I chose to book my honeymoon with Royal Caribbean. I chose this company because of their reputation, loyalty program and a past experience aboard. I was shocked to find two days before my cruise date that my honeymoon would be less of an experience than I expected it to be. I called RC two months or so before the sail date and booked directly with one of their phone operators, Lewis. Lewis was so helpful, kind and excited for my honeymoon. I told Lewis that my husband and I were looking to book a suite, wanted have some alone time, wanted to celebrate his birthday, dine at the chefs table and really enjoy the ship for what it had to offer. Lewis explained that I would get better pricing if I agreed to a "suite guarantee" where I didn't have a choice of stateroom location but I would be assigned one in the class I chose before the sail date.
I was so excited about what the suite class had to offer. We planned on being lazy, laying out on our private balcony. Away from the many families with young children that would be onboard. We looked forward to Coastal Kitchen, and priority boarding. A honeymoon is meant to be lavish and sadly our expectations were not even half met. Two days before our sail date I received a phone call that the ship "was overbooked" and RC was downgrading our Jr. Suite to an ocean balcony room. I honestly cried, I know it sounds dramatic but I had an image painted in my head of the vacation my husband and I were about to enjoy. As I tired not to cry on the phone with the RC rep. I was rushed into agreeing to their downgrade with a money back offer on the difference of the room and $300 onboard credit. My husband came home to a crying wife, and quickly called RC back to explain that the offer wasn't sufficient and the vacation wasn't proving to be what we had imagined.
The phone operator assured me that we would get a phone call the morning of the sail date as to whether or not there were any cancellations. She promised our sea pass card would reflect the initial booking we made in the suite class and the opportunity to utilize Coastal Kitchen would be there. She also threw in the complete romance package, I guess so that my husband could try to salvage the lack of grandeur we were about to experience.
This cabin was not the one we initially booked, as you can read in my review. Upon arriving I had welcome notices in the name of another guest who must have booked their room there initially. The room was clean, attendant was good. The balcony was fine, just not the room I was expecting.
We live in the general area, and would not do an excursion here.
I would skip getting off the boat here.