KristiZ

A quick trip to the Loyalty Desk got me the C&A stats for this cruise: 617 passengers - 105 Gold - 73 Platinum - 64 Emerald - 145 Diamond - 136 Diamond Plus - 33 Pinnacle So right about half of the passengers are Diamond an above, which is why they closed the Viking Crown full time. I think they’ve gotten some complaints though, because it sounded like that was a very temporary change. Here’s hoping!

Continuing our ship tour! The Shops of Centrum are on Deck 5. As you can see, it’s a much more compact experience than the bigger ships. There are no brand shops, although there are some branded goods like Guess, Citizen, Morimoto, etc. This is definitely a concept that Royal has expanded and improved over the years — fewer shore partnerships and more in-house selling. I intended to get more pictures of the casino (Deck 6), but it has been surprisingly busy and I do try to keep people’s faces out of my shots when I can. With all the sea days, there are lots of casino hours! Through the casino is the pub. It unfortunately feels a bit “stuck in at the end of the world” on Serenade. Too bad, as it’s a nice space. There’s also a real, if small, cinema tucked behind the pub. It’s fun to watch a movie in there, rather than the theater or your tiny cabin TV.

I would take the extra half bath over a walk in closet ANY DAY!

You and MisterZ both!

Me either. Hence my “they can’t possibly mean me!” attitude. Ha!

Day 6 - At Sea Remember that confusing letter about antigen testing we got early on? Turns out my best guess at what was intended was wrong. Fortunately MomMe read it differently and decided to go confirm her suspicions at Guest Services. Because our cruise is over 7 days, CDC requires mid-voyage testing of all passengers, not just unvaccinated. So while I was blithely ignoring the notices in the Cruise Compass, my mother was signing up for her test. In my defense, nothing said “mandatory” until Day 5. Anyway, we all got signed up, and none of our names got announced over the shipwide speaker as being on the Bad Kid List. Whew! Testing is on Day 6 and Day 7, and you pick a one hour window for your appointment. Here’s the card they give you: However, as Day 6 progressed, they realized that they could process people much faster than they thought they might. Announcements started with “anyone who has an appointment later today can come now and get it out of the way”, and by noon they were calling for any guests who wanted to come now and be done with it. We went down to the Safari Club and got swabbed. It was a very easy, not-at-all-deep nose swab that took 15 seconds total. I’m actually glad I didn’t realize this was mandatory before, since I would have had the nagging “what if we test positive???” thoughts. No fun!

There hasn’t been a ton of wildlife so far on the cruise, but we have seen sea lions (in Port of LA), dolphins (randomly on Day 2), iguanas (in PV), and Masked Boobies (every day, swirling around the ship and fishing in the wake). The dolphins were especially fun because it was a large pod with a number of very small babies. Super cute! Mostly they’re all too far away for photos, but here’s my attempt at the birds:

Well, that’s what happens when witness protection gives you a new identity!

Tonight we chose to dine at Izumi. We had eaten in an Izumi once before, back in 2012 or 2013. Then we were living in Asia after that and Izumi because less interesting. Now that we’re back in the Western Hemisphere we were looking forward to eating here again. On Serenade, Izumi is in a lovely location on Deck 12 aft. The space is very pretty. The fun tableware, plus my She’s A Geisha beverage (tastes like koolaid ). Chicken Karaage: Pork Gyoza: Tonkatsu Ramen: Shrimp and Vegetable Tempura: Chef’s Choice Sushi plate: FYI, the $35 option is a huge amount of food. We ate ala carte and got out at less than $24* per person. And we walked out on our own power — no wheelbarrow needed to get us back to our cabins! *Edit to adjust the math. I forgot we got a random 30% discount from the waiter!

Definitely. But this time they’re blocking the Viking Crown completely, day and night. First time I had seen that. I plan to get to the Loyalty Desk to confirm my suspicion that a large percentage of people on this trip are D or higher.

I love snorkeling. I also have a tiny face, so it’s always the kids masks that fit me, and I often have a hard time convincing the tour operator of this. So I bought a mask and tube and bring that with me. I’m ensured of a good fit every time. But usually, we book an excursion. Often the very best snorkeling is out a bit from shore so having a boat take you out is easiest. The only exception to this is Grand Cayman, where you can taxi or bus to Cemetery Beach and have amazing snorkeling right from the shore with no crowds.

It may depend on the ship, but currently on Serenade it is table service only.

Hi! Welcome to the forums! Yes, the app is confusing about the MDR. You don’t have to worry. Late seating is on Deck 4 of the MDR. I believe it is broken up in the app so that it can show the different times available for unvaccinated folks. Let me know if you have any other questions and I either answer or go find out!

The Izumi menu has a lot of non-sushi items on it too, like karaage (chicken nuggets) and gyoza (pot stickers). He might find plenty to eat on the ala carte menu!

Hopefully restrictions will be lessened soon. Or there will be fewer higher level C&A passengers on your sailings!

Day 5 - At Sea One of my most favorite things about Radiance-class ships is the Viking Crown lounge on Deck 13. That the Suite Lounge and the Diamond Lounge are also up in that space on Serenade is an added bonus. The first night, we headed up to the Suite Lounge and saw a big “Private Event” sign on the Viking Crown. Oh, OK, that happens sometimes, no worries. The second night, the same sign was in place. I got suspicious. I asked the nice woman at the door when will the Viking Crown be open and she said it wouldn’t. Whaaaaaat? Nonono! I think she might have seen my panic, because she quickly asked if I was Diamond, Diamond Plus, or Pinnacle. Turns out, the whole Viking Crown has been turned into the Diamond Club for this trip. Whew! I can still sit up there and enjoy the great view! However, if we weren’t Diamond (oh hey, we actually turned Diamond Plus today! Yay us!) I would have been crushed not to be able to use this space, so I feel a little bad about that. It also means that MomMe can’t join us there Here’s the Suite Lounge: The outdoor space is especially nice. Here’s the Viking Crown/Diamond Lounge: What used to be the Diamond Club is now the Pinnacle Club, at least for this cruise: I’m super bummed I didn’t get a picture of the sign the first day — It was a hand-written “Pinnacle Club Only” piece of scratch paper slapped up over the Diamond Club sign, not completely covering it. They quickly fixed it, but I thought it was quite funny. I’ll be curious to see if the Pinnacle Club thing sticks around after Covid protocols are loosened. Sorry the lighting is so wonky on these shots.

I never imagined I would get involved in the Filet Wars, and yet here I am… I have had filet in the MDR, Chops, Giovanni’s, and Asia’s equivalent of CK, the Golden Dining room, on a variety of ships. The best filet is at Chef’s Table on Serenade. Fight me. This was our first time trying Chef’s Table. Current protocols limit the attendance to 8; we had 6. We were inadvertently smart, booking it on a night before a sea day — I think I would not have enjoyed a morning shore excursion very much The aperitif, some sort of bubbly Elderflower mint concoction: Scallop Carpaccio: Smoked Tomato Soup, pre and post combination. It also required stirring to blend all the ingredients, so I’m going to say that I assisted in the preparation of this excellent soup! And then, unfortunately, came the third glass of wine. Only unfortunate for you, Gentle Readers — I failed to take pictures of the next two courses Both the Maine Lobster Salad and the Roasted Branzino were delicious and I apologize for my shortcomings as a blogger! Then, the filet. Could not have been better! I ate the whole thing even though I was stuffed already! There was some sauce added after the photo was taken. The dessert was The World. Very, very rich! It came with an espresso martini. I was very pleased with the whole experience. We had fun companions, a good waiter, and a charismatic chef. One couple had eaten at Chef’s Table a dozen or so times and said that it was always just a bit different as each chef put their own mark on it. Kenneth redeemed himself tonight:

Day 4 - Puerto Vallarta We were trying to decide when we had last been to PV. Best we could come up with was “earlier than 2000”. It has changed since then We didn’t plan an excursion because none of the options appealed, but we wanted to explore the port area a bit and put a few dollars in the local economy. And by “we” I mean MomMe and me — MisterZ decided it was “too freakin’ hot”. (He was not actually wrong.) We disembarked on Deck 2 and were then directed to “exit through the gift shop”, otherwise known as Puerto Magico. It’s a big facility with duty free shopping, coffee shops, artisans, photo ops, and various tour operators stumping for clients. The taxi drivers and tour guides in this area and just outside are licensed and all wear government IDs so you can feel pretty confident they will take good care of you. We turned right out of the port and walked to a free local beach. I wouldn’t maybe get in the water there in the middle of town, but there was sun and sand and beer vendors. We saw a lot of local Mexican tourists heading this way; both PV and Mazatlan have historically been internal vacation destinations which is likely why the city didn’t seem as hard hit as I feared, economy-wise. We stopped at a local pharmacy and bought a pile of consumables to give to the crew — toothpaste, Tylenol, tums, that sort of thing. They were very appreciative, since they are not allowed off the ship in Mexico. Here’s the view from our balcony while docked: The Noordam seems to be in cold layup here. There were some crew, but very little activity. We were invited to a sailaway party on the helipad: It was hot, as you can imagine, but as we backed out of port we were able to keep to the shade cast by the ship pretty well. It was a fun perspective — made it feel like we were on a much smaller ship.

Mine came 5 days prior to sailing this time around. I think there are a lot of moving parts right now.

We have had phenomenal seas so far. Seriously like glass: And some lovely sunrises: One of my very favorite things is the days being noted on the elevators. I hope this tradition never goes away! A great thing about Radiance-class ships is all the glass. Here is Vintages: And here is the view from Vintages seating: (Window could be cleaner. Sorry.) Day 3 ended with Main Dining room delivery to our balcony again. Chicken Parmesan and Braised Beef Ribs: No towel art tonight. Kenneth is in big trouble!

It was in the app, but showed up much later than the rest of check in. Just keep looking!

We used an iPad, and one of us held it for the other so our hands were free. It’s a little hard to show the proctor everything they need to see.

We got our second crystal block on this trip Hooray! They are super hard to photograph Grr!

The gym on Serenade takes up prime real estate at the bow on Deck 12. It’s also about the same size as the gym on Spectrum, with only about 40% of the passenger capacity. A statement on how cruising has changed in the last 25 years!

Sometimes two!!