Mariner of The Seas
12/16/07 - 12/23/07
About Us
Our family consist of myself, 35, Staci 41, Caitlen 17, and Lexi 15. We live in Charleston, SC not far from where I was born. Or hatched As a family I would like to think we are pretty unsophisticated . We don’t expect much nor do we like anyone to make much of a fuss over us. Our two teenage girls monsters like most girls are boy crazy. While this was a little bit of a problem on the cruise, I found that once you caught one of the little boys hormones with legs and duct taped him to the railing, the rest want nothing to do with your daughters. While planning the cruise I was worried that the girls would not have a good time. Both can be a bit shy and I was worried that they would not make friends. On day two I was wishing this was still the case when I saw the line of boys following them across the pool deck. they caught the sent
Pre-Cruise
Prior to the cruise we spent two nights at the Radisson Resort at the Port. I can’t say enough good things about this place. We were checked in by a 300 pound man with a German accent. I can’t remember his name now so I will call him Honz. in person i called him sir Despite his Mariner-like size he was a nice young man. We were promptly and pleasantly checked in to our room. We had reserved a Jacuzzi suit with a view of the port. If you chose to stay here please keep in mind that this is Florida. The décor screams tropical. it also screams blind interior decorator Once in the room I quickly found all the important things to be in functioning order, those being the TV, bathroom and sleep number bed. Now this hole sleep number thing kinda confused me. I am from the country where we didn’t have all this fancy stuff. The last time I saw a bed that had buttons I was strapped to it. Needless to say I kept that little box under the bed for safety reasons. The pool here was awesome. It’s heated think peeing in the pool I spent the better part of Saturday lounging by the pool sipping Rum Runners he spent the better part of that night passed out on the bed because alcohol doesn't go with pain killers…..rocket scientist! Before I knew it Sunday morning had arrived! I jumped out of bed, threw the curtains open wide and quickly realized two disturbing things. One, it was raining outside and two I was naked!! oops? As soon as I realized this I did what any normal man would do…..I put on my moose slippers because my feet were cold. Oh and to be polite I waved to the folks in the parking lot. Take a picture it last longer Once my feet were nice and warm I turned on the local news. The weather reports were not good. Severe thunderstorms through most of the morning and early afternoon. Despite that I was not going to let it bother me. Everyone rolled out of bed around 8. We got all our luggage together and tagged for the cruise. Kitchen sink After the girls got everything packed up and in order I called the front desk to have our things brought down. That was the last time I saw our luggage until later that night. The staff at the Radisson has it all together. I am hear to tell you it was as worry free as it can be. I didn’t have to haul anything around which would have been a problem with my back. All I had to do was show up. We left our car at the Radisson while we went on vacation. You can’t beat that!! I would highly recommend the Radisson to anyone looking for a pre or post cruise stay pay me enough and i will recommend you too Should we ever leave out of Port Canaveral again I will stay with them again.
Embarkation
Embarkation was fairly smooth. At least as smooth as herding 3,100 people from all over the world into one place can be. The lines were long but moved fairly quickly. Unlike DMV While being a smooth process it did kind of remind me of corralling our cattle when I was a kid. Wont tell you what we did to them next but i can tell you that going on a cruise was much more pleasant than what happened to the cattle All in all we were probably in line for an hour at most. Once on board I quickly located all the important parts of the ship, the bathrooms, the state rooms, and the food, once again all functioned properly.
Cabins
As I mentioned earlier it doesn’t take too much to impress us. This being my first cruise on RCCL and only my second cruise period Carnival Liberty I wasn’t sure what to expect. We were in 6316 which is a balcony room on the “hump”. The room had all the important things, a bed, a pooper, and a TV. The balcony was just a bonus. The beds were very comfortable and they had no buttons or anything for me to worry about. I am not the largest guy in the world. 6’ tall and about 235 pre cruise the bathrooms were a little cramped to say the least. The shower reminded me of a coffin with a sliding door . If you drop your soap in this shower you don’t have to worry about bending over to pick it up, you can’t. Trust me I tried. Other than that everything worked fine. The water was wet, and the towels dry. I don’t due this often but I am going to offer those of you who have never cruised before a word of advice. Ladies….if you have a man who’s favorite excursion is sitting on the toilet do yourself a favor. TAKE GLADE!!! Or as Staci did take several air fresheners. Trust me….the odor wont stop at the bathroom door. Thank god for the balcony!! The girls were in a Promenade room just down the hall. It was much like ours but different. It didn’t take long before it looked just like their rooms at home. Disaster area
The Ship
The ship was beautiful. Not loud and flashy like the Carnival Liberty. The crew keeps her looking beautiful. It is hard to believe that she is 4 years old. Not that 4 years is a long time but if you think of all the passengers that she has had it is amazing. I wish my house were kept up as well. And came with a room steward, cook, and traveled the Caribbean
The Food
The food was edible for the most part. I wasn’t expecting anything awesome. Staci I think was expecting more because her father had sailed with RCCL once and told her the food was awesome. her fathers favorite food is bread I will say the food in the dinning room was better than expected. I don’t understand how people can complain so much about the food in the dining room and Windjammer. To those people I say what do you expect? They cook meals for over 3,000 people. Do you really expect the eggs not to be powdered? duh? That being said they do offer plenty of fresh fruits to chose from. Not to mention Jade was a pretty good alternative. If you want a pretty decent steak try Chops. I loved it.
The down side to the food is I got food poisoning on the second night. I am not sure what I ate but I know it was from the Windjammer. Tasted like the nachos when it came back up.
Room Service
I would love to tell you something positive about room service but I am still waiting for my meal to arrive. We ordered room service 3 times and I am still waiting. However, I have been assured that it will be here any minute now….
The Islands
Our cruise was of the Western Caribbean which included Libadee, Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel. Libadee was nice and relaxing. Of course I was up all night with food poisoning so I had no choice but to relax. I was plopped down in a beach chair and that is wear I stayed. However, from what I could see through my eyelids was beautiful!! I have heard complaints about the some of the locals being pushy with setting up chairs and selling things. I can tell you that we didn’t have that problem. They did set up our chairs but they were not rude about it. The girls went shopping and said they had no problem with the vendors. The one thing that we did find funny was that some of the merchandise originally had Hawaii on it but the ‘waii” was crossed out and replaced with Haiti. Made in China
Jamaica. I was still sick this day. The only reason I went ashore is because I was concerned about the girls safety. I’ve read plenty on how unsafe Jamaica is. While I am not one to jump to conclusions or be over protective I can see where Jamaica can be very unsafe. However, I can also think of many places in the U.S that are just as unsafe. In Jamaica we booked Bob Marley’s house with Marva Shaw. While Marva was great I will never go up in the mountains of Jamaica again. This was the only safety concern I had with Jamaica. The roads are terrible up in the mountains. It’s amazing to see how the people live. On the other hand my girls also got to see how fortunate they are to live in such a nice place. As far as the Bob Marley House. I wouldn’t waste my time with it. It’s just one big tourist trap. You pay $45.00 to see where Bob sat on a rock and got stoned all the time. Not to mention all the people sitting around getting stoned. Don’t waist your time! The port area is very dirty for the most part. If I find myself back there on another cruise chances are I will stay on the boat. Should we decide to do something there I will use Marva Shaw again.
Grand Cayman Up all night sick. Stayed in bed all day while the girls went to shop. My favorite excursion on this day was the toilet. Long ride…not very pleasant.
Cozumel I felt much better today. The girls and I went into town shopping. As far as ports go Cozumel was my favorite. It was just a relaxing day. We strolled down the street spending my money. What’s not to enjoy? I only wish we had more time. We purchased some alcohol, and some rings for the girls. Staci, did a shot of something that cleared up her cold. So it was a good day.
My only real issues on this cruise other than room service was that of the sales agents. While on board we tried to put down a deposit towards our next cruise. We spoke with the agent who was very rude and simply told us that unless we knew what cruise we wanted it wouldn’t be worth his time to look. He told us that his computer was moving to slow and to look when we got home. When I explained to him we just wanted to put down a deposit for a future cruise in general we were told again to do it from home. I was told that we could still get the on board credit. On the last night of the cruise I checked with another agent who was there. She told me that he told me wrong. When I asked if she could help she said she was too far behind in her bookings to help me. This kind of took me by surprise. I thought they would be happy to help, but this was not the case. Up until that night was almost certain I wanted to try RCCL again despite the minor issue of room service and food poisoning. I went back to my room discouraged and disappointed, not how I wanted to end my cruise.
Conclusion
All in all I am glad I got the chance to share this experience with the people I love the most. I’ve been on Cruise Freeks for a little while now and I’ve read many reviews and researched many things. Sometimes I feel like people lose site of what’s important. For me the most important thing was seeing those people I love the most smile. Sure this cruise wasn’t a perfect experience for me personally, but I wouldn’t trade it for the world. The people I was with made that week one of the high lights of my life. Not to mention meeting the people on our roll call. I feel like I’ve made some great friends on this trip. People I hope I will be able to keep in touch with. It’s amazing how many CF members take the time out of their day to share experiences and advice on a wide variety of topics. They unselfishly give this so others can make the most out of their cruising experience. I for one have enjoyed this site. For me CF is half of the cruising experience. For the past year I’ve looked forward to posting, and reading on our roll call. So to all of you who use this site and take the time to post, to the community managers and host, thank you for your time!!! Happy Cruising!!
Tue Jan 27, 2009 2:21 pm
jackass...
