Enchantment of the Seas 10/18-10/25/2012 Canada/New England - Review

[buckirj1]

I booked the cruise a little more than a month before sailing. I'm a casual, low-maintenance cruiser, who doesn't desire or expect a lot of interaction with staff, crew or fellow passengers. Being something of a risk taker, I booked the lowest inside guarantee at a terrific price for a sailing with a low solo supplement. I was assigned a cabin almost immediately...directly beneath the main dining room! You pays your money and you takes your chances, but uh-oh, how loud is that going to be? The answer: not much. I heard rolling carts, but it wasn't much different than any other sound onboard ship. The extra noise didn't disturb me at all.

 

 

 

The cabin itself, though small, had lots of storage. Small bars of soap were provided; I didn't think cruiselines did that anymore. Terrible bathroom layout, with the toilet jammed into a corner. No elbow room at all, and that's as detailed as I'm going to get. This time the shower had clamshell doors, instead of a shower curtain: a huge improvement.

 

The cabin steward was fine: he called me by name, and was unfailingly personable and professional. I usually gave him mornings off since I like to sleep late. I'm perfectly fine with having my cabin serviced only once a day, though many are bound to disagree with this viewpoint. I prepaid gratuities, but left extra for the steward since my sleeping schedule likely put him off his work schedule.

 

The itinerary included the standard Canada/NE ports. I'd been to those ports many times, and decided to stay onboard for the most part. The weather was typical for that part of the world at that time of year. The first sea day was quite rough, but smoothed out for the remainder of the cruise.

 

Sailing from my home port of Baltimore was terrific. A local shared shuttle service picked me up at my home midway between Baltimore and Washington, DC shortly before 11AM, and by 12:05PM I was enjoying a drink at the Centrum bar and watching others board. It doesn't get much better than that! I'd sailed the Enchantment once before, shortly after it'd been stretched. It didn't look any different this time around. The ship was attractive in a 1990s brass-and-glass sort of way, complete with soaring atrium. Carpets, furnishings, etc. all seemed to be in good repair.

 

I found the ship's layout left much to be desired. Unlike other ships that group similar types of venues on the same floor, the Enchantment had them all over the place. It seemed like I was always taking the stairs or elevators to get anywhere. The main show theater was small, and got crowded quickly, but there were several seats that were perfect for a solo cruiser. It's hard to describe, but there were rows of seats ending with a pole, and then one more seat next to the outside aisle. I snatched them up every time:-)

 

Speaking of solo cruisers, it seemed as if RCI has no idea how to deal with us. There was an annoying contrived DO Something FUN atmosphere that was totally out of place on a laid-back Canada/NE itinerary. I realize I'm not expressing this very well, but there was a definite frantic vibe that doesn't exist in my experience on Carnival, Cunard or NCL.

 

I detest assigned seating, and changed my dining assignment from late-fixed to Anytime Dining shortly after boarding. I split my time between the main dining room and the Windjammer. The food was adequate, but nothing jumped out at me like my favorites on other cruiselines. In fact, the best thing I ate all week was a simple baked ham one night in the WJ. As an experiment, I opted to eat alone one evening in the MDR. Disastrous! The wait staff had no idea what to do with me. The treatment went from obsequious "we'll take good care of you" to being completely ignored. I gave it up as a bad break before dessert. Gimme freestyle dining on a cruiseline that knows how to do it!

 

Entertainment wasn't very...entertaining. Jugglers, comedians, singer and dancers. Enough to pass a few hours during the evening, but nothing to really look forward to or get excited about. It wasn't as dreadful as Cunard's evening entertainment, but wasn't much better, either. Entertainment was nowhere near NCL standards.

 

What else would Cruise Critic folks be interested in? Oh yeah. Dress code. I saw lots of jeans in the main dining room and nobody turned a hair. I was at the Windjammer (in jeans) on the two formal nights, but I saw lots of people wandering the ship wearing jeans on the formal evenings after dinner. No clue if they started out in jeans, or changed after dinner. It doesn't matter to me one way or another. Everybody seemed to smoke where they were supposed to. I hung out in the smoking space a good bit, as that was often the shady spot on the ship, and I'd much rather stink than be hot and burned. Smoking doesn't bother me much, but it was hugely entertaining to watch the folks walk by who couldn't be arsed to walk on the other side of the ship. Does that fake coughing/hand-flapping thing really help?

 

Sailing from my home port was great, but the total experience didn't measure up. What wasn't good were the things that are important to me when I cruise. What was good were the things that don't matter so much to me. In part, I chose this cruise as an experiment to see if this class of ship would be acceptable for a future Alaska cruise. The Rhapsody of the Seas has a great itinerary with not-too-early port stops and a long daytime stop in Victoria. Unfortunately, the ship layout and bathroom design, along with the RCI "culture" doesn't make this an attractive choice, after all. Even so, it was a valuable experience in that it gave more definition to those things I like and don't like. I think I'll return to one of the lines I like best for the next cruise or two before experimenting again.

[Straughn]

Interesting review. I am a long time RCCL cruiser (1993-2007: one or to times a year). This is my first cruise on RCCL since Oct 2007- took advantage of the proximity of the ship to No Virginia. We are booked on Enchantment over Christmas- sailing with someone who has only cruised twice and never on RCCL. I agree with your low-maintenace part as I do not really care about activities- only want decent food (not expecting 5 star on any cruise line I can afford) and a reasonably behaved demographic. I enjoyed and agree with your comment about the Vision class ships' layout. Until you stated it,I could never put it into words. We always seemed to be one deck off from where we wanted to be.

 

I am looking forward to this cruise, but have some concerns about the culture, especially for my friend. From reading this board and other reviews, there has obviously been a huge shift in the way RCCL operates. This cruise will be an "experiment" as to whether I continue with RCCL or just enjoy my D+ status on Celebrity.

[KirkNC]

Thanks for the review.

[motherof]

Please tell me more about the shuttle service. I searched in vain for one last year. The few links I found were broken. With a small car and 4 passengers, fitting all the luggage in was a challenge.

[buckirj1]

Please tell me more about the shuttle service. I searched in vain for one last year. The few links I found were broken. With a small car and 4 passengers, fitting all the luggage in was a challenge.

 

I used The Airport Shuttle (http://www.theairportshuttle.com). I've used the company for other trips to BWI and Amtrak, but this was the first time I've taken them to the Baltimore cruise port. I was pleased with both price and service. I'm not sure how it'd work with 4 people; I don't know if they do a shared van for that many. You might need to book a dedicated van, and that seemed pretty expensive. It's worth looking into, though. Good luck

 

The website is confusing, but they're very helpful on the telephone.

 

Duh moment: actually looked at the website, and they quote a one-way price of $61 for a party of four from the airport

[motherof]

Thanks! If they come out to the College Park area, that would be great!

[spookwife]

whatever you do do NOT use Super shuttle.

 

maybe it was just our driver, but he was an hour late to pick us up on the way out to BWI, got lost twice, screwed up his GPS on the way back so that we sat in the van for an hour and THEN went around the circuit again and all we got was a half hearted apology from the manager who came out to fix his GPS.

Dude barely spoke American as well.

[Sugar*Magnolia]

Interesting review. Thanks for pointing out the details. We have never experienced the "culture" you describe on RC cruises and think that description almost matches our recent CCL cruise :eek: . That was some 'experience" to say the least. Im also unsure how cunard can be compared to any of the other cruise lines mentioned, but that's just my thoughts.

[Sugar*Magnolia]

...duplicate post.

[pd52]

did you notice if people were bringing soda/water on board???

i have heard rumors that some times balt has issues.

 

thanks