Qcruise

Agree with Sabors idea....great tableside guacamole and chips for nominal fee of $3 dollars....margaritas are not cheap though. If you can swing it do Chops, really great appetizers and entres. Izumi tepan was fantastic too. Cat's looks like it may be a mistake.....jury is still out on that.

We are just off Oasis.....he is right, Royal Promenade is great, many venues to sit and enjoy a beverage watching people pass by. There is a pub, pizza place, rising tide, champagne bar and more on deck 5. Also the central park and boardwalk areas are nice. Dazzles, Blaze, Jazz all offer great evening entertainment.

My wife and I did the Sapphire last March to Santa Barbara/Ensenada....we had a balcony and enjoyed great weather, were able to tender in Santa Barbara, they were still dredging out the harbor from a big storm. We had no marine layers any days, allowing nice mornings with bright sunshine. We did have some strong winds in Ensenada which delayed our departure a couple of hours.

So after speaking again with them it looks like we are able to use our OBC anywhere, it was apparently our casino history that got us the promo according to them, which makes no sense as we have maybe lost a total of $200 bucks in their casinos our entire Princess sailing history. Now we are trying to negociate pricing for three more couples to sail with us. If we can bring six more people on board with our booking one would think they would be willing to negociate pricing for that many people......:confused:

So my wife and I have cruised with Princess now around 3 or 4 times, and we get many "offers" from them with exclusive pricing which we have taken advantage of now twice just this year and enjoyed our cruises much. These offers have given us great pricing along with on board credits we have used and been able to offer friends and relatives to go with us. We just received an offer from them which looked just like the other ones we took advantage of this year, and we asked friends if they'd like to join us. After talking with the reps this morning, we were told that this particular offer is only available to us, and that the OBC is just a "casino loyalty" credit we can use in the casino only, not for anything else as we did in the past. Now it may be a great deal for us, and that's great, my point is this....please be CLEAR when offering these deals just exactly what it is. This offer it seems to me is disguised to look like the others but only when we talk with reps do we find out the details, so what if we booked online expecting something different, because all we can go by is what we have experienced in the past....we are not big gamblers so it's rather surprising that this deal is offered to us. Am I out of line being ticked....??

The three specialty dining venues we ate at were wonderful. Izumi tepan was great fun and incredible food. Chops was great service, top notch steaks and appetizers I've never seen before were awesome. Then Solarium Grille was very healthy food and desserts, the service was slow because they had no bussing help, our server had to bus the tables, keep water glasses full for too many tables. Can't fault the food though.

We were aboard Oasis two weeks ago and they were having real problems with "my time dining" then. Our group of six were given a standing 6:30pm reservation in the Grand dining room, every time we'd show up they had no place to sit us. We were comped three specialty restaurants through the week because of this. We finally were told by Thursday night that they had a run of early diners so we moved our time to 7:30pm on the last night and we were fine. I hope they can get a handle on this concept, because if everything is "my time" for everyone and it was that bad when it was limited on our cruise they will have issues.

Just off Oasis and we pondered as all do whether to purchase a beverage package before hand.....we are so glad we did not.....this ship has included beverage choices we've never seen on another ship. They offered a sparkling flavored water in mango/peach, kiwi strawberry or lemon lime flavor at the Park café and Soarium restaurants along with the usual iced teas or water. We would fill up our insulated mugs with this all day long, and sometimes add a fortification to it as well. This ship offers great choices included so I can't see a need for paying extra for a beverage package, unless one drinks alcohol all day long.

We purchased a future cruise last week while on board Oasis as we fell into their enticing offer of an extra $300 OBC. He told us that we could move the cruise to anything we wanted but they only went out until March 2016 now, so we could move it and the OBC would follow to that cruise. That was really the only reason we pulled the trigger on it....then we find out from our travel agency that the booking went through that we use that $200 of this OBC is only good if you book the cruise by year end Dec. 2014. I am not happy that it seems they will tell you anything just to get the booking.....we are now in the position of having to find a cruise that will work for us within the 18 month choices. We've cruised now with RCI three times, and we don't mind obviously cruising again, but please be honest with us about the details. What do you think.....??

Our experience in the main dining room for breakfast was pretty bad....the eggs benedict I ordered the eggs were hard boiled, very little hollandaise sauce on them...my wifes was the same. As you said service very slow, our friends tried breakfast there one time and he sent the eggs benedict back and ordered scrambled eggs.....they never went back. With the solarium and Park café available for breakfast we went there and loved it.

As to the "my time" dining problem for us.....we finally found out that because we were given a 6:30pm dining time for a party of six, by that time every night the venue was completely full, so no place to put a party of six. This was told to us finally on Thursday night by Anna the supervisor. We had been bounce all over the ship at dinner. So we never got the same wait staff, we got the same staff on two nights, day four and day seven. On the last night Herb and Hichem gave us such wonderful service, they got many staff members to sing "happy anniversary" to our group once we told them we were three couples celebrating 30. 25 & 20 years. We tipped them well on that last evening, and Anna too. If we had been told earlier just to move our time to 7:30pm it could have been avoided, but nobody told us of the problem. It makes for very frustrated guests when each time you arrive for dinner at your reserved time they can't accommodate you.

In Chops my favorite appetizers (the two I ordered) were a slice of bacon that our server told us he had helped the chef prepare that day. It was glazed, the size of a New York strip steak and delicious. Also the shrimp cocktail....the largest freshest I've ever seen or had. The steak I had was the 6oz filet cooked perfectly, everyone was very happy with Chops. I believe there were some upcharge menu items to select from. Izumi was incredible....one of our party ordered a sashimi appetizer I had to take a picture of it was so pretty.....the tepan show was amazing and the food was great. Let me be clear, the staff we spoke with were not cranky but expressed the lack of staff and how the work load impacted their ability to stay positive. We mostly ate at Park Café, Solarium or Prominade Café, the Sabor chips and quac with a margarita was great too. Never got to Johny Rockets......

Our party of three anniversary couples just off Oasis this past Saturday and I can tell you they are working on some things. When I do write a review I plan to call it "Lemonade from lemons" multiple times. Overall we believe that RCI has understaffed the ship and it is reflected in the service and some attitudes of staff we spoke with. They are also working on fine tuning the dining process to figure out the new "dynamic dining" concept, and we're not sure how it will work. We were given as a group of six a standing my time dining time of 6:30pm all week by the RCI person by phone weeks prior to boarding. When we arrived the first evening, they did not know what to do with us. We were shuffled off to various people and told to wait over there, there were two lines of people waiting growing longer by the minute. After waiting about 30 minutes we were approached by the maître d and escorted away to Izumi for their first night opening the tepan restaurant at no charge. We were told they had been slammed with early diners and could not seat us in the Grand dining room. Our dining experience there was fantastic. When we returned to Grand on the third night (we ate at Chops on second night) we had to wait again and eventually given a table next to a busy station. That night we were approached by Anna a supervisor and asked if we would dine up at the Solarium Bistro the next night for free and report our experience back to them.....can you say YES...?? Our experience there was very good, but slow service as our waiter had to bus the dishes, keep water glasses full, do everything with no help. He did the best he could, but service was slow, while the food was very good and healthy to boot. We told Anna after speaking with our server that night they don't want to share the tips so request to do by themselves.....the customer suffers with this policy. Other servers were speaking of long hours and short staff, while trying to maintain happy attitudes to customers. I'll speak of lots more as this thread continues. We were very happy with Oasis, so many healthy choices for food, we never ate at Windjammer, we loved Solarium, Park Café, Promenade Café....the dining room for breakfast was terrible, only did that once. Ask away.....our Cruise Critic group was fun, with a cabin crawl and slot pull.

Dinning room will be open on sea days but not on port days for lunch. By every elevator is a kiosk that will show how busy each venue is. You can also check on the TV in your room. When we sailed on The Allure 2 years ago we did not eat the Windjammer at all. We always checked what was the least wait and ate there.

 

We will probably do the same thing on The Oasis in 5 days!

See you on the cruise!

Thanks killtheump.....I love the user name.....maybe we'll see you at the M&M, slot pull or cabin crawl.....

Thanks for the reply.....can I assume then that lunch is served in a dining room on other days....??

Hi guys....we're leaving this Saturday on the Oasis, never have been on this ship and would like to know if they serve lunch at any of the dining rooms on embarkation day.....?? I know how crazy the windjammer can be:mad:, and I know there are many other venues in which to have lunch, but on other lines I know they do have one dining room available for lunch....it's so much more civilized. So who can tell us the best lunch alternative if we're not wanting to spend the money on Giovani's table....?? Thanks.....:)

We went to customer service the morning before debarkation to change our status......

We were on the Golden 13-17th and we did not have any type of debarkation cards. Is this something new? We debarked according to colored luggage tags.

We went to customer service and change our luggage tags to walk off. We were given a card with number 300 on it and told to go to a lounge on deck 7. We walked our luggage off.....estimated at 8:10am....but by 8:15am no calling of numbers. They said a crowd had assembled at the main exit and they could not call numbers. The crowd obviously won the battle because we sat in the lounge patiently until the told us to walk back to the Vista lounge to leave there, but we came in behind the mob in line. Very sad.

We were delayed until 10:30pm leaving port on Friday night....divers still clearing out the water intake pipes.....air conditioning and all systems worked well on board. Everything except debarkation went smoothly, that was a nightmare thanks to the idiots rushing the main debarkation area and not doing what they were told to do and wait in a lounge until called by number. It make many folks angry as Elite members and people with low numbers were behind the masses of morons waiting for customs. The crew did not manage that mess well. I'll be happy to answer any questions.......:)

We're leaving Friday on the Golden weekender to Ensenada and are assigned to anytime dining which we've done before and it worked out great for us. I just read a review from recent and they had to wait an hour each time. Not acceptable.....I know our ship is booked completely so it could be nuts. Can I make a reservation as soon as we get on board for the first night to avoid this wait time. Before we just showed up and were seated within minutes. Thanks.....

We'll be aboard her this Friday....can't tell you how we've been sweating this out......thanks

Based on my experience with Carnival.....I blew out my knee the second night of a week cruise to Mexico in one of their lounges at a private party. It was all my own fault....dancing and it slipped out....I was in a wheel chair the rest of the cruise, and three years and two surgeries later I live with a torn ACL.....Carnival never billed me, I had to sign all the legal wavers stating they had no fault, I had reasonably good care on board. I think the cruise lines just don't want a law suite so they don't bill you....at least Carnival didn't.

We did the four day up to Santa Barbara then Ensenada back in March.....weather was perfect everywhere. There were NO marine layers at sea any of our mornings even off the Santa Barbara coast, sea day was sunny and beautiful....Ensenada we got 40mph winds that even delayed our departure that day. Weather is something that can be anything.....luck of the draw.....you're gonna make the best of it either way.....:)

Last March we had to call room service to get it into our room...it was not there at arrival.

The wife and I live in Long Beach and love the coastals.....We took the Saphire this past March and went to Santa Barbara and Ensenada. It was very cool to see Santa Barbara from a cruise perspective....we enjoyed no marine layer every morning, and warm days for poolside lounging. We leave in 3 weeks on the Golden for the three nighter just to Ensenada, we just get off the ship to walk around a bit while there. They offer such deals we can't stay home that cheap. This time a balcony was $600 including a $200 OBC.....we just love these quick getaways.....I can just take off half day Friday and be back to work by 9:30am Monday morning....awesome.