Adventure of the Seas, 1st and probably last cruise.

My husband and I have done 15 cruises. Obviously, we love it. Next year it will be our first time doing Miami, Port Canaveral and cocoa cay. Heard these ports weren’t the greatest, but for us, it is being on the ship, not the itinerary. Plus, this is a back to back, so what’s not to love! Actually, after our first cruise in 1986, we said, not for us, but tried again in 2000 and the rest is history!

Marg

having to watch an alligator with its mouth taped shut passed around like a cuddly toy.

No matter how large or small it was, I can tell you that you don't want to experience it without its mouth taped shut. I can promise you that.

Now if you're against the premise of it, I think you should've read the excursion more closely. Captive animals are captive. You can be as PRO or AGAINST that as you personally want, but vote with your wallet.

As someone who lives nearby, but has no knowledge of this specific place, I can tell you that a lot of good work is done by these small animal places. That's a general statement. I'm sure there are plenty of places that DO NOT do good, as well.

The first rule of Florida tourism is to never do anything with “gator” in the name.

That is SOOOOO not true. There are some awesome things to do with gator in the title.

Not wanting to knock the OPer but did you seriously do no research. We were due to sail on the very same cruise as you have been on, admittedly earlier in the year but things didn’t pan out and we had to cancel.

We knew the best time to arrive at the port because we asked here.

We knew what excursions to avoid because we did the research.

And we knew exactly what type of ship we were due to sail on because we watched every YouTube video on her we could find.

Top tip to anyone

Get as much info you can so you know what to expect and decide if it’s for you.

I haven’t been to CocoCay but have been to Labadee. I’ve also spent significant amounts of time in Blackpool and I am really struggling to make the comparison!

Agreed, how on earth could a tropical paradise be compared to Blackpool of all places. :o

Sorry you were disappointed in your trip. We were on that sailing and had a wonderful time! Found something to do at each of the ports. A lot of vacationing is so subjective I guess.

I'm going to back up OP on one thing - embarkation that day was a mess no matter what time you arrived. Our friends arrived early and had a long wait, we arrived late and had a long wait. They simply did not have enough staff available at the unloading station and the line backed up.

We actually tried to avoid watching the pool tv as most of the day it seemed to play weird YouTube-y videos. We did see a glimpse of Mary Poppins one night while walking by =P

Just finished AOS the week after you (New England itinerary). Completely agree with you on food: lack of variety, meat on buffet overdone and hard to find a veggie (except broccoli maybe once on buffet). Mary Poppins was in fact listed two nights in row as playing at the pool. Not sure if it was a typo or not but they did announce a different movie would play instead. Thought it was an odd choice to play once, let alone twice! This was second time on RC, first on AOS. Not my favorite. Been on several other cruise lines. Celebrity probably favorite but HAL food is hard to beat. Don't judge cruising by this sailing alone.

I'm going to chime in. We did a cruise for our honeymoon in 1985 on a ship with a now-defunct line. The ship picked up stablilizers to make up time and even the crew got sea sick. Port of Aruba was closed for a once-every-four years election, we were told it was a new ship when in fact it was an old ship that had sunk during renovation and had to be re-reronovated....I could go on and on about how awful everything was but we took the lemons and made lemonade. We made friends with others and made the best of it which made for a memorable trip. Somehow I actually managed to get my husband back on a ship and we've now done 20+ cruises. Yes the food has gone down but realistically the prices haven't gone up (especially factoring in inflation). I paid less for a balcony now than I did 10 years ago!!. Some times we cruise for the ports (Alaska, Europe), sometimes for the ship (Allure) and sometimes just because we need to get away (whatever is least expensive when we can get away). But no matter what, as long as no one gets sick, we have a great time. To quote my friend Bob Bitchin'

ATTITUDE IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ORDEAL & ADVENTURE.

I think I was on the same cruise but we went into the cruise with completely different expectations. We actually only got off the ship in Nassau and it was only to go shopping and get some conch fritters :) The rest of the cruise was spent reading (Viking Crown Lounge - best spot for reading), relaxing (every day at the Solarium pool), people watching, drinking, and eating (repeat as necessary over 7 days).

I believe Mary Poppins played on two days (I know because we actually watched it from start to finish).

We ate all of our meals (except for two) in the Windjammer. Food was good (not great). We had my time dining so I insisted that we go to the dining room once -- second formal night - food was very good as was the service. We also did a sushi making class at Izumi and that was alot of fun and very good sushi (if I do say so myself).

I will agree that embarkment was bad. It took over an hour just to get from the entrance of the port up to the terminal itself (people getting off and people getting on). Once we got to the terminal, however, it was a breeze (I believe it took about 15 minutes from entering the terminal until we were actually on the ship).

You should try Celebrity or Azamara. Both owned by RCI. Both have better food and smaller ships. But they cost more.:)

Celebrity ships aren't really any smaller. Solstice class holds around 3000 pax, roughly the same as RC's Voyager class which is what the OP was on. Summit class is around 2500 I think? Maybe 2200? Either way, it's similar to RC's Radiance class and Vision class.

Celebrity is an 'up-market' RCI.

There are a few things that are a little nicer on Celebrity but by and large it is still a mass market cruise line, much more similar to others like RC than different. For a true up market cruise, one would be better off looking at Oceania, Crystal, Regent etc.

No idea why every time someone does not fall in love with cruising there are always some who will try to convince them to try another. If I tried a certain type of vacation and it wasn't to my liking I certainly would not waste my money or vacation time on the same type of vacation again.

 

Probably because frequently, such as in the case of the OP, it seems that it isn't cruising that they dislike as much as it is some of the specific choices they made. Examples:

--OP seems to dislike the large, commercial nature of the ship. But they chose a ship that carries over 3k pax. There are lots of smaller ships that carry 1k or fewer. We were on an Oceania ship a few years ago that only carried 600 and loved it.

--OP seems to dislike the ports of call but they chose the itinerary. I know it was stated that they were limited due to personal schedules, but in theory they could go on another itinerary next time that they like better.

--OP didn't care for one of the excursions. Again, they chose it and it would appear that they did so without doing any research on it.

--OP didn't like the snorkeling at Coco Cay, but if snorkeling is really important there are other itineraries with MUCH better snorkeling. This goes back to itinerary selection.

--OP was frustrated at the disorganized check-in process. I get that, but I also know that frequently we arrive somewhere on an early flight and then can't check in for several hours because the room isn't ready. As it doesn't affect the entire trip, we try to just write that off. And once again, if choosing a smaller ship the whole check-in process would be much quicker.

Personally it seems silly to me to write off all cruising when choosing a different type of ship and a different itinerary would likely make a world of difference in the experience.

We still have a couple of days left of our cruise, I will say my observations are mine alone and completely down to personal taste.

 

Embarking in NJ took us twice as long as it did to actually get from Manhattan to the terminal. Getting to the drop off point once we’d arrived took 2 hours it didn’t seem very organised, however, once dropped off security and check in were very quick and we were onboard 20 mins later.

Hi, sorry the cruise wasn't all you had hoped. We experienced that on an NCL cruise and didn't cruise them again for 8 years. Hope maybe you find the time to do another and make a better memory.

I have a question about your statement that I highlighted. We have to drive our daughter to that port next year for her RCCL cruise. What time did you arrive? And was the drop off area hard to find? It might help us plan. Thanks.