Mariner of the Seas Review

4.5 / 5.0
1,328 reviews

Italian group first with Royal Caribbean

Review for the Western Caribbean Cruise on Mariner of the Seas
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antholuc
First Time Cruiser • Age 60s

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Sail Date: Nov 2008
Cabin: Interior Stateroom

Background information: 53 years old, male, retired from airline cabin crew, 2 previous cruises with Costa and Celebrity. Cruised with my wife and 19 year old son.Travel to port of embarkation: Slept in Orlando and with private bus reached Port Canaveral: Embarkation: took us 1 hour from the moment we reached the Port at noon Unfortunately and I do not know why, Only 3 of us, out of 50, received documents and tags. This has meant a lot of confusion to help my 50 friends to fill out blank tags given on the premises while the luggage were being taken down from the bus: stress and confusion because my friends only speak few words of english. Stateroom 6637, inside stateroom, smaller than Costa and Celebrity but enough room for storage. Nicely appointed. This room had a bunk bed for the third occupant, rather than a sofa-bed, like Celebrity and Costa. This meant that my wife had to pay attention to her head when getting up from the bed, since the bunk bed was right on top of our bed. The stateroom was very quiet and well isolated from our "neighbors". Ship info: This voyager class vessel is very elegant, clean and didn't appear "claustrophobic" even if it was at it's full capability. The Windjammer "Lido" restaurant even in the busiest hours, never had long lines, and this because of it's many food stations. Shore excursions: Labadee, Haiti - RCCL owned, has nice beaches, the best one is Malfini beach, in my opinion. Waters are calm and best suitable for small children. On the other side there is a wide beach with a nice view but with not so powdery sand and the sea can get rough as it is not protected as Malfini is. Ocho Rios: We organized everything on the Internet, since we were 50 italian guys. We chose Marva Shaw, since we heard good reports from other cruisers. Well we had a good time and felt in no danger with her. We first went to the Dunn's River Falls and then to the James Bond beach, which we left in 5 (five) minutes, since we found it to small. Besides that, the restaurant appeared to be closed, even if the guy that was in the premises told us it was "open". We moved to Mahogany Beach, much closer to the where the ship was anchored and much nicer. We ate at the restaurant on the beach (try the jerk chicken) and enjoyed it, even if we didn't have time for a swim, since we lost much time going to James Bond beach first. Grand Cayman; Also in Cayman we organized via internet with Nativeway: excellent decision: we had the snorkel, Rum Point beach and stingray tour and it was worth it. Rum Point beach is amazing, like an "away from it all" experience. There is a restaurant on the beach where we had a good and reasonably priced lunch. Only downturn is that time runs fast and when you are beginning to enjoy the beach, it is time to go! Cozumel: Here we didn't organize anything and things went anyway very smooth. We just took two taxis with fixed price fares to Playa Palancar: I have heard of aggressive taxi drivers, but we did find very friendly mannered people with reasonable priced fares and taxis awaiting in line for customers to come. Playa Palancar is beautiful and just 10 minutes away: it has a bar a restaurant, and a dive shop where tours depart for the famous Palancar reef offshore. To return to the ship or to visit Cozumel with it's souvenir shops, just ask for a taxi at the entrance of the beach. Problems: It was challenging: bring 50 italian friends on a first time cruise in a first time landing in United States. And what better than Mariner of the Seas: one of the biggest cruise line companies and one of the biggest ships on earth until a few years ago! We booked on march to ensure everybody to have staterooms on the same deck and possibly near to each other. The ship is splendid! Every public room is very clean and the cabins are well appointed even if a little smaller compared with Celebrity ships. For example my son of 19 had to sleep in a bed that came from the roof instead of the sofa bed that we had on Celebrity,s Millennium ship. The happiness of being on board soon vanished as we noticed that on all our Royal Caribbean electronic keys we had Second seatings options. I had to spend more than 2 hours with the Maitre'D to have what we asked for in March! Without doubt something went wrong with RCCL organization! Anyway we were settled on two different decks for dinner, 4th and 5th deck, and on different tables, so we couldn't share each others company while dining. In the meanwhile I asked every single day, starting from sunday evening, where were our onboard credits, from 75$ to 200$, that everyone was entitled for at time of booking. Only on thursday evening we were told that RCCL was not aware of our onboard credits! Most of us by that date had spent what they presumed to have, so this is a big concern for us but not for RCCL who seemed to not pay much attention to. Food and Service: Excellent, better than I imagined. The staff was all very professional and ready to help in any way. The food was of good quality, even the fillet steak was more than average. Cabin attendant: very good to excellent. Entertainment: Business as usual except for the Ice Show and the phenomenal "The Temptations" tribute band: really enjoyable and a show you would pay for in any city. In conclusion I say it is a pity that after all the efforts RCCL makes to have a "good value for money" cruise, they have to make 50 persons first timers, disembark with the feeling of something "spoiled". Anthony L

Cabin Review

Interior Stateroom

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