Cruising right after drydock

[lojill]

Has our anybody ever taken the 1st cruise out of dry dock and if so what are your opinions and experience

Edited August 14, 2015 by lojill

[reallyitsmema]

Has our anybody ever taken the 1st cruise out of dry dock and if so what are your opinions and experience

 

Yes, we have sailed right after a drydock and everything was open. It really depends on what type of drydock you are talking about, if it is just a routine, once every five or six year drydock, then it is typically not a big deal. if you are sailing after a ship's extensive renovation, then things might not be completed.

[lojill]

Its going to be dry docked for 3 weeks.

[lojill]

We are sailing on Adventure of the Seas next year 2016 and we are deciding to go the first week or second week. The first week is the week of Thanksgiving. The will be out from middle of October to November 19th

[MADflyer]

I have taken Serenade, Vision and Oasis out from dry dock the past 3 years.

 

I actually enjoy those sailings, but I am not the type to be upset only small things.

 

We had no Centrum aerial entertainment on Serenade due to safety concerns and they were working every night getting that together during the sailing from Barcelona. It was interesting being the first to try the new Park Café, Izumi and Giovanni's table on that cruise and see how excited the officers and staff were to have these new dining options.

 

I sailed on 3 sailings on Vision right after dry dock. I had a JS corner aft, a GS and an OS. Here they had totally renovated all suites so that was wonderful, but here those in inside cabins got the shock that Vision removed all the soap dispensers in the showers and was the only ship in the fleet to all of a sudden not offer amenities to standard cabins.

 

Vision also had some plumbing issues following the dry dock and this was annoying, but we dealt with it. The concierge was wonderful, but some staff on Vision were new after dry dock and that was somewhat trying at times as they did not quickly deal with problems.

 

And then there is that Oasis TA from Rotterdam. Here I personally had a fantastic cruise and the officers and crew were wonderful. Here they had installed a new Diamond lounge, but I quickly learned to stay out of there to avoid all the very annoying complainers. Everything was a disaster for these people....

 

The espresso machine in the lounge was not working so what did they do but grant us complementary coffee and tea at the Café Promenade. Well, that did not satisfy them, but I was happy.

 

Here Cats was struggling in rehearsals and they had no sound track. Again, a disaster for some and adventure for others. I really enjoyed seeing how they try to bring a show together.

 

Here, they were still working on cabins and I have to admit that a few lovely people were really disadvantaged by RCI. Here there was some justified feelings of disappointment, but many of these that lost suites handled the situation quite well.

 

So, ships post dry dock are not for everyone. Wait a few sailings if you are sensitive to minor disruptions. But if you like to see the officers and crew at their best, take one.

Edited August 14, 2015 by MADflyer

[wilmingtech]

We sailed on FOTS the second cruise out of drydock in Feb 2015. We noticed that the crew was refreshed and we got amazing service. This was a turnaround from the reviews of Freedom that we read online right before drydock that all said it was a bad cruise and bad service as Freedom was missing ports and running late from Azipod issues.

 

I think the first week out of drydock there was one restaurant that was not open yet. But everything was open for us. I think sailing after drydock is a huge plus. Service will be better as crew morale will be up and the ship will be in its best shape.

 

-Sean

[39august]

During at least some of the extensive dry docks the crew has been kept on board to help with the grunt work. so they were'nt "refreshed" at all. Maybe not all ships require this. However, I know that on some ships, Oasis and Voyager a few years ago come to mind, that a lot of work was not complete and areas of the ship were not available on their first cruise after dry dock. I would avoid that sailing if possible.

[MADflyer]

During at least some of the extensive dry docks the crew has been kept on board to help with the grunt work. so they were'nt "refreshed" at all. Maybe not all ships require this. However, I know that on some ships, Oasis and Voyager a few years ago come to mind, that a lot of work was not complete and areas of the ship were not available on their first cruise after dry dock. I would avoid that sailing if possible.

 

While in the past some hotel staff were kept onboard to 'service' the workers with housekeeping and Food and Beverage, this has now expanded to the point that crew that have hotel jobs are actually assigned to more 'heavy' tasks like fire duty, waste disposal and so on.

 

Now only about 20% of the crew are scheduled to be switched out at dry dock. Oasis had almost 500 signing on at 7 AM in Rotterdam when I walked over there from my hotel.

 

This is not RCI related, but I was amazed at NCL having over 200+ new ship crew signing on at Barcelona prior to their Cadiz dry dock for Spirit.

[wilmingtech]

During at least some of the extensive dry docks the crew has been kept on board to help with the grunt work. so they were'nt "refreshed" at all. Maybe not all ships require this. However, I know that on some ships, Oasis and Voyager a few years ago come to mind, that a lot of work was not complete and areas of the ship were not available on their first cruise after dry dock. I would avoid that sailing if possible.

We spoke to the crew about drydock during our trip. Of the 6 people we spoke to they were housed off ship and didnt need to work more than 10 hours a day on the ship and had 2 days off a week to do whatever they wanted. (I'm not sure if it was mandatory and royal houses them or if they had a choice to stay on or off ship on their own dime)

 

They all said they had work but none of it skilled (such as carpentry, electrical, tile work, carpet repair) Most of the repair and cleanup work is contracted out.

 

One of our servers had the job of "firewatch" which was sitting for 2 hours at a time and rotating through 4 areas of the ship to report if a fire broke out.

 

The girls in the spa that we spoke to did some painting and decorating and restocking as well as learning about new spa treatments.

 

The woman in Adventure Ocean said she had a choice to work or take the time off (without pay) She chose to work and had to check people in and out each day as they came aboard the ship.

 

So while they are working during dry dock, they are not putting up with crabby cruisers and working split shifts. They are able to leave the ship and they are getting R&R unlike being at sea for 6 months.

 

I'd hardly call it "grunt" work. Its not like they are slaving away in the hot sun. I think just getting a break from the cruisers and being able to leave the ship at the end of your shift is a nice break.

 

And again - on our cruise at least, the morale of the crew was pretty high.

 

-Sean

Edited August 14, 2015 by wilmingtech

[Paulette3028]

I have taken Serenade, Vision and Oasis out from dry dock the past 3 years.

 

I actually enjoy those sailings, but I am not the type to be upset only small things.

 

We had no Centrum aerial entertainment on Serenade due to safety concerns and they were working every night getting that together during the sailing from Barcelona. It was interesting being the first to try the new Park Café, Izumi and Giovanni's table on that cruise and see how excited the officers and staff were to have these new dining options.

 

I sailed on 3 sailings on Vision right after dry dock. I had a JS corner aft, a GS and an OS. Here they had totally renovated all suites so that was wonderful, but here those in inside cabins got the shock that Vision removed all the soap dispensers in the showers and was the only ship in the fleet to all of a sudden not offer amenities to standard cabins.

 

Vision also had some plumbing issues following the dry dock and this was annoying, but we dealt with it. The concierge was wonderful, but some staff on Vision were new after dry dock and that was somewhat trying at times as they did not quickly deal with problems.

 

And then there is that Oasis TA from Rotterdam. Here I personally had a fantastic cruise and the officers and crew were wonderful. Here they had installed a new Diamond lounge, but I quickly learned to stay out of there to avoid all the very annoying complainers. Everything was a disaster for these people....

 

The espresso machine in the lounge was not working so what did they do but grant us complementary coffee and tea at the Café Promenade. Well, that did not satisfy them, but I was happy.

 

Here Cats was struggling in rehearsals and they had no sound track. Again, a disaster for some and adventure for others. I really enjoyed seeing how they try to bring a show together.

 

Here, they were still working on cabins and I have to admit that a few lovely people were really disadvantaged by RCI. Here there was some justified feelings of disappointment, but many of these that lost suites handled the situation quite well.

 

So, ships post dry dock are not for everyone. Wait a few sailings if you are sensitive to minor disruptions. But if you like to see the officers and crew at their best, take one.

 

Personally, I don't feel we would ever want to take a cruise immediately out of drydock. We are not difficult to please in any way, but it just doesn't seem like something that we would want to do. I would not want to be around OTHER cruisers bellyaching in any way and using the excuse of the recent dry dock not being fully completed.

 

I generally hate complaining cruisers more than the reason they are complaining. I often want to push those cruisers off the ship.

 

DH and I went to breakfast in MDR one morning on Allure back in 2013, to be seated at a table with what we thought was a lovely couple....except that after the 'simple conversations about family and where you come from' they proceeded to tell us all the things they hated about Royal and why this cruise did not change their opinion....keep in mind that the prior cruise on Royal was 10 years earlier. No matter how I tried to change the subject, they kept finding a way back.....it in NO WAY impacted my terrific cruise on Allure.

[MADflyer]

We spoke to the crew about drydock during our trip. Of the 6 people we spoke to they were housed off ship and didnt need to work more than 10 hours a day on the ship and had 2 days off a week to do whatever they wanted.

 

-Sean

 

I visited the Oasis in Rotterdam while it was in dry dock and it was an amazing site to see how many regular crew were coming and going on shifts. Those I spoke with stated they were living onboard the ship.

 

 

Here you can see the heavy security for 'RCCL Personnel- report inside' set up by the Verolme shipyard in Rotterdam.

 

 

When the Dutch did a spot check of documents one time during the dry-dock the Dutch found 77 Philippines and 8 'South Americans' without the proper work permit.

 

Speculation in the Dutch press was that the $1.1 million final fine was only for these few workers and in reality a true fine could have been far greater. The ship was allowed to leave Rotterdam even though this fine was imposed just hours prior to the TA departure.

 

http://worldmaritimenews.com/archives/140055/royal-caribbean-facing-major-fine/

[CVU]

Never again!:eek::eek:

 

:eek: We were on the Oasis out of Rotterdam. About 1000 employees were living on board.

Plumbing problems and Noise. The WJ had construction noise all the time.

They opened the New DL and closed the old CL to only open the CL on the change over day! The next cruise had both DL and CL.

It was such a disappointing TA that everyone on the ship had a personal RCL phone call of apology and a Future Cruise Credit on % based on your cabin cost.

Edited August 14, 2015 by CVU

[BBowCruiser]

In Feb. 2007 we took Rhapsody out of Galveston on the first cruise out of dry dock. We thought it would be good to have everything clean, refreshed, and refurbished, but it was a mess. The ship was late getting to Texas, so we didn't board until around 8:00. We were all given $25 per cabin shipboard credit. The Windjammer wasn't done, so they set up a lunch buffet around the pool and the dining room was jam packed because there was no evening buffet (they did allow shorts on even formal night because there was nowhere else to eat). The elevators weren't working and some people were stuck in one for over an hour.

[JamesEM]

Did it once and will not do it again, apparently someone underestimated the time needed for renovations. But the ship sailed as scheduled and completed the repairs the week we sailed.

[Desertbelle]

The worse cruise we have ever had was a ship newly out of dry dock. It was in dry dock because of engine issues and because that was going to take a lot of time they decided to do other extensive remodeling and repairs at the same dry dock.

 

AFTER final payment we were informed by the cruise company (it was Princess) that the new engines would only be able to go at half speed, as there would be a "breaking-in" period....so, our 10 day, 7 port cruise was changed to a 10 day, 3 port cruise, and 2 of the ports would be half-days!! For this "inconvenience" we were given $100 per cabin in onboard credit!! If we cancelled we would loose all our money!

 

We decided to make the best of it, but it was hard. The pool was out of commission part of the cruise because they were refinishing the decks. There was no internet until day 7, which means no TV, no ATM's, no news, etc! Part of the dining room was not available, so there was a lot of crowding every night. There was carpeting being laid all over the ship and other areas were available on and off, depending on what they had under construction/repair. And the staff where completely confused and miserable..most acted like they had no idea what they were supposed to do. Our waiter apologized every night for the poor service and horrible food.

 

Never before have I seen many, many families exiting off the ship with their luggage in the few ports we managed to get to. I guess they would rather find a different way home than to endure even a few more days onboard.

 

We learned our lesson the hard way. Never again a Princess cruise...their out and out lying about the dry dock is unforgivable (I have an email from Princess that tells me not to worry about the dry dock, and that the ship would be "as good as new"....yeah, right. And, never again a post-dry dock cruise.

[insidecabin]

recenty it seems RCI have been running building sites with PAX pre and post dry dock.

 

We were on Oasis and there were things not finished so workers in coridors welding etc. going on.

 

Not all the facilities were available on the ship.

 

The theatre was in use for cats practice so could not be used for events caused overload as things moved to smaller venues.

 

Other ships have had issues as well.

 

also there have been a few threads on the issues with the ships relocating and work going on,

 

The biggest issue is RCI are not keeping passengers informed pre cruise so you have no idea what might be happening on your cruise till you get on the ship.

Edited August 16, 2015 by insidecabin

[lojill]

Thanks for the information