My wife and I sailed with a group of 45 people arranged from a travel agency with people from our community. We had a wonderful experience on this unbelievable ship. The major flaw on the cruise occurred in the dining arrangements. We requested late seating (8:30 PM) in the main dining room and a table for 8 or 10. We like to meet and mingle with new people. We were assigned a table number on our sail card and appeared there the first night. It was a table for 6 but the waiter put the wrong table number on the table and 6 people were sitting there when we arrived. Well the Maitre'd did some shuffling and we were seated with 2 other couples that was absolutely lovely. The evening was great and we made new friends. Low and behold, the next morning there was a notice in our cabin that our table was changed and we would be on table #127 in the EARLY seating. It was a shock and required me to visit the dining room captain to see about the change. Well he told me that the slip was filled out wrong and it still was late seating. (mistake #2). He then told me the other people at the table requested to relocate and as we were the only ones left, he had to relocate us as well. Well that turned out to be a lie. (mistake #3). In any case he offered me a table for 4 which I protested as I wanted a large table. He then told me I am in luck as 1 couple just requested to be moved from a table of 8 and we were moved to table #438. On arrival the next night, we found that 1 couple (although lovely people) did not speak a word of English. a 2nd couple, newly married daughter of the first couple were on their honeymoon and never showed up for dinner. And the last couple worked out fine except they didn't dine too often in the dining room. Low and behold, I met the original couples in one of the shows and they wanted to know where we went. They were still at the original table and we were replaced by a different couple. They were so upset, as we were, that they made heroic strides to get the Maitre'd to relocate them all to a table for 8 and return us to their table. The remainder of the dining experience was happily ever after. Thanks to the perseverance of those couples and no thanks to the dining room staff.

That entire experience was a bummer. I felt badly for the couple on the relocated table when we no longer showed up. I felt badly for the waiters, who were great people, for the juggling act. and I was in a quandry as to who to tip so I wound up tipping all of them. Except for the Maitre'd on the first table as I felt he was responsible for the whole mess. It put a damper on the trip and we lost a number of nights of enjoyable dining.

We also dined in Giovanni's table (lunch), 150 Central Park, Park Cafe, Promenade Cafe, Johnny Rockets and each one was greater than the last. Including service, food and pricing. The very best was a 2 1/2 hour dining experience at 150 Central Park. One of the best evenings of dining. Our waiter (Pritish) was exquisite. Personal attention and continual explanations of the food and preparation and where each thing came from and how it was prepare made it fabulous. Read more