Symphony of the Seas - 8-night Southern Caribbean - 10-18 February 2024 - ***RECAP*** with pics

[FionaMG]

It's been a while since I've done one of these and there doesn't seem to have been a recent one covering Symphony's current 8-night itineraries down to Aruba and Curaçao, so in the interests of a) being useful and b) reliving our recent cruise - just disembarked this past Sunday , I thought, why not?

So, Day One - Travelling from Custard Tart Land (aka Portugal) to Miami, Florida.

 As per usual, our travel itinerary had us flying from Faro, our local airport in Southern Portugal, via Lisbon to Miami.

Take off. The watery area below is a renowned wetland zone called the Ria Formosa, which translates to "beautiful estuary", and which is famed for its wildlife, especially birds.

As usual, we were flying on the Portuguese flag carrier, TAP. Unusually, however, they had two flights going out on this day, so instead of flying up to Lisbon the night before and then out to Miami the next day, we saved on the hotel cost by "enduring" a five-hour layover in Lisbon. It actually wasn't too bad; Lisbon has some decent shops and restaurants to keep you occupied.

We had lunch at our favourite eatery, the Cockpit. If you ever have a layover in Lisbon over a mealtime I recommend it. They have a small seating area with table service or you can order at the counter and eat in the food court. Our preferred choice is the "Prego com presunto e ovo estrelado" in the "Snacks" section of the menu. (They do have a menu available in English). This is a beefsteak sandwich, topped with dry-cured ham and a fried egg, and served with what they call "country" fries. Very yummy and very filling. However, if you still have room for dessert, there's a great pastry shop right next door... 

After lunch, we found a good spot to rest up until it was time for our flight. You do have to hunt a bit for these seats. They're located near the electronic passport gates, but before your go through them. There is also a coffee shop and a toilet that are not nearly as crowded as the main departure lounge area.

Finally on board. We paid extra for emergency exit seats for some extra space and comfort (business class being well over our budget). Well worth it.

TAP includes food on transatlantic flights. The timing of this flight meant we had dinner and a late-night snack just before arrival into Miami. The dinner (chicken stroganoff) looks pretty disgusting but it was actually quite nice. TAP economy catering is generally edible unlike some other airlines.

The flight itself was uneventful and it landed just a little behind schedule, something of an achievement for TAP, who must have one of the worst punctuality records in the business.

Immigration was the quickest we've ever had at Miami, thanks to the timing of the flight; landing around 10 pm, there were no other international flights arriving to that terminal. the luggage seemed to take forever to come through but to be fair it was probably only about 15 minutes and we were soon in a Lyft on our way to our hotel.

I had previously linked my Hilton and Lyft accounts. This gets you Hilton points for each Lyft journey.

We were staying for two nights at the Hampton Inn in Brickell. I had booked a standard king room but we were upgraded to a king studio. I don't really know why, possibly because I had cashed in some points in part payment.

I'd checked in on the Hilton app ahead of time so I was able to choose our room and having stayed here before I knew which area would give us the best "view" if you can really call it that.

By this time, we'd been up and on the go for 22 hours so we literally dropped our bags and fell into bed for a good night's sleep before a full day out and about in Miami the following day.

 

 

[DDaley]

Hooray! Thanks for doing a recap for us. I am booked on a Norwegian sailing in 2025 that goes to Aruba/Bonaire/Curaçao and will be happy to read about your port adventures! 

[FionaMG]

29 minutes ago, DDaley said:

Hooray! Thanks for doing a recap for us. I am booked on a Norwegian sailing in 2025 that goes to Aruba/Bonaire/Curaçao and will be happy to read about your port adventures! 

We didn't have Bonaire on this one. Despite being an 8-night cruise we only had three ports, the third being Labadee. But I will definitely be sharing details and pics of what we did in the other two.

[LandstromCruise]

1 hour ago, FionaMG said:

We didn't have Bonaire on this one. Despite being an 8-night cruise we only had three ports, the third being Labadee. But I will definitely be sharing details and pics of what we did in the other two.

yeah i had similar itinerary in November on Odyssey that had PDCC instead of Labadee.  i would rather have had Bonaire. 

[asquared17]

symphony! our favorite ship!

[FionaMG]

4 hours ago, asquared17 said:

symphony! our favorite ship!

We enjoyed her.

Like you, we have also done Oasis and Harmony, twice each in fact, but this was our first time on Symphony.

[sammy79]

We like staying at Hampton in Brickell. My son loves to ride the metromover. 

[FionaMG]

56 minutes ago, sammy79 said:

We like staying at Hampton in Brickell. My son loves to ride the metromover. 

The metromover is very handy. During our stay, the Brickell line was out of service so they had combined the Omni (?) and Brickell services into one, called Full Loop. This didn't affect us heading into Bayside but caused us a lot of confusion on the way back. I'm guessing it was a temporary thing for whatever reason.

[FionaMG]

Day Two - Miami

We started the day with the Hampton's usual included breakfast. The last time we stayed here (pre-Covid), they had a wonderful fruit salad at breakfast but, sadly, that was missing this time around. That did not stop us from enjoying fuelling up, though. The coffee was very good. They had a dark roast and a light roast as well as decaf, so we took full advantage of it, knowing that we would be unlikely to get any decent coffee on board the ship. There are all the usual continental items, with cold meats and cheeses, cereal, fresh fruit and various types of bread. Plus hot items that change daily; DH said his omelette was very good. I looked for them the next day and it was scrambled eggs instead, so I missed out. And there is a make-your-own waffle station too.

Just in case it matters to anyone, the plates and cutlery are the disposable type.

We had a full day today in Miami and we had decided to do the ho-ho bus to try and see some stuff we hadn't got round to or had only had a fleeting glance at on our previous visit, most notably Wynwood Walls and Little Havana.

The weather was looking rather unfriendly first thing in the morning and someone (hint: wasn't me!) thought he should dress for a cooler day... By the time we arrived at Bayside, the sun was out and it was pretty warm and that someone realised he hadn't made the best of wardrobe choices! 

In the interests of comfort, given that he had a thick long-sleeved t-shirt on underneath all that stuff, we ended up going back to the hotel so he could change. We reckoned this would cost us maybe 45 minutes tops. Wrong. This was where we fell foul of the changes in the metromover schedule. By the time we'd figured out what was going on, changed trains twice and waited for a then delayed inner loop train, it was 90 minutes before we got back to Bayside and onto the bus. This would subsequently impact the rest of the day.

First stop was Miami Beach where we had a nice wander with a few rest stops in shady spots, eventually followed by an instantly forgettable hot dog with fries that were UNforgettable, not to mention inedible, because of how salty they were. The place was called Redhead Burger. I wouldn't recommend it.

Rest stop with the beach gym equipment. I did not use it, other than as a backdrop.

After lunch we headed back to the bus. The traffic was horrendous and we realised we weren't going to be able to make it to both Wynwood Walls and Little Havana, so we opted to leave Wynwood for a future visit because at least we could see some of the street murals from the bus as we were driving through the area. I think next time I will book us a hotel in the Wynwood area to make sure we don't miss out again.

We enjoyed wandering up and down the main street in Little Havana, cheekily popped into the domino club to use their bathrooms and then indulged in an ice cream from the place with a giant ice cream cone on the wall outside. It was too early for dinner (for us, anyway) so we headed back to the hotel for a pre-dinner rest.

I posted recently here on the boards about restaurants near the Hampton Inn Brickell but I'll just add the information here too, in case it might be useful to anyone who didn't see that thread.

There are several restaurants in immediate walking distance even if you are not very mobile. Turn right out of the main door and there is a Vietnamese place right next door, although it looked like a kind of fast-food place, then there is Sergio's Cuban, the Batch Gastro Pub that @AshleyDillo likes and, on the corner, a place called Alma Rosa which, from the menu, might have been Mexican or Peruvian. It looked quite nice. Just past there was where we ended up, an Italian place called Piola. 

The pizzas were good and reasonably priced but they were too big for us. We could have shared one with a side salad and that would have been the perfect amount. We sat outside on the covered terrace and it was very pleasant. There was a saxophonist playing for part of the time we were there. We were at the far end of the terrace from him so the music wasn't too loud, but it wasn't gentle either; I think if we'd been closer to him, it might have been uncomfortable. At least he played well!

Capricciosa pizza:

And Como pizza:

For information's sake, there are also some eating places if you turn left out of the hotel: Coyotaco and an upscale-looking place with valet parking called Marion. Just beyond that there was another (I think Mexican) whose name escapes me and a 7/11 store for last-minute essentials.

By now, jet-lag and the day's exploring had taken their toll so like the well-behaved pre-vintages that we are, we toddled off back to the hotel for another night's rest before moving to Fort Lauderdale the next day for our final pre-cruise night.

[AshleyDillo]

1 hour ago, FionaMG said:

Just past there was where we ended up, an Italian place called Piola.

We have wrestled with trying this place but we have one in our traveling party who has issues with garlic and onions, but only sometimes, so Italian is always dangerous. It's even more dangerous when it is more than two steps away from the hotel front door

[jbrinkm]

Following! This is our exact cruise in March, and you're right - I haven't seen a review of it either! Thank you for doing one. I'm especially curious about your shore excursions/activities at the port stops.

23 hours ago, FionaMG said:

we were flying on the Portuguese flag carrier, TAP

How do you like TAP? I've seen it have some inexpensive fares and always wondering how it is as a carrier for transatlantic flights.

1 hour ago, FionaMG said:

We started the day with the Hampton's usual included breakfast. The last time we stayed here (pre-Covid), they had a wonderful fruit salad at breakfast but, sadly, that was missing this time around. That did not stop us from enjoying fuelling up, though. The coffee was very good. 

Hoo boy, I am surprised to hear this opinion about the coffee!  Hampton Inn is my family's usual go-to hotel when traveling (we like the 2 queen suites that give us 3 sleeping spaces) and we find that coffee terrible. I don't usually put sugar in my coffee but when I'm there, I find myself adding 3 packets to cover the taste. 

2 hours ago, FionaMG said:

it was 90 minutes before we got back to Bayside and onto the bus.

Oof, this sounds rough. I guess they hadn't marked it with the changes in the route?

 

 

 

 

[FionaMG]

12 minutes ago, jbrinkm said:

Following! This is our exact cruise in March, and you're right - I haven't seen a review of it either! Thank you for doing one. I'm especially curious about your shore excursions/activities at the port stops.

How do you like TAP? I've seen it have some inexpensive fares and always wondering how it is as a carrier for transatlantic flights.

Hoo boy, I am surprised to hear this opinion about the coffee!  Hampton Inn is my family's usual go-to hotel when traveling (we like the 2 queen suites that give us 3 sleeping spaces) and we find that coffee terrible. I don't usually put sugar in my coffee but when I'm there, I find myself adding 3 packets to cover the taste. 

Oof, this sounds rough. I guess they hadn't marked it with the changes in the route?

TAP are actually OK. They do have issues with punctuality but unless you have a short connection somewhere that's not necessarily a problem. And they do have a tendency to shoot themselves in the foot with poor customer service when it comes to admin issues, especially refunds. That said, the few times I've had to contact them for something I've DM-ed them on FB messenger and my issue has been resolved promptly and to my satisfaction, so I guess it's one of those YMMV things.

Their fleet is very new, so decent aircraft. Most, but not all, have internet access at various price points and with free text messages (whatsapp, etc. no images) and USB charging points. As it happens, on this trip, the return flight was on one of their slightly older planes, so no connectivity or charging points, but when your flight leaves at 1 am chances are you're going to be asleep anyway. 

The crew and ground staff are generally extremely helpful and friendly. On connecting flights, they will usually have staff at the end of the jetbridge or at the bus arrival point (yes, Lisbon Airport is hopelessly undersized for the amount of traffic it gets, so buses to the terminal building are often a thing) directing connecting passengers.

So, all in all, when comparing prices, I do believe you get value for money when flying with them. Also, they're Star Alliance so you may be able to get an award flight with them if you have partner miles. I don't know where you're based but they fly to Portugal from a number of US airports: Miami, Newark, JFK, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco and I think maybe Washington. I may be missing a couple if they've introduced any newer routes.

Hampton Inn coffee, to be fair, I don't remember it being as good the last time we stayed there. Maybe they've changed their supplier in the meantime? I do like my coffee strong so I was happy. 

Yes, the metromover, I could figure out the routes ok, because there were easy-to-understand maps at the stations. The big problem was that it didn't say anywhere at Brickell station or the one for Bayside (forget the name) that the Brickell route wasn't operating. We half figured it out because there were absolutely no Brickell trains coming through, but taking the Omni Full Loop would have meant going ALL the way round to get where we wanted to go, which was a few stops back in the totally opposite direction. It wasn't until we jumped on an inner loop that took us back to Government Center that we finally saw a notice about the Brickell Loop. It was a bit frustrating but it wasn't the end of the world ane we made it eventually. 

 

[PPPJJ-GCVAB]

12 hours ago, FionaMG said:

Day Two - Miami

We started the day with the Hampton's usual included breakfast. The last time we stayed here (pre-Covid), they had a wonderful fruit salad at breakfast but, sadly, that was missing this time around. That did not stop us from enjoying fuelling up, though. The coffee was very good. They had a dark roast and a light roast as well as decaf, so we took full advantage of it, knowing that we would be unlikely to get any decent coffee on board the ship. There are all the usual continental items, with cold meats and cheeses, cereal, fresh fruit and various types of bread. Plus hot items that change daily; DH said his omelette was very good. I looked for them the next day and it was scrambled eggs instead, so I missed out. And there is a make-your-own waffle station too.

Just in case it matters to anyone, the plates and cutlery are the disposable type.

 

There are several restaurants in immediate walking distance even if you are not very mobile. Turn right out of the main door and there is a Vietnamese place right next door, although it looked like a kind of fast-food place, then there is Sergio's Cuban, the Batch Gastro Pub that @AshleyDillo likes and, on the corner, a place called Alma Rosa which, from the menu, might have been Mexican or Peruvian. 

We stayed at same hotel last November…the room was very nice (we had a King suite)…breakfast-just ok.  I drink my coffee with light cream (my one habit I will never break!) so could not drink theirs as they have those little creamers .  We also LOVED Batch Gastro Pub!  The food was sooo good!  
I am currently in San Antonio staying at the Hampton Inn and coffee is awful!  Luckily my granddaughter and I found a cute little shop around the corner with Starbucks like coffee so every morning this week we walked there before breakfast to grab our coffees (well, I got a Caramel Macchiato and she got a Caramel Blended frozen drink).

[FionaMG]

Day Three - Fort Lauderdale

Partly because our ship was leaving from Port Everglades and mostly because hotel prices in Miami on that Friday night jumped substantially, we moved to Fort Lauderdale for our third pre-cruise night.

After enjoying another Hampton breakfast we got our stuff together and called a Lyft to go to Fort Lauderdale. It took about 45 minutes and cost just under $40 not including tip.

In Fort Lauderdale, we were returning to the Best Western Plus Oceanside Inn on Seabreeze. We have stayed here twice before and it ticks our boxes in terms of price, location and amenities, this last essentially meaning the included breakfast, which is usually a deal breaker for us when choosing a hotel. However, there is also a bar that serves both drinks and food. The food menu is below. We did not eat there so can't attest as to the quality.

Two queens with balcony. The balcony overlooked the pool area of the B Ocean next door.

 

Food menu.

 

We were lucky in that there was a room available and we able to check in straight away.

After putting our things in our room we headed out to spend the rest of the day wandering up and down the seafront, punctuated by a couple of eating stops. Sorry, this particular post seems to be almost exclusively about food! 

Lunch was eaten at the Cafe del Mar.

Menu:

Chicken BLT: 

Caprese sandwich:

These sandwiches were very nice but so big we couldn't finish them and we were still stuffed later when we went to Bubba Gump for dinner. We usually do BG when we are in Fort Lauderdale. I know it's not very exciting to most folks reading this but we don't have that chain here and we enjoy it. I forgot to take a pic of the menu but we opted for lighter fare since we were only really eating because it was dinner time and not because we were hungry.

Lobster mac & cheese (appetizer size):

And I think this was mahi mahi:

We went for a long after dinner walk to help with the digestion and then headed back to the hotel for our last pre-cruise sleep.

Fort Lauderdale by night from the Las Olas Bridge:

[FionaMG]

Day Four - It's Cruise Day!

After breakfast, we called a Lyft to the port. It took about 10 minutes and cost just under $13 not including tip.

We arrived within our pre-booked time slot but there were some ladies ahead of us who asked if they could come in anyway even though their time was later and they were told yes. Just an FYI for those who may not be able to secure an earlier arrival time. 

Boarding had already started and although I didn't time it, it probably took us about 20 minutes to get through security, check-in, photo stop and on to the ship.

After dealing with the muster drill, we grabbed a seat in Central Park (and a lemonade and some cookies) until it was time for our 1 pm lunch at Jamies. Actually, if I had been thinking straight at the time, I would have remembered about the Park Cafe and not bothered booking Jamies as that is really a strategy to avoid the WJ on boarding day.

The couple sitting next to us kindly agreed to take a pic for us. We're both hopeless at selfies. I'm so pleased with the one they took, I'm going to print it a frame it. 

Lunch at Jamies:

Garlic buns. Very good.

Meat plank. Also very good.

Penne carbonara. DH said it was meh.

Super salmon. I loved this when I had it on Anthem and it was just as good here.

For dessert we split a banana split. I mentioned in another post on the boards that this was a big let-down. When I had it last, on Anthem, it had come with three large scoops of very high quality ice cream, but today it was three small scoops of normal ice cream. No pic as it did not deserve the space on my camera. 

By this time, the rooms were open. We had booked a neighbourhood balcony guarantee and been assigned 11195, which we could actually see from our table in Jamies. This was our first time in this type of cabin and it was perfectly fine for us. We did find we missed the over-the-bed storage we had had on Anthem and Odyssey. I think a family with 3 or 4 people would struggle to find room for everyone's stuff. One nice thing was that there loads of hangers, some wooden and a lot of what looked like new plastic ones.

On this cruise, we used our balcony a bit more than we have done on previous trips. Comparing CP balcony, BW balcony and OV balcony, I think my favourite is the OV but DH said he really liked seeing CP and listening to the music that they often had playing there in the evening. We knew to keep our curtains closed and we were never bothered by noise so we were happy with our room.

The bed is by the door in this room:

 

Keep the curtains closed! 

The view by day:

And by night:

Given all of the horror stories I had read about My Time Dining on these bigger ships, we had opted for late traditional on this cruise. We were very disappointed with our table (381) which was stuck away in a hidden corner about as far from the beautiful central area as you could possibly get while still actually being in the same room. If I had remembered, I would have checked out the location ahead of time but having had MTD on all of our post-Covid cruises up till now I completely forgot.

The only redeeming factor and which stopped us for asking to change was our servers Sydney and Gendraj. They were just what we old hands expect of our dining room staff: friendly, helpful and attentive to all of our needs.

The Welcome Aboard dinner is one of the (IMHO) better ones of the cut-back menus:

We had the crab cake to start and it did not disappoint. I know it's not a "proper" Maryland crab cake (notice they've stopped calling it "Maryland style" in the menu?) but we like them.

Next came the prime rib. Since they usually overcook this, we asked for medium rare. It came out still kicking and mooing on our plates and we had to send it back for medium. However, either way, it definitely wasn't as good as we remembered.

For dessert we had the Boston cream pie and the cheesecake. I wasn't quick enough with the camera here but suffice to say both were very nice.

After that and ONLY because I mentioned it to them, Sydney, Gendraj and the up until then completely MIA headwaiter, whose name I never did get because he was so rarely seen, brought me my birthday slice of cake with candle. This is a rather disappointing development on Royal's part. In the past, when we had a birthday or anniversary on board, we would always receive this treatment without prompting. I know it was specified on the booking because our lovely MEI agent @michelle put it on and I saw it on the invoice. But our servers didn't know, the HW never came to ask if anyone had a special occasion (someone at the next table also had a birthday during the week) and if I hadn't made a point of mentioning it it would have gone uncelebrated.

In comparison, our DD is currently working as a Guest Services agent on MSC and a member of her team is always tasked with ensuring that everyone celebrating a birthday on board gets a birthday card delivered to their room. It's only a very small gesture but it makes you feel special and I feel Royal have perhaps lost their way a bit in this regard, which is a pity.

That said, when we went to the casino after dinner and I tapped my card to get my free $6 play, the slot machine acknowledged the occasion by flashing up "Happy Birthday!" That did make me laugh.  I still didn't win anything with my free play though.

And then it was time for our ritual bedtime tea and cookies from the Promenade Cafe before turning in for the night.

 

 

 

[WAAAYTOOO]

Happy Birthday, Fiona !

[FionaMG]

26 minutes ago, WAAAYTOOO said:

Happy Birthday, Fiona !

Thank you! 

[jbrinkm]

Happy birthday! Nice pic, and so sorry about your dining table spot - does it feel intimate at least, away from other tables?

I haven't been on a ship yet with Jamie's. Giovanni's on Allure seems to blend in well with Central Park, but is it just me, or does the Jamie's sign seem a bit garish? Bright red neon just seems to clash with everything else in the park...

1 hour ago, FionaMG said:

The couple sitting next to us kindly agreed to take a pic for us. We're both hopeless at selfies. I'm so pleased with the one they took, I'm going to print it a frame it. 

And by night:

 

[Cactus527]

Happy belated birthday!

[FionaMG]

39 minutes ago, jbrinkm said:

Happy birthday! Nice pic, and so sorry about your dining table spot - does it feel intimate at least, away from other tables?

I haven't been on a ship yet with Jamie's. Giovanni's on Allure seems to blend in well with Central Park, but is it just me, or does the Jamie's sign seem a bit garish? Bright red neon just seems to clash with everything else in the park...

 

Thank you! 

Unfortunately, it didn't. It felt like the naughty corner. I felt sorry for the servers because there were a number of empty tables there and I'm guessing some people probably did switch. I actually don't know what we've done to anger the table assignment gods but only once, out of all our cruises on Royal with traditional dining, have we been given a decent table.  Oh well, it's not the end of the world but it did detract from the experience.

Yes, I agree, the big red Jamie's sign is a bit of an eyesore. 

[FionaMG]

16 minutes ago, Cactus527 said:

Happy belated birthday!

Thank you! 

[Ampurp85]

Happy belated birthday .

 

[FionaMG]

2 minutes ago, Ampurp85 said:

Happy belated birthday .

 

Thank you!

[TRagone]

We were on this cruise, too, and also in a Central Park balcony. We were in 10649 and loved this type of cabin. The ambiance at night on the balcony was relaxing and I enjoyed sitting there in the evening. I probably walked right past your table when you were at Jamie’s! We ate there for lunch at noon on embarkation day. We enjoyed our meal there. We had MTD and were also stuck in an out of the way location. We ended up forgoing the main dining room three nights. Our meals there were good, but nothing special. Looking forward to the rest of your recap and seeing if we are in the background of your pictures. 

[FionaMG]

6 hours ago, TRagone said:

We were on this cruise, too, and also in a Central Park balcony. We were in 10649 and loved this type of cabin. The ambiance at night on the balcony was relaxing and I enjoyed sitting there in the evening. I probably walked right past your table when you were at Jamie’s! We ate there for lunch at noon on embarkation day. We enjoyed our meal there. We had MTD and were also stuck in an out of the way location. We ended up forgoing the main dining room three nights. Our meals there were good, but nothing special. Looking forward to the rest of your recap and seeing if we are in the background of your pictures. 

I'm glad you enjoyed your cruise too.

We sat at one of the outside tables at Jamies so it's a safe bet you did walk past us.

Sorry to hear you got a bad table in the MDR too.

[FionaMG]

Day Five - (Cruise Day Two) - At Sea.

Today was a hugely significant day for us. This was the day we accumulated our 175th C&A point. After several anxious days of constantly refreshing my account page, the points have finally posted and we have now made it to the eagerly awaited milestone of D+. Woohoo!  We were among those who really benefited from the post-pandemic double points promo; without it, we would still have been 22 points adrift of D+ at the present moment in time.

We really like when our first full day on a cruise is a sea day because you have time to explore the ship at leisure, so that is what we did, especially since it was our first sailing on Symphony.

We had breakfast in the Windjammer. I am not usually a fan, preferring the MDR, but DH likes the WJ because he can see what's on offer rather than having to imagine it from a description on the menu. And to be fair, on this cruise, we never found the WJ to be the seething mass of humanity we were expecting. Perhaps it was because we usually managed to go at off-peak times but we never had to really hunt for a table and we never once heard the recorded message asking people to leave to make room for others.

On the whole, we enjoyed pretty much everything we ate in the WJ, which was all but one breakfast and most lunches. I don't remember either of us disliking anything that we tried. I meant to make myself a  DIY chocolate chip cookie with vanilla ice cream like @OCSC Mike suggested, but I forgot. I am kicking myself over this and will have to remedy the oversight on a future cruise! 

First WJ breakfast. All subsequent WJ breakfasts were pretty much identical so I won't be boring you with any more pics of them. And, in fact, I didn't take any pics of our WJ lunches.

As you can tell from the breakfast pic, it was a sunny day but there was a very strong wind and this would be a constant throughout much of the cruise, making sunbathing not such a pleasant pastime unless you were lucky enough to be able to find a sunbed in a sheltered spot. That did not stop many of our fellow cruisers from catching some rays.

Although it does look quite busy we never had any real difficulty finding a spot to sit in. That said, we don't mind not being right beside the pool and we actually prefer the seats over the loungers.

There were a few takers for some of the casitas that can be seen in the pics. I was less than impressed with these. Because the sides are slatted, the wind blew right through them. Also, as the sun moved so did the shade. I did see some of them occupied, though, so clearly some people found value in them. The loungers did have nice, thick padded cushions on them, so I'm sure they were far more comfortable than the normal ones.

Given the weather, the solarium was very busy. I somehow managed not to take any pics of the solarium, which was very remiss of me, but we noticed that it had openings in the ceiling that let the air (and the wind!) in and because the wind was so strong on these days, it was whistling very loudly through those openings. I think that noise would have got to me after a bit. We don't usually spend much time in the solarium anyway but I would have to say I preferred the ones on Odyssey and Anthem, precisely because of that, although I imagine it wouldn't be an issue on a calm day.

There was a parade called "Anchors Aweigh" in the promenade today (it would subsequently be repeated on the last sea day, presumably to ensure more people had a chance to see it). It lasted about 15 minutes and was a lot of fun. Lots of folks staked out their spots well in advance, taking advantage of the chairs at Sorrento's, the pub and the Café. If you don't mind standing, the overlook at Focus, the photo place, affords a great view. Again, you do need to get there early to secure your spot.

Today was Super Bowl and the game was shown in a number of venues. We popped into the theatre just as they were playing the US national anthem and the atmosphere was electric. It was also shown in the Aqua Theatre, which was packed, and at Playmakers. The tables in Playmakers were all roped off; I think you had to book if you wanted to sit there as it said something about it in the app and there was a dollar sign.

Because of the event, tonight was not formal night as would normally be expected and the dinner menu was not the usual French menu. Instead it was a casual night and the dinner menu was the Italian menu.

Minestrone soup:

DH hated this and only ate a couple of spoonsful. He said it had a strong acidic taste to it. I reckon that would have been from the tomatoes. Any time I'm making sauces or soups with tomatoes I throw in some sugar to counteract the acidity. Anyway, since his tummy had been acting up a bit today, he decided just to have a cheese plate and leave it at that.

I had the arancini, which I really enjoyed:

The sole, which was fine, nothing to write home about.

And the Italian chocolate-hazelnut cake, which was better than I had been expecting, having been disappointed with it on a couple of previous cruises:

After dinner, we went to see the ice show, which was very good. We were too busy actually watching it to get much in the way of pictures but it is definitely a not-to-be-missed entertainment item.

This was followed by a few minutes (literally all the time it took!) in the casino for DH to make his nightly contribution and we then retired exhausted from our long day of doing not a lot and needing to rest up in preparation for repeating it all again the following day. 

 

[OCSC Mike]

5 minutes ago, FionaMG said:

I meant to make myself a  DIY chocolate chip cookie with vanilla ice cream like @OCSC Mike suggested, but I forgot. I am kicking myself over this and will have to remedy the oversight on a future cruise!

Next time...

Loving the food pics. Even though I'm not a big MDR fan, it's nice to see stuff (much like your husband likes to see the buffet spread). When I see "chocolate hazelnut cake" on a menu I assume I'd get a slice of cake... yours looks more like the warm chocolate cake from the Royal (lobster) night menu. Was there a strong hazelnut flavor or mostly chocolate? Asking for my wife who winds up just getting ice cream most MDR nights (she loved the warm chocolate cake though).

[FionaMG]

12 minutes ago, OCSC Mike said:

Next time...

Loving the food pics. Even though I'm not a big MDR fan, it's nice to see stuff (much like your husband likes to see the buffet spread). When I see "chocolate hazelnut cake" on a menu I assume I'd get a slice of cake... yours looks more like the warm chocolate cake from the Royal (lobster) night menu. Was there a strong hazelnut flavor or mostly chocolate? Asking for my wife who winds up just getting ice cream most MDR nights (she loved the warm chocolate cake though).

It was indeed like the warm chocolate cake and it was mostly chocolate. The hazelnutty bit was more about the flakes on top. I did not order the ice cream with it; our waiter brought that on his own initiative and it was a good call. It did not go to waste. 

[OCSC Mike]

2 minutes ago, FionaMG said:

It was indeed like the warm chocolate cake and it was mostly chocolate. The hazelnutty bit was more about the flakes on top. I did not order the ice cream with it; our waiter brought that on his own initiative and it was a good call. It did not go to waste. 

Thanks, good to hear! Italian is one of my wife's acceptable MDR menus. Worst case... she doesn't like it and just gets ice cream anyway and I eat her cake.

[FionaMG]

3 minutes ago, OCSC Mike said:

Thanks, good to hear! Italian is one of my wife's acceptable MDR menus. Worst case... she doesn't like it and just gets ice cream anyway and I eat her cake.

Agree with your wife as far as the word "acceptable". Not our favourite but also not one of the ones that we'd class as "avoid at all costs".

[Ampurp85]

Your husband was correct, that minestrone soup was horrible. It is so good at Giovanni's table. They need to add either vegetable or chicken broth to cut the tomato. You are also correct about the hazelnut cake, my mother was so disappointed with hers on mariner and it seems to not be consistent, as I had in on Allure and it was really wet.

[FionaMG]

4 minutes ago, Ampurp85 said:

Your husband was correct, that minestrone soup was horrible. It is so good at Giovanni's table. They need to add either vegetable or chicken broth to cut the tomato. You are also correct about the hazelnut cake, my mother was so disappointed with hers on mariner and it seems to not be consistent, as I had in on Allure and it was really wet.

That is good to know. We will need to try it the next time we are on a ship with Giovanni's. 

[OCSC Mike]

19 minutes ago, FionaMG said:

Agree with your wife as far as the word "acceptable". Not our favourite but also not one of the ones that we'd class as "avoid at all costs".

For her, "acceptable" means there is actually an entree on the menu that she'd be OK ordering, not that she will necessarily love it. We stopped doing much MDR at all for a while b/c with the old menus, she would order caesar salad and the classic grilled chicken 4 or 5 out of 7 nights. It's not that she was dying to eat boring grilled chicken over and over, she's just that picky.

Our dinner plans are like a logic puzzle built around her acceptable nights but we make it work. I eat enough outside of dinner that I don't really care. I can always find something somewhere.

[Sweety]

Happy Belated Fiona! Have fun on the cruise.

[FionaMG]

1 minute ago, Sweety said:

Happy Belated Fiona! Have fun on the cruise.

Thank you!

[WAAAYTOOO]

Congrats on making D+. Very nice milestone !

[FionaMG]

1 minute ago, WAAAYTOOO said:

Congrats on making D+. Very nice milestone !

Thanks. We are very pleased to have made it. With all the changes (think Crown Lounge) we were worried they might change the tiers just before we got there.

[FionaMG]

Day Six - Cruise Day Three - Another Day at Sea

Today was largely a repeat of yesterday, i.e. generally loafing around. It was still very windy but as we were farther south it was a bit warmer.

Our Chef's Surprise (or whatever it's called) turned up in the room today. Another sign of the cutbacks. There used to be six bites on this plate; today's had only four. Not that we minded since we didn't eat them anyway. 

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, formal night had been shifted from day two to day three to accommodate Super Bowl, so tonight's dinner was the corresponding French menu.

I don't care for any of the starters on this menu so I didn't order one, plus I was saving space for the bits that come along with the Indian main course. I think DH might have had the pumpkin soup but I have no pic to substantiate that suspicion.

I love Indian food. Back home in my native Scotland we have a very large Indian community and we have some very highly rated restaurants. However, I'm the only one in the household who likes it, so I was thrilled when Royal started having a nightly Indian dish, even though they are not as fully authentic as you might get on land. I did ask Stanley about this (he is from India) and he said that, on board, they did not have access to all the spices that they would normally use on land. Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed the ones that I did have on board.

Tonight's was lamb rogan josh:

DH had the tenderloin and asked for fries with it. Luckily, fries are on the kids' menu so you can get them every night if you want.

He said it was fine, again nothing to write home about but definitely better than the prime rib from the first night.

The desserts were good.

Warm apple cobbler:

And cappuccino chocolate cake with a side of vanilla ice cream.

One of the things we missed on this sailing, in comparison to the "old days", was the nightly show. Our typical routine back in those days would be dinner, show, casino, and tea & cookies before bed.

At something of a loose end, we wandered onto the boardwalk where the aqua show was due to start. We had bookings for the following night but thought if we could get in on the standby line we might as well see it tonight. There didn't seem to be a huge crowd and they let us in ahead of the usual cut-off time.

However, remember that wind I mentioned earlier on... well, it was so strong that the water was literally sloshing out of the pool and onto the stage in huge waves. Obvious outcome, the show that night was cancelled. So much for catching it a day early. Oh well, at least we had bookings for the next night. The cancelled show was rescheduled for 7 pm on night five.

So instead we had an early night in preparation for our first port of call the next day, which would be Aruba.

[jbrinkm]

Huh, we have the same itinerary as you at the end of March, but we have Labadee first, then Aruba, then Curacao, with 2 sea days at the end. I wondered when you said they pushed formal night back, when they would do it, but it makes sense when you had the two sea days in the beginning rather than the end of the sailing.

Congrats on D+, big milestone!!!

[FionaMG]

Day Seven - Cruise Day Four - Aruba

Today was the first of our three ports of call. 

We were in port from 8 am until 9 pm. 

We had booked an excursion through Royal, called "Aruba's Hidden Gems". The amount of information in Internet Land about this particular excursion is extremely sparse, so we had little more than Royal's own description to go by and we all know how "good" those are. 

The excursion was initially supposed to start at 1.30 pm but in the week before the cruise it was changed to 12.30 pm. As I understand it, this excursion sometimes operates in the morning and sometimes in the afternoon. The fact that this was an afternoon one meant we didn't need to be up early, which was great. I hate getting up early! 

The meeting point was on the pier at 12.15 so we had a leisurely breakfast and still had time for a stroll through the town to do a little bit of souvenir shopping. This would turn out to be a good call, because by the time we returned to the ship at the end of the excursion (5.30 pm ish) it was coming up to closing time for the shops in main street (6 pm). The souvenir stalls beside the port stay open until later though.

Given the lack of information, I was quite surprised to discover that there were two full busloads for the excursion, which was operated by De Palm Tours. It departed on time and our driver/guide was Ray. He was very good but one thing I did not like was that he did not have a hands-free microphone, so he was essentially driving with one hand and using the other to hold the microphone. I meant to comment on this on the post-cruise questionnaire but forgot . The bus itself was comfortable and had air conditioning; it wasn't one of those open-sided ones.

I did keep notes on this one, so I would be able to give a good description afterwards.

Our first stop was at a place called Tourism Plaza where there is an Aruba sign and, behind it, a path to Surfside Beach, which is apparently popular with locals. It was nice enough but not a patch on Eagle Beach, which has to be one of my all-time favourite beaches anywhere. My pic of DH is far better than either of the ones he took of me, which is why you're getting him! 

Surfside Beach. The ship in this pic is P&O's Britannia. Ours was parked behind it so you can't see it from this vantage point.

Our second stop was at Mangal Alto Beach. Mangal Alto means Tall Mangroves and the beach was hidden behind them to the extent that you couldn't see it from the road. DH did a better job with the camera this time. 

From here, we drove through the future art district of San Nicolaas, 19 km southeast of Oranjestad, where we saw lots of murals that reminded me of the ones we'd seen when were driving through Wynwood in Miami. Ray told us that the Aruban government is putting a lot of money into this area and that work is ongoing to build a brand new cruise port here. When it is ready, it is to be used for the larger cruise ships while the smaller ones will continue to dock in Oranjestad. The area did look very nice. Unfortunately, since the bus was moving and we didn't stop here, I didn't get any pics of the murals.

Next, we stopped at the Grotto of Lourdes, a religious landmark with a roadside shrine built into the cliff that is used for Catholic worship.

From here, we went to the first of the two sets of caves we would visit during the excursion. They are located in the Arikok National Park.

Quadirikiri Cave.

View from the mouth of the cave. Note that there are some very steep uneven steps to get up here.

Inside the cave:

The "heart" above us in this last one is formed by the light interacting with the minerals on the cave wall. Ray told us all exactly where to stand and kindly took pics for everyone who wanted one.

The next cave was the Fontein Cave, which has ancient paintings inside it. There was no steep staircase to get into this one but you still had to take care because the ground is uneven under foot and it is dark inside the cave.

The green colour on the rock is caused by the mineral content.

There are porta-potties at the caves. Obviously not ideal but when needs must... Be sure to have tissues and wipes to hand.

From the caves, we drove a very short distance to see a cove whose name I can't remember and, unfortunately, I did not get a pic of the sign with the name on it.

To get on to the beach, you have to go down a staircase.

Swimming is not allowed at this cove because the sea is too dangerous.

The area around it is very barren.

The roads in the national park are not paved so it was quite a bumpy ride even though Ray drove very slowly. However at least we didn't get covered in dust like the folks we saw in some jeeps.

From here we headed to our last stop, the Casibari rock formation. We had been here before on a previous visit to Aruba. There is a passage through the rock that you can use to get to the top. You need to be very careful of your footing and also mindful of the very low ceiling. Alternatively, walk round to the left where there is an actual staircase.

There is a good view from the top and you can see the ships off in the distance. It was a bit hazy at this time of day, but you can still see them in the pic even so.

There are free toilets here but they were out of order on this occasion. They had been in use on our previous visit. However, across the road there is a small facility offering snacks, souvenirs and a proper toilet that you had to pay a dollar to use. We did not go in so I can't say what it was like.

This was the last stop on the tour and from here we headed back to the ship.

Given the timing of the tour - over lunchtime - and with very little in the way of food available during it, we were quite hungry so we made a beeline for Sorrento's for some pizza, although we were careful not to overindulge as we would be eating at 150 Central Park later.

Overall, we enjoyed this tour as it gave us a chance to see some sights that we would not have been able to otherwise. I booked it during a sale at $49.99 each and, in fact, used up some Next Cruise OBC to pay for it. I know it did go up during non-sale periods, but I can't remember exactly how much. I have a feeling maybe another $10 on top.

The description lists the tour as being "strenuous". I would have to say that's probably a bit of an exaggeration, but the stairs up into the cave could be a bit challenging for some people and it would be a definite "no" if you are not normally mobile.

I would recommend wearing trainers (sneakers) or some other comfortable closed-toe footwear. Sandals and flip-flops are definitely not a good idea given the underfoot conditions.

Since this has been quite a long post, I'll do a separate one for our evening activities.