Random World Cruise Thoughts...

[CrimsonCruiser]

So now that the rabid interest in the world cruise has calmed down, I'm curious about some things and wonder if anyone knows or can guess on them:

 

Passenger laundry facilities: it came to my attention that Serenade offers coin laundry facilities for passengers on the world cruise (not sure if for all passengers or just people doing the whole length) and I wonder how this came about. Obviously, we all know that the only non-industrial laundry on board is in the crew area for the crew. If passengers are using this does this mean crew have to compete with passengers for limited space? Did Royal build a second laundry area for passengers? did the crew one become a passenger one and the crew was given free pick-up drop off laundry?

Crew contracts: 9-months is a pretty typical crew contract so I'm curious if Royal brought on new contracts specifically for this sailing or if they are still switching people in and out like normal.

Food, water and gas: on a standard week long cruise, the ship is stocked on turn around day. but even the segments are in 3 month periods...so when and where are they stocking up on food, water and gas, and where are they dumping the black and brown water that can't be flushed back into the ocean?

 

These questions have been bopping around in my head since day one and I was hoping the algorithm on TikTok would have brought me to a crew member who could answer...but it hasn't so now you guys get to deal with it lol.

 

Bonus question: I have family on an Oceania world cruise right now, and she mentioned that, as the ship diverts to avoid war areas and piracy, they have a couple days where the passengers are asked to conserve water and some foodstuffs until the ship can restock (limiting showers, not as robust menus). Now obviously Serenade is bigger than any Oceania ship but, also curious if anyone has heard of Serenade doing the same?

 

[Curt From Canada]

38 minutes ago, CrimsonCruiser said:

So now that the rabid interest in the world cruise has calmed down, I'm curious about some things and wonder if anyone knows or can guess on them:

 

Passenger laundry facilities: it came to my attention that Serenade offers coin laundry facilities for passengers on the world cruise (not sure if for all passengers or just people doing the whole length) and I wonder how this came about. Obviously, we all know that the only non-industrial laundry on board is in the crew area for the crew. If passengers are using this does this mean crew have to compete with passengers for limited space? Did Royal build a second laundry area for passengers? did the crew one become a passenger one and the crew was given free pick-up drop off laundry?

Crew contracts: 9-months is a pretty typical crew contract so I'm curious if Royal brought on new contracts specifically for this sailing or if they are still switching people in and out like normal.

Food, water and gas: on a standard week long cruise, the ship is stocked on turn around day. but even the segments are in 3 month periods...so when and where are they stocking up on food, water and gas, and where are they dumping the black and brown water that can't be flushed back into the ocean?

 

These questions have been bopping around in my head since day one and I was hoping the algorithm on TikTok would have brought me to a crew member who could answer...but it hasn't so now you guys get to deal with it lol.

 

Bonus question: I have family on an Oceania world cruise right now, and she mentioned that, as the ship diverts to avoid war areas and piracy, they have a couple days where the passengers are asked to conserve water and some foodstuffs until the ship can restock (limiting showers, not as robust menus). Now obviously Serenade is bigger than any Oceania ship but, also curious if anyone has heard of Serenade doing the same?

 

My soulmate and I were on the Antarctic leg of this cruise in January. It was definitely a Royal Caribbean style cruise, but with quite a few differences that made for an even better experience. First your questions:

1). Laundry:  Only World Cruisers have access and it was a special (very small) area that was created just for them. It did not cause any confrontations , but the scheduling of time in there was an ongoing “process” each week. I do not know the details, but the World Cruisers (and Royal Caribbean) needed to be totally organized to make the scheduling work. 
2). Crew Contracts: They seemed to be just like regular cruises. Crew rotates in and out on normal schedules. Our favourite bartender was going to rotate out and then get back on to Serenade for the last few legs of the World Cruise.  One of the senior Food & Beverage Mgrs rotated out just after our leg and should be back on the ship soon. Staggered rotations for everyone (as usual). 
3). Provisioning & Port Issues: This is a great question. I did not sense any issues at all, but I did sense a big advantage … variety. The food varied noticeably as we moved from one region to the next.  I had the best Filet Mignon at sea while docked (for two days) in Buenos Aires AND I was in the MDR.  The entertainment was much more varied and plentiful.  More variety of enrichment lecturers and topics.  More variety of climates (93+ deg down to 30ish)

We seriously looked at another leg, but could not make the timing work. We could never be away for the entire cruise, but would look at other interesting legs if they ever do again. 

Curt from Canada

[KJones]

My guesses:

There are multiple laundry areas used by the hotel services, I would say maybe on every deck that is primarily staterooms (if not two small ones each deck - one aft / forward). It would be pretty easy to convert one of these into the guest laundry room, without impacting the crew members' own laundry facilities in the crew area. I can't imagine them having crew bring their personal laundry up to the stateroom decks, or sending guests down to the crew decks.

I think I recall reading something about switching out crew as normal. They might just arrive/depart from more varied ports.

The ship likely has laid out of a schedule of how frequently they need food / water / gas etc and have coordinated with local vendors along the itinerary to have the ship restocked while its docked in the various ports.

[smokeybandit]

Last year we met a bartender who was starting out on the world cruise, but timed it to have his contract ending in Manila since he's Filipino.

[CrimsonCruiser]

2 hours ago, Curt From Canada said:

My soulmate and I were on the Antarctic leg of this cruise in January. It was definitely a Royal Caribbean style cruise, but with quite a few differences that made for an even better experience. First your questions:

1). Laundry:  Only World Cruisers have access and it was a special (very small) area that was created just for them. It did not cause any confrontations , but the scheduling of time in there was an ongoing “process” each week. I do not know the details, but the World Cruisers (and Royal Caribbean) needed to be totally organized to make the scheduling work. 
2). Crew Contracts: They seemed to be just like regular cruises. Crew rotates in and out on normal schedules. Our favourite bartender was going to rotate out and then get back on to Serenade for the last few legs of the World Cruise.  One of the senior Food & Beverage Mgrs rotated out just after our leg and should be back on the ship soon. Staggered rotations for everyone (as usual). 
3). Provisioning & Port Issues: This is a great question. I did not sense any issues at all, but I did sense a big advantage … variety. The food varied noticeably as we moved from one region to the next.  I had the best Filet Mignon at sea while docked (for two days) in Buenos Aires AND I was in the MDR.  The entertainment was much more varied and plentiful.  More variety of enrichment lecturers and topics.  More variety of climates (93+ deg down to 30ish)

We seriously looked at another leg, but could not make the timing work. We could never be away for the entire cruise, but would look at other interesting legs if they ever do again. 

Curt from Canada

1 - There was scheduling?! I guess that makes sense considering how many people would be trying to use it at any given time but wow that seems like a bit of a hassle....

3 - so glad to hear the food was changed up and delicious. I definitely did think they would have to switch up the menus (one can only have so much "royal night" lol) and it sounds like they planned ahead based on the stops.

 

2 hours ago, KJones said:

My guesses:

There are multiple laundry areas used by the hotel services, I would say maybe on every deck that is primarily staterooms (if not two small ones each deck - one aft / forward). It would be pretty easy to convert one of these into the guest laundry room, without impacting the crew members' own laundry facilities in the crew area. I can't imagine them having crew bring their personal laundry up to the stateroom decks, or sending guests down to the crew decks.

I think I recall reading something about switching out crew as normal. They might just arrive/depart from more varied ports.

The ship likely has laid out of a schedule of how frequently they need food / water / gas etc and have coordinated with local vendors along the itinerary to have the ship restocked while its docked in the various ports.

It never dawned on me that there would be laundry facilities on more than the lower decks. I know I've seen the rooms filled with towels and sheets up on deck 10, but I just assumed they were staging areas to fill the carts....now I wonder if they machines in there....

 

 

Good to know about the contracts. It would have been a more interesting social experiment to see how the crew got on if they were stuck with the same people for 9 straight months!

[Curt From Canada]

3 hours ago, CrimsonCruiser said:

1 - There was scheduling?! I guess that makes sense considering how many people would be trying to use it at any given time but wow that seems like a bit of a hassle....

3 - so glad to hear the food was changed up and delicious. I definitely did think they would have to switch up the menus (one can only have so much "royal night" lol) and it sounds like they planned ahead based on the stops.

 

It never dawned on me that there would be laundry facilities on more than the lower decks. I know I've seen the rooms filled with towels and sheets up on deck 10, but I just assumed they were staging areas to fill the carts....now I wonder if they machines in there....

 

 

Good to know about the contracts. It would have been a more interesting social experiment to see how the crew got on if they were stuck with the same people for 9 straight months!

1).  I believe they had to book times and stick to those times. If the ship was filled with World Cruisers (2,400ish instead of 700) there may have been massive issues that they would have solved with the large ship laundry services. 
3).  I fear I have misled. Not all food was delicious. It was typical RCL “hit and miss”, some details (all MDR and Specialty … we do not eat in the Windjammer )

Breakfast:  It is hard to mess up breakfast. Everything was good. Nothing spectacular, just good. 

Lunch: This was the miss. A big miss. By the end of the cruise we would have the soup and grab a mediocre sandwich somewhere else.  There was nothing in the MDR for lunch that was good. On bigger ships there are tons of options (other than the MDR) for lunch.  Not on Radiance Class ships (full disclosure we love this class of ship.  Radiance Class sea views more than make up for this shortfall … especially in Antarctica).

Supper:  Meals had some excellent successes (the Filet and a Thai Chicken special were the best at sea that we remember).  Other than that, good consistent food with variety over the entire 18 days  

Specially: Was just like other cruises.  Chops was Chops and it was good.  Giovani’s was OK, but did serve a very memorable risotto.  It was too much, so we told the waiter to hold the potatoe dishes (still to come) and leave the risotto.  It was very special.

Curt from Canada