Voyager of the Seas
14 Day
Westbound Transatlantic
Nov 29 - Dec 13 2009
By Owen
This was our third westbound crossing on the Voyager so this
review will mostly deal with the shipboard experience since we had
been to all the ports before. We are in our mid-60's and have done
over 30 cruises over the years.
We flew in a day early and stayed at the Hotel Continental where
many cruisers were staying both for our voyage and two or three
other ships that were in port. While the hotel is certainly not the
Four Seasons, it is clean, reasonably priced (95 euro), convenient
(on Las Ramblas), easy to get to from the airport via a bus, free
food, wine, beer, etc., and about a 17 euro taxi ride to the pier.
The rooms are small with an elevator about the size of a telephone
booth but it works. Decorating is inspired by hot pink and florals..
They have a "sister" hotel a couple of blocks away that is a little
nicer but is around 35 euro more.
Embarkation was quick and easy. They have a duty free shop AFTER you
put your carry-ons through the scanner which sells alcohol. I had
heard that another check of bags would be made prior to getting on
the ship but it wasn't in our case..
CABIN-7250
We have been getting E1/E2 cabins for several cruises. While we prefer Deck 6 forward close to the elevators, this cabin was on Deck 7. Good was that our balcony has glass below the railing while on Deck 6, they are steel. The glass allows a little more light into the cabin. We prefer Deck 6 forward because it is only one deck straight down to the Promenade Café, Cleopatra's Needle, and the Promenade business. It is two decks straight down to the Schooner Bar, casino, and theater. Hence, we can avoid using the elevators except to go up to the Windjammer and pool deck. I like being close to the theater because if I need to use Ladies after the show I can get to the cabin quickly via the stairs and not have to wait on an elevator. The downside is that you walk the length of the ship to get to the feeding troughs. Hopefully, it will walk off some calories. However, being on Deck 7, I found I was using the elevators more. Going down, not a problem but if I was on Deck 4, then I would take them to get back up to Deck 7. We have never been disturbed by noise from the elevators or the passengers using them. While on the deck plan it looks like they are right in front of your door, they really are "around the corner."
Our cabin steward, Ronaldo, introduced himself and I gave him my "punch" list of requests. Empty the refrigerator, give us two Compass a day, keep my thermo cooler in the shower iced down daily, and see if he could find an egg crate for us. All were fulfilled.
Cabin was in pretty good shape. The sofa had been recovered which was good-you could have grown crops on the last one we had in the fall of 2008. There was a big gouge on the bathroom door which didn't bother us but I was mildly concerned they may think we had done it. Apparently not because Ronaldo had them repair it the second day. They gave it a band-aid treatment putting some paper over it. There were splatters of paint on the glass of our balcony but nothing too disturbing.
The balcony walls were solid on both sides. In the past, our balconies have been a wall up one side and a "partition" on the other side. I liked this because, as one of those horrible smokers, I felt it kept smoke from "drifting" over to the neighboring balconies a little bit. Still, I always look at the neighboring balconies before lighting up to make sure they are empty. The walls gave us a little more privacy as you really had to lean over the railing to see on the next balcony.
Our cabin steward was one of the best we have had. The first week, if he saw us coming down the hall he would hustle to our door and open it for us which hasn't happened in the recent past on our cruises. The second week, though, this didn't happen. He always greeted us by name and asked if everything was o.k. The only "complaint" I had was that he would service the cabin and collect the ice bucket but not return it until around 1:30 when he was replacing all of them in the cabins. So, if we wanted to nap, we knew not to do it until he had returned our ice bucket because there would be a knock on the door. I guess we could have put the "do not disturb" sign out but then we would miss the ice refill as he would be going off duty for the afternoon.
The main "complaint" I had about the cabin was that the bed lights were over the headboard rather than to the side of the bed which they have been on previous cruises so sometimes it was awkward to read in bed. I noticed there was no stationery or pens in the desk drawer. Cost cutting?? Maybe Ronaldo didn't replace them from the previous occupant.
DINING
We were at late seating in the Carmen dining room at a table for
ten. Our Diamond Plus companion is solo, so we had an empty seat.
Our dining companions were just great and we had a wonderful time
with them. Our travel companion did not join us for dinner after the
first night but ate in the Windjammer so we basically had a table of
eight. Our waiter and assistant waiter were not the best we have had
but far from the worst. They served us in a timely manner, the food
was hot, and what we ordered and how we ordered it. . I was
impressed that he took the women's orders first and served the women
first. I haven't seen that in quite a few cruises. I felt like the
portions were smaller than in the past but never left the table
hungry.
Sorry to say, the food has not improved.. Selections are limited. If
you like chicken, salmon, pasta, then you will be happy. They
combine the "always available" with the entrees so it looks like you
have more selection than you do since half of the choices are
"always available."
We ate breakfast every morning in the main dining room. They have an
"express buffet" set up where they had basics like eggs, bacon,
sausage, hash browns, fruit, Danish, cereal, cold cuts. Seated, they
came around promptly with coffee and took juice orders then the
waiter came to take the breakfast order. We would order any hot
items we wanted like pancakes, French toast, eggs benedict, omelet,
oatmeal (no waffles), and then go to the buffet for "starters" like
cereal and fruit. By the time we finished that, the rest of the meal
arrived. If you don't want to get your own cereal, etc., they would
bring it to you. One thing I liked about Royal vs. other lines was
that the bacon was crisp and not still going "oink" and if you tried
to get one or two strips, it all stuck together so you ended up with
a plate full like on other lines. However, on this cruise, it wasn't
always so. I would get my bacon at the buffet where I could "pick
and choose" but still had a problem finding crisp and not a bunch of
it stuck together, some crisp and most not. Even if I ordered it
from the waiter and asked for crisp, it did not always come that
way.
We enjoyed meeting other people at our table and being served
without having to run to different "stations" while one person
guarded the table like you do in the Windjammer. If you are not a
social person in the morning, there were tables for two available.
As a Diamond member, we were told in our welcome letter we could be
served in the Seville dining room where they had full service and
upgraded coffee available for free. Not being a coffee drinker, this
did not appeal to me but I did peek in there and it was not set up
for dining-in fact had computer paper boxes stacked around the
perimeter. So I asked where the Diamond dining was and told they set
off a section in the MDR for it. I didn't investigate that so I
can't comment on it.
We ate all our lunches in the Windjammer. I am a soup, sandwich,
dessert person; husband likes to hunker down with a plate full of
pasta or ribs so this was a happy medium. We never had trouble
getting a table and they were pretty good about cleaning them and
getting drinks if you asked. My friend that ate dinners in the
Windjammer said the selection there was not nearly as good as on
past cruises.
In the afternoons at 3:00 they had tea/snack time. Clotted cream,
scones, sandwiches with the crust cut off, etc. for the tea sippers.
In the back, husband was delighted to find nachos and tacos to tide
him over until our late dinner seating.
The Promenade Café is open 24 hours with pastries in the morning
followed by sandwiches, pizza, cookies and desserts in the afternoon
and evenings. The first couple of days there was no iced tea
available there but I guess some Texans 'splained to them about the
necessity of iced tea being available 24/7. The only other place to
get iced tea would be the WJ which didn't put it out until 11:30 and
closed at 9:00 p.m. Lemonade was, also, set up which hasn't been
done on our previous cruises.. They had coffee, tea, hot chocolate
there 24/7, also. However, the machines were leaking something and
it was constantly wet around them no matter how fast they mopped. I
saw many near falls from people "skating" on the water. Hopefully,
they have fixed it.
We passed on Johnny Rockets since they took the BOGO coupon out of
the booklet. We did not go to Portofino's this time either. They do
not have a Chops on the Voyager.
ENTERTAINMENT
Our Cruise Direction was Mike Szwajkowaski (I learned how to spell
it sure it would get me extra points on trivia-it didn't) and one of
the best we have had. He was very visible around the ship, hosted a
Q&A session, and hosted the marathon trivia.
I didn't feel like the entertainment was as good as we have had in
the past. The production show had minimal sets-mostly projection
backgrounds on a screen. We went to a few of them and nothing stands
out as particularly great We did not do the ice show this time as we
have seen it twice before. We discovered that seats in the balcony
on the sides did not have a full view of the stage. We never had any
problems finding a seat as the shows were not that crowded-even the
production shows.
We are trivia players and play just about every time they schedule
one. Things I noticed this time were that the prizes were much
better-not just the key chains, water wallets, and pens but
umbrellas, caps, Ipod holders, passport holders, etc. They had a
marathon trivia on sea days where the scores are cumulative. The
first couple of days, they let us grade our own papers which kinda
raised my eyebrows. Then we traded papers. The team that had high
scores the first two days which raised even more suspicion still
cleaned our clock after we traded papers. No doubt they were
SMART!!!!!! They got comped a dinner at Portofino's from our CD
Mike.
For Bingo you could buy one card for $22 or three cards for $30+
(can't remember the exact amount). . No hand helds were being
rented. In the past, the prizes have been based on how many played.
However, on this cruise they had set prizes like $100 for the first
game, $110 for the second, etc (can't remember the exact numbers)
which I believe I heard was because of low participation.
Generally on port days, there were no activities scheduled on board
after 10:30 until around 4:00 p.m. other than movies in the
screening room.
ELEVATORS
Many of the directional lights were out so you had to depend on
"ding" for up and "ding ding" for down and guess which elevator was
coming missing a few when you guessed wrong. The lights for calling
the elevator did not work on a few so you wondered if it was being
called or not. Fortunately, you could look on the other side of the
bank and if the light was on. Some lights did not light up inside of
the elevator to indicate what floor you were on or behind a button
you pushed for your floor. I felt like more elevators than usual
were "out of order" off and on. Overall, there did not seem to be a
long wait for them other than when you expect it around dinner time,
show letting out, and disembarkation in port. Hint: When coming in
from port, walk by the first bank of elevators and go to the far
bank behind them. It looks like you are going into a crew area but
you aren't and there is seldom a wait for one there. Elevators
definitely need attention.
CASINO
Our cruise critic group scheduled a group slot pull. The fellow in
charge of it spoke with the casino manager who was the most
uncooperative one he has ever run into having set these up numerous
times. We had $2,000 to gamble and we are talking 3:00 p.m.-not one
of your high traffic times. In order to set aside machines for us so
we wouldn't be blocking traffic, he wanted $6 for every $20 we were
feeding into the machine or something like that. So, we divided up
into five groups of 20 and gambled "on our own." Four groups lost
all their money (but had good entertainment) and one group actually
came out ahead. As a stockholder, I am a little miffed that the
manager would not cooperate more to bring in $2,000 in revenue.
I am a big gambler. Penny slots. One penny at a time-100 pulls per
dollar. In the past, I have taken my dollar down and played for an
hour or so with it. Not this time. I was lucky to get 20 minutes for
my dollar.. I like the Luau thingee where you get 15 bonus pulls if
you get three Tikis and that's what would keep me going. I wasn't
getting three Tiki's very often. So, for the fun of it, I started
counting how many pulls until I got the bonus. The first time it
took 80 pulls and that was about average. Then, on the second week,
more and more pulls needed until I got up to 350 pulls towards the
end. Whereas in the past you have to bird dog a seat at the penny
slots, this time there were empty ones a lot of time. I think other
people came to the same realization I did that those machines were
just not paying. In fact, I didn't see as many people as in the past
playing the slots.
The Black Jack table had a $6 minimum which I think is to encourage
you to play $5 on the game and put $1 on the little circle that if
you get black jack you can spin the wheel for more money. Those odds
rank right up there with buying insurance when the dealer has an ace
showing. It, also, might be to encourage you to bet two $5 chips
instead of the $6 minimum. What was interesting was in the Compass a
couple of times there was a coupon for black jack for $5 match play
yet the minimum was $6. I never investigated how that worked out but
guess you put $6 plus the coupon down and if you won, the coupon was
paid at $5.. Usually the black jack $5 table was standing room only
while the $10, $25 table dealers were picking their fingernails
waiting for customers. There were three roulette tables but only one
was in use most of the time and then with one or two players. I'm
not sure if they had a craps table. If they did, they were mighty
quiet and usually the craps players aren't quiet (lol).
In the past, on formal nights, the casino has been non-smoking but
that was not done on this cruise.
ODDS AND ENDS
There was a multitude of hand sanitizers both going into the dining
areas and around the ship. They had crew members stationed at the
doors of the dining room and it was very difficult to get by them
without getting a squirt. You were reminded often that hand washing
with hot water was the best thing to do. However, I noticed in the
public bathrooms, there wasn't hot water (lol). In the past, I never
saw a hand sanitizer on the ship with the exception of one time when
we were in port they squirted us reboarding. Later we heard that
another ship in port had had a breakout of the virus and they
thought we might have come in contact with them. When asked why
there were no sanitizers around the ship, the Captain at a Q&A
session on a previous sailing said it was because they weren't that
effective, hand washing was the best solution, and people were not
washing their hands before meals relying on the sanitizers.
On the tables in the Windjammer was a little sign saying that card
players were welcome to use the Magic Flute dining room for their
games and to please not tie up tables in the Windjammer. Hence, I
did not see tables being used for anything other than eating during
the cruise. Good move, Royal Caribbean.
Muster drill was held on deck but we did not have to take our life
jackets. Good move, Royal Caribbean.
We are Diamond but a traveling companion is Diamond Plus. He called
our cabin to tell me that his welcome letter along with his CL key
said that Diamonds were welcome in the CL which was located in Cloud
Nine next to High Notes for happy hour. However, our welcome letter
did not state that and we were not given a key. So, I told him to
check it out that night and let me know which was correct. He went
to the Concierge Lounge for happy hour and reported it was utter
chaos. Only one person mixing drinks, no place to sit, very crowded,
and the concierge blew him off when he asked if they could stock
non-alcoholic beer saying it was "not on the list." However, the
following night he reported that it was not crowded, very nice
appetizers, more servers, and he got his non-alcoholic beer because
a server went over to the High Notes bar and got it for him. He said
that the server made sure there was his beer there every night for
him. Goodbye tip to concierge, hello tip for the server. We were
wondering if some Diamonds "crashed" the first night having gotten
the same message he conveyed to me from the Diamond Plus welcome
letter. He said the concierge told him there were 120 Diamond Pluses
on the ship. Our friend said about 40 or so were in the lounge in
the evenings.
There was a Diamond Lounge in Cleopatra's with free wine, champagne,
soft drinks and music. No appetizers, though. It was very lively and
well attended. In fact, many Diamond + went down there in spite of
having to pay for their drinks to be with their Diamond friends and
saying it was more fun.
Prior to this cruise, I had been on four trans-Atlantics as Platinum
or better. However, this was the first time there was a luncheon for
Platinum/Diamond members on a cruise I was on. In the past, it has
been a special ice show. The luncheon was outstanding. The best food
on the whole cruise along with plenty of wine. At our table was an
officer in charge of inventory (non-food) so we had very interesting
conversations going.
For the first time, I noticed the library books were locked and only
unlocked when the librarian was there. Then after a few days, they
weren't locked up. The library is pretty worthless at best so bring
your own reading material. If you get desperate, you can "dumpster
dive" for returned books in the return box. I heard there was an
exchange shelf set up somewhere in the library but didn't see it or
look for it.
We made an appointment with the Loyalty Ambassador to book a fall
AOS trans-Atlantic for November 2010. Signing up in the appointment
book has been like an appointment with the doctor-a license to wait.
In hopes of avoiding a long wait past my appointment time, I signed
up for the first appointment in the afternoon. We arrived 15 minutes
early only to find the LA dealing with someone-most likely a walk up
he thought would only take a short time.. After waiting ½ an hour
seeing that the present customer was not getting close to completing
his business, it became necessary to reschedule as we had somewhere
we needed to be at 2:00. I took the first appointment of the day and
got there half an hour early to preclude anyone else getting in
before me.
As I mentioned before, we did not do anything in the ports other
than get off and find an internet café. In Tenerife, we met with
some friends we have cruised with several times who were in port on
a Celebrity ship. That was the "highlight" of our port adventures.
A couple of times the port authority held us up and the Captain
added time to our port stay to compensate for it.
Another thing that Royal did that was new was have those with their
excursions get off on a different gangplank than those without them.
This really speeded things up for those that chose to go out on
their own. Good move, Royal Caribbean!
We did not get our invitation to the M&M in our cabin. I knew where
and when and turned up. I got my favor (note pad) and a ticket for
the raffle drawings. I think the reason was because after I signed
up, the "list" was deleted because we went from a lot being signed
up to only 20 signed up overnight. However, they said if you had
signed up, you didn't need to sign up again, they had a record.
Guess not.
DISEMBARKATION
The ever popular art auctions were there. This time, though, no free
champagne every time. I don't go to them or buy from them so I can't
comment any further. I heard the no champagne complaints from
others.
The worst part about trans-Atlantics is the lack of communication
from the shore. We could be in WW3 and not know it. They had Fox
butit was mostly repeats from days before with a little ticker
across the bottom of the screen with current news--one word at a
time--on a non-flat screen TV, I might add. As for sports, don't
even think about it. A San Diego/Oakland football game from
September was shown repeatedly. I was ready to go down to the sports
bar and start taking Oakland and points. All the other sports being
shown had long since been played. Lots of soccer. Very frustrating
for college football fans when Alabama/Florida and Texas/Nebraska
games were being played for conference championships. Husband
wandered the Promenade the next morning looking for someone with a
computer to find out how they turned out. Movies were past their
prime, some waaaaaay past their prime. We enjoyed some classic John
Wayne ones, though. This is especially frustrating since in a cost
cutting measure they don't have the NY Times thingee anymore.
When I work up and saw the fog, I said a silent prayer the ship was
still moving. It was, slowly. We self-disembarked which was to
commence at 7:30. Because of the fog slightly delaying our arrival,
it didn't start until about 8:00. Once it got going, though, it was
quick even though there were people "cutting" in line from the sides
rather than going to the end of the line. I was happy to see that
employees inside the terminal directed those that "sneaked" into the
self-disembarkation, to step aside and let us off. They were
identified by colored luggage tags on their carry-ons (tags issued
for suitcases being taken off the ship) which were not given to
those of us self-disembarking. The only "snag" was if you did not
have "one hand free," you could not use the escalator and had to
take an elevator to get down to the first floor. Needless to say,
the elevator had a wait. There are steps to the left of the elevator
which we took. We were through immigration and customs and outside
the terminal by 8:20.
Things did not go so well for others, though. There were not enough
custom agents to handle the influx of Europeans traditionally on a
trans-Atlantic as well as returning Americans so the back-up got
pretty bad. I heard the last passenger got off the ship at 3:30. In
the meantime, people were arriving to get on the ship. The terminal
is not that great even if things go right as far as loading and
unloading goes and this made it really bad. People couldn't park
because parking spots were being taken up by people who hadn't left
the ship. They couldn't process people on the ship until people were
off the ship. The fog was as bad as it ever gets. Bottom line, the
ship was in port until Tuesday afternoon due to the fog.
Overall, a great cruise as usual and we're ready to do it again.
If you have any questions, feel free to e-mail me at
whitlock (at) alumni.utexas.net.
Owen