Indy 3/1/14 the good the bad and the ugly

[drarill]

Excellent review! Thanks for sharing your cruise experience with us!:):)

[wolfganghowell]

So the 4 of us like to gamble. 3 of us play slots mainly although I do play tables. For some reason, I wasn't in the mood this cruise. Mr Wolf is the tables guy - specifically Ultimate Tx Hold Em. We would usually end up there around 12 each night - mainly because the other venues either had bad entertainment or were closed. Mr Wolf was HOT that first night. He managed to give a little bit back the next nights and then the last night he was WARM. He ended up winning back his starting bank and enough to pay for our onboard account. Nice.

 

Around Night 5, the girls were at the roulette machine. It's an electronic version of the table game where each player has their own screen/machine. Around 12:30 I cashed out and headed to bed with my $234 ticket. The next night, I put my ticket in the machine. Rejected. Play some cash and try the ticket again. Rejected. We end up at the roulette machine again - my girlfriend has now gone to bed. Ticket rejected. Mr Wolf is sent to the cashier to have them give him cash for the ticket. He comes back saying it is an invalid ticket. The casino gave him the money temporarily but they are investigating. One of the managers comes over to discuss with me since it was my ticket. I explain that I cashed out last night and took the ticket with me where it remained in the safe until we came back tonight. He tells me that the ticket was hand paid last night and that "they" must have forgotten to take the ticket and that I found it. Ummm....are they actually saying that I am trying to steal a ticket and con them into giving me the money? Wow, yeah they are. I repeat myself and say to check the cameras. Which will show I cashed out and left the casino with the ticket. Long story short this goes on for a good 30 minutes. I'm not really crazy about the implication that they are accusing me of theft. Isn't the customer always right? (Answer - no.) So now that the fun has left the building, we just hand him back the money. Again, it's not the money it's the principal of the thing. We did nothing wrong. OK, it's partly the money. I won it fair and square!

 

Cut to breakfast - our friends greet us with "We have solved the mystery." Remember she had gone to bed but our friend Joe witnessed the whole thing. He told her about it and she went "OMG, I played that machine after she left and when I tried to cash out, it wouldn't give me a ticket so they hand paid me. I got more money than I thought I had but I just figured I hadn't been paying attention." She said they told her that machine had been malfunctioning. So her hand pay had included my money, hence my ticket was invalidated based on HER hand pay. She paid me my $$ - what a nice friend! :D Needless to say, I found that casino manager and told him that the mystery was solved. Once again, I understand that things happen. But it was pretty disappointing to be basically called a thief when all they had to do was check the video footage. I knew what time I had left the casino.

[Cruzn Fool]

Other than this, lovely day at sea. We are depressed. It seems to all of us that 8 days went by faster than 7. We have no idea how or why this happened. Maybe alien abduction? Something.

 

 

One word - ALCOHOL:D

 

Great review. It was very entertaining and informative. I totally understand your position on the cabana. Sometimes it not about the money and, as you said, you were more than willing to pay the cost and just enjoy the day. It really sucks to spend your vacation doing anything other than what you planned on doing especially when it is fighting with somebody over these types of things. However I am glad you at least got compensated with the meals and excellent service in Chops. That had to at least make up for some of the hassles. You seem to have a similiar attitude to how we vacation. When you face some adversity you just move on to the next fun activity and not let it spoil your whole trip. Many people would not have the same attitude you had about a few of those things.

[wolfganghowell]

I realize I have related 2 negative stories but really they were glitches. It's all in the resolution of them. While I love the cruises where absolutely nothing goes wrong, even the ones with some hiccups are great experiences.

 

We found the Independence to be a lovely ship with a very friendly staff and crew. The activities seemed well rounded. Other than the Schooner and Pub entertainers, the other acts seemed quite good.

 

Any questions you have - fire away!

[wolfganghowell]

LOL Fool, yeah we tried to blame the drink package too. Time just floats faster on sea days. It probably didn't help that I was reading a great book so I had to keep reading!

 

And thanks yes - the cabana thing was just not going to ruin my day. It "dampened our enthusiasm" for a few hours which is a bummer but dang 2 hours out of 8 days ain't bad. Even adding in the casino issue, again, less than 4 not so great hours out of 8 days. Still a win. I wasn't at work! :D

[SnappyNappi]

Great review, Wolf. :) Really enjoyed your view and your honesty. We travel much the same way... it is vacation so we try not to let anything get to us. After all, a day at sea, even with issues, is still better than a day at work!

 

DH and I are considering one of the Freedom class ships for Summer 2015. I see from your signature that you have sailed other classes of ships - which is your favorite? We have done Oasis and the Explorer (Explorer for the 3rd time this Fall) - since you sound like you have similar expectations and views, I am curious to know how you think the Freedom class measures up against the other classes on RCCL.

[bugger832001]

After they covered the pool I was at the other pool sitting on the edge with a bottle and they came running at me and I new what they wanted I just turned around and faced the other way.

[PhilNDebbieAtSea]

Great review! Thanks so much!!

[joand452]

Disappointing to read about the entertainment in the Schooner Bar. That's where DH and I like to sit most nights. We've been leaving more than we've been staying lately, due to lousy entertainers.

 

That's all right -- we'll still have fun -- we're traveling with two other couples.

 

Thank you sharing your trip with us!

Edited March 11, 2014 by joand452

[nednrom]

Great Review, thank you so much! I didn't have time to write a review so I hope you don't think I'm hijacking your thread.

 

We were on the Independence Feb 15-23rd and we had the same experience as you did:

 

1. Chair Hogs -- All the chairs in the Solarium Poolside would have towels on them by 8:30 in the morning. There were a lot of complaints, the pool attendants tried to help to no avail.

 

2. Bands: Schooner Bar and Dog& Badger entertainment was disappointing. Rock the Boat played in different venues and were pretty good -- music of our time. Hot Spice the Caribbean Band's reggae set was limited. they played and sung pop songs reggae style which didn't fit. We didn't get a chance to hear the Jazz band. The venues all closed by MN -- I mean we're not partiers at late 40/early 50s but on vacations we like to stay up a little later and dance.

 

3. Labadee Cabana -- I reserved a OTW Cabana 8 months before the cruise. When we got to Labadee, we were shown to a beach cabana. I was told that this was the cabana assigned to us and the rest of the cabanas were already taken and it was 10:30 ( ship docks at 10:00). We were lucky that the beach cabana was at a very good location with a great view and we had a wonderful attendant so we didn't complain after boarding.

 

We also purchased the drink package and had a great time. Ate at Chops twice because they offered us a 30% discount both nights and at Giovannis one night. Service and staff are great on this ship.

Edited March 12, 2014 by nednrom

[Poorplaya]

Our cabana could technically be called OTW. It does have a ladder into the water. However, it faces the beach of people. Where's that great view of the water, the ship, the mountains? Oh it's to our right - we now have the worst OTW cabana. And it's crowded. Now, we had never been to Labadee and I did my due diligence, I knew this beach was more crowded. BUT we were right off the beach, no privacy.

 

 

 

 

 

We now have a very surly supervisor watching us. Raj feels terrible and to his credit, he had a rough day with many other cabana problems. I feel for the guy and he did so much to make us happy again...eventually. We take our floaties and go to Barefoot Beach. Surly Supervisor tells us we can't go there. Uhh...yeah we can. This is the one time where we enjoyed flashing that gold card. We had access to that beach based on the card, you don't have to have a cabana. So we ended up schlepping over there when we wanted to float and eat lunch.

 

 

 

BUT the story is not over. The location of the cabana was so lousy that Mr Wolf went back to Barefoot to tell Raj that we never would have accepted this cabana - that the location is not what he promised. We ended up moving again to another one that sort of faced the ship and the water. It was fine. For the less than 4 hours that were left to us. Raj told us to order anything we wanted, even if it wasn't on the drink package, he would take care of it onboard. We were thinking bottle of champagne or at the worst, a bucket of beer. Nope - our attendants refused since we were on the drink package even when we told them to go ahead and charge us. We could only do the one drink at a time.

 

 

 

Now, I realize that some of you may think - oh poor you NOT. I get it. But -

 

 

 

We felt like we got conned out of our lovely cabana to accommodate someone else. Yes, it was now free. But honestly, that was not the point with us. The cost was $125 per couple - it wasn't a big deal. Yes we appreciated the generosity of the offer but that alone did not make us accept it. We actually enjoyed the fact that by helping someone else, we were also receiving a benefit. Had we known what we know now, we would have said, Sorry we aren't changing, sorry those people can't have a cabana but we reserved it first. Selfish, well perhaps. But poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine? Right?

 

We would rather have paid for the cabana and enjoyed the beach and view we originally had than dealt with losing 2 hours of relaxation and fun plus the attitude of the locals.

 

 

 

On the positive side, our cabana attendant was very gracious and was not involved so of course we made sure to tip him and thank him for his service. He was great. Back onboard, we filled Raj in on the disappointments of the day. Raj is a great concierge and the sign of that is when things go bad, how do you handle it? It's easy to be great when nothing goes wrong! He worked very hard to bring us back to being happy. We couldn't get back the wasted time but he came up with a little resolution for us that I felt was fair. I won't share it here but it was a credit for all of that again, money was not the objective and we actually did NOT ask for credit. But I felt as a customer service issue, Raj did what he could within his power to show his empathy for our disappointment. I also think he told Chops to treat us well because they DID.

 

So I have a question for you, we too will have a concierge on our cruise on Indy April 26th, how do we find out who our concierge will be and how we email them because I was wanting to make the same request. Thanks for the help!

 

 

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Cruise Critic Forums mobile app

[Clarea]

So I have a question for you, we too will have a concierge on our cruise on Indy April 26th, how do we find out who our concierge will be and how we email them because I was wanting to make the same request. Thanks for the help!

The concierge has a generic email: [noparse]ID_Concierge@rccl.com[/noparse].

 

You can look at this thread starting at the bottom and work up to the list of current concierges:

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1518418

Edited March 12, 2014 by clarea

[leaveitallbehind]

Our cabana could technically be called OTW. It does have a ladder into the water. However, it faces the beach of people. Where's that great view of the water, the ship, the mountains? Oh it's to our right - we now have the worst OTW cabana. And it's crowded. Now, we had never been to Labadee and I did my due diligence, I knew this beach was more crowded. BUT we were right off the beach, no privacy.

 

 

We now have a very surly supervisor watching us. Raj feels terrible and to his credit, he had a rough day with many other cabana problems. I feel for the guy and he did so much to make us happy again...eventually. We take our floaties and go to Barefoot Beach. Surly Supervisor tells us we can't go there. Uhh...yeah we can. This is the one time where we enjoyed flashing that gold card. We had access to that beach based on the card, you don't have to have a cabana. So we ended up schlepping over there when we wanted to float and eat lunch.

 

BUT the story is not over. The location of the cabana was so lousy that Mr Wolf went back to Barefoot to tell Raj that we never would have accepted this cabana - that the location is not what he promised. We ended up moving again to another one that sort of faced the ship and the water. It was fine. For the less than 4 hours that were left to us. Raj told us to order anything we wanted, even if it wasn't on the drink package, he would take care of it onboard. We were thinking bottle of champagne or at the worst, a bucket of beer. Nope - our attendants refused since we were on the drink package even when we told them to go ahead and charge us. We could only do the one drink at a time.

 

Now, I realize that some of you may think - oh poor you NOT. I get it. But -

 

We felt like we got conned out of our lovely cabana to accommodate someone else. Yes, it was now free. But honestly, that was not the point with us. The cost was $125 per couple - it wasn't a big deal. Yes we appreciated the generosity of the offer but that alone did not make us accept it. We actually enjoyed the fact that by helping someone else, we were also receiving a benefit. Had we known what we know now, we would have said, Sorry we aren't changing, sorry those people can't have a cabana but we reserved it first. Selfish, well perhaps. But poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine? Right?

We would rather have paid for the cabana and enjoyed the beach and view we originally had than dealt with losing 2 hours of relaxation and fun plus the attitude of the locals.

 

On the positive side, our cabana attendant was very gracious and was not involved so of course we made sure to tip him and thank him for his service. He was great. Back onboard, we filled Raj in on the disappointments of the day. Raj is a great concierge and the sign of that is when things go bad, how do you handle it? It's easy to be great when nothing goes wrong! He worked very hard to bring us back to being happy. We couldn't get back the wasted time but he came up with a little resolution for us that I felt was fair. I won't share it here but it was a credit for all of that again, money was not the objective and we actually did NOT ask for credit. But I felt as a customer service issue, Raj did what he could within his power to show his empathy for our disappointment. I also think he told Chops to treat us well because they DID.

 

That's a shame that the cabana situation unfolded the way it did as your ultimate Nellie's cabana actually was vacant until you arrived. We arrived there early next to you and watched as first one party came to it, but stayed only a few minutes and left, then a second party came and asked us if it was vacant and how to go about getting it as they had not reserved one earlier. They were not able to rent it "on shore" so it remained vacant. Raj and another staff member came over at one point clipboard in hand and were in a rather intense discussion for a few minutes apparently trying to determine why it was not occupied.

 

We left for a while and when we got back you were there. I didn't ask when we briefly talked, but I was curious as to why you arrived so late in the day when I thought you would have been at Barefoot.

 

Hopefully it still allowed enough enjoyment for the remainder of the day for you. Agree with you regarding the attendant - he was very good.

[niksmom630]

Thanks for the review-enjoyed reading about your experience on Indy!

 

We had a similar experience--entertainment in the Schooner and Pub was ho hum....zzzzzzzzzzzz

 

And those "end" over the water cabana's on Nellies that face the beach are a horrible location. Nothing peaceful or quiet about it! Luckily we were there early enough to be able to change our location, but this was not an easy process either.

 

What we did love about Indy was the crew, and overall had a good experience despite some bumps along the way!

[Poorplaya]

The concierge has a generic email: [noparse]ID_Concierge@rccl.com[/noparse].

 

You can look at this thread starting at the bottom and work up to the list of current concierges:

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1518418

 

 

Thanks for the info, I appreciate it!!!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Cruise Critic Forums mobile app

[bethco]

Thanks for the great review. I was on Independence a year ago and am taking the Transatlantic. We were really hoping that they had some better entertainment in the Schooner and the Pub, but it sounds like it's the same guys. :(

[vermontvoyager]

I enjoyed reading your review of Indy. We were on 2 previous cruises before you 2/9-2/23 and had similar experience with the entertainment being subpar.

Indy is 1 of our favorite ships and found I hated what they did to the promenade shops with the stores they have.:(

They no longer have a Logo Souvenir shop to buy things, unless you like the crappy logo items and over priced items in the shop SEASONS.

They have 2 high end handbag and purse shops DESIRES and MICHAEL KORS.:mad:

Why they need 2 high priced handbag/purse stores on the ship is ridiculous.

 

Raj...is the best Concierge we have had on all of cruises and greatly enjoyed our 2 weeks with him. :)

 

Chops was also fantastic on the 2 nights we dined there and the filets were excellent.

 

[Ocean Boy]

I enjoyed reading your review of Indy. We were on 2 previous cruises before you 2/9-2/23 and had similar experience with the entertainment being subpar.

Indy is 1 of our favorite ships and found I hated what they did to the promenade shops with the stores they have.:(

They no longer have a Logo Souvenir shop to buy things, unless you like the crappy logo items and over priced items in the shop SEASONS.

They have 2 high end handbag and purse shops DESIRES and MICHAEL KORS.:mad:

Why they need 2 high priced handbag/purse stores on the ship is ridiculous.

Raj...is the best Concierge we have had on all of cruises and greatly enjoyed our 2 weeks with him. :)

 

Chops was also fantastic on the 2 nights we dined there and the filets were excellent.

 

 

I wonder how many times RCI needs to read these types of comments before they actually DO something about it.:rolleyes: And I completely agree with you.

[wolfganghowell]

Snappy, we call the Freedom class ships Voyager class on steroids. There are a few small differences but really we don't have much preference either way. We've had good experiences on 3 V class and 2 F class.

[Jimnbigd]

There are rumors the Indy might go to Galveston when the Navigator leaves in 2015. I'd like that.

[wolfganghowell]

Hi leaveit! Yeah, now you know the subject of that intense conversation - we were! I really felt for Raj, we saw at least 3 other people berating him. He knew we were not happy but we are not the type to yell or verbally abuse someone. I also feel that some of the problems were out of his control - ie the locals. He absolutely jumped through hoops to make it right. It was just one of those things. Next time, we won't "give up" a cabana and we will make sure we stick with Barefoot. It was a nice afternoon although we schlepped our floats to and from Barefoot since it was so peaceful in the water over there.

[wolfganghowell]

Jim - I don't think it will be Indy - she is contracted again to Ft L. Last I heard it might be Liberty coming to Galveston.

 

And Raj is an amazing guy. We laughed that he is running for office - he is a real schmoozer, very energetic and will go to great lengths to make you happy. He kept his cool in a crisis - and we were not the only glitch he dealt with that day.

 

I agree, the shops were pretty average. However, I'm not a big onboard shopper. The bad entertainers did surprise me though. Why have 2 low energy people in Schooner and Pub? There should be one mellow and one high energy. I would think there would be more competition for those gigs. When you see someone like Derek Lewis who can pack a venue standing room only and then you have guys like this who can't attract more than a dozen folks, it makes you wonder what Royal is thinking!

 

We got one specific post cruise survery and then another general survey about shopping and entertainment so hopefully they are paying attention.

 

Also - there was a definite push on anti-noro. Constant cleaning and wiping. I saw them wiping down everything. We had the hand sanitizer PLUS they handed out wipes as well. There was an announcement one day at lunch regarding noro but we couldn't hear it - not sure if there was a few cases on board or if they were just being extra vigilant.

[leaveitallbehind]

Also - there was a definite push on anti-noro. Constant cleaning and wiping. I saw them wiping down everything. We had the hand sanitizer PLUS they handed out wipes as well. There was an announcement one day at lunch regarding noro but we couldn't hear it - not sure if there was a few cases on board or if they were just being extra vigilant.

 

We were told on board that the ship went to a "Level 2" status regarding sanitation. That reportedly is the result of reaching 6 stateroom isolations with passengers due to a reported illness (not specifically defined as noro, however) and is an increased level of precaution indicated with the wipes, for instance, as you mention.

 

We were also told (by someone who was involved) that behind the scenes after they closed, they did a more comprehensive cleaning of the restaurants and the casino as well. More of a "stepped up" cleaning process. They also ran that video on the TV's (if you saw it) discussing the over all commitment to ship cleanliness and recommended passenger steps for hand washing, etc. They also cancelled the behind the scenes tours - at least that is what they told us regarding our bridge tour.

 

Apparently all that is still considered relatively minor and from what I heard there were no further illnesses reported. We were also told that if they go to a higher alert they would start serving the food in the Windjammer versus self serve. But that of course did not happen.

Edited March 12, 2014 by leaveitallbehind

[bugger832001]

Hey wolfgang,I was talking to the guy in schooners and he is subcontracted and is leaving to go on the jewel in about a month, this guy was on the liberty with us 2 years ago

Edited March 12, 2014 by bugger832001
adding more

[linedancer]

Loved your review. We were also on the same sailing. Two of our friends did get the Norovirus. One missed Labadee and the last sea day, his wife didn't get it till 3:00am the morning we were leaving. Thank goodness she didn't get it as bad as he did.

 

We loved the rock band, Rock the Boat, we also liked the Caribbean band, but the guy at the Schooner was awful. We usually like to hang there at night, but not this trip.

 

We had dinner at Giovanni's table the first night and it was wonderful. The rest of the time we ate in the MDR. Food was good, sometimes even excellent.

 

We tired to get a Cabana, but I was told by Raj, that they were all full and he wasn't even taking a waiting list anymore and that was the second morning. But we ended up going to Columbus Cove, getting 4 chairs in the shade and had a wonderful afternoon.

 

One of my friends got the non alcoholic drink package and loved it. He had his soda, virgin pinacolada, specialty coffee, he loved it.

 

We had a great cruise and I agreed it still went too fast.

 

Can't wait to go again.

 

Irene