Cabin Review

This was by far the smallest cabin I have every stayed in. The size is needed to fit four interior rooms in addition to two ocean views in the width of the ship with three total but narrow hallways/corridors, the one for our room was a dead-end with an emergency exit at the other (crew only door). Several of the corridors on the ship were too narrow to easily pass people going the opposite direction, made worse by the lack of space for the stateroom attendants carts. The room size wouldn't be much of a problem except the walls need to flare out to fit the bed(s) along with minimal walking space. When the beds are combined into one larger bed it leaves only enough room for someone to shuffle sideways around the bed but then needing to turn last second as the walls angle back in towards the room. (Would have a more reasonable path if beds are separated). The biggest headache with the beds was one was much older and falling apart (I always check seams for signs of bedbugs, there weren't any which is nice). But given the two were different ages and firmness they were also different heights so when the beds were put together there was a more than one inch height difference. This made things rather uncomfortable. We complained about this on day one, and on day two we were given a mattress foam cushion (which smelled light feet) which helped not only bridge the gap between the mattresses but also make the height difference less noticeable. This was removed on day 3 (not sure why) and never put back so we simply made due).

The rooms accent lights are only controlled by a switch above one side of the bed, so they are turned on they can be annoying to turn back off (usually turned on my stateroom attended during morning room maintenance). The main cabin lights have a button press style switch (to allow a control on either side of the room, and I assume some central control by the ship), this is fine but they often had as much as a 30 second delay before starting to turn on one light at a time. It would also cause a slight flash in the reading lights above the bed, so perhaps just badly wired in our room).

The lack of seating is a big annoying, but given the size of the room there isn't much space to put any (though from what I understand most larger rooms still don't have more seating). There is only a box that acts as storage (it opens), as a table (though too low to use without chairs), or as a chair (if you remove the hard table surface there is a cushion to sit on while at the desk/makeup mirror).

The thermostat was fine, it had a cool button (snowflake symbol) to bring the temp back down more quickly but it would then reset to the default room temp and negate the results). There were several levels of cooling and warming though the room would randomly feel too warm or too cool depending on time of day with no way of easily telling what temperature it was in the room (I usually bring a magnetic thermometer but forgot it this time).

The usual fridge in a cabinet is in the room stocked with overpriced water (I take them out on the first day so I can use the fridge). But either they didn't vent this area correctly or it was replaced with the wrong style fridge it was extremely hot around the unit as soon as you opened the door hiding the unit. It would be impossible in that heat for the fridge to operate efficiently (negating the energy savings of turning off the room lights when leaving).

The safe was standard in the closet but facing sideways and harder to access. This also recessed into the wall slightly removing use of some shelf space outside the closet (space for 3+ shelves but only two are offered due to the back of the safe). Though the safe didn't take up nearly as much space as was reserved for it.

The bathroom was rather large compared to the rest of the room. Our room had a built-in tissue paper box (nose) holder but we did not have the tissue box, or the spare usually found on the shelf below the sink. We asked for one and received it a day or two later. The toilet paper was single ply though later we received a two ply-roll. Neither was great or very absorbent but at least the two-ply was less see-through. The shelves in the bathroom were dusty, and the mirror was streaky (it was cleaned several times throughout the cruise, sometimes even leaving some cleaning foam hanging from the light above the mirror).

The shower was fine (though not seemingly properly cleaned regularly with hair from multiple previous guests on multiple walls in various lengths and colors, I make it a point to wash down the walls when I finish showering before turning off the water) with built in shampoo and bodywash dispensers (no details on either and no option for those who are sensitive to perfumes or dyes other than to bring your own). The shower controls are a standard style found on almost every ship. With a nob for pressure on one side and temp on the other and a mixing valve in the bar in the middle (Which can get very hot to the touch). On this ship the shower stall is a reasonable size and to make it bigger the shower controls and head are recessed into a small alcove in the wall, along with a small bar to places your foot when washing your legs or perhaps shaving). The problem is this ship (or at least our room) is using rain-fall style shower heads (not uncommon when reducing water pressure and consumption), but the style is meant to be more above you as the limited water pressure reduces any arch when mounted at an angle. This is where the combination of this style shower head and the recessed alcove become a problem. You basically need to constantly hold the detachable shower head above you with one hand or squeeze into the alcove (not using most of the shower area) which isn't so easy for larger individuals. This made showering more of a headache than a relaxing experience (though easily fixed with a different style low flow shower head or a mount to hold the shower head/wand somewhere more central in the shower.

The biggest annoyance with the room was the door. The handle would require an inconstant amount of force to open that wasn't resolved in our voyage. Sometimes it was smooth and simple and other times it would stop just before unlatching, requiring some extra force (was not easy for my travel companion and I found myself using my left arm due to an injury on my right).