Joe01

I've kinda accepted at this point that Royal has changed direction and is very much going for the short cruise market in the Caribbean. If that works for them, fair enough I guess. They shouldn't apply this to the decreasing number of ships in other regions though - I still maintain that putting Indy on shorter runs in Europe is a bit mad and is unlikely to work, total misunderstanding of the UK market. And certainly curious about how both Quantum & Navigator will work in LA, not much variety in ports there!

I love the Oasis Class but I think a 7th is overkill, especially with Icon being a mega ship with a new design. With 7 Oasis's and at least 3 Icons, where are they going to put them all as well?

Playmakers was not a fun experience on Odyssey last week either. It just seems very disorganised, and it's laid out badly. I try to be sympathetic to crew but the service was definitely poor there. It's a shame because the food is good.

Crew: It can vary from ship to ship, but from both sailings, I can say that Odyssey has one of the best crews. I just hope that now she isn't the new kid on the block that it stays that way - I loved Harmony when she came out but I don't feel that Harmony is the ship she once was any more, it didn't seem like the happiest crew in August (I guess switching homeports so much and losing both Captain Gus & Captain Johnny is why). I do think therefore that Captain Per & Hotel Director Tony should take some credit for that as the Captain & Hotel Director do set the tone on the ship. Captain Per is definitely very personable and likeable, though a little more low-key than some others. There was one crew member in the spa who was very rude to my sister and made snide comments about her hair, apparently demanding to speak to her mother about it (even though she is in her 20s), but everyone I personally interacted with was great. We had a very nice stateroom attendant who was always greeting us around the hallway and did a great job with our room. Every crew member I had was great though. Odyssey is a ship that radiates happy vibes and you can always feel it. Cruise Director: If you know me, you know that the Cruise Director is a BIG part of any sailing I take, stemming from having Joff Eaton way back on my first few cruises, but also from doing my research and realising just how important they are, they are responsible for all of the onboard activities, entertainment and other things to do (even the sports stuff). I've had many great ones in my time, so where did Ricky Matthews fall among them? Well, this picture may sum Ricky up. He is truly fantastic! Right up there with Joff Eaton & Abe Hughes as the 3 Cruise Directors who I feel actively added to my sailing. That's not to say the others were bad (most of them were pretty good), but I feel that these 3 are gold tier. And it's funny because they are 3 completely different styles - dry, witty Joff; smiley, charming Abe; and wacky, energetic Ricky. His strengths are most definitely at the theme parties and game shows, getting the crowd going, I just don't know how someone has so much energy. You can't miss his wacky outfits and afro at the 70s party. The L&M format was a bit different to some other CDs but it was an entertaining show, and I was totally spoiled for my first ever Quest, I can imagine it's a bit more tame with others but with him, it was definitely pretty risqué, and he dealt pretty well with some crazy teams. Belly Flop with him was probably the funniest of all though. I also appreciated that Ricky was able to inject a little of his personality into the morning show - since COVID, most other CDs I've had have really taken a business-like approach to it and just listed out the basic info. But equally, he brought a more laid back vibe to Captain's Corner, and from a business perspective, I'd say it was a well planned cruise with lots of activities and events, so he has to take the credit for that. I can see why everyone loved him so much (the most raved about on the Cruise Director Facebook group for sure) and would love to have him again on a future sailing. Activities Manager: And of course, the Activities Manager is basically the CD's right hand man, and the second most important person in ensuring it's a fun time, so why not talk about him as well? The AM was Tristan from South Africa, I'm not sure how long he's been an AM or with Royal, but give this guy a CD position ASAP! I just loved him. I'd say that he reminded me a little of Richard Spacey (who I never sailed with but I've saw quite a few clips of) - his segments on the morning show were always great, he has such a cheeky and charming personality and somehow, he made what was basically listing out a bunch of activities really entertaining, I made sure to watch each morning to hear his latest take on the day's events, never a dull moment. And as I and others in my party enjoyed the daytime activities, he clearly did a good job with his team of Cruise Director's Staff. I didn't get to see Tristan host many events on his own but every activity I saw him, he had plenty of energy - he certainly was great fun at the 70s & 80s parties, the guy can dance really well! I could also tell that he & Ricky were an actual team with good chemistry, he was a good right hand man at Quest and Belly Flop. Again, someone who actively added to my cruise and I hope he gets a promotion to Cruise Director soon.

Day time activities: The activities schedule was jam-packed on the cruise and I got the chance to go to many of the activities. I was happy that they had a Captain's Corner unlike on Harmony in August, and it was a good Q&A/info session with Captain Per. Some of my party liked the dance classes and enjoyed the team who led them. I didn't participate but I did observe a few trivias and bingos, they were pretty good. Some of the trivia is a bit beyond me. I'm not religious so did not attend but some of my party are Catholic and appreciated having midnight mass on Christmas. I unfortunately missed World's Sexiest Man as it was moved time at the eleventh hour due to bad weather, shame as I reckon it would have been fun. Belly Flop however was one I did attend and that was great, Ricky definitely brought great energy to the proceedings and we had a nice variety of contestants (including the first ever female contestant who I'd seen do it) Evening entertainment: This is a bit of an N/A category for me as I rarely see headliner shows and usually stick with aqua & ice shows, neither of which are on this ship. I missed the Two70 shows but they look cool. I did however love the theme parties & game shows. This was my first time attending the Quest (held in SeaPlex), not sure why it took so long but I'm glad I finally went as it was pretty epic, and about as risqué as they could get. Some of those team captains are crazy! Love & Marriage is always a hit with me, possibly not the most exciting participants that I've seen but Ricky kept it entertaining. As for the parties, they were hit and miss - 80s would have been a hit but was a miss because of the venue (Music Hall), felt like a nightclub and the room was too loud/crowded for me to stay in despite an enthusiastic staff & audience. 70s OTOH was great, held in the much more spacious Two70 and was so much fun, with the perfect CD to lead it (more on that later). Things to do: I hate making reservations and try to keep my onboard account as low as possible so no North Star again (at least did it once on Anthem though). I did do Bumper Cars on the last day and that was always great fun, though I was able to avoid colliding for the most part. I will note that the SeaPlex can get pretty crowded, and we were surrounded by some queue skippers (being from the UK, that is a total no-no). I don't usually do Rock Wall or FlowRider but did notice that the SkyPad is now redundant, I wonder what they'll do with that space when she goes to drydock in 2 years, I was thinking a waterslide? Most of my afternoons were spent in the Solarium and that was my happy place on this ship.

Stateroom: Apologies but I don't have a full cabin photo. Nonetheless - we had a balcony stateroom on Deck 7 (starboard & forward). I’d stayed in a similar room in the same part of the ship before so knew what to expect. With Odyssey being a new ship, there are plenty of charging sockets, alongside USB socket. There is also a European plug socket if you have a European plug or adaptor. The bed was very comfortable, the bathroom was standard fare for ships as was the balcony. Slightly obstructed view if you look down (presumably due to Deck 5) but generally nice. I enjoy the balcony but I don’t use it too much. The sofa IMO is extremely uncomfortable, this is a ship-wide problem and not specific to Odyssey but I really hate sitting on them. Dining: I dined at the Windjammer most of the time. It can vary from ship to ship, but it is usually pretty good on Odyssey. El Loco Fresh is a good snack for daytime (though I just stick with the quesadillas), as is Sorrento’s & Cafe Promenade at night. I enjoyed Playmakers, though I personally felt it was disorganised. There were Sunday NFL games on our first sea day and it made it impossible to get a table. Also didn’t open until 4pm on port days. Food itself was good, can’t go wrong with wings (always little league buffalo for me). And the campfire cookie dessert is always a hit!

Ports of call: As said in the intro, this was our first cruise visiting the Southern Caribbean, and the furthest South I’ve ever been. I’d heard great things about the region, and I can see why. Our first port of call was Willemstad, Curacao. It was a bit of a walk from the ship to downtown Willemstad (I’d estimate about 20 mins). The downtown area is very pretty with gorgeous architecture, a nice mix of Dutch and Caribbean influence. We walked around it for about an hour, the locals seemed friendly. It was otherwise the usual Caribbean fare of restaurants and Diamonds International type stores. Despite being Boxing Day, it was very warm, I can only imagine it in the summer…. The following day was Oranjestad, Aruba, another former Dutch island. Downtown Oranjestad was much nearer the ship than Willemstad was, however it looked very different. I’d say it had much more of an American influence in the buildings, it looked like a strip in Miami Beach or something like that. Very nice to walk through though. Been to Labadee, Haiti several times. Always enjoy an hour on the beach and going in the water, but at times, it can be unclean (I found a bottle full of sand just floating, yuk). I also advise everyone to avoid the markets at all costs, that was a scary experience when I went there before. A brief note on our homeport, I’d say I prefer the Fort Lauderdale terminal to the Miami terminal purely because it’s open. I hate waiting for an Uber or taxi after debarking in Miami, it is way too stuffy, loud and crowded. Lauderdale was easier. The actual embarkation and debarkation is more or less equal between the two.

That was the journey from hell. I do not recommend British Airways.

I've tried live blogging and then doing post-cruise blogging but I rarely have the time in the end, particularly when it comes to uploading photos. However, I'll commit to giving a shorter review of this cruise. Just off Odyssey for an 8 night Christmas cruise to the Southern Caribbean. This was our first time cruising at Christmas, however our 2nd winter sailing after NYE on Oasis last year. 2nd time on Odyssey & 3rd time on Quantum Class (did Anthem once a few years before). It was also our first time visiting the Southern Caribbean, with new ports Aruba & Curaçao, alongside Labadee on the way back to Fort Lauderdale. Pre-cruise, spent 1 night in Edinburgh (visited Christmas markets and had an early flight) and flew via London to Miami the next day where we stayed 2 nights at the Hyatt Regency Downtown. Highly recommended if you are sailing from Port of Miami in particular, very spacious rooms, though better to take Ubers to get places than walk. That's all for the pre-cruise part. I'm currently in Miami airport waiting for my flight to London (I got the A380!), will tell all about the cruise itself when I get home!

Checking in from Odyssey! She's a great ship, better than Anthem. They made some improvements and it feels better suited to the Caribbean somehow. I'm sure you'll have a great cruise. The main events have been a hoot with Ricky Matthews as CD. His assistant Tristan is also great.

I wouldn't hold your breath on that one... The menu labelled it as "Chicken Tenders".

Due to the long queues, we were stuck in rush hour traffic so the journey sadly took even longer yet again. And I forgot that I was in America and almost didn't tip the driver (since we don't usually do that here) . But finally, I arrived at my hotel - the DoubleTree Boston Bayside. This was decent, a standard DoubleTree fare, cookie for check-in and all. My room was a decent size and perfectly comfortable for the two nights I spent there. A downside was that the hotel was a bit out of the city, had to take the MBTA red line into the centre from JFK/Mass to Downtown Crossing. In typical tourist fashion, I didn't know how to use the ticket machines or ticket barriers. Then it was through to the train. Sadly this is where I have to give Boston a thumbs down, the red line gives this city a bad, bad name. Perhaps I'm spoiled coming from Western Europe but I've never seen a more underinvested, decrepit subway system in all of my life. And the train took ages to go about 4/5 stations, it kept stopping for no reason. Finally into the centre area, I walked around for about 20 minutes until it started raining really, really heavily. Even as a Scot, it was brutal. Needless to say, I ended up going into the nearest restaurant I could find - a place called Back Deck. They had an interesting twist on some American items. But I was just glad to be out of the rain and to have some food:

Monday - August 21st The day started at 9am with an Uber from my apartment in Glasgow all the way to Edinburgh Airport, this journey takes about 45 minutes. After checking in my suitcase and going through security, I went to the Plaza Premium lounge in the airport for a couple of hours. I managed to catch the last of their breakfast offering and enjoyed the views of the planes coming in and out: The flight was DL123 from Edinburgh to Boston, we left around 1.30pm. This was a good flight, for the first time in a while, I lucked out in having a vacant seat next to me, and was near the front of the plane by my standards (row 19). I highly recommend Delta if you travel to Scotland from the States, their transatlantic product is far better than United IMO. They use 767s as opposed to United's crap 757s so it feels more spacious, the planes feel up to date (with USB chargers) and the service is usually pretty good. After around 7 hours, we landed at Logan Airport. Unfortunately, this is where things got a little pear-shaped, as most of the booths were closed, meaning that we had a queue of about an hour, I was definitely thankful that I walk fast and was near the front of the plane, otherwise it would have been longer. It took so long in fact, that my suitcase had been taken off the belt and was literally sitting there waiting for me at the baggage claim. Then it was into a taxi to my hotel in Boston.

Hi all, was on the Harmony this past week for a 7 night Eastern Caribbean sailing. Arrived home less than 24 hours ago, from the cabin on Harmony to my apartment in Glasgow it was about 22 hours worth of travel so definitely tired. But it was a great trip. I'll review the trip in it's entirety, but to give some context first - this cruise came about as my sister was working in a Summer camp in America for 2 months, and the opportunity to go on a Caribbean cruise after she finished came up. I didn't have my summer vacation booked so I figured why not. On this one, I travelled solo for 4/5 days, visiting Boston, New York & Miami before finally meeting her for the cruise. Itinerary was as follows: August 21st - Fly from Edinburgh to Boston August 22nd - Full day in Boston August 23rd - Amtrak from Boston-NYC, dinner & evening in Times Square August 24th - Fly from LaGuardia to Miami August 25th - Full day in Miami August 26th - Embark Harmony of the Seas August 27th - Perfect Day at CocoCay, Bahamas August 28th - Sea Day August 29th - Charlotte Amalie, St Thomas (stayed on ship) August 30th - Philipsburg, St Maarten August 31st - Sea Day September 1st - Sea Day September 2nd - Debark Harmony/fly from Miami-JFK, overnight to Edinburgh September 3rd - Arrive back in Scotland Most definitely a packed 2 weeks, lots of fun had! Next up is the day by day blog/review.

I like what they're doing with Icon. Because it frees up the Oasis Class from being so expensive and full of kids.

With Anthem going to Asia, that's now 4 of the 5 ships in the Asia-Pacific region and only one in the Western/Atlantic region, which is quite strange for a company like Royal. Has Quantum Class really flopped that badly in the West? I'm going to guess the Florida deployment was an experiment until Icon came in but with that now happening and Odyssey losing her 'new ship' status soon, they don't need her in Florida any more. I enjoyed sailing out of Civitavecchia though and it looks like that region is left without a ship, unless Anthem might do that in summer 2025 and only doing Singapore in Winter (not unheard of - Legend rotated between Italy & Singapore around 2007/08 for a couple of years)

Sailing her in August. I have sailed her before but on my recent cruises on other ships, the desserts have been pretty hit or miss and often, I can't find very many of them. Wonder was particularly bad for that. I think I lost weight on all 3 cruises for that reason lol. On all of those ships, there was a Playmakers and we'd go to get the Campfire Cookie Dough once or twice a cruise. Harmony doesn't have Playmakers. Used to love Cafe Promenade but the cookies they put out these days generally aren't my style. Anyone have any ideas on where to get desserts?

For me: Independence Allure Odyssey Symphony Harmony Oasis Explorer Jewel Anthem Wonder Enchantment Serenade Nothing really between Symphony, Harmony & Oasis though. To be honest though, 8 of the 12 ships in that list, I really liked. 3 of the others (Anthem, Wonder, Serenade) just didn't do it for me despite much better experiences on sister ships. If I went on those 3 ships another time, I might have a completely different experience. Enchantment however didn't fit our needs at the time. Too old and not enough pool space. But I'd kinda like to try another Vision Class one day. Some of my opinions on ships are over a decade old though.

We are looking to take a cruise in the last week of August. We're wanting to do a ship from Florida but I'm not really sure what is the best option. We've done Oasis Class predominantly for years now but would be interested in something different. But I'm not blown away by the choices in Florida. The ships that are of most interest (Mariner & Freedom) are both on shorter itineraries which sucks. Granted, Mariner is a 6 nighter but would be better if it were 7 given I'd be flying out from Scotland. Frustrating that this is the summer when Symphony is in Europe, if she was still in Miami, she'd be the obvious choice. Adventure has a good price and is a 7 nighter, but I've heard negative reviews about her and she isn't AMPed. We're Playmakers fans but it's not a dealbreaker. Any idea?

There's no way I would take this, Wonder to Explorer???

Did Harmony's last Med cruise before the Transatlantic several years ago in mid-October and it was starting to get too cold in the region for that type of ship, pool deck at night wasn't always pleasant and we encountered some rain which affected the Boardwalk and AquaTheater. I think though that a Radiance or Quantum Class could work.

I knew it was popular since my Harmony cruises from there were full but I never really understood why, it's not a short distance from MCO and only a few Southern states are really driving distance. The South Florida ports and Bayonne are the most convenient easily.

Seen some really cheap fares going for the Allure from Galveston in August compared to the other Oasis Class ships in the Caribbean. What's the deal there?

I received this very generous message whilst walking the dark and rainy streets of Glasgow, Scotland at 8.40pm. Of course, I would absolutely love to be attending a muster station as it would mean being on a ship. However, last time I checked, all ships in the Royal Caribbean International fleet are at least 3000+ miles away from me at this present moment. Aviation has evolved considerably in recent decades however not even Concorde would get me there in 30 minutes so I'm afraid I am unable to attend. Sorry in advance to whoever is onboard and has to endure the passive-aggressive announcements from the Cruise Director about people not attending their muster station.

Didn't get any in the cabin on Oasis over New Years and there were also none at Guest Services either. I can understand not putting them for everyone in the cabin but none at guest services is inexcusable IMO. To get the compass though the app, you basically have to pay for their WiFi service which is insanely expensive, that part pissed me off. Unless you're in port of course but sea days are where the compass is most useful. Odyssey at least had compasses but they also wouldn't allow you onto the North Star on sea days without booking it on the app, which is so easy to do when in the middle of the sea between Greece & Italy. I think this over-reliance on the app is going to be my new bête noire of cruising.