Cabin Review

Our room was a family balcony. We originally booked just a balcony guarantee room, and were upgraded to a larger balcony because the fares for our departure date kept dropping. Our balcony was on a hump and therefore pretty big. We appreciated that the balconies were nonsmoking as past cruises before RCCL banned balcony smoking resulted in us not being able to use or enjoy our outdoor space due to our neighbors' fumes. The room itself was pretty tight. I mean that in both senses: it was cramped for two people to get around each other, and the decor was attractive. The rounded beds look very glamorous but in practice were a weird experience. They were extremely comfortable, but I couldn't sleep very close to the headboard if I wanted to keep my pillow in a rectangular shape, and therefore the highest point I could put my pillow resulted in my 5'4" body hanging off the end of the bed. For the record my 5'10" husband said he had no problem, but he mushes his pillows up every which-way and was not bothered by the loss of mattress space due to the curved shape of the headboard. The other issue I had with the bed was that, due to the curve at the foot, the bedding had to start at that furthest-out point, meaning the linens did not come up as high as a person might desire at bedtime. I realize my round-bed complaints sound a little ridiculous and petty, but, am I really the only person who notices these things? The room featured ample storage space. Just when I thought I had everything put away I found more drawers and hide-y holes where I could put more stuff! There were two poorly thought-out components of the storage though. First, the cupboard adjacent to the vanity mirror, which contains the safe, has a very large door that swings out quite far. If you forget to close it, there is absolutely no way through your stateroom without climbing over the bed. I hit my head several times on this. The other issue was, there is a full-length closet on one side of the wardrobe with two hanging bars, and a half-height closet on the other side of the wardrobe above three large doors. But, all of the hangers are the non-removable kind, meaning since they were all on the top bar of the full-length closet, there were none available to put on the lower bar on that side, or in the half-height closet above the drawers. It wasn't a big deal as I just got creative with my unpacking, but it was still infuriating to look at and wonder what people were thinking when they made design decisions for the closets. The bathroom setup worked mostly okay. You've probably read that the toilet and shower are in separate closets which can be blocked off from the rest of the stateroom by a curtain, and the sink is out in the room across from the rounded bed. This worked fine except during #2. We have been together a long time and we obviously know that we both have to do #2 sometimes ... I just don't want to hear or be heard during this process, and the bathroom closet does not have any noise blocking powers whatsoever. Therefore during these times if both were in the stateroom the non-toilet-closet occupant had to go out on the balcony to avoid listening, or else the toilet-user would have to leave and find a public bathroom. Okay, I probably sound ridiculous, but just think about whether this would matter for you to have a good vacation! The stateroom TVs are interactive, enabling you to reserve shows and restaurants from the comfort of your own bed.