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Majesty of the Seas (Long Review)
My daughter and I recently finished a four-night
cruise on Royal Caribbean's Majesty of the Seas, sailing from Miami to the Bahamas and Key West. This was our second Royal Caribbean cruise; our first, on the Grandeur of the Seas, was about eighteen months ago. This was my daughter's fourth cruise, and my eighth. Neither one of us had ever taken a four-night cruise before, however. I was somewhat surprised at the amount of duplication between my two Royal Caribbean cruises. The menus on this one were identical to the ones on my previous cruise, the shipboard games were exactly the same, and even one of the shows was exactly the same. I suppose some repeat cruisers would consider this a good thing, but I would have preferred a bit more variety. Here are some detailed comments concerning specific topics. EMBARCATION: The pre-cruise information provided us said that boarding was at 2PM, but we got to the Port shortly before noon and boarding had already commenced. At this hour there were practically no lines and we got on board quickly. ITINERARY: The planned itinerary was Nassau, Coco Cay (a private island) and Key West, but the middle stop was cancelled because of rough weather. I gather this is not an uncommon occurrence. Also, one thing that I didn't know before the cruise was that in Key West nobody is allowed to leave the ship until every single person has cleared customs. Thus, it is entirely possible that you might not get off the ship until around 11, a fact to keep in mind if you were planning to sightsee in the morning and take an excursion in the afternoon. Of course, on our cruise there were, as I suspect there are on every cruise, a couple of idiots who didn't follow directions and clear customs when they were supposed to do so; they had to be called by name on the PA system after delaying 2000 people from getting off the ship and enjoying the port. SHORE EXCURSIONS: In Nassau we took a morning excursion to snorkel with stingrays and in Key West took the afternoon Fury Catamaran trip to snorkel on a coral reef. The first excursion was quite nice and the second was awful. There are two stingray snorkel excursions. We opted for the more expensive one, called the express, because it promised a more intimate experience with the rays. By using a "thriller boat" we got to the stingray area much faster (and had an exciting ride) and spent about an hour snorkeling in an enclosed area with a bout thirty rays of all sizes. We also had a chance to feed them. Adjacent to the enclosed area was an excellent beach where you could body surf, but we didn't spend a lot of time doing that because we thought the stingrays were more fun. The Key West tour might have been fun were it not for the rough weather. When we got to the reef there were four-foot waves, which made snorkeling very difficult. The choppy water also dramatically decreased visibility. Between fighting these waves and not seeing very far, nobody saw very many fish. I thought it was outrageous that the trip even took place under these conditions. At the very least people should have been notified of the conditions and given an opportunity to opt out. I'm sure some people took the tour just to have a boat ride and drink free beer on the way back, and they may have had fun, but those of us who went because we wanted to snorkel were very disappointed. STAFF: Our waitress, assistant waiter and cabin attendant were pleasant and competent. I didn't think too much of the cruise director (perhaps because the cruise director on the Grandeur was excellent and I had high expectations). FOOD: The food gets an A+ for quantity and a B for quality. If you want to, you can eat pretty much constantly during the day. The three main meals can be eaten in either a formal dining room or the Windjammer café on Deck 11; after lunch the Windjammer also provides a "snack" (really a complete buffet) and from noon to 2am pizza and hot dogs are served in a sports bar on Deck 12. There is also a midnight buffet just about every night, but I never stayed up for any of them. I ate all my dinners in the dining room and had some lunches and breakfasts in both the dining room and Windjammer. I thought the dining room was better for breakfast and Windjammer was better for lunch. You should also be aware that the menus in these venues are not co-extensive. For example, in Key West, I really wanted to try a slice of Key Lime pie, which was not available in the dining room but was available in the Windjammer. As for quality, the food was OK, but hardly memorable. The four dining themes were, in order, Caribbean night, the Captain's gala dinner, Italian night, and International night. Steaks are available every night in addition to the five entrees. SHOWS: On this cruise there was a comedian, a comedy magician, a pair of acrobats, and a song-and-dance group, The Royal Caribbean Players. It was the latter group whose show I saw on the Grandeur, but the others were new. The comedian, John Joseph, seemed to get the most raves from the passengers; he gave two shows, one on the first night and an adults-only show (which really wasn't all that risqué) on the last. SUMMARY: I definitely prefer weeklong cruises to four-night ones, not only because I like cruises and therefore prefer longer ones to shorter ones, but also because I think you get a better connection to the ship on a longer cruise. This cruise was certainly pretty good, but I wasn't wowed by it as I was by other cruises I've taken. I certainly don't rule out the possibility of other Royal Caribbean cruises in the future, but I'll probably look elsewhere for my next cruise. |
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Majesty of the Seas (Long Review)
Answered inline:
"mark hunacek" wrote in message om... My daughter and I recently finished a four-night cruise on Royal Caribbean's Majesty of the Seas, sailing from Miami to the Bahamas and Key West. Thank you for an interesting review, Mark, You did not mention if there were many young people onboard, especially since it was during the month of spring breaks. Embarkation was expidited in a timely fashion on both of our RCL cruises this year. We also arrived around noon. Also, one thing that I didn't know before the cruise was that in Key West nobody is allowed to leave the ship until every single person has cleared customs. Of course, on our cruise there were, as I suspect there are on every cruise, a couple of idiots who didn't follow directions and clear customs when they were supposed to do so; they had to be called by name on the PA system after delaying 2000 people from getting off the ship and enjoying the port. That can be really annoying and seems to happen often then and at disembarkation. When you worry about getting off in time to catch a flight, it makes you wish that if a passenger does not respond to being paged on the PA system, they should be fined ~ a set amount be charged to their shipboard account for a set amount of time! ;-) Maybe that would make them hustle and not hold others up. It is not like they don't have access to the house phones on each deck if they are not answering the cabin phone and let the pursers' desk know they are on their way. Sometimes the pages are reapeated more than once or twice. FOOD: The food gets an A+ for quantity and a B for quality. That seems to be the consensus of everyone sailing on RCL lately. With so many feeling that way, I hope RCL hears it and does something about it as their ships are lovely. SUMMARY: I definitely prefer weeklong cruises to four-night ones, I agree, four days would seem like I just boarded and had to get off! --Jean |
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Majesty of the Seas (Long Review)
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