Freedom of the Seas 3/18/17 LIVE

[Clarea]

Thanks for the info. Newbie Diamond here. Can we get frozen drinks too?

No frozen or blender drinks.

[Pia1913]

No frozen or blender drinks.

 

BOO HOO :loudcry:. I'll survive.

[transam84]

This is great! Thank you. We leave next Sunday on Freedom and I'm so excited. This is making the wait a bit more tolerable as I can live vicariously through you until then. :cool:

Edited March 18, 2017 by transam84

[skohrs]

I'm looking forward to your review as we may be on FOS exactly a year from now. I'm curious about the number of kids on board due to spring break and what that means for pools, wait times, etc.

 

 

 

There are apparently over 4,200 on board. I'll let you know about pools, number of children, wait times, etc

as the cruise goes on.

 

 

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[skohrs]

So cool, following along... We are onboard April 23rd!! Any signs regarding the beverage packages sitting around? Have a GREAT time!!

 

 

 

Here is a list of drink packages:

 

 

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[APDMOM]

Can you post information on what the young teens have going on? 11-14? I would like to convince my daughter she should go there and hang out!

 

 

I have not found anything specific for 12-14. The only teen program on the shelf by guest services is the one OP posted for ages 15-18. There was a long and constant line at guest services, so I did not ask if they have a separate program... will do so early tomorrow.

 

11-year old kids are still in the younger programs. Only 12-18 year olds are in the teen groups.

 

 

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[anne.brumlevestaley]

Following! We'll be boarding on 4/1!

 

 

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[APDMOM]

The program for the 12-14 group was on the shelf by guest services today..,

 

 

 

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[skohrs]

Sorry it's been so long since I've posted. The Wi-Fi service has not been working since last night, and It just started working again about an hour ago.

 

I am uploading photos now to Google Photo, and I will post again shortly once photos are uploaded.

 

So it had been kind of a funny day. We woke up this morning and opened the window shades on our RP cabin window. My wife looked out, and directly across from us there was a naked guy standing there in his cabin with the shades fully open, completely oblivious. It was an old guy, and it brought back memories of the friends episode with the naked guy in the apartment across from them. Sorry, no photos (thought that might be a little creepy).

 

TIP: If you have an RP cabin, CLOSE YOUR SHADES WHEN GETTING DRESSED. YOU DON'T FACE THE OCEAN.!!! At least now we have a funny story to tell. Kind of like on our last RCCL cruise on the Allure, when there was an old guy sitting behind us by the pool, and he was completely unaware that his "jewels" were hanging completely out of his shorts. I mean, they were not encased at all. My wife and daughters all got unsuspecting views of that masterpiece. That image is indelibly etched into their memory, and they can't get it out. What is it with old men and their "junk" on the Royal ships. We have seen no nudity on Disney (we are only cruising Royal from now on - no correlation to the nudity, our kids are just too old for Disney cruisesnow and we live in Orlando with annual Disney passes anyway).

 

 

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[skohrs]

As for the Wi-Fi not working, I spoke with the tech people at the business center about it and they said that they were having server issues, and that IT techs were working on fixing all day. He said hopefully it will be working again by tonight. We got the Wi-Fi for us and our daughter so we could contact her onboard to meet up via iMessage and so we could FaceTime or other kids who stayed back in Orlando. I went to the front desk and asked if we would get credit back on our accounts for the time Wi-Fi was not working. The customer service guy (completely oblivious to how tech works) said he thinks the reason Wi-Fi is not working is because we are at sea. I told him that wet are on a ship, we are supposed to be at sea. I wouldn't have purchased Wi-Fi to use only in port. Anyway, I wasn't mad. I only mention it because I thought that may have been the funniest answer I have ever heard. Much funnier than the standard "Do the stairs go up or down?" and the "Doors the crew live on the ship?" questions the comedians always joke about.

 

At any rate, Wi-Fi is working again. Yay!!!!

 

Here is today's Compass.

 

 

 

 

If you have any questions or any photos you would like me to take/post, let me know and I'll do my best.

 

 

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[APDMOM]

Hi, skohrs! It is strange that you have wifi problems... maybe it is related to your location on the ship? We are deck 7 aft and had very minimal problems. When we log out on one device and try to log on to another, it may say we cannot connect. We just hit cancel 1 or 2 times, then it works.

 

Sorry we did not get to meet you at M&M this morning! Did you attend? DH & I were there with our Rubik's cube shirts... Hope to run into you sometime. [emoji846]

 

 

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[skohrs]

Hi, skohrs! It is strange that you have wifi problems... maybe it is related to your location on the ship? We are deck 7 aft and had very minimal problems. When we log out on one device and try to log on to another, it may say we cannot connect. We just hit cancel 1 or 2 times, then it works.

 

Sorry we did not get to meet you at M&M this morning! Did you attend? DH & I were there with our Rubik's cube shirts... Hope to run into you sometime. [emoji846]

 

We were there. My wife Erin the Del Sol bag.

 

We have had Wi-Fi problems all over the ship as have my sister and her family (completely different part of the ship).They said the problems were intermittent. They seem to have fixed it now.

 

 

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[TimeToGetNauti]

Have a great trip

[luv2cruiserccl]

Following! We'll be boarding on 4/1!

 

 

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Me to see ya there

 

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[Kissmya63]

Following! We have more than a year before we board!

 

Have a great trip!!!

[prmetime]

Sailing on FOS in June in the Med. Just wondering if there are USB ports in the staterooms like some of the newer ships?? Have a great time!

[skohrs]

Sailing on FOS in June in the Med. Just wondering if there are USB ports in the staterooms like some of the newer ships?? Have a great time!

 

Unfortunately not. There are only 2 standard 120 volt outlets. I have an Anker USB charging station that allows me to plug in 10 USB cords that works out great for charging 3 iPhones, 3 Apple watch chargers, 3 portable backup batteries for the iPhones, and my digital camera.

[skohrs]

Day 1 recap:

 

We got to check-in at 10:30am and we were onboard the ship at 11:10am. We walked up to Windjammer for lunch because the elevators were turned off (something to do with the Coast Guard inspection). Windjammer was empty because: 1 - it was early; and 2 - nobody wanted to walk up to deck 11 and chose to wait for the elevators to turn back on.

 

We finished lunch at about noon and decided to explore the Royal Promenade for a little while and purchase the soda package for my daughter.

 

 

 

 

At 1pm they made an announcement that the cabins would not be available until 1:30pm. At 1:29:59pm they opened the door allowing us to go to check out our cabin. We had connecting Royal Promenade Interior Staterooms (7561 and 7563) on the port side of the ship overlooking Sorrento's.

 

 

 

Here is a view of the Freestyle Soda machines from our cabin window:

 

Edited March 20, 2017 by skohrs
fix images not appearing

[skohrs]

We are big coffee drinkers, so we headed for Cafe Promenade to check out the coffee offerings. We had read a lot of reviews for Freedom, but could not get an accurate answer to what type of coffee they use on the ship. On other Royal ships, we have had Starbucks and Seattle's Best. We were pleasantly surprised with the coffee on Freedom. For the espresso drinks, they use "illy" coffee (I think it is an Italian brand). It was delicious.

 

 

The "free" coffee was also really good. It's been 2 days, and I have probably had a gallon already. That coffee is "laVazza" brand. We cruised on Disney Fantasy last year, and the "free" coffee on Disney ships is horrible. I think it is made from a syrup or concentrate of some kind. This laVazza coffee was brewed and delicious.

 

[skohrs]

Next we went up on deck and saw the ocean on one side and the terminal on the other. Guess which side was prettier.

 

 

We also saw Harmony setting out to sea.

 

My daughter and her best friend decided to to the Flow Rider at about 2pm. There was absolutely no line!!!! There was a small wipeout as you can see from this photo (notice there is no board to be seen).

 

Here is something you rarely see. An empty H2O Zone when it is during open hours.

 

... and a daily empty Solarium.

 

After the Muster Drill at 4:30, it was time to get go to the Spa so we could NOT win anything in the raffle for the 12th straight cruise, and then to the cabin to get ready for dinner at Chop's Grille (we did the BOGO). By the way, the Captain announced during the Muster Drill that the Coast Guard completed their "Annual Inspection" and they received a perfect report. Not a single deficiency. So ... we did not have to sit in port for an extra 24 hours like the Majesty did last month. Whew!!!!

 

Here is the first sunset of our cruise on our way to dinner.

[skohrs]

Dinner at Chop's was good, not great. If I had to pay full price, I would have been disappointed. At only $15 as part of the BOGO, it was well worth the money. It might just be that I am not a "Steakhouse" type of guy, but the presentation of a slab of meat on a plate by itself is just not appealing. The side dishes served "family style" in ugly containers that were not big enough for what was in them did not add any visual appeal. Also, all of the food was just kind of warm. Nothing came out hot. However, even at the warm temperature, the food tasted great. Here are some photos:

 

Goat Cheese Salad

 

Shrimp Cocktail

 

Lobster Bisque

 

Mushroom Soup

 

Crab Cake

 

Barbecue Peppered Bacon (It was a thick piece that actually didn't taste like bacon at all - tasted just like barbecue pork with too much fat. I was hoping it would be something crispy),

[skohrs]

All four of us had the fillet mignon.

 

See what I mean about the slab of meat on a plate? We eat with our eyes first, and this does not make my eyes hungry. Mine was perfectly medium-rare. My wife's was supposed to be medium-rare, but came out closer to medium-well. It was still good though.

 

The desserts were good. The service was just kind of meh. Our server was nice, but didn't go out of her way at all. We were never offered coffee with our dessert, and we didn't know if they had coffee there so we didn't ask. We knew we could get delicious coffee at Cafe Promenade anyway. We did have SUPERB service at Giovanni's the next night (I'll get to that later). We also got awesome service in Windjammer for day one lunch and day two breakfast. The servers in Windjammer were so friendly and helpful, especially considering it was a buffet venue. There has been a lot of talk on these boards about the hard-sell tactics by the staff during meals at Windjammer trying to get you purchase specialty dinner packages. It really didn't bother us at all. A few people asked us at each meal so far, but when you tell them you are not interested or that you already booked, not one of them pushed us or continued to try to sell. I certainly didn't let it ruin my vacation.

 

Anyway, back to the dessert photos.

 

Cheesecake

 

some type of Chocolate Cake (delicious)

 

Carrot Cake (looks delicious, but was actually really dry for carrot cake).

 

While we were eating, a different server was trying to carry too many items at once and a shrimp cocktail fell off his tray dumping shrimp and crushed ice all over a woman (on her head and all over her clothing). Funny to see, but I did feel bad for the woman. The diners at that table took it okay and didn't let it ruin their dinner. Every time the waiter came near them with a tray, they would pretend they were scared and duck or cover up.

 

All in all it was a great dinner for $15 per person.

Edited March 20, 2017 by skohrs
fix a photo

[skohrs]

I forgot to mention that we walked through Windjammer after dinner at Chops and I took a photo of the sushi that was available and the crepe station. We asked if the crepe station was there for the one night only, or every night. He told us that it was there "every other night." We hope to get some crepes one night if we can.

 

 

[transam84]

I'm loving your review! I look forward to it every morning. Feel like I'm getting a two week cruise! We leave Sunday so we will be getting on when you are getting off. :cool: Thanks!

[mtns2sea]

Thanks for taking us along. We are on the 4/15 sailing. Makes the wait slightly more tolerable [emoji4]

 

 

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