Best Iona Main Dining Room

[gteach]

Hi all,

 

From my understanding, all main dining rooms serve the same menu every meal time.

 

However, in your opinion, what is the best MDR to eat in? View, atmosphere and table/service wise?!

[SarahHben]

Depending on where you get seated I feel Pearl and Coral have the best views, large windows looking over the aft.
Opal was smaller and felt more peaceful and intimate, my dad & brother in law said that was their favourite. We only used Aqua once for afternoon tea.

We didn’t notice a difference table service wise.

 

[Purdey16]

We preferred pearl and coral which was more open and spacious with views of the aft , waiters quick , felt a bit hemmed in the other two and one was quite dark and close tables together. Service was slower.

[devonuk]

For us… coral and pearl - too many people and too bright and airy. aqua - our second favourite but okay. opal - our front runner, intimate/friendly and had a understated vibe which we enjoyed. 
The Quays was a great place to catch a meal at other times 👍

[indiana123]

We felt that both Coral and Pearl were too bright which meant there wasn't any special ambience associated with dining out.

[AchileLauro]

We are all different and we thought that both Coral and Pearl restaurants were light and airy and so favoured them more on a recent cruise. While Aqua was smaller and quite pleasant we didn't like it quite as much. 

As for Opel, well that was just dark and unappealing especially when busy which it was on the evening that it was the only restaurant where we could get a table. To be absolutely honest that evening we were getting totally frustrated by the whole dining booking system that simply didn't work for us (a party of 7). 

We've experienced both club and freedom dining in the past, and each suited us well at the time for those cruises. However, that evening on Iona we weren't very happy at all with the system in place at that time, and we would have been extremely unhappy if the only alternative open to us was to resort to the buffet for dinner. Again, it looks like work in progress in the shake down of Iona.

[Son of Anarchy]

We preferred Pearl and Coral restaurants over the other MDRs.

[bobstheboy]

Pearl and Coral, but it's down to personal opinion.