Transatlantic Cruise on Independence of the Seas - April 2010 - Long

14 day trip on the Independence of the Seas - April 11th, 2010 -
crossing
the Atlantic.

Here is the story of our trip. I hope our experiences were pretty
good, and I hope they are of some help to others considering a similar
trip.

We left for the port a little later than usual, and arrived around 2
pm. The crowd had thinned down, and there was no waiting whatsoever.
We checked in with no effort - we had filled out the forms on line a
week before the trip. We had also purchased a couple of shore
excursions on line. We do not normally do ship shore excursions, but
we had never been to Europe, and I was a bit nervous about striking
out on our own on our first-ever overseas trip.

After walking up a long ramp, taking the obligatory 'welcome aboard'
photo, and finding our room, we started to get settled. They do not
escort you to your room on this ship, but there are people stationed
at every possible
juncture of the hallways ready to give directions.

We met our room steward right away. He spoke excellent English, and
over the course of two weeks became our second-favorite room steward
of all time. (We have cruised about 30 times). This guy, named
Lambert, was
really good. After the 1st day he knew our habits, and had the room
cleaned without prompting or door message cards or anything. Only one
that was ever his equal was on the Freedom of the Seas.

The Independence of the Seas is a truly beautiful ship, well
maintained and sparkling with an upbeat flair. The crew had been told
to always say 'Good Morning' or 'Good evening' or whatever whenever
they were within talking
distance of a passenger. At first I thought it was a bit extreme, but
after a day or so, I really began to appreciate the warmth of the
greeting.

We headed across the Atlantic on time, and the seas were realtively
smooth. I understand there were 20 ft swells, but the large ship
simply bumps a little now and then as it cuts through the water. The
wind kicked up by
midnight, and there was a fierce headwind for the balance of the
crossing it was almost impossible to be on a deck with the headwind.
The temperature settled in around 62 degrees F that evening and did
not vary much as we
crossed the Atlantic. We had bathing suits, but certainly did not need
them on this cruise. It finally turned a bit warmer around day 10,
and was only warm for a day, still very windy. Therefore we spent
almost all of our
time indoors, which was not a chore as this is a huge ship.

ENTERTAINMENT

The production show people were new, we were told, and so we did not
have a production show until about the 8th or 9th day. The
'headliners' were ok (with one awful exception), but not wonderful.
The second night was the first show - a decent magician, but most of
his illusions were designed for closer viewing, making it a bit
difficult for a large audience. The second headliner was a comedian
from Branson Mo, and he was very pleasant, and his humor was low key -
sort of like early Bill Cosby - nice but nothing new.

Then we had something unusual - a hypnotist. I did not care for him
at all. I was very uncomfortable watching people making fools of
themselves under his control. Then he had to tell the audience to
laugh - everyone was a bit taken back by this guy. It seemed as
though the 'hypnotic trance' was just a phony thing to impress the
audience. He seemed to be able to touch peoples foreheads and they
would pass out in his arms - much like a faith healer I saw years
ago.

Some of the crew told me he had put on a similar show for them, and
their fellow crew members were under his control with just a touch as
well. One person, who worked in the gym, seemed very honest with me,
and equally disturbed that crew mates he had been working with fell
under this guys control with only a touch. Plus, once under his
control, this guy was not showing much respect for his victims. Hate
to think of him dating somebody's daughter...

Other show room entertainers were two singers - one a British singer
named 'Izzy' who had to cancel the show after one number because her
voice gave out (one of those things, I guess). There was a violinist
and a pianist, both fine but I had hoped for a bigger production.

By far the highlight was the ice shows. Every time I see one on Royal
(we have seen about 6-8 ice shows on different ships), I think there
is no way that I could ever see another one as well done again. I was
wrong about
that. The ice shows were simply spectacular. Beyond description -
you have to see them.

The other show rooms had traditional entertainment, a notch better
than some of the other ships we have been on recently. However, the
passengers making the crossing were not young, and so they adjusted
their presentations for
the age group, as was appropriate.

The cruise director had a nightmare of problems. In addition to a new
cast for the shows, which set him back a bit, we next had to deal with
the results of the volcanic dust in Europe, which grounded all
aircraft for days, preventing the new entertainers from boarding as we
got to our first stop. They simply could not get there. So he had to
deal with the same entertainers, who were not equipped for multiple
days of shows, and no new talent. Plus the singer (Izzy), whose voice
gave out and left the stage. He took a lot of heat from some of the
passengers, but I think he did the best anyone could have done - but,
unfortunately, he was never in the right place at the right time - not
his fault - things just did not go well for him. No matter where he
was, there was a problem somewhere else.

One other entertainer made the ship on day 11 or so, and we had one
new show - an energetic and funny comedy magician. Not world class,
but very entertaining none the less. The only loser was the
hypnotist, who was
simply creepy. If you are a spiritual person, I think he would make
your skin crawl.

They also had two guest lecturers on board - one was an historian. I
did not attend the lectures by the historian - I am not particularly
interested in that area, so I cannot tell you if they were bad or
good. The other man was from Israel and was a college professor. The
first day he was going to speak, the cruise 'compass' said he was
going to talk about economics.

It is 2010 as I write this review, and the world economic situation is
really a mess, with Greece nearing bankruptcy and the US trying to dig
out of a real mess caused by a combination of its congress and a
couple of US megabanks that seriously damaged the US economic system.
The room was packed. But unfortunately, he talked theory of
macro and micro economics and was not in any way topical. The second
day the room was virtually empty. I hope he got the hint. He was an
intelligent man, but his presentation did not cover current economic
issues, and that is a subject that is of huge interest to the world at
this point in time. Too bad we could not have had a better, more
articulate speaker who was focusing on current issues.

FOOD

RCL has changed its menu slightly in the main dining room, and I am
not overly enthused about the changes. HOWEVER, that being said, food
prep was outstanding overall. The desserts (not an RCL specialty, I
have learned over many cruises), were very good on this ship. They
finally seemed to have a pastry chef that understands how to make
them. They appear to have fixed a problem that plagues RCL, or
perhaps it is just this ship that has an above-average dessert chef.

As to the dining room, the assistant waiter was very good - my glass
of iced tea was never empty. The waiter, well, not quite as good.
Service was agonziingly slow, and he would constantly forget that my
wife had dietary restrictions and bring her dinner with sauces and
seasonings she cannot digest. They gave us a questionaire on day five
and I was not shy to complain about that problem while complimenting
on many things. We had asked the head waiter
repeatedly, but no real results. He simply delivered the prepared
food personally with the spices, etc. still on it. The first time he
brought her dinner personally, we thought the food he brought was
prepared without the spices (as had been the case on all other RCL and
even Carnival ships), and that would be fine for her, but after hours
of stomach distress the first night we gave up. We ate in the
Windjammer for a couple of nights then returned to the dining room to
help our tablemates celebrate a birthday. The head waiter suddenly
took an interest. After that we had no problems.

At least the waiters did not do the normal parade and sing Italian
folk songs out of tune on this ship - thankfully.

The Windjammer was very, very good. Lots of people bringing refills
on drinks, willing to get anything for you that you needed any time
you needed it, always smiling and anxious to help. They would stop to
make conversation, sometimes struggling trying to figure out what to
say, but they never gave up - and that is positive in my book. There
was only one slight flaw, and it was kind of a weird one. The bacon
in the morning was almost never thoroughly cooked. Odd, and many
passengers complained about it to no avail. They would always go and
get some that was more cooked when asked, but it would take a while,
and the next day we would be right back with large quantities of
undercooked bacon. But that is one problem, and only one problem, as
they did thousands of things right. Great food, excellent
presentation, and as on any ship, endless quantities.

And of course there was Johnny Rockets - sparsely attended because you
had to go outside (or cut through the kids area) to get to it, and no
one in their right mind wanted to go out on deck if they did not have
to do so. We
did not try the two high priced restaurants.

GAMES

I am not a bingo player, but I was told that the bingo cards were very
expensive compared to the cost of the cards on other ships - do not
know for sure, but that is what I was told.

The ship had the standard games, but they had added a 'progressvie'
trivia which was very popular. They kept track of the points earned
every night, and the winning team was the one with the most points
accumulated over the length of the cruise. This game drew a packed
house - wall to wall people - in the relatively small schooner bar.
It was enjoyable, if you like trivia games. The only problems with it
were the crowds, and the fact that the presence of so many people made
it impossible for people not to 'cheat.' That would have been fine,
as it was all in fun, but a couple of the teams were angry that extra
people were drifting in and out of the bar and giving answers to some
of the teams (which were supposed to be limited to six people per team
- some had about 10, I think). I wish everyone could just have
enjoyed it, but some of the teams were so intense that it took a bit
of the fun away from the drinking teams. In case you have not figured
it out, mine was one of the drinking teams...

Scheduling of typical on-board games was not great - reminded me of
early Carnival ships where they would schedule the few things we liked
to do at the same time, rather than spreading things out during the
day. They did about every cruise game I have ever seen, and rightly
so, as the entertainment in the main showroom was so hampered by the
volcanic ash problem. They just did not schedule very well. And with
the high winds and cool weather, the on-deck games were out of the
question.

The Casino was fine except they had removed the Craps table. Said it
just was not busy enough (translation - generating enough revenue per
square foot). That was disappointing to me, as I like to play that
game.

They had added a few unusual gimmicky table games, an electronic
roulette table - first I had ever seen, and several poker tables, but
they only staffed one poker table. There were several totally unused
tables in the casino every night. I do not know if they were short
handed, or if the new games were simply not popular enough to warrant
opening the tables. Minimums at Blackjack were as low as $4 at one
table, and were never higher than $6 - very player friendly for the
casual player, I thought. Two single deck tables, and three 8 deck
tables. There was a no-smoking section, but the blackjack table there
was rarely open. I did OK in the Casino, but I sorely missed the
Craps table. It always adds cheering, noise, and excitement to a
casino, as that is about the only game where noise is common and
encouraged. It seemed dull without a table.

We learned that our table mate likes to play in the casino
tournaments - but the poker tournament did not even have a cash prize,
I was told. You had to put in major bucks, and if you won, your name
was put in a hat with the names of people from other ships to win a
cruise. Stupid, RCL. Table players like immediate gratification when
they win. You lost a lot of bucks with that philosophy, I believe.
Better to give smaller prizes and get more winners.

Lots of slot machines - looked like some newer ones - and of course,
the standard push-the-money-off-the-cliff game machine. The casino
gets 3-1/2 stars from me. No craps table, and poor tournaments (I was
told). But lots and lots of machines, and player-friendly low
minimums at the table games made if pretty nice in many ways.

SHOPS

The bad things - they have expanded the shops well into the street
area of the ship using tables and displays - prior passengers on
Voyager and larger RCL ships know what the street area is. On this
ship, you could barely walk down the street anymore. Plus they are
pushing overpriced watches. My mother had one years ago, and never
wore it. Then after she passed away selling it used was a chore.
Unless you really want one to wear personally, I think they are an
albatross. Just my opinion, though.

Another minor annoyance is the way they structure their coupons for
repeat passengers. They offer 'sale' prices in the shops and then
they tell us the coupon does not apply. I think it would be wise to
let the coupons apply - it is only a few bucks, and would result in
less annoyance to customers who think they are being treated well by
receiving a book of almost useless coupons. Better to skip the
coupons than to annoy your frequent customers, I would think.,

HOWEVER, the cool thing about the shops is they have lowered the price
of their logo merchandise - at least the stuff I wanted to buy. I
bought a logo golf shirt with a collar for around $20 bucks. I would
have bought two, but then they would not apply the discount coupon,
because they were offering a different discount for two shirts.

These shirts were priced like this years ago, and then they upped the
price to about $40 for one. Now it is back to a reasonable level, in
my view. Other items seemed more reasonable to me as well. We bought
way more junk than we probably should have, but their favorable
pricing hooked us. Very smart here, RCL.

They were pushing fancy watches for most of the cruise. Must be high
profit. Not for us. The stuffed animal 'pet at sea' gimmick seems to
work for them - whatever. They had the obligatory art auction, but
thankfully they did not push it.

They have also added an artist doing caricatures - one of my
suggestions a couple of years ago. We did not have one made, but may
try it on a futue cruise. This guy seemed very busy. Wish he had
posted prices, it would have helped us make a decision. The pizza
shop is open about 15 hours a day, I think, and the pizza is free.
The clothes on display in the other shops looked pretty good too.

PORTS OF CALL

Well, skip the Azores. It was cold and wet and foggy, and we were
told that is common at this port. We took a ship's tour. The buses
took us to a high elevation and parked there for an eternity. It was
so foggy you could not see the bus parked in front of you, and it was
raining. The tour guide, who spoke very poor English, got off the bus
to urinate. The rest of us wished we have done the same. And I won't
mention where we thought we should go to do so...

Madeira was the second stop. It was a truly beautiful, friendly
island. We took what they called a cable car to the top of the
mountain (suspended baskets hanging from a wire - much like over a
theme park), and we took the
toboggans down the mountain (sleds with wide runners that they
actually use on city streets, with two men pulling, pushing, and
guiding the sleds on steep hills). The is, I understand, unique to
this island. OK, a little touristy, but what the heck. Really fun
and very different.

We also got a glass of wine from the local winery, and visited the
marketplace downtown. When done, as we waited for our tour bus to
meet us, as we sat on a park bench downtown. A mix of music was piped
throughout downtown - everything from Christian hymms to excellent big-
band jazz. A flower festival had just ended, and downtown was
beautiful, even though the island had a terrible storm 7 weeks ago
that brought huge mudslides down the mountain.

This island is populated by hard-working people who were very upbeat
and friendly. (For instance, the tour guide did not urinate behind
the bus, as the guide did in the Azores)

In Portugal we went to Fatima, a very famous Catholic shrine located
at a place where three children claim to have seen the Virgin Mary
appear to them. It is huge - and something to see. Unfortunately,
the building boom there has almost overpowered the shrine. One
interesting thing is that there is a statue there, sculpted under the
direction of one of the children, and if the visitation was genuine,
this may be the best existing replica of what this amazing woman
really looked like in real life. Am I a believer? I think maybe -
maybe not, but there is a lot of evidence to say that it was a genuine
thing. We will probably never know until the afterlife, one way or
the other.

In Spain we stopped at the port city of Vigo. I did not go ashore
pesonally, but my tablemates said the visit to the adjacent city on
the ships tour was really very, very nice.

Complaints? Two of them. First of all, the RCL Port and shopping
guide was considerably more interested in routing us to the RCL
affilliated shops than she was in explaining the city situation to
us. I would have loved to know something about how to deal the the
local currencies - I had never been to Europe, and did not know what a
Euro was - plus I wanted to understand the tipping customs. How much
is common? (10% they say). But if you are on a tour, and a guide
pulls your toboggan down the mountain and a tip is in order, how
much? 10% of what? (We learned later that 1-2 euros is the usual
tip, and that the guides are salaried - not depending on tips alone
for a living).

DISEMBARKING

WOW! Did I say WOW? I meant it. British customs got on the ship two
days before we landed in England! We went through all the paperwork a
full day before we got to land. And when we got there, it was like an
American airport - you simply picked up your luggage, and unless you
were one of the unlucky ones picked to have a full search of your
luggage (and I mean a FULL search - seemed to happen to about one out
of every 50-75 people), you just walked out and that was it! They do
it right. I hope the USA can learn something from them.

We took the bus to Heathrow (pricey - $100 per person), but it was
effortless. Heathrow is nice - much like an American airport in most
ways. In the front of Heathrow, there is a long, wide area with
shops, restaurants, and benches. Our travel agent, Ray Goldenberg,
had told us what to expect so we had no problems at all. We ate at
one restaurant, and had a seat on the benches. In Heathrow, they do
not call you to go to the gate until they are ready to board, as the
seating in the gate areas is minimal.

We had been forwarned that the Europeans are more strict about luggage
size and weight than the Americans, but to my supprise the ticket
agent did not measure our suitcases, but of course there is a built-in
scale next to the desk, so I suspect they checked the weight. I have
a small hand scale (mechanical $19.95) that came in handy, as my
luggage was very close to the maximum weight.

We did something a bit unusual that others may find meets their needs
as well. We intentionally took one old suitcase with us on the ship
(where we had also placed a few bottles of table wine to carry on
board - not legal with RCL, but they never seem to check the suitcases
you check, and we like to drink wine in the evening in our room, and
find the on-board prices pretty steep). We discarded the 'extra'
suitcase on the ship, along with some bulky mens undershirts and
jockey shorts. We realized we could easily replace the clothes back
in the US for about $20, and the suitcase was almost worthless to us.
So we ended up with one suitcase apiece for the flight, saving us $50
- the cost of checking the second suitcase.

We had been warned that England counts even a womans' purse as a carry-
on item, but the Delta Airlines people did not seem to much care what
we carried on - we had zero problems. Plus the steward and stewardess
were very 'user friendly' to the passengers. Perhaps Virgin Air or
British Airways would have been more strict in this regard.

We took a 767-400ER plane, which was supposed to have electrical
outlets where I was sitting - but it did not have them. I wanted
power for my laptop, but fortunately I had also purchased a larger
battery, and had no problems using my computer with the backup
batttery as needed for most of the 10 hour flight.

I later read they are retrofitting the 767-400ER planes now, adding
some fold-down seats as well as more electrical connections for
computers, etc. Another thing that you should know - I also learned
that at least on this plane, the 3 seats in the middle of the plane
have a LOT more footroom than the two-seat areas by the windows. The
distance between the seats in noticeably greater in the center of the
aircraft. It would have been physically impossible for me (at 270
lbs) to use the tray table for a computer on the window seats if both
seats were occupied. However, with good computer batteries, and with
an amazing choice of free movies available on the individual TV screen
in each seat (a choice of about 10-20 movies), the ten hour flight
went very quickly.

The negative here - US customs. We arrived in Atlanta, went thru
immigration, then customs, then inspections, then we had to put our
luggage BACK on a conveyor for more inspections. Plus we had to go
through the metal detectors again - even though we were getting off
the plane- not on it!! So once again unpacking the computer, the CPAP
machine, taking the coat off, the shoes off, etc., etc. I hope the
Americans can learn from the British here...After 10 hours on an
airplane, a 5 hour time change, etc., etc., having to 'jump thru
hoops' and be searched again just to get off of the plane was not what
I would have chosen to do... Our government at work earning our tax
dollars...

BOTTOM LINE

Super cruise - primarily retirees, though, sort of like being on
Holland American. Exquisite ship, exceptional service, bargain
prices. Was it perfect? No. But 80% of the problems were caused by
external things pretty much outside of RCL's control. And the real
problems were minimal. Would I take this cruise again under the same
circumstances? Knowing that the volcano would limit the
entertainment, and the weather would be less than ideal? YES, In a
heartbeat.

Hope this helps...

On May 6, 12:17*am, RJQMAN wrote:
The cruise director had a nightmare of problems. *In addition to a new
cast for the shows, which set him back a bit, we next had to deal with
the results of the volcanic dust in Europe, which grounded all
aircraft for days, preventing the new entertainers from boarding as we
got to our first stop. *

I'm not so sure the problem was entirely about the volcano. I did
Navigator of the Seas fall transatlantic in '09. The entertainment was
quite poor the entire cruise and the entertainers we started with in
Malaga were the same ones we ended up with in Miami. If anyone new
boarded in the Canary Islands before we started the crossing - it
wasn't obvious. In addition to this, the lounge music was terrible as
well. Up in the Viking Crown the nightly band was the calypso "band"
which started out as a duo and mysteriously became a one man band on
the third night of a 12 night crew (though the other guy was on the
ship the entire time lounging around). The only good lounge band was
in Boleros where predictably (since the cruise departed from Spain and
carried a large contingent of Spanish folks) there was a Spanish band
that was excellent.

The cast of the ice show was brand new - performing the show for the
first time on our sailing. They were quite good but with the one
obligatory skater who missed on nearly all her tricks. Poor girl - you
could hear everyone hold their breath every time she had a solo.

Warren