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A Symphony Cruise April 23, 2022


YouthD

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This'll be our third cruise since it restarted! First one was on the Celebrity Edge in Sept, followed by the Disney Fantasy in Jan.

We will be going on the Symphony on the April 23rd Western Caribbean and Perfect Day cruise. At CocoCay we will be having a Beach Cabana at Coco Beach Club, very excited about the views and food! First time there. My wife and I also have passes to the thermal suite all cruise, so hopefully it's not too crowded.

  • Day 1 - Depart Miami
  • Day 2 - At Sea
  • Day 3 - Puerto Costa Maya, Mexico (Possibly Mexican Salsa Experience and Beach Break)
  • Day 4 - Roaton, Honduras (BOSS Underwater Adventure)
  • Day 5 - Cozumel, Mexico (Legacy of the Maya: Ruins and Chocolate Tasting)
  • Day 6 - At Sea
  • Day 7 - Perfect Day at CocoCay (Beach Cabana at Coco Beach Club)
  • Day 8 - Worst day ever, Disembarkation

My wife and I are VERY excited for this cruise. We're going with her parents, aunt, cousin, sister, brother-in-law, and two friends. All in all, there will be 10 of us, all with the UDP, my wife and I are planning mostly everything, so it'll be fun trying to make those reservations the first day... We all either have the UDP or Refreshments Package. This is our second cruise on RCL and most of the parties first cruise ever. All of us will be in Balcony rooms, but we submitted a Royal Up bid for a 2-Bedroom Aquatheatre Suite and a Star Loft Suite, for that Genie Service. We only put in the minimum bids, so not expecting to get them.

This community has been so great answering questions about all things cruising. Probably have the entire cruise ship memorized from watching hours and hours of Youtube videos. Let me know if you guys have any recommendations. Will update this as we get closer to the date!

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We're getting VERY excited! All travel documents together, luggage tags together, going to start packing soon! We have started using packing cubes, and they make everything so easy! We go with 1 garment bag on wheels, 1 large suitcase, 2 "carry on" bags and 1 travel bag. The garment bag is perfect for her dresses, my dress shirts and slacks and my size 16 clunker shoes. Getting our nightly dinner list set.

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On 4/19/2022 at 3:06 PM, YouthD said:

Just won our bid for a Villa Suite! Too bad we can't add people to it after the fact.

@YouthD fairy tale ending for me to see who picked up the suite and also Sunil😊🤗.  You got the whole package!! 
The suite was MIA for a couple weeks so it’s pretty incredible that you got Royal’d up like that — Quite the mysterious program LOL!    Good for you!  ⭐️Enjoy😎

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12 minutes ago, MamaShark said:

@YouthD fairy tale ending for me to see who picked up the suite and also Sunil😊🤗.  You got the whole package!! 
The suite was MIA for a couple weeks so it’s pretty incredible that you got Royal’d up like that — Quite the mysterious program LOL!    Good for you!  ⭐️Enjoy😎

@MamaShark have you had Sunil before? What does he like?

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@MamaShark have you had Sunil before? What does he like?

@YouthD Cash is appropriate and preferred. Genies have many guests and  little space to keep well intended gifts.  If you’re asking about gifts in addition to cash,  there are only a couple genies who I feel comfortable that I know we’ll enough to give personal items — along with cash. Cash tips are the best! . 

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Day 1 - Embarkation

 

We started the day around 6 am to leave Orlando for sunny Miami! After a 3 hour tour, ahem ride, we made it down! We dropped everyone off at the Star Class drop off, then parked the cars. We couldn't wait to meet Sunil! We made our way up to the suites waiting area and met our genie! All 10 of us did our quick boarding process, then on to the ship! I wish it was always this fast! As soon as we crossed the gangplank to the ship, there was a prior guest waiting to hand Sunil some Crumbl cookies! Would have brought some of I knew he loved them so much. We did our very quick and easy e muster (the best thing that came out of the pandemic), then up to our room!

 

 

 

I let Margaret (my wife) do the honors of opening the room for the first time. Wow, so much room in this suite! We all piled in and they explored while we did the low down the Sunil. We were able to get reservations for 10 people everyday! Margaret got her body pillow, is amazing! He got us some great snacks from Wonderland and some desserts, and a good amount of drinks that we requested. 

 

We broke away from the rest of the group and HAD to visit Coastal Kitchen for lunch. I had some good scallops and we split the Braised Beef, SOOO GOOD! Then went to see what the hub bub was about Park Cafe. We had a small second lunch from the salad bar there. 

 

Explored the ship some more, had pre dinner drinks at Playmakers, then off to Jamies for dinner! Since there was so many of us we got the appetizers and pasta served family style, and we each had our own mains. This place is amazing. I don't think we disliked anything, the lasagna was probably some of the best that I've had.

 

No show the first night, we wanted to have a quiet night. Well, we ordered some campfire cookies for a late night snack. We now have a standing order of these everynight..

 

Crashed so hard!

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I am glad your cruise has started out smooth and amazing.

I stayed in this room on Harmony with @AshleyDillo, her mom and brother. With the four of us it was way too big, if it is just 2 of you......I can't imagine. It is insane to RU to a room like this. It has the wow factor for size and not necessarily beauty. But you could literally have your family come and get dinner from room service and that is nice. 

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1 hour ago, carlosalonsor said:

Did they allow you to use some of the suite perks with the rest of your party? 

Just making reservations for our whole party. I guess ordering a bunch of food, is not necessarily giving them access to the perk.

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1 hour ago, YouthD said:

Just making reservations for our whole party. I guess ordering a bunch of food, is not necessarily giving them access to the perk.

I'm so sorry if my question felt aggressive or in another tone, it was never my intention, it was a genuine question, specially regarding check in, dinner reservations, shows, etc...

 

Have a great trip!

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38 minutes ago, carlosalonsor said:

I'm so sorry if my question felt aggressive or in another tone, it was never my intention, it was a genuine question, specially regarding check in, dinner reservations, shows, etc...

 

Have a great trip!

Sorry If my answer felt that way, I never felt any aggression in your reply. I usually have my wife read my replies as can come across as crass.

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Day 2 - At Sea

 

We woke up to having our morning Starbucks order of a Venti Iced Chai and a Grande Iced Toasted Vanilla Oat milk. Gonna miss have Starbucks delivered in the mornings after the cruise. We had a late start, so wrongfully decided to join the rest of our crew at Windjammer. There was a ridiculously long line, so we asked Sunil about it, he was like WINDJAMMER?! Where is that? I had to promise him we would never go back. After a very long line, we finally got breakfast.

 

Afterwards, we got some drinks at Playmakers, and asked about the Draft playing on Thursday, no straight answer. Hopefully they show it! Did some exploring, then played a friend in a friendly game of mini golf. Luckily, I beat him by a few strokes, both of us didn't play very well. Right as we finished my wife texted me and said she got a last seat at Izumi Sushi, the waiter called Sunil and he came running over to say Hi. Ordered some sushi, karaage, gyoza and ramen, everything was great! My wife loved the Japanese Strawberry Milk drink, so much that I asked Sunil about having some delivered later, and magically a pitcher of it arrived to our room right as they reopened later. That was a good pre-dinner drink. We did a Pub trivia and won! Also did a pool volleyball competition, did not win that...

 

We got to have formal night at 150 Central Park! It was an amazing experience. But we were a little rushed since we were going to see 1977 that night, what an amazing show! We're seated in the second row by Sunil. 

 

After the show we were greater in our room by an Izumi Sushi feast we had put in earlier, SOOO good. Then our standing order of campfire cookies. 

 

It was a great day, definitely noticed the cruise ship being much much closer to capacity. But having our genie has really helped. Need to hide our ducks!

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Day 3 - Puerto Costa Maya

 

Today was an early day, so we had an early order of Starbucks and breakfast delivered before we had to depart at 815 for our excursion. We did the Mexican Salsa Experience and Beach Break. We had Sunil bring us down to the gangway, so much smoother! Made our way to ships time and take a short bus ride. The salsa experience was great! We made guacamole and a few different types of salsa, one was very spicy, my favourite, and the other had no spice, my wife loved that one. Then we got to try two different aged tequilas, one 12 year and the other 18 year, both were very smooth! Then we tried a strawberry tequila, WAY to sweet for me. After this it was on to the Salsa dancing! We had fun trying to keep up pace with the dancers, but ultimately bowed out, as my coordination is not the best. After this we walked over to the beach, it was such a nice day! Laid in a beach chair for awhile watching the waves hit the shore, swung in their giant swinging chairs and had some much needed water. I even found a geocache down the road!

 

When we got back to the port, we pretty much walked straight back to the ship as we've been there before and everything is so pricey there... We had Sunil order us some food from Coastal Kitchen, Curry Chicken, Cesar salad, tortellini, flan and an apple pie dessert. Everything was soo good! Some of our party did a Tandem bike excursion to a cenote, but it definitely was not a cenote, more like a regular pool, and they did not like the food at all, they were very sad.

 

Before dinner we did a Star Wars trivia and Name that Tune 90s Edition. We thought we were pretty knowledgeable in Star Wars, but we didn't do very well, compared to others, same with the Name that Tune. Off to dinner at Chops!

 

We were greated by Sunil at Chops who walked with us to our table. After some chat, he vanished like the genie he is. We all ordered different things. For appetizers I tried the Crab Cakes, Bacon and Shrimp cocktail, very good! The cocktail had just the right amount of horseradish. For would I tried the Mushroom Soup, Lobster Bisque and the Goat cheese salad. My favourite was definitely the mushroom soup! For theain course, I ordered the Filet, rare, and Lobster. Both were amazing, filet was very tender, lobster was cooked perfectly. We got all the sides, our favourite was the creamed spinach and the cheese tator tots. The Mac and cheese was not very good at all. Tried the red velvet cake and the warm chocolate cake. Both were good, but the Star was the warm chocolate cake.

 

Luckily, we weren't rushed as we had ample time between dinner and the show. We saw Ron Lucas the ventriloquist, his show was very funny. My wife's mom LOVES ventriloquists. Afterwards we had a charcuterie board and some strawberries brought up for a late night snack.

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Day 4 - Roatan, Honduras

 

Today we had an early morning excursion, so we had our standing Starbucks order along with room service. Our excursion for the day was the BOSS Underwater adventure! Got off the ship in a flash with the genies help. The water is so clear! Being able to be underwater in the submersible was amazing, and seeing the reef and all the fish. Then snorkeled for an hour afterwards while the other groups went.

 

When we got back to the boat we had Johnny Rockets delivered to our suite. Onions rings were ok, not as good as Playmakers. Burgers were good, they messed up the order a little bit, had to get another burger delivered. Walked around in the shops until dinner.

 

This was our second night in Jamie's, and they were struggling. The food wasn't as good as the first night there, didn't come out as fresh. I think they were much busier this night.

 

Afterwards we say Iskate 2.0. Our genie lead us into the show. All of the ice skating shows are fantastic! They had a slight technical hiccup at the beginning, but restarted and everything was good.

 

One of our favourite parts of the cruise is the Silent Disco! It always so fun to listen and watch people sing along to the three different stations. Grabbed a Sorrento's pizza, then off to bed!

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On 4/29/2022 at 10:57 PM, nikken79 said:

You guys are getting me so excited.  We are in that exact suite June 4th.  Was hoping to get Sunil but heard he was leaving prior to us getting there.  Do you know if that is true.

We forgot to ask 😞

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  • 2 weeks later...
31 minutes ago, Penq7777 said:

We are on the June 4th cruise got a letter that Sunil is leaving but Reyno Varkevisseer will be taking over, who I have heard good things about him as well. 

Reyno is a trip.  We’ve had him twice.  His outstanding attribute (my opinion) is party planning, so if you are planning an event in your suite, you are golden.  Reyno only has 1 speed - and it’s a forced pace march (he’s a former milit’ry man).  I could never keep up with him.  He’s a bundle of energy.  Have a great time.

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6 hours ago, Penq7777 said:

We are on the June 4th cruise got a letter that Sunil is leaving but Reyno Varkevisseer will be taking over, who I have heard good things about him as well. 

Nice.  We are on that same sailing.  We have Andrei. I have heard so many great things about him. 

 

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