Serenade of the Seas review from my 4th grader

For those who want to see the perspective of a boy who's an experienced traveler but first-time cruiser, here's his (very detailed) review of the trip:

https://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=611557

I also copied the text to the post below.

"I thought our cruise on the Serenade of the Seas was fabulous, though I suppose it helped that this was our first cruise. I know I’m just a kid, but I think I can still write a decent review. First, I thought the embarkation was very smooth. Not that much security, so not much wasted time. It was still safe because they checked all our IDs, our clothes, and our luggage, which we mostly gave to a man who checked it and brought it to our room.

When we went to Windjammer for the first time, I was like,”GASP” (I like saying GASP out loud and not actually gasping), this is the best buffet I’ve ever been in. In my opinion, there weren’t many choices, but the reason I gave it 5 stars is because my family loved it, and because I am picky. I then realized the rooms were open, so we all hurried down to our rooms. It was miniscule! For a few minutes, we complained, but after a day, it felt nice and cozy. Though you will usually not spend much time in it, each time you come into your room, you feel happy, cozy, safe, and relaxed.

Next, you should go to Adventure Ocean, which we called the Kid’s Club. (Parents always have to accompany you for the first time and if your parents sign the permission sheet, you get a white wrist band and you can sign yourself out and in.) They have many fantastically fun activities, such as Crazy Tag, Gaga Ball, Fireball, e.t.c.They even have tournaments! The consoulers were pretty good, but sometimes they make bad choices and rules.

And for dinner… the main dining room, Reflections! You may have to place a free reservation, but it’s worth it! But try not to be like me, because for main course and dessert I had the same thing every night… Aged Manhattan Steak and New York Cheesecake! Looks like I was going for an ad on the billboards in Manhattan: The Crazy Guy Who Ate Our Steak and Cheesecake for 5 Days in a Row! That said, I’m sure that other people would love everything, because that restaurant served everything from fried snails to crab cake! Plus, they switched most of the menu every day! We had excellent Waiters, and their assistants were excellent too. Say hello to Pinto and Kumar for me! Same for Robert and his assistant Karina from Russia!

The variety of sports are amazing! They have two ping-pong tables, a basketball court, a few swimming pools, and a mini-golf course. They can entertain you for a loooooooooooooong time, as I saw some grown-ups and kids play for hours on the same basketball court for hours! Believe it or not, they played every day! If you think they’re just extreme basketball lovers, let’s check out the pools! There are 2 pools. Let’s start off with the less crowded one: the kiddie pool. It is shallow, and has a deep section which is about a meter deep. There is a floating serpent streaking through the outer sections, and there are two water slides: a water slide that does not spew water and is in the section where the serpent is, and a slide that does spew water, where our family kept getting stuck. There is a shark shaped shower, and there are a few beach chairs dotted at the side. That pool seemed good for tots and other little kids. Now, the most popular pool was a regularpool we often see in a hotel, which had, once again, a shallow zone and a deep zone. It had 2 hot tubs on the side, which I really loved. The hot tubs were filled with bubbles!. Every now and then, there were even waves! There is also a bar next to it that serves food like hot dogs and drinks like lemonade! Overlooking the pool was a giant public balcony where if you didn’t want to swim, you could watch! At a corner, there are towels, though they smell like vegetables (which I actually like). Pretty good, eh? But that’s not all! Well, the mini golf was pretty small, but it had a good variety of courses (nine), ranging from plain easy to pretty hard.

Now, if you think that’s all, you’re wrong! There were activities, and like the dining menus at Reflections, most of them change every day! There were movies every day, and you’d want them to change. There were 2 movies every night, with a variety from Wonder to Logan Lucky. There are activities from midnight to 1:00 a.m., and 24-hour activities to fill the gap. Since they overlap each other, you should be plenty busy! Well, if you don’t like any of the activities, then you must have NEVER been happy. There is SUCH a big variety of activities, you cannot possibly be bored. If you’re a kid, you’ll like activities like the Fun Darts Game, the Family Water Balloon Toss, Origami, Rock Climbing, Family Paper Airplanes Competition, Family Selfie Trivia Hunt, etc. If you’re a grown-up, you still have a lot of events, actually more than kids!

Even with all those on the ship, the experience at the excursions were great! I’m going to describe them in order. Your first stop is Costa Maya. If you’ve never been to that port before, it looked great! Another great part was that people made some of the port look like the Mayan Ruins! There are some great tours for the Mayan ruins! We went with a company called Native Choices, to a stone pyramid which used to be a temple. We saw more structures like that and an amazing flight of stairs! Service was great, and so were pineapples and Mayan food like chicken, tortillas, salsa, all types of veggies, etc., which we ate in a Mayan village! On the second destination, Cozumel, we had a blast snorkeling! Since it was very windy, the Royal Caribbean one got canceled, but Cozumel Cruise Excursions (the company we used) didn’t! I couldn’t see very clearly and needed to get onboard quickly, so I didn’t see anything on the first station (Palancar Reef), but I could on the second (Columbia Reef) and third (El Cielo). El Cielo is so beautiful. There are sea creatures like starfish, turtles, sand dollars, stingrays, etc. My sister even found a colorful shell!

Finally, for disembarking, I’d say, I really didn’t like it. It was terrible! Picture this. We had time for breakfast. We were neatly sorted by number off the ship. We were #2. Our big suitcase was poking its head out of the luggage pack #2. We went through a brief yet secure personal check. That only took about 2 minutes. We boarded a bus to our excursion. Most people would ask, “What was so bad about that?” Well, if I were you, I would think, “Wait. He was on a cruise. Theruise was totally fun. I know that because I read this totally awesome review. And he just left one!” Then, as some (1 out of 152 people, probably?) of you would think, “I’m surprised he wasn’t bawling his eyes out.”

Interesting. We got off our first cruise, and it’s still not over? What if this is just the conclusion? Nope, it’s not. I’m positive. I’m the writer, after all. Another cruise stop? Nope, since the last paragraph was about disembarkation. Plus, we were already in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, U.S., North America, Earth, in the Milky Way. Well, we were going to the Florida Everglade National Park! We first went on a city tour, then went to the Park. I got to hold a baby alligator, and saw many animals like a giant crocodile, a panther, a kookaburra, etc. When we went into our speedboat or whatever boat it was, it was soooooooooooo loud that we had to put earplugs into our ears! We had a good boat captain, Bob, and went astoundingly fast! Before we knew it, our adventure was done!!!!!! :( :) @-@

Sorry, dudes. Gotta stop the party now. THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! for reading this review. Have a great ride on the Serenade of the Seas, have a great year, and don’t eat too much donuts for breakfast at Windjammer. Bye!"

This is GREAT! Please tell your son he’s a dynamic story teller. I have kids who were at one time his age, and were fortunate to have their first cruise at that time, so I appreciate it from that fact. But, the thought that went thru my mind is that his viewpoint is what most adults need to have. A cruise is a wondrous vacation filled with sights sounds and tastes, and (barring truly disasterous experiences) we forget that when we get hung up on negatives that in reality are not that important in the grand scheme. I aspire to feel like your son every time I step on board!

Fantastic!! I had a smile on my face reading the entire review. Your son is an amazing story teller, and it is really nice to read a review from a kid's point of view. You can really feel his enthusiasm. I am going to show this review to my own kids. Tell him Great Job, and to keep up the writing!

That was fantastic! Tel l him to keep up the great work!!

That was very good! I enjoyed reading it.

What a fabulous review! Your son could have a future as a travel writer. I very much appreciated how he found something positive to say about every aspect of his first grand adventure at sea. We could all learn a thing or two from him about seeing the fun in everything :D

When we went to Windjammer for the first time, I was like,”GASP” (I like saying GASP out loud and not actually gasping), this is the best buffet I’ve ever been in.... because for main course and dessert I had the same thing every night…

Beautiful. I love a child's perspective. :D Thank you for the smile.

Tell your son that my son also went to the dining room and had a steak every night (in addition to his regular entrée). Mind you he was 18 and starving all the time... but I distinctly remember him saying he "went on a cruise and had a steak every night".

Sounds like there are many more cruises in your son's future...

Thanking for sharing, I had a smile on my face the entire review.

Such a wonderful review from a very sweet young man....You made my day! Thanks for caring and giving us your thoughts! :)

What a wonderful review. I was smiling the whole time I was reading, and I am still smiling. :D

Loved it! Who wouldn't want to go on a cruise after that.

Tell your son he has a future in writing. His vocabulary is excellent and he painted great pictures with his words. We will be on the Serenade and as we have no kids it was great to get a view of the ship from his point of view.

Erika

Super job on that review!!

A great review with a very positive perspective. His expressed point of view may frame the way I look at things on my upcoming cruise.

This is the BEST review I have ever read! He's got quite a voice. I do have a question for him, as a parent who's considering a 2019 cruise with a 4 year old (I know the ages are quite different but bear with me): can he elaborate on the AO counselors sometimes making "bad choices and rules"? I certainly don't think it could be anything too bad, since it seems he enjoyed himself, but I'm still curious as to what he meant. Thank you!

I also have a 4-year-old on the cruise. She liked the kids club so much that she's willing to go there immediately after we came back from the Mayan Ruins trip (which was a long and tiring one). They were dressed up as pirates and "surveyed" the whole ship. So cute.

This is the reply from my son:

"I think some of the game's rules were unfair. For example, in a ball game, I was told that I hit someone on her head, and I was out. I was 99% sure I didn't, but even if I did, I thought that I should have at least 2 chances. I still enjoyed it very much.

I was in Voyagers and I think your child will be in Aquanauts (I hope I spelled that right). Thanks for reading my review!"

This is the BEST review I have ever read! He's got quite a voice. I do have a question for him, as a parent who's considering a 2019 cruise with a 4 year old (I know the ages are quite different but bear with me): can he elaborate on the AO counselors sometimes making "bad choices and rules"? I certainly don't think it could be anything too bad, since it seems he enjoyed himself, but I'm still curious as to what he meant. Thank you!

Thank you so much for the encouraging words to my boy. I am less enthusiastic about the entertainment on board, but this is a beautiful ship (compared with 5 other ships docking at the same port, all much bigger than Serenade), service is great, and El Cielo is truly amazing.

I also have a 4-year-old on the cruise. She liked the kids club so much that she's willing to go there immediately after we came back from the Mayan Ruins trip (which was a long and tiring one). They were dressed up as pirates and "surveyed" the whole ship. So cute.

 

This is the reply from my son:

 

"I think some of the game's rules were unfair. For example, in a ball game, I was told that I hit someone on her head, and I was out. I was 99% sure I didn't, but even if I did, I thought that I should have at least 2 chances. I still enjoyed it very much.

I was in Voyagers and I think your child will be in Aquanauts (I hope I spelled that right). Thanks for reading my review!"

Thank you to your son for replying! That sets my mind at ease and it's also heartening to hear that your 4yo loved it so much.

Again, please let him know that his review was VERY helpful to me and we we may just book that RCI cruise next year because of it!

(Note to you - I say "may," not because his review wasn't stellar, but because we're going to start trying for a second in August so depending on if/when that happens, that determines the cruise! No cruises after 24 weeks.)

He needs to get his own CC account and write more reviews, really enjoyed it.

This is what my 4-year-old told me the other day:

"Mom, I would like to go to that hotel again, the hotel that floats on water. Bob (my son) said it would be a lot of money. Can you go buy a lot money then?"

I wish! :D:D

Thank you to your son for replying! That sets my mind at ease and it's also heartening to hear that your 4yo loved it so much.

 

Again, please let him know that his review was VERY helpful to me and we we may just book that RCI cruise next year because of it!

 

(Note to you - I say "may," not because his review wasn't stellar, but because we're going to start trying for a second in August so depending on if/when that happens, that determines the cruise! No cruises after 24 weeks.)

That means we will have to cruise more often. :-)

We travel a lot, but never chose cruise because I thought it would be, well, boring. The kids read CC and got really excited about it. From the very beginning my son wanted to write a review for CC, so he took notes along the way, and noted the names of various locations and animals. I am glad he did his part to CC.

He needs to get his own CC account and write more reviews, really enjoyed it.

wow

awesome review

your kiddo is totally going places

thank you for sharing!!

Love this review! I hope when my daughter gets to 4th grade, she will be writing as well as your son!!! Thanks for the review!

"I thought our cruise on the Serenade of the Seas was fabulous, though I suppose it helped that this was our first cruise. I know I’m just a kid, but I think I can still write a decent review. First, I thought the embarkation was very smooth. Not that much security, so not much wasted time. It was still safe because they checked all our IDs, our clothes, and our luggage, which we mostly gave to a man who checked it and brought it to our room.

 

When we went to Windjammer for the first time, I was like,”GASP” (I like saying GASP out loud and not actually gasping), this is the best buffet I’ve ever been in. In my opinion, there weren’t many choices, but the reason I gave it 5 stars is because my family loved it, and because I am picky. I then realized the rooms were open, so we all hurried down to our rooms. It was miniscule! For a few minutes, we complained, but after a day, it felt nice and cozy. Though you will usually not spend much time in it, each time you come into your room, you feel happy, cozy, safe, and relaxed.

 

Next, you should go to Adventure Ocean, which we called the Kid’s Club. (Parents always have to accompany you for the first time and if your parents sign the permission sheet, you get a white wrist band and you can sign yourself out and in.) They have many fantastically fun activities, such as Crazy Tag, Gaga Ball, Fireball, e.t.c.They even have tournaments! The consoulers were pretty good, but sometimes they make bad choices and rules.

 

And for dinner… the main dining room, Reflections! You may have to place a free reservation, but it’s worth it! But try not to be like me, because for main course and dessert I had the same thing every night… Aged Manhattan Steak and New York Cheesecake! Looks like I was going for an ad on the billboards in Manhattan: The Crazy Guy Who Ate Our Steak and Cheesecake for 5 Days in a Row! That said, I’m sure that other people would love everything, because that restaurant served everything from fried snails to crab cake! Plus, they switched most of the menu every day! We had excellent Waiters, and their assistants were excellent too. Say hello to Pinto and Kumar for me! Same for Robert and his assistant Karina from Russia!

 

The variety of sports are amazing! They have two ping-pong tables, a basketball court, a few swimming pools, and a mini-golf course. They can entertain you for a loooooooooooooong time, as I saw some grown-ups and kids play for hours on the same basketball court for hours! Believe it or not, they played every day! If you think they’re just extreme basketball lovers, let’s check out the pools! There are 2 pools. Let’s start off with the less crowded one: the kiddie pool. It is shallow, and has a deep section which is about a meter deep. There is a floating serpent streaking through the outer sections, and there are two water slides: a water slide that does not spew water and is in the section where the serpent is, and a slide that does spew water, where our family kept getting stuck. There is a shark shaped shower, and there are a few beach chairs dotted at the side. That pool seemed good for tots and other little kids. Now, the most popular pool was a regularpool we often see in a hotel, which had, once again, a shallow zone and a deep zone. It had 2 hot tubs on the side, which I really loved. The hot tubs were filled with bubbles!. Every now and then, there were even waves! There is also a bar next to it that serves food like hot dogs and drinks like lemonade! Overlooking the pool was a giant public balcony where if you didn’t want to swim, you could watch! At a corner, there are towels, though they smell like vegetables (which I actually like). Pretty good, eh? But that’s not all! Well, the mini golf was pretty small, but it had a good variety of courses (nine), ranging from plain easy to pretty hard.

 

Now, if you think that’s all, you’re wrong! There were activities, and like the dining menus at Reflections, most of them change every day! There were movies every day, and you’d want them to change. There were 2 movies every night, with a variety from Wonder to Logan Lucky. There are activities from midnight to 1:00 a.m., and 24-hour activities to fill the gap. Since they overlap each other, you should be plenty busy! Well, if you don’t like any of the activities, then you must have NEVER been happy. There is SUCH a big variety of activities, you cannot possibly be bored. If you’re a kid, you’ll like activities like the Fun Darts Game, the Family Water Balloon Toss, Origami, Rock Climbing, Family Paper Airplanes Competition, Family Selfie Trivia Hunt, etc. If you’re a grown-up, you still have a lot of events, actually more than kids!

 

Even with all those on the ship, the experience at the excursions were great! I’m going to describe them in order. Your first stop is Costa Maya. If you’ve never been to that port before, it looked great! Another great part was that people made some of the port look like the Mayan Ruins! There are some great tours for the Mayan ruins! We went with a company called Native Choices, to a stone pyramid which used to be a temple. We saw more structures like that and an amazing flight of stairs! Service was great, and so were pineapples and Mayan food like chicken, tortillas, salsa, all types of veggies, etc., which we ate in a Mayan village! On the second destination, Cozumel, we had a blast snorkeling! Since it was very windy, the Royal Caribbean one got canceled, but Cozumel Cruise Excursions (the company we used) didn’t! I couldn’t see very clearly and needed to get onboard quickly, so I didn’t see anything on the first station (Palancar Reef), but I could on the second (Columbia Reef) and third (El Cielo). El Cielo is so beautiful. There are sea creatures like starfish, turtles, sand dollars, stingrays, etc. My sister even found a colorful shell!

 

Finally, for disembarking, I’d say, I really didn’t like it. It was terrible! Picture this. We had time for breakfast. We were neatly sorted by number off the ship. We were #2. Our big suitcase was poking its head out of the luggage pack #2. We went through a brief yet secure personal check. That only took about 2 minutes. We boarded a bus to our excursion. Most people would ask, “What was so bad about that?” Well, if I were you, I would think, “Wait. He was on a cruise. Theruise was totally fun. I know that because I read this totally awesome review. And he just left one!” Then, as some (1 out of 152 people, probably?) of you would think, “I’m surprised he wasn’t bawling his eyes out.”

 

Interesting. We got off our first cruise, and it’s still not over? What if this is just the conclusion? Nope, it’s not. I’m positive. I’m the writer, after all. Another cruise stop? Nope, since the last paragraph was about disembarkation. Plus, we were already in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, U.S., North America, Earth, in the Milky Way. Well, we were going to the Florida Everglade National Park! We first went on a city tour, then went to the Park. I got to hold a baby alligator, and saw many animals like a giant crocodile, a panther, a kookaburra, etc. When we went into our speedboat or whatever boat it was, it was soooooooooooo loud that we had to put earplugs into our ears! We had a good boat captain, Bob, and went astoundingly fast! Before we knew it, our adventure was done!!!!!! :( :) @-@

 

Sorry, dudes. Gotta stop the party now. THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! for reading this review. Have a great ride on the Serenade of the Seas, have a great year, and don’t eat too much donuts for breakfast at Windjammer. Bye!"

He sounds like a VERY bright boy.