philbel

We are also booked on this sailing and the one directly after. I read posts saying that we should not be booking, that we are wasting money to keep RCI afloat etc but if we can afford to do so, they why not?! We all love cruising, which is why we are commenting here after all. We should be on the Anthem now on our way to Southampton, cruise cancelled of course, but happy to keep positive and look forward to future cruises. We live in the Middle East, always warm, cold weather is a marvelous novelty!  

1 hour ago, Roger88 said:

I wonder what will happen if all the ports on your route will suddenly close while you are at sea..the ship will go back? Anyway Qatar is ok, you can go to UAE and a few other places and countries of the golf. We were in Qatar last New Year. Its a very boring place to be honest. I wouldn't recommend going there anyway. There is like literally one place where all the fun is concentrated. The rest of the country is super boring

I am having a little giggle since I currently live in Qatar. You are not wrong though

On 1/30/2020 at 12:42 PM, icsys said:

Yes, there are issues in the Middle East but it does not affect life onboard the ship or in the port stops. There are no signs anywhere of any problems or tension. Business as usual.

Sadly, the ship has pulled out of visiting Bahrain and Muscat but the reason given is simply one of precaution.

 

Jewel seemed to be pretty full last week with everyone having a good time. If we had more time available to be off work we would still be onboard now!

 

We live in Doha, Qatar and can see ships coming into Port regularly from our apartment. Don’t worry about booking these sailings, the region is very safe and interesting for visitors if the culture here is of interest to you. I would do Feb or even March because it is unexpectedly cool for us this year, 11-15 celsius on average  

Another plus is you can take as much luggage as you can fit into your cabin😁

Agreed, I sailed on her in July this year, JR is only one, pool deck is your only option

Our Son has done adventure ocean on Brilliance for 2 past cruises. It is small but the kids still all had a great time. Just before you board near the gangway you must stop by a desk to get their muster station wristbands. Adventure Ocean is generally open for signup as soon as you board so we always pop up there first to get it done before battling the Windjammer crowds. We don’t sail with NCL anymore as we find RC has a much better set-up all round for catering to kids

Thank you all- might just check out the offerings once on board and decide. 😁

Hi, can anyone comment on the Chefs Table on Anthem? We did it twice on Brilliance which was wonderful both times and had its own special venue, but when we did it on Explorer it was shoved up the back of Chops with a sad looking room partition and no atmosphere at all. The Chef was obviously busy with the restaurant and not us, and the host knew nothing about the food or wine pairings. We are keen to try again on Anthem but only if the venue and service matches what one would expect for the price... 

We are not big fans of public transport so we booked a private car for our cruise this past July. We used blackberrycars.com 

Excellent service, nice vehicles. We had a family of four and it cost us £110 total each  way from our central London hotel. Can actually work out cheaper than the train depending on booking class and time you wish to travel.

On 5/4/2019 at 10:16 PM, LadyBeBop said:

Mine is the Red Velvet Cake. I only saw that in one bar on the Freedom of the Seas. Can you get that on other ships as well?  In particular, the Ovation?

I should think so, I had one in the R Bar on both the Brilliance and Explorer recently

We had done Chefs table twice before on the Brilliance which was wonderful both times so we were really looking forward to it on Explorer. Unfortunately we were disappointed. The venue was a sad partitioned off area at the back of Chops Grill. The host was not a sommelier and had no knowledge of the wines selected and the chef seemed very busy with no time to ‘set the stage’ for our meal. The meal was still very nice but the experience we had come to expect was just not there.

I will do it again on our next sailing on Anthem (our first time on her) I can only hope it is a return to the Brilliance standard !

We took our 4 yr old to the first 30 mins our our Chefs table only because the Adventure Ocean program wasn’t open until then, we quickly ducked out to drop him off once it did open. Certainly not geared towards kids and it would be preferable for parents if RC considered this in their reservation times! We were lucky he was well behaved and the other guests were very understanding and pleasant about it

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I'll check that out, many thanks

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Yes you are right, it is with AMA. We have always wanted to do a river cruise, but this was the only one we found that was actually geared towards families. We actually have never sailed with DCL either so have zero Disney experiences. I think the cost may still be oppressive though for 7 nights but I'm waiting for the quote.

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Thanks for that, I am looking for a river cruise where we can bring our young son without him being the only kid on board. I get the impression that kids aren't 'encouraged' on regular river cruises on other lines ...

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Has anyone done one of these? I am looking at the 2018 Christmas Market cruise and would appreciate hearing of someone's experience

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We paid $39 per day for the Deluxe package on our med cruise just last month

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We recently sailed the Med on Brilliance. Husband and I are avid cruisers but this was our first time with our 3 year old son. We also sailed with extended family. Our son was fully toilet trained at 3 so no issues with pool or kids club rules. We didn't expect to need to use anyone to look after him either, but he enjoyed the adventure ocean program so much he was begging us to leave him there! We ended up doing the shore excursions whilst leaving him onboard as it was all he wanted to do! Great cruise and hassle free. We have booked again for 2018 and he is already talking about what he will do next time on the 'big ship'

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We sailed in an ocean veranda/balcony room on the Brilliance. Curtains divided the room between us and our 3 yr olds bed (Pullman bed from ceiling with decent bedrails). Was perfect and decent sized cabin.

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It was US$105 when we purchased online for our upcoming cruise, but they often change prices online as well

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