This was our first experience with Royal Caribbean. Having sailed many times with Carnival and Norwegian, we were eager to see what Royal Caribbean was all about. My husband's sister/husband drove up from Florida to our home in Georgia. The four of us drove up together to my husband's brother/wife and all six of us then traveled to Cape Liberty to sail together. Embarkation went smoothly enough for us. I found the ship was showing some age. I understand she is going in for a refit, soon. The Explorer is an attractively decorated ship, though. We sailed pretty full, I believe. The dining areas, promenade, elevators, etc. were all crowded.

I thought that the Explorer's gift shop was poorly stocked. There were a lot of empty shelves, racks, etc. I'd hoped to find a ship specific ornament, as I collect one from every ship we sail on..but there were none to be had. The air conditioning worked great in our cabin, but we felt it was a little warm and stuffy in most of the public areas of the ship..such as the theater and dining and shopping areas. We had a Jr. suite which I loved. One of the best staterooms we've had, yet. Deck 10..almost dead center across the back. Huge balcony, awesome view...large cabin. Walk-in closet. Tub and shower. Very spacious. Our door had some damage to it, though, and the dead-bolt was not operational. We just made sure our valuables were locked in the safe. Our room steward, Lola, was awesome. Seemed to always be working. Our room was always spotless and ready for us.

Our dining room server, Jo Patrick, was wonderful. Took amazing care of us. We ate often in the Windjammer buffet. The food was always plentiful and tasty, but we found it to be kind of chaotic. Things hard to find, at times. The beverages were a little hard to get to, as well...though the servers were really good about circulating the room and bringing you anything you wanted. Once we were back at Cape Liberty, debarkation was chaotic. We were called by numbers to leave the ship once our luggage was ready in the terminal. We felt we were moving along, nicely, when we were brought up to a sudden halt and forced to stand in a crowded 'clump' because they said our luggage was, as it turned out, NOT ready. Once we were able to grab our luggage, it was a breeze moving on through customs. It was rainy and miserable, so we were all grateful when we got everything out and loaded into our van and headed down the highway. :-) We enjoyed this trip, though. It was a great mini-reunion with family that we hadn't seen in quite a while.