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Should have never read reviews!

KEG21552

By KEG21552,
in Royal Caribbean International

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KEG21552

KEG21552

Posted
Posted

I have about 25 cruises under my belt, most on Celebrity, Royal a few NCL and 1 Princess and Carnival.  

Never have I had a bad cruise, some better than others but have enjoyed something about all of them.  I know that reviews are generally posted by people who are dissatisfied or angry about something, so they take the time to publicly complain and that is fine.

 

We are sailing on Allure next month and if I had read the reviews, I don’t think I would have booked it!   According to some, it is a giant floating disaster with terrible food, too crowded (ya think - with 6,000 passengers?) and generally in terrible shape and unenjoyable.

That being said, we are looking forward to going and intend to have a wonderful time.  We did just get a move up bid to an AquaTheater 1 bedroom cabin from a JS and after doing somewhat of a deep dive, I am not sure we made the right choice.  I did try to search this but the search was unavailable.

Any recent travelers in this category?

Again, we (a group of 10) generally have a pretty good time wherever we go and really looking forward to this!

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OCSC Mike "Live from...." Rare

OCSC Mike

Posted
Posted

Ignore the reviews and form your own opinions. Even more negativity in forum-land these days than usual.

 

FWIW, I had an amazing cruise (as usual) on Wonder in June and can't wait to go back on her 3 times between March and July. If Allure was doing 7-nighters from PC I'd have happily booked Allure (my BIL/SIL and nieces had a great time on her last summer).

 

Since my wife is a teacher, we almost always sail on full/nearly-full Oasis class ships. The crowds don't bother us. The 6000+ people are pretty well spread out. The main pool is the one area that we find to be overcrowded but we also never hang out there (no kids and need shade so we prefer the Solarium).

 

Congrats on the RoyalUp to Sky Class! As long as you're OK with the price you paid, you'll love the perks! Highly recommend making Coastal Kitchen reservations for every night you're not doing specialty dining. It's MUCH better than the MDR, IMO.

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cruiselvr04 Great Review Rare

cruiselvr04

Posted
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We have spent 2 weeks on Allure this year.  It will be great!  We’ve never had a bad cruise but some are more enjoyable than others.  Don’t sweat the small stuff and you’ll be fine.  Your food should be better than an average with the costal kitchen.  Your biggest problem will be ever wanting to cruise in a lesser cabin again.  

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firefly333

firefly333

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18 minutes ago, ticketsunlimited said:

Sailing on her 9/10 to complete the final Oasis class ship on our resume.  Looking forward to it.

Me too. I'm also looking forward to the shows and all the food. Cant wait. .. soon. 5 shows booked, all checked in. .. ready to go. 

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doghog

doghog

Posted
Posted

We would never book or not book a cruise line, ship, itinerary, etc. based on others positive or negative opinions or experiences. I enjoy reading about their cruises and respect what they say but never a deciding factor with our cruise decisions. 

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bigque

bigque

Posted
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If I would have went by all the mostly bad reviews of my first cruise which was on Sovereign of the Seas I wouldn’t be cruising today. This was back in 2008 and most of the reviews were so bad I almost cancelled the cruise. I went and we had the time of our lives and have been cruising ever since. Turns out we didn’t experience any of the bad stuff we read about. 

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alfaeric

alfaeric

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Which deck did you get?  We've done both the one on deck 12 and 14- the only issue we had with the one on 14 was that the balcony was a little odd shaped.  The cabin was really nice.  But we preferred the one on deck 12 because of the larger balcony.

Either way, they are better than a JS, in our opinion.

 

Watching the show from up there is pretty cool.

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KEG21552

KEG21552

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19 minutes ago, alfaeric said:

Which deck did you get?  We've done both the one on deck 12 and 14- the only issue we had with the one on 14 was that the balcony was a little odd shaped.  The cabin was really nice.  But we preferred the one on deck 12 because of the larger balcony.

Either way, they are better than a JS, in our opinion.

 

Watching the show from up there is pretty cool.

We are on deck 14.  Looking forward to entertaining the group.  The cabin certainly looks big enough!

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HicksRA

HicksRA

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I was just on Allure for the president’s cruise and didn’t find anything at all bad or wrong with the ship itself. Of course, it’d been spit shined due to the CEO coming onboard. 
No complaints at all about the ship, just the cheapening aspect overall by Royal fleetwide. 

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volk904

volk904

Posted
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I would never worry about reviews even though I read them.  No doubt the Allure has some age but I am sure it is in decent shape.  The MDR food complaints are probably the same as very Royal Ship but you have a suite and can eat as many meals as you want in the private Coastal Kitchen so that is an upgrade.   Once you sail you can come back and give your opinion on the old gal.  

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PaulManchester

PaulManchester

Posted
Posted

Never, ever, EVER, take any notice of excessively negative reviews. They are invariably written by liars. 
 

A fun game we always play after any holiday is to wait a couple of weeks and then read the reviews for the cruise/land Holiday we have just been on. Many reviews ARE fair of course, even less than perfect ones naturally, but some are hilariously hyperbolic in their condemnation.  
Cruise reviews of this nature invariably stick to a well worn path, utilising several popular and oft-used stock phrases. Some examples:

 

“Food was like school dinners”

”Butlins on Sea” (Butlins is a fantastic holiday camp company in the UK, but for some reason I’ve never understood, a very small (but determined to “jolly well have their say”) number of cruise reviewers use it as a pejorative. 
“Balcony not cleaned once the whole cruise”

”Balcony covered in rust”

”Cups and Saucers in the room not replaced daily, even after use”

”Underwear from the previous passenger found under the bed” (why is it always underwear that the slovenly, lazy, cabin steward forgets to remove and never a tee-shirt or a blouse???)

”Waited up to 30 minutes to be served in the bar”

”Food in MDR was cold”

”Waiter in MDR didn’t greet me or look me in the eye at all, for the entire cruise”

”I received my starter, main course, dessert , and coffee before my companion had even received their starter”

”Couldn’t get into a single show all cruise as seats were always taken despite arriving an hour before showtime each day”

In over 40 years of travel I have never, not once, experienced any of the above complaints, nor do I know of anyone that has, but they are there in so many excessively

negative reviews. As sure as night follows day. 

 

There are several more stalwarts of the lesser-spotted uber-complainer but I’m typing this on a phone and my fingers are tired. 
The point is, if you read a review that is excessively negative you can be pretty confident in assuming that it is a pile of steaming horse ‘stuff’. Particularly if it contains a selection of the above stock complaints. As an added game, count how many times the enraged reviewer mentions two things 1) How many cruises they have done in the past (“30-40” usually), and 2) How many cruises they have booked over the following 6-12 months with the relevant cruise line (invariably “I’m now having doubts about my 2-week cruise to the med in six weeks, and my canaries cruise a month later and don’t get me started on the 35-nighter we are due to depart on, the week after we get back from the canaries”)
 

For a bit of fun have a look at the review section on this site, go to reviews for the British line P and O cruises, (we Brits love a good moan and whinge), filter it for one star reviews and within one or two pages you will see some of the above phrases used over and over. 
 

In short, go and enjoy your cruise. It will almost certainly be excellent and fantastic value for money. 
 

Good luck. 

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Sphilli2

Sphilli2

Posted
Posted
19 hours ago, ticketsunlimited said:

Sailing on her 9/10 to complete the final Oasis class ship on our resume.  Looking forward to it.

We will be on this sailing as well! This will actually be the largest ship we've been on, we can't wait.

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