Brillance Transatlantic Review W/ Pictures

I have posted my blog about this cruise here but I thought I would do a picture review for those who don't want to read the whole story.

The wife and I took this cruise after a long debate. She wanted to visit her mother, I wanted to house hunt and both of those things took us all the way cross country, North to South and West to East. I thought we should take a cruise as long as we've traveled so for to get to Florida.

We timed the cruise to correspond to the mother-in-laws birthday.

The Ship: It's just the right size for us. We don't us the flowrider or things like that. It has dings in the hallway like all ships this age do. The carpet wasn't our favorite. Okay I'm being charitable, we hated the carpets in the halls to the stateroom. We loved the centrum. The library is now a book nook and that wonderful room above the atrium has been taken over by unused equipment. Overall A- for the ship itself.

Out home for 14 days

The front of the ship from the helicopter pad.

The mini golf was fun, but hard to do. It was always windy.

Just loved the Atrium

Nice start, thanks!:)

Can't wait to read the rest. :) Brings back happy memories since we did the Brilliance transatlantic last year and had a fantastic cruise. Thanks for sharing with us.

Looking forward to this as we'll be on there in just under 3 weeks :)

Stateroom

I loved the large balcony with a table you can actually eat off of. I've seen very small tables on other cruise lines. The desk wasn't much to speak of. I'm a writer so I wanted a little more width, but I made it work. Wrote 22,000 words on it. Mostly the cruise blog.

The bed was hard. Wife complained so they put a couple of layers more on it. It was sill a killer. A supervisor was checking out our steward's work about three quarters into the cruise. Didn't expect us to be in the stateroom I guess. Wife complained to him about the bed. When we arrived back on board that day, we had 10 pillows made into the bed. I joked about having a pillow top mattress, literally.

I'm usually not fussy about things like that, but I would wake up in the night with my hip in screaming pain and have to roll over. That worked until the other hip was hurting, then I would roll back over.

The toilet would make a deep moaning sound in the middle of the night for no apparent reason. It would stop soon after.

I would give the room a C+. It went up to an A- after the mattress was fixed.

I enjoyed the golf.

Room service breakfast on the Balcony

Formal night. I didn't want to bring a suit coat so I just brought ties. Wore red because it was Italian night at the MDR and if I spilled my lasagne, it wouldn't show

The Food

The food is always subjective, but it was good. Comparing it to the last Princess cruise we took, it was better. The only complaint I had is that they cook with a lot of alcohol. I'm a non-drinker so it limited my choices.

The problem with a fourteen day cruise, is breakfast and lunch menu's don't change. On the plus side, there was a wonderful salad bar in the main dinning room for lunch. I was a good break from the heavy meals.

Food rates an A.

Going under the Sunshine Skyway Bridge.

Formal night

Following along as I'll be on her in 43 days!!!! :)

In fact, in the picture from the helipad, I can see my cabin window!! (Bottom row, just left of center! Whee!!!)

Love the pictures! A TA is on my list of cruises to take.

Thanks for the review.

Following. :)

Thanks everyone.

Entertainment

The theater was large enough to accommodate the crowds. They had impersonators, I think that's what they called them. Someone who impersonates another singer. They were good. The violinist was great. The shows were good. All in all it went well. We didn't go to the juggler, but heard he was just so so. When we docked in Gibraltar we had a whole new group of entertainers come on.

Public rooms.

It's a great ship. Its just the size we like. Didn't spend much time in the Viking Crown Lounge as that was basically turned into a Diamond plus lounge. Didn't do the climbing wall, but did the mini golf. I heard the pool tables weren't functioning correctly and all the balls would go to one side, but I never used it.

Service was excellent, they went above and beyond.

Gibraltar

I found out that the reason the ships stop at Gibraltar is to gas up. The chief engineer was quoted as saying that he could make it to Barcelona without filling up but he'd have to turn out the lights.

It was an amazing port. We had a private tour booked with other Cruise Critic members and it worked out perfect.

The siege tunnels

There are 36 miles of tunnels in the rock, which is very impressive considering the whole territory is only three miles across.

More siege tunnels

The airport at Gibraltar, with a plane coming in for a landing.

It also doubles as a road.

Map

The Rock

Gibraltar

 

The chief engineer was quoted as saying that he could make it to Barcelona without filling up but he'd have to turn out the lights.

haha! Love the photos - thank you!

Great review! We are doing this cruise next April and looking forward to it, and it will be our first TA also.

Loved reading your cruise blog, very interesting about the time warps, good to know for next year's cruise! We usually enjoy early seating for dinner, but now are thinking maybe second/late would be better.

Did you book your return airfare through Air2Sea or on your own?

Thanks for the review, enjoyable reading! :cool:

Gibraltar continued

Lots of guns there.

The famous Barbary Apes that are really monkeys. They will steal food out of your hand.

St. Michael's caves

The top of the rock.

Great review! We are doing this cruise next April and looking forward to it, and it will be our first TA also.

 

Loved reading your cruise blog, very interesting about the time warps, good to know for next year's cruise! We usually enjoy early seating for dinner, but now are thinking maybe second/late would be better.

 

Did you book your return airfare through Air2Sea or on your own?

 

Thanks for the review, enjoyable reading! :cool:

I booked it on my own. That's why we spent the night in Copenhagen, we had separate flights because it was less expensive. $500 from Copenhagen to Seattle and just over a hundred from Barcelona to Copenhagen. It would have been $1100 for a direct flight home. Wow Airlines are going to start flying to some US cities, they would be even less than the Iceland Air we took.

We did the same for our Grand Mediterranean cruise in 2014, but nearly didn't make the flight in Copenhagen. It's a funny story and is the last part of that blog post.

Great review and pictures!

Great review and pictures!

Thank you

I seem to be doing things backwards. We visited San Juan Puerto Rico before we visited Gibraltar. It was hot that day, but we still loved it. Here are a few pictures.

This is the fort that guards the harbor. I forget the name of it, but I have it in my blog somewhere.

The U.S. Coast Guard station there. The white thing behind it is a ship, not part of the station.

The capital building

The dome inside. Each of the four murals depict important events. Columbus discovering the island. The end of slavery. The signing of the constitution, etc.

A beach resort along the coast.

The back of the fort that guards the harbor. It has an old graveyard at the base of it and a large grassy area that the locals use to fly kites.

San Juan Continued.

Sorry it's taking so long to complete this review. I'm busier than I want to be.

Guard tower.

Private School bus as compared to the public school bus next door.

https://scontent-sea1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/13239178_1027922120625627_1849699232266824377_n.jpg?oh=a6eb819cf427d2b9489644ef1cb236bf&oe=57D7E467

Another view of the large grassy area between the forts.

The rain in Spain falls on the coast too.

Frank and I in the rain soaked streets of Malaga.

It was Sunday and mass was going on. I felt guilty, but the worship areas were roped off, like they were used to this sort of thing.

We thought this was a tapas bar, but they served hamburgers instead. Can hamburgers be considered tapas? I'm never sure.

Lunch.

Leaving Malaga

Still loving the pics! Thank you so much for doing this!

Still loving the pics! Thank you so much for doing this!

Welcome.

Our trip ended in Copenhagen where we had a one day layover. On purpose. We wanted to see the city. So that is where I'll end this review.

A castle complete with moat.

Picnic lunch in a boat.

You are here. One of the few times we actually knew where we were.

Overview:

The wife thought that there were too many sea days, but I enjoyed every minute. It started to feel like home after a while. The ship, the crew, and the room were great. I would have liked a bigger desk and an outlet under the bed so I didn't have a cord across the width of the room at night, but we managed. They fixed the bed, only wish is was done before day twelve.

Would I sail Royal Caribbean again. Yes, in a heartbeat. Would I sail this ship again, yes.

I had a wonderful time. The only downside was the meet and mingle that was badly planned and badly executed, but that's not the reason that I cruise so I had no real problem there.