Main Seating or Late Seating?

[peter1975]

I'm a veteran Royal Caribbean cruiser and have always done late seating for dinner (8:30PM). I love it! I don't really want to change. I'm cruising with some friends in October who have suggested the early seating. I'm biased, so can I get some advice from this board -- pros and cons -- of doing early or late seating? Thanks!

[TEXASMUNK]

1. More kids, if ya like kids at dinner, no problem at early

2. Nap time! After beach hours....shower, dress...liesure before late seating

3. Conversation....if you enjoy a more liesurely pace to a meal, late. If you sole purpose if food, early....Not rushed out for the next seating.

4. Pre dinner adult beverages.....late seating.

 

pls note our prejudice, LOL...

 

Compromise with your friends...maybe MTD at 7P?

[jlbkty]

Early is way too early, but late is a tad too late. We always do late so we are not rushed to get back to the ship & get ready for dinner on port days. I agree with the above poster about not being rushed to get out due to another seating coming in after you. However, I have found that we never make it to the shows when we have late seating.

[mikemike404]

I also heard on the early seating you cannot order more then one helping. Can someone confirm this ?

[mrpayroll]

I also heard on the early seating you cannot order more then one helping. Can someone confirm this ?

 

NOT true....order as much as you want.

[justmeinflorida]

We prefer the late seating ourselves. We're night owls, so, it more closely matches our schedule. The early seating is just too early for us to eat. We end up hungry again before bed and hunting a littl3 more than a late night snack. NOT a terribly bad thing aboard a cruise ship though I suppose. LOL

 

I guess my only problem with the late seating is twice on our last cruise (late seating) one or more of our table decided they either didn't like what they had ordered, wanted a 2nd plate, or just wanted to try something that had interested them and were told they couldn't be accommodated because the galley was already shut down.

 

My parents who cruise regularly on RCL, and normally dine the first seating when sailing on their own have never experienced that before.

 

It was somewhat disappointing to say the least to order something that wasn't up to expectations, and be unable to order something different just because you chose the late seating.

 

For that reason alone, we've gone ahead and selected the early seating for our next cruise.

[luvscruising2007]

We have always enjoyed late seating. It is closer to our dinner time here at home. I also believe it is less rushed. We have never missed a show because of late seating. They are generally scheduled before dinner and we have no problem being ready.

[cb at sea]

We, too prefer late..we like to drink before dinner...not so much after!

of course, you could all sign up for MTD and go at a time to suit everyone!

[parrotfeathers]

I've always done the late seating, but I really don't like waiting until 8 pm to eat. On my next cruise (Majesty) I am going to try the MTD and go for about 7 pm. If I don't like it that would only be 4 days to endure it.

 

nancy

[pltag]

If given the choice of Early or Late ...... we always chose Late. But, on our last cruise we did MTD at 7:30ish most nights and that was perfect!

[tigers2425]

We have always done the early seating. The other posters are right about the days you are in port it cuts your day a little short but if you really wanted to stay on the island you could always do the windjammer for dinner.

 

We have not tried the MTD because we have always enjoyed interacting with our waitstaff. We were told we were not guaranteed the same table/waitstaff if we chose my time dining.

 

When we began cruising our kids were a little younger and dinner was always a time we would "catch up" on the days activities and come together. We also enjoy going to the shows so once dinner is over we go to the shows.

 

I guess we are a little biased with regards to the early seating.

 

Enjoy your cruise :c)

 

Tigers2425

Lori

[onefishtwofish]

We have always done the late seating (with kids) except for once. We prefer the late seating hands down. The early was too early as we really like to enjoy our days....MTD may be a good alternative to think about so you can be flexible....;)

[BBT]

I'm a veteran Royal Caribbean cruiser and have always done late seating for dinner (8:30PM). I love it! I don't really want to change. I'm cruising with some friends in October who have suggested the early seating. I'm biased, so can I get some advice from this board -- pros and cons -- of doing early or late seating? Thanks!

 

Are your friends new to cruising? If they are they may want to participate in the late night deck party & buffet. That was at 11pm on my cruise and I had late dinding and finished dinner way after 10pm, so just couldn't indulge in the yummy looking food they had. So I didn't care for the late seating on that occasion.

 

Like others have posted - compromise with MTD at say 7:30? Can MTD vary from night to night to accommodate events later in the evening? If that's the case, maybe that would be a good choice (kind of like Freestyle on NCL).