HAL vet back from 4 day Paradise with Review

[FightOnRon]

FightonRon,

 

Did you ever use the showers in the gym? Or the sauna or steam room? Was there a charge for those?

 

Looking forward to hearing what you did in Catalina (if you made it) and Ensenada...

 

Didn't use them but wandered through them a couple of times. There was no one there to take any info so I assume it was free. People were coming and going. One did use the spa but thats for the 3rd day review.

 

FYI: HAL vs CCL in gym,,I saw no difference. Same machines, same placement,,all looked the same to me.

[LaurieHoffman]

Didn't use them but wandered through them a couple of times. There was no one there to take any info so I assume it was free. People were coming and going. One did use the spa but thats for the 3rd day review.

 

FYI: HAL vs CCL in gym,,I saw no difference. Same machines, same placement,,all looked the same to me.

 

 

Thank you for the quick answer. When my kids are busy with the kids programs I enjoy relaxing in the sauna and steam room. Then I enjoy taking a shower as those showers are usually much larger than the one in the room and I don't have to fight to use the room one.. :)

[FightOnRon]

Thank you for the quick answer. When my kids are busy with the kids programs I enjoy relaxing in the sauna and steam room. Then I enjoy taking a shower as those showers are usually much larger than the one in the room and I don't have to fight to use the room one.. :)

 

I think the shower in the room was fine. As I stated another HAL difference is the shower/tub/whirlpool combo. The HAL ships are pretty confusing your first time with all this handles and knobs, CCL you walk in and turn it on. I thought the CCL ships would have one of those shower curtains that sticks to you but it didn't.

 

FYI ON HAL: They have designer soaps and shampoos and conditioners as an upscale hotel would have (sewing kits, shoe shine thingys etc). HAL also has Dove bodywash dispensers in the tubs. All cabins have hair dryers,,that funky one in the bathroom that does nothing and one in the drawer. It's been a couple of years but to my recollection the may have 2 power outlets in the cabins but also maybe not.

 

HAL ships have DVD players. IF you have a suite (same as a cat 12) the DVD library is free, if not they rent the DVDs to you. Pretty extensive library too.

 

Most HAL ships have a movie theater with free popcorn. If not they use,,as I believe the Paradise did, ,one of the lounges for movies. I think the Queen Mary lounge showed movies on shore days. I would ook in my FUN Times but we are still not unpaked,,but hey,,I found my camera.

 

Also,,,becuase of that one thread somone stared a month or so ago, I looked high and low in my cabin when we first embarked for either a treasure someone left or disgusting stuff someone left. Sad to say found no treasure, happy to say found nothing disgusting. Cabin was too clean.

[LivingWild]

Could I ask where you ate most of your meals? I am curious and wondering if the time one eats has something to do with it.

 

That’s interesting and may be valid. We had late seating each night. Had our dishes been served at a reasonable temperature half of them probably would have been better.

This may anger many of the full time CCL supporters here but these are OUR observations on the food only and anyone can take or leave it. We had a good time on the cruise due to most of the staff, other cruisers, and atmosphere. Due to the weather we spent a fair amount of time at the Hold'em table and had our entire cruise paid for by some drunk college kids who thought they could play poker so the price was right. :) Hell, we were on vacation and were going to enjoy ourselves regardless of food or weather conditions.

I can't make a blanket statement that all food was bad because that is just not true. I will say that there was nothing we thought was truly great. We are not picky eaters and will usually have a very open mind as long as the food is fresh and cooked properly. We eat at restaurants ranging from $6 to $25 per plate approximately 6-8 per month so we don’t have outrageous expectations of 4 or 5 star quality food.

One of our favorite cruise activities is enjoying the sunset over the ocean so we don’t like the early dinner seating. We ate dinner in the MDR and had late seating at 8:15 on nights 1, 2, and 4. We do not like to spend a great deal of time eating while we’re on vacation so we ate on the Lido for all other meals.

Most of the sauces were thick, cold and had obviously been sitting for a while. No hot dishes were hot and the only cold dishes that were cold were the ice creams. I’ll list what I can remember from our party but it is not complete because I wasn’t always paying attention to what others were eating.

Our group had many of the soups and found them to be nearly all above average and very flavorful. Nearly all of the cooked veggies were overdone and cold.

Dinner rolls – pretty decent and I learned the importance of filling up on them.

Salmon and Candied Tomatoes – This was a decent dish.

Black Tiger Shrimp cocktail – very tiny and rubber like.

Sweet and Sour Shrimp – May have been good if not served cold but the breading was paste-like on the inside.

Cesar Salad – OK on night 1 but wilted lettuce after that.

Flat Iron Steak – Very dry and flavorless. Potatoes were good.

Indian Vegetarian Dinner – One of the best dishes we experienced.

BBQ Baby backs – Cold and had an overpowering seasoning.

Penne Mariscos – Terrible. Undercooked noodles, cold sauce and meat.

Pork Loin – OK and nicely seasoned. Would try again.

Prime Rib – May have been good but they butchered this with a nasty gravy. Probably to keep moist while it sat for hours.

Stuffed Mushrooms – Cold, rubbery, flavorless, and stuck in the sauce like mortar.

Crab Cakes – I don’t believe that anyone at the table took a second bite. I truly think that this dish had gone bad. The fishy flavor and smell was overpowering.

Lobster – This was a discussion and butt of jokes amongst our table and two adjoining tables. Approximately 15 people at the 3 tables ordered the lobster and nearly all of them ordered 2 up front. Every single one of us was disappointed in what was served and it had nothing to do with how small or cold they were. They were HEAVILY salted and nearly inedible. We were joking that CCL was trying to save a buck and make us dislike the dish and fill up on water so we would not order more.

Warm Chocolate Melting cake – this was very good. It was nearly identical to Dominos Pizza’s Chocolate Lava cake.

Strawberry Cheesecake (“A classic cheesecake topped with strawberries”) – False advertising. Served room temperature, the sides were dry as if it were sitting out since lunchtime, and the “strawberries” were only strawberry seeds in liquid just like Kerns Strawberry nectar. The next two of our MDR dinners I stuck with the sherbet to avoid disappointment.

Tiramisu – My wife said this was good.

Dining room coffee – this was actually quite good.

Lido breakfasts (we ate between 8:30am and 9:30am each morning)

Omelets – these are good but they offer very few fillings. Became one of our morning staples.

Scrambled eggs – don’t believe these are eggs. Probably converted from powder and can be eaten with a straw.

Bacon – a little on the greasy side but thick and meaty. Worth trying.

Sausage links – average. Wouldn’t call them good or bad.

Fried potato rounds – Not bad. Standard frozen tot-like potatoes found in every supermarket frozen isle.

Orange Juice – they should not be allowed to call this yellow water “juice”.

Pastries – very tasty and fresh. Had 2 each morning.

Oatmeal – not great but needed my morning fiber infusion so I ate it anyway.

French toast – This was good and cooked the way I like it.

Lido Coffee – How can they have such good coffee in the dining room yet serve this burnt liquid tar on the Lido? We truly believe that they make the Lido coffee nasty on purpose in order to get morning coffee drinkers to pay for the “premium” coffees.

Lido Lunch (ate anywhere between noon and 2pm on days 1, 2, and 3)

Sandwich station – most of these were ok and equivalent to what you would get at a grocery store service deli. My wife enjoyed the salmon and bagel sandwich.

Salad bar – Good but not great. Many of the veggies were pushing their freshness levels but still edible. The potato salad was very good. Became another of my lunch staples.

Warm buffet line food – can’t detail each individual item but this wasn’t bad. The food was warm and had good flavor.

Pizza Bar – I had had heard many say how good it was so I was really looking forward to it since I love good pizza. Disappointed! They were extremely skimpy on the cheese and the dough was undercooked. These were equivalent to the $2 frozen pizzas that are always on sale at the grocery store. I was wrong in thinking the calzone would be better. The crust was cooked but I cut it open and I found a small amount of meat with a clear liquid sauce running out. There was nothing that resembled cheese on the inside.

Burgers - Heard these were good but found them to be just average. Tasted like the 75-80% frozen burger patties in the bulk bags at the grocery store and the meat was cold and dry.

Fries - these were above average and great for soaking up alcohol.

Flour Tortilla chips - These were good and made fresh, not bagged. One of the better finger foods on the ship.

Deserts – they were mostly good. Many were showing the effects of sitting out too long but were still flavorful.

On day 4 we had the 2 best meals of our cruise. We were in Ensenada and had tacos at a place called “Taqurito” (?) which was 3 doors down from Mango Mango. and accross the street from Papas & Beer. We loved our early lunch so much we went back for seconds a few hours later. Fresh toppings and sauces with the tortillas hand made and cooked to order right in front of you. Stuffed 4 adults for under $30. If you go to Ensenada you must try this place.

[sassyredhat]

We will go to "Taquritos". Sounds good. Did you use pesos or dollars ?

 

Pat

[luv2gonow]

Fight on Ron:D

Thanks for this great review.

 

Can you tell us more about the disturbance down the halll.....that involved "custom agents":eek:

thanks

K

[FightOnRon]

On day 4 we had the 2 best meals of our cruise. We were in Ensenada and had tacos at a place called “Taqurito” (?) which was 3 doors down from Mango Mango. and accross the street from Papas & Beer. We loved our early lunch so much we went back for seconds a few hours later. Fresh toppings and sauces with the tortillas hand made and cooked to order right in front of you. Stuffed 4 adults for under $30. If you go to Ensenada you must try this place.

 

I may comment on you take on all the food after I read it but did want to comment on this even if it is before my Ensenada adventure. We actually ate there too. On the excursion we took it was recommended to us. Very good.

[FightOnRon]

Fight on Ron:D

Thanks for this great review.

 

Can you tell us more about the disturbance down the halll.....that involved "custom agents":eek:

thanks

K

 

I will when I get to that part,,,,that is how I keep the readers coming back. But I will tell you,,there were more then just our floor and the Custom agents were all over the ship. Some people had too much Fun on the Fun Ship.!

[FightOnRon]

We will go to "Taquritos". Sounds good. Did you use pesos or dollars ?

 

Pat

 

Everyone takes dollars,,just know your exchange rate. Most menus were in both dollars and pesos.

[LaurieHoffman]

I may comment on you take on all the food after I read it but did want to comment on this even if it is before my Ensenada adventure. We actually ate there too. On the excursion we took it was recommended to us. Very good.

 

 

Is this location walking distance..? I know there is a free quick shuttle to town but can you walk from where it drops you off? Last time we did a tour to the blow hole so we didn't see anything in town. The kids are not sure if they want to do a tour so we might just walk around town and then head back to the ship

[FightOnRon]

I have a little time so I can do Catalina, or most of it. We got up and went to breakfast in the MDR. The ship pulled in about 7 but it was now 8:30. The deal was,,it was still choppy. So after breakfast I went into the room and watch the nose camera on the ship and it appears the Captain was moving the ship slowly right and left to find the perfect angle to block the chop fomr the side of the ship so we could get into tenders. Evidently CCL has a problem with people falling into the water instead of getting on the tenders. Guess it's against their rules. So eventually the announcement was made on off we went,,,,,,to a line a quarter of a mile long.

 

We actually only stood in line maybe 10 minutes but we did get on a tender and it was a heck of a wild ride. Makes one appreciate how big of a hit a ship can take and not feel it. So we get to the dock and I run into my rude passenger.

 

We are going singel file off the tender as,,well,,there was only room for one at a time on the little ramp. Right before my foot steps on the ramp the lady in front of me kind of trips and loses her shoe. So I stop so she can bend over , pick it up, and put it on while she is still on the ramp. From behind I get blindsided by some tool that figures he was supposed to be first and so and he shoves me out of the way then shoves the lady out of the way and he takes off. Seriously,,I am old but I work out and I do have a temper when activated. I am, afterall, an Oakland Raider fan. My immediate reaction was to chase him down and throw him off the pier but my sanity caught hold real quick and I held myself back. I should have done it in retrospect after all,,"it's my vacation and I can do what I want",,,but I didn't.

 

So my friends finally, after a couple of decades of trying, finally made it to Avalon. We rented a golf cart and did that thing,,then did some shppoing and some hill walking and finally went to get back to the dock and,,,another line a quarter of a mile long.

 

Had a late lunch on the ship,,played bingo,,did some drinking,,got a heck of a laugh at disco school,went to dinner then it was time for another show,,or is it?

[oncruisecontrol]

Nice review. Can't wait for the rest. Especially the bit about the passengers who had a little too much fun.

[FightOnRon]

That’s interesting and may be valid. We had late seating each night. Had our dishes been served at a reasonable temperature half of them probably would have been better.

 

I think times must have something to do with it. Nothing was cold that was supposed to be hot for us, ever.

 

Due to the weather we spent a fair amount of time at the Hold'em table and had our entire cruise paid for by some drunk college kids who thought they could play poker so the price was right. :) Hell, we were on vacation and were going to enjoy ourselves regardless of food or weather conditions.

 

There were a few of these, huh? I had fun with a few of them,,they were easy to mess with as they are not seasoned drinkers like we are!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our group had many of the soups and found them to be nearly all above average and very flavorful. Nearly all of the cooked veggies were overdone and cold.

 

Agree and disargree,,,again because fo the time? The soups were very good, I had them everyday but the vegys were not cold at all.

Dinner rolls – pretty decent and I learned the importance of filling up on them.Agreed

 

 

Black Tiger Shrimp cocktail – very tiny and rubber like.One of my fiends ate this twice, he liked it and he is from San Fransico and eats a lot of sea food. Sitting out too long????

 

Flat Iron Steak – Very dry and flavorless. Potatoes were good.

HAd it w=once, was good. I ordered medium and it came like that. My DW had it once and liked it too.

 

BBQ Baby backs – Cold and had an overpowering seasoning. Mine were hot and like they came right of the grill.

 

Prime Rib – May have been good but they butchered this with a nasty gravy. Probably to keep moist while it sat for hours.Mine had no sauce on it at all, it was fine

 

Stuffed Mushrooms – Cold, rubbery, flavorless, and stuck in the sauce like mortar.Friends liked it

 

Crab Cakes – I don’t believe that anyone at the table took a second bite. I truly think that this dish had gone bad. The fishy flavor and smell was overpowering.Friends liked it. I should add, I don't eat seafood so I can't tell you

 

Lobster – This was a discussion and butt of jokes amongst our table and two adjoining tables. Approximately 15 people at the 3 tables ordered the lobster and nearly all of them ordered 2 up front. Every single one of us was disappointed in what was served and it had nothing to do with how small or cold they were. They were HEAVILY salted and nearly inedible. We were joking that CCL was trying to save a buck and make us dislike the dish and fill up on water so we would not order more.I have to check with my friends,,they liked it a lot

 

Warm Chocolate Melting cake – this was very good. It was nearly identical to Dominos Pizza’s Chocolate Lava cake. Was very good , wasn't it?

 

 

Dining room coffee – this was actually quite good.

 

Interesting that meals could be so different to different people but as it is noted, food is subjective. I found the pizza and the burgers to be exactly what I expected as they are identical to HAL's. I think HAL's steaks are a bit better but I did have a sirloin on one ship that needed a chainsaw to cut through.

[Rosefloater]

We will go to "Taquritos". Sounds good. Did you use pesos or dollars ? You can use pesos or dollars.

 

Pat

 

The restaurant is called Taqueria Mexico Linda. It is next door to Hussongs. It is an easy 1 mile walk to this area from the ship. A few doors down from Hussongs is a paleteria (mexican ice cream store). They don't speak much English. The Coca (coconut) and the Pina (pineapple) popsicles are very good.

 

Here is a link to a map that I created for my CC roll call from 3/6: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1069012&page=12

 

 

I'm attaching the menu. The prices on the right are in dollars. You can sit at the bar or there are a few tables in the back and clean bathrooms. We always get the carne asada or chicken tacos. Good salsa and guacamole for the tacos.

 

[FightOnRon]

Rosefloater is right,,that is the one we ate at,,,muy bueno

[STEVENJAN]

[ So we get to the dock and I run into my rude passenger.

 

We are going singel file off the tender as,,well,,there was only room for one at a time on the little ramp. Right before my foot steps on the ramp the lady in front of me kind of trips and loses her shoe. So I stop so she can bend over , pick it up, and put it on while she is still on the ramp. From behind I get blindsided by some tool that figures he was supposed to be first and so and he shoves me out of the way then shoves the lady out of the way and he takes off. Seriously,,I am old but I work out and I do have a temper when activated. I am, afterall, an Oakland Raider fan. My immediate reaction was to chase him down and throw him off the pier but my sanity caught hold real quick and I held myself back. I should have done it in retrospect after all,,"it's my vacation and I can do what I want",,,but I didn't.

 

 

I had almost the same thing happen to me at the "Happiest Place On Earth" (not to me)

 

Some joker basically bumped me out of the way and then I bumped him to join my wife and daughter. He got mad and basically threatened me and asked what I was going to do about it. I told him after he beat me up, I was going to sue his butt. He backed down.

Probably the same guy.

[luv2gonow]

I will when I get to that part,,,,that is how I keep the readers coming back. But I will tell you,,there were more then just our floor and the Custom agents were all over the ship. Some people had too much Fun on the Fun Ship.!

 

LOL......Aha....so thats how it's done;) Looking forward the rest of your review:)

K

[FightOnRon]

I wanted to mention something LIVINGWILD spoke of too.

 

We returned to the ship from Catalina about 3 pm. We went to the Lido for some lunch,,I stuck to the burgers, my wife braved the Mongolian grill line again. My friends made themselves huge salads and and sandwhiches fromr the deli which they liked.

 

My DW went to take a power nap. Ny buddies wife went to the Spa to have a massage somy and my buddy wandered the ship. The ship was getting ready to leave and I wanted him to be on deck when we did. As we wandered you could see the energixed passengers, as described by LIVINGWILD. Familys playing ping pong and shuffleboard,,guys shooting hoops,, people in the hot tubs and trying to get some sun through the wind. As a side note we went back to the serenity deck and had a laugh with the worker there trying to keep all the mats on the deck chairs from blowing off the ship in the wind. I saw families playing board games many people with smiles on thier faces.

 

So by 4 pm or so when all the people were back on the ship, it didn't seem very crowded and everyone seemed to be having fun. It was a little brutal in the buffett are with people chaotically running around trying to find tables inside to eat what they could find but I saw nothing that would have made anyone say, "man these Carnival passengers are awful".

 

PS: line cutting. When I was standing in line for my burger someone asked if they could jsut reach around me and get something and I saw no probelm with that. I didn't consider that line cutting at all. Also, I wanted some potatoe salad and right when I got to it they took it away to refill it. I made a comment abou tthat to the guy behind me. When it came back I was too far away so he organsied a pass the potatoe salad line and had someone spoon some on a plate and they passed it up to me. Pretty nice.

 

PARENTS,,I did see something that may or may not be a bad thing so I will meniton it here. My buddy and myslef,,both old guys and I am sure we look like grandpas to younger ones,,not to ourselves of course. I was on the Verhanda deck trying to find my way out to that observation platform there. I was up there on the first dya but they had the door blocked because fo the wind. Anyhow in the hallway there was a young girl,,teenager to be sure,,talking to a worker (not a steward but some kind of cleaning guy,,I could tell it wasn't a steard because they all dressed in a specific uniform). Didn't know what the conversation was about. Anyhow we went to the door and the sign was still on it but we decided tey jsut forgto to remove it so we were going through the door. The young girl walked up to us and said "guys, do you know how to get outside to a deck". we told her to follow us, the deck is on the other side of the door. She told us the worker, that had disappeared, told her to come down to deck 3 and he'll show her the outside. I asked her if she knew what deck three was and she said no. I told her that was where the crew lived and to NOT go down there with a crewmember no matter what they said. Now maybe this was innocent, or maybe a communication breakdown witht he crewmember who may not have had a command of the English language,,but whatever the reason I go the point accross to her.

 

SPA: Can't compare HAl to CCL, my DW or myslef had never used them. After lunch my friends wife did get a massage. As an FYI,,although they live in San Fransico , she goes to Vegas a lot. Sort of a low/high roller. She looses just enough to get her rooms compt. She does go so spas there so I asmed he on a scal of 1-5 waht she thought. She said 3 1/2 maybe a 4. Price wise it was no more then she is used to paying and yes they did try to sell the products they used on her but she said all spas do that where she goes. So no hard sell any worse then any other sell.

 

Will do our evening in a bit,,although not much to tell.

[FightOnRon]

after reading a couple of other threads today...

 

There was not an overload of trays in the hall, one or two there,,just what I have seen in hotels,,,i guess no one wants to call room service and have the trays taken away....

 

the few scooters abourd were a little more annoying then strollers, although niether was bad. Parents with strollers are good at manuvering them out of the way as to be for the most part unobtrusive...people in the scooters won't manuver and will mow you down

 

tables in the Lido area were bussed pretty quickly,,the day we came back from Catalina to have lucnh we saw a table we wanted but it was dirty, took us all of 30 seconds to find a guy to clean it,,so no problem at all

 

I neglected to mention that for breakfast on Catalina day I thought I would out fox the room serviec for my morning coffe,,I requested it to be delivered at 715 and sure enough it showed up at 7, when I really wanted it. We had an oppourtunity to call room serice for drinks a couple of times, they took no more the 5 minutes to get out order to us. the longest I had to wait was on the last night when they forgeot my breakfast card,,that ook 20 minutes but I can understand as they figured there was nothing in it for them why hurry (the room stewrad was off duty)

 

Stewards,,,,I never noticed on HAL a room stewrad having a fixed schedule. Seems ike the same guy assinged to one's room worked 24-7 and whever you called them that was who you got,,and if you left your room for 20 minutes it was cleaned again when you came back . CCL stewards have fixed hours,,like 9 to 1 and 6 to 9. Other then that you're on your own with the off duty person, whomever that would be.

[sassyredhat]

The restaurant is called Taqueria Mexico Linda. It is next door to Hussongs. It is an easy 1 mile walk to this area from the ship. A few doors down from Hussongs is a paleteria (mexican ice cream store). They don't speak much English. The Coca (coconut) and the Pina (pineapple) popsicles are very good.

Here is a link to a map that I created for my CC roll call from 3/6: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1069012&page=12

I'm attaching the menu. The prices on the right are in dollars. You can sit at the bar or there are a few tables in the back and clean bathrooms. We always get the carne asada or chicken tacos. Good salsa and guacamole for the tacos.

 

Thank You ! :)

 

Pat

[FightOnRon]

So...we covered most of this day. But our next rude passenger wa smy friends wife.

 

We wanted to see the early show which was at 830 but we know the 8pm bingo folks would tag up the chairs and not move so we decided to go to dinner enough time to sit through bingo then hog our seats for the show. The Chogs were out in full force in the showroom,,not saving for others but getting there so early it did remind me of HAL. On HAL ships the oldsters will get to a show early to get the best seats.

 

Well my friends wife did her hiting in the spa but they did talk her into a longer masssage then she had planned and we had told her to be done by 6:30,,which came and went. 645,,no word,,7pm we call the spa and tell her to finish up as she was supposed to be done by 630. We were ticked at her because we felt our seats going away. Generally dinner was taking about an hour or a bit longer depending upon how many appetizers my friends ordered.

 

So we got to dinner at 715 and knew we were out of luck but our waiter,,Dan,,knew out dilema and somehow he had out food get to us quicker then ever. We made the 8 pm half off bing and had good seats for the show,,again dodgeing the poles that are everywhere.

 

Once againn< will admit I enjoyed thier show and my wife sat through her 4th show ever,,the 3rd without a complaint. The show was Shout and they really did a fine job singing and dancing again. The female lead singer really should try a country gig not on a crusieship she really was the best of those type of singers that I had seen on a cruiseship. Not as good as the broadway how/opera singer on HAL, but pretty good.

 

I will say too,,someone mentioned it. HAL has a string quartet that roves the ship during theevening afternoon hours and if you like this type of music it's worth hunting them down.

 

I also will say I did not get a chance to try the dance clubs or those types of venues but I know they were rocking all night because of the feedback I got from other passengers.

 

I think we just visited the casino a bit, made our deposit into the CCL coffers and that was it. time for beddy by and hopefully a fun day tomorrow in Ensenada.

[FightOnRon]

Thank You ! :)

 

Pat

 

Not that it makes much of a difference but most things on that menu were about a quarter higher then the menu showed. guess they raised them because America is recovering,,where I don't know but supposedly we are. Also,,even though on the menu, the salsa and chips were free,,maybe cause we bought other things too.

[FightOnRon]

Anytime dining thoughts. ON HAL the had a version of that but that was late in 2008, it may have changed. In 2008 on HAL you could eat whenever you wanted or have fixed dining jsut like CCL> But back then on HAL you ahd to make your anytime dining reservation in the morning. The idea was to base it upon when you wanted to eat that day, but you made a reservation. I only had fixed dining times on HAL so I didn't try it.

 

On the Paradise, the Elation was used for anytime dining. Thet assigned one side of the dining room for us,,the part that wasn't raised. I am not 100% sure but the other unraised side may have been anytime too but since we asked, and had, the same waiter every night I couldn't say for sure.

 

We happened to have dinner when the dancing waiter show was going one,,it seemd to always be about 7:15. However, we couldn't alwys see it. the waiters at anytime dining work a lot harder because thier flow of customers is non-stop. They was a separated group used for busing tables baecause it had to be done so often. Our waiter wa s agreat guy and he said hi and talked to whever I saw him on the ship,,either during breakfast (although he was never our waiter) or lunch time when he worked the Lido. So you can build a reproire with an anytime dining waiter if you wanted to,,it was you choice.

[Rosefloater]

Not that it makes much of a difference but most things on that menu were about a quarter higher then the menu showed. guess they raised them because America is recovering,,where I don't know but supposedly we are. Also,,even though on the menu, the salsa and chips were free,,maybe cause we bought other things too.

 

It might depend on the exchange rate. It has been hovering around 12.75 pesos to 1 dollar.

[FightOnRon]

I took that pic in Jan. Those were the prices we paid in Jan and again last week.

 

Maybe I had to many SOLs......