Brilliance of the Seas Review

Brilliance of the Seas - Central America/Panama Canal

Review for the Panama Canal & Central America Cruise on Brilliance of the Seas
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Cruising Family
First Time Cruiser • Age 20s

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Sail Date: Mar 2007
Cabin: Junior Suite
Traveled with children

We are a family of 4. Kids are 10 and 11. We are in our 40's. This was our 6th cruise, the second with RCC. Our first RCC cruise was on the sister ship the Radiance. Overall on this cruise we had a terrific time. The ship is clean and beautiful. The staff everywhere were friendly and helpful. This is our first cruise longer than a week and boy I could get used to that! We had a JS on the 3/16th sailing out of Miami. No problems embarking. We tried to get there earlier but we ran into traffic. Ended up arriving at 1230 and were onboard by 1pm. Our JS did NOT allow for priority/suite check in. But lines were not bad at all. Our JS was very nice. Plenty of room for my family I think. BRAND new bedding and mattress had just been installed. Lots of drawers and a great walk in closet. Our cabin steward David took good care of us. Very friendly and always keep our cooler (full of sodas and some wine delivered from Just Because) full of ice the whole 10 days. No robes or toiletries. Only one shower dispenser with shampoo. The pull out couch is very small, (really I wouldnt even want to sleep there as an adult) so David brought a cot for my daughter. It fit fine in our JS. David closed it up for us every morning anyway. There were two evenings that we got towel animals.

We had early/main seating. We had requested a small table and we did get one. Dining time is quite early, 5:30pm. Too early if you ask me, but the latter is just too late for us. Dennis our waiter was friendly and kind and very hardworking. Karla is assistant as well. Our head waiter Sonja was the most attentive hands-on head waiter we have ever met. Every night she rushed over to cut my son's pizza into little slices like he likes. We certainly appreciate the fine dining room service we received all week. There were several times when we were going to be late for dinner coming back from excursions and our waiter and head waiters encouraged us to come anyway. We did and they took grand and speedy care of us. They seemed to really want to serve us. The dining room food however was not a great as I had hoped. Some things were fine, and some things were very good. But a good bit of the time everything was just ok. Notable favorites were the escargot, tiger shrimp and the lobster. Both nights Dennis handed us seconds without even asking. Sorry, but overall I enjoyed the dining room food on my last Carnival and Princess cruises quite a bit more than this one. We did have the great experience of dining in Chops and Portofinos. WOW! Excellent. Fantastic food from start to finish. I had the crab cake and seafood skewer tower and tiramisu in Portofinos. Excellent. At Chops we had a fantastic filet mignon and you get to try all of the sauces with it. SO Yummy. And my absolute favorite dessert experience ever---Chop's mudpie. DELICIOUS. We were not crazy about the Windjammer. It was ok and well laid out but I never was interested in the main courses offered there. Breakfasts were fine but not great. The pancakes were inedible. Really gross. Gritty and mushy. The french toast was cold and hard. There were 2 omelet stations and lots of juices and lots of fruits and breads. We loved the Seaview cafe. We ate there for lunch most days. The kids loved the pizzas and pasta. We loved the Caesar salads and paninnis. Great service up there too. We did not eat in the Solarium. Someone told me there were crepes there but there were none on my cruise. There were several midnight buffets that I didn't go to so I cannot comment. There was a chocolate buffet the last sea day. Kinda disappointing. I DO like the fact that it was at 3pm rather than midnight. But the line was enormous and the pickins were slim when we finally made it to the front. The chocolate buffet on the Carnival Miracle was WAY better. One further disappointment was the poolside barbecue day. Another huge line for chicken thighs and hotdogs. The poolside barbecue in comparison on the Radiance was memorable mouthwatering ribs. So I guess we were looking for those again. We did go to a couple of the shows. The ones we saw were quite good. My favorite was the production show Now and Then. It was great. The singers are excellent I think. There was also a comedian we all enjoyed. We are big fans of family karaoke. This was only offered one night on the whole cruise. The other karaoke was all late at night and for 18 and over. My husband and I thoroughly enjoyed the Murder Mystery Dinner. The very talented singers and some dancers are the actors. We laughed and had great fun. The food and wind and service at Portofinos that night were excellent too. On sea days we all enjoyed many of the "ship shape" group activities like mini golf tournaments, baggo, ping pong, yoga, walk-a mile. There are many activities to choose from. Also lots of quiet places to do nothing. We played some bingo and read some books. My kids enjoyed spending part of the time in Adventure Ocean. They did some fun activities. Some they liked more than others. But they had a great time.

Ports--I loved Aruba. We rented a jeep from Super Rental Car on the pier and explored the beautiful island. We visited the donkey sanctuary and ostrich farm and the other usual highlights Costa Rica. Beautiful country. I will definitely go back again. So much more to see. We took a small group tour with Oscar Brown. We felt very safe the whole time. We spent alot of the day driving, but we did get to go through the rainforest on the aerial tram, and took a boat through the canals to spot wildlife. Panama Canal. Very interesting. You arrive very early. From the lake we took the ships excursion Monkey Watch. It was ok. Not our favorite excursion. Very long bus ride. Huge group of people. Very disorganized. But we DID see monkeys! A couple of them jumped ontop of the boat canopy looking for a cracker or two! Too cute. Grand Cayman we took a private boat charter booked through Island Marketing. Excellent day. Stingrays and tubing and snorkeling and a picnic on starfish beach. One last note--check your sea pass account. There were several errors on ours. Something weird happened with some excursions that we hadn't ordered, and also some internet time mixup. Guest services did remove the charges after looking into them. All in all, it was a great cruise and excellent itinerary. Happy Cruising Everyone!

Cabin Review

Junior Suite

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