it parallels a lot of our experience as well. I agree about the beach club pork. So. So. Good.

[_tacocat_]

10 minutes ago, ceight said:

Quick question if you don’t mind - not sure if you rented shoes or are familiar with cleats on cycling shoes, but do you know what type they were? SPD?

Yep, the shoes they have are Pearl Izumi (know your European size if you want to quickly grab the right pair!), and they use normal SPD clips (non-Peloton style).  If you don't like the shoes or can't find your size, the pedals also have cages on the other side.  I was going to bring mine, but realized I already had waaaay too much luggage to lug single-purpose sneakers along!

[_tacocat_]

4 minutes ago, ociana said:

Thank you for the review, it parallels a lot of our experience as well. I agree about the beach club pork. So. So. Good.

We got seconds of the pork 😄  I wish I knew what was in those tortillas!  I couldn't figure out if they were corn or flour, but they were tasty either way. 

[britincanada]

Thank you for sharing your experience! Roll on May - we were also originally booked on the Birthday Bash for July '20, rebooked for the same July '21, we are now going on a  Dominican Daze in May '22.

[Janthere]

Love the detail in this review - thank you SO much for all of your comments. We sail in under 30 days and this will really help us set our expectations and maximize the short 4 nights we will be on board.

[imahistorygeek]

On 12/13/2021 at 3:33 PM, _tacocat_ said:

 

• Since the MerMaiden, it seems like there has been a really heavy contingent of travel agents.  Anywhere we went, TAs were either asking us about our experience so they could “give our feedback to their clients” (do your own job, please!), or caucusing with each other to dissect the VV onboard experience vs. that of other lines.  I’m hopeful that as the initial launch hype dies down, the omnipresence of TAs onboard will as well.

 

 

 

This is such a great review!

I think what you mention about the TAs is a real problem. I'm a TA and VV emailed us before our cruises and said basically to leave the guests alone if you're traveling on VV's dime. They just wanted us to act like a regular guest. 

[marty's mom]

Same travel week.  We've already nooked an 8 nighter!

 

we brought our son and his gf, mid 20's, and they also are booking another.  they loved the room service menu

 

a had app issues with the wallet and loot. Sailor services were very helpful, with 1 excetion

 

crew was great.

 

yes, hours for galley and the hot dog place should be expanded.

 

meals were great, other than test kitchen. 

 

son and gf did helmet diving excursion in Cozumel which they loved.

 

I really liked the fact that there weren't any annoying photographers, announcements etc

 

very relaxing time

[The_Force]

Thank you so much for sharing your experience, this is what CC is for. Really appreciate all your effort to include so much detail, You have another loyal follower here! Thanks again!

[_tacocat_]

On 12/26/2021 at 6:01 AM, The_Force said:

Thank you so much for sharing your experience, this is what CC is for. Really appreciate all your effort to include so much detail, You have another loyal follower here! Thanks again!

hah no problem!  there was just a lot of negativity on FB and some posts and reviews on CC, so i felt that a more comprehensive review was in order 😊

[Wildcatllamas]

23 hours ago, _tacocat_ said:

hah no problem!  there was just a lot of negativity on FB and some posts and reviews on CC, so i felt that a more comprehensive review was in order 😊

I was on this cruise with you. And I have to say I agree with almost everything you have said. The friend I was traveling with and I talked a lot about how friendly the crew were. We took the time to talk to them and ask where they were from. Every one of them said they loved working for VV.

 

I am a TA and I also found it kind of offensive when there were a couple of TA who approached my friend about getting them a good cruise deal. The one time I walked up about that time and he introduced me as his TA and the woman took off like a shot. Just plain wrong.

 

I am looking to cruise with them again. I am really looking at doing the one in Greece but it will depend on the amount of time I can get off work.

[Robjacksen]

What would you say the average age was if you had to give a rough estimate? Was there a lot of singles? I’m a 30 year old male and wanted to do a solo cruise. I’m pretty social and like to meet new people. 

[_tacocat_]

On 12/28/2021 at 10:06 PM, Robjacksen said:

What would you say the average age was if you had to give a rough estimate? Was there a lot of singles? I’m a 30 year old male and wanted to do a solo cruise. I’m pretty social and like to meet new people. 

It was kind of all over the place, but maybe mid-late 40s on average?  Definitely had a mix of people who wanted to party and people who wanted to relax, and you can be as social as you want. 

 

While they don't have mixers or solo cruisers events, they do have lots of activities that are designed for people to meet each other.  Grog walk had activities that made us mingle with our shipmates to "earn" your drinks, and there were a few solo travelers.  Shot for Shot cocktail class was also a fun opportunity to meet others.  We also got to meet a few of the Happenings Cast in a pretty small setting in both of those activities which was cool, and they said hi to us throughout our trip.  If you're into fitness, there are plenty of group classes.  

 

There's also trivia almost every night (if not every night?) where you make teams of ~6, so plenty of opportunity for socializing there too.  If that isn't enough, you can always volunteer to participate in Never Sleep Alone 😉

[benjaminnicholas]

I'd say 80's kids who wanted to let loose without breaking a hip.

[drewdawg199]

51 minutes ago, benjaminnicholas said:

I'd say 80's kids who wanted to let loose without breaking a hip.

Accurate