Liberty 02022020 - our experience

[TravelinGert]

Any of your group trying out the flow rider this trip? 

[hukoli]

20 hours ago, wolfganghowell said:

Would you mind asking MJ how long he is onboard?  We sailed with him last year and coming back March 29th.  Hoping he will still be there.  Enjoying your review - enjoy your last few days.  And welcome to Texas!

 

He won't be onboard on that sailing. He comes back for the next one. 

[wolfganghowell]

Rats!  Thank you for asking - enjoy your final days on board!

[OSUZorba]

12 hours ago, wolfganghowell said:

Rats!  Thank you for asking - enjoy your final days on board!

I haven't met MJ, but I really liked Nadja too. I think she is in the DL right now, but she was in the SL in October.

[hukoli]

Day 9, Cozumel

 

Both the Atlantis submarine and my diving excursions were cancelled. So we  decided to head to town for some shopping. Didn't buy much, girl bought a bracelet with her name for 5 dollars, and I bought couple of sodas while we were walking. Few souvenirs from port and we were done. 

Tonight was the second formal night, and we had booked MDR for 11 of us at 7.30 pm. After we left the port, I had planned to take a nice long moment in sauna and then get dressed for dinner. No luck there either. Sauna was cold. Spend few minutes in that steam room instead, not good replacement for real sauna.

 

We had asked for the same table what we had on day 7, and got it. Our servers were once again great, they opened up the lobsters for those who needed help, and we got few extra ones on the table as well. We got few extra desserts too to try out. After dinner kids went to bed and I finally had time to spend at Casino. I played through almost 300 in different games, finally won enough to get even. And then I burned through 50 dollars in Arcade with my brother. Had fun, but burning through all that cash in there after midnight, maybe wasn't the brightest idea. But we got over 2000 points on his card, so tomorrow our kids get to open lot of junk plastic prizes.

 

Tomorrow (or today) we have bridge tour at 9.50 am, followed by sushi making class at 10.30. And a lot of packing up to do. Maybe even another go at bingo, since our account is very negative thanks to all those missed activities. Dinner is booked at 5.30 pm in Chops. 

 

[hukoli]

Day 10, last day of our cruise

 

Well, this cruise has been series of bad timings. Today was the same. That sushi making class started at 10, so no time for bridge tour. After that went to watch the parade with our boy, girl was swimming. And after that parade they had some fair on the promenade. Different activities to try, and each successful attempt got you one raffle ticket. It was fun, but we didn't win any of the glorious prizes they had.

 

We tried the win a cruise bingo, as we had so much credit left in our account. Still bad experience compared to our previous ones. Only one game per sheet, total of 3 games. I don't know if this new system is fleet wide, but I think we won't be paying for any more bingo coupons on Royal's ships. We like bingo more when the time spent playing is longer than the part where we listen for the rules and the host telling stories.

 

I tried to visit the sauna again, but same result as yesterday, only cold stones waiting there. We visited the suite lounge before dinner, only time I had seen that place busy. Ate few sushi pieces and then it was time for our last dinner in Chops. Kids were all eating somewhere else, so tonight it was just me and my gf. I may have eaten one too many appetizer or desert, possibly even both, but after dinner I had to rest in our cabin for a while. Then we somehow managed to fit most of our stuff into our bags, and left them outside to be collected. After all that hard work, it was time for some fun. Took our kids to the arcade, and one hour later we have a plastic bag full of cheap prizes.

 

Tomorrow we will eat breakfast at Chops, and our scheduled meeting time is 8.10 am. We have no plans about how we are getting from port to our hotel, or how we will merge with rest of our group after we get out of the port. We should be leaving an hour before those 3 non-suite cabins. And our hotel's check in time is 3 pm.

 

I think I'll do a small summary of our experiences onboard tomorrow, and if getting of the ship was better than trying to get on the ship. And after we get home, I'll try to upload few photos from our trip.

[hukoli]

On 2/7/2020 at 1:51 AM, TravelinGert said:

Any of your group trying out the flow rider this trip? 

 

No, I don't think anyone was brave enough to try that thing. Sorry, I must have missed your post while on the ship. 

[hukoli]

Day 11, end of our cruise

 

After waking up, I checked our invoice for that common towel tax. Only one this time, bit weird since we checked yesterday when we returned towels for the last time that we were ok. After taking care of that on deck 5, we went to our assigned departure lounge. I think we left the lounge around 8.30 am, and we were at our hotel at 9.15 am. Much smoother process than the boarding.

 

 

Pros from this cruise:

 

-Gold card, I might get used to this type of cruising.
-MDR and Chops waiters, they used so much time to keep our kids happy.
-Taking a brother along to take the kids in pools and slides. (I hate water, unless I'm diving) 
-Cabin size was great, and having two bathrooms was even better. 
-Food was great, no matter where we ate.
-Pizza.
-Lot of activities on board. 

 

Cons:

 

-Rattling tv furniture. 
-Cabin location in the bow, we felt the ship's movement quite well. Doesn't bother me at all, but gf was on dramamine the whole cruise.
-Missed port, but what can you do?
-Next cruise desk, nothing to add here. 
-Bingo, reasons should be clear by now. 
-Towel tax, wonder why checking out a towel always logs fine, but returning them doesn't?
-All those announcements started to get to our nerves.
-Smoking in the Casino. 
-Pools closed quite early. 
-Timing conflicts with what we wanted to do. 

-Sauna was hot only once out of my 3 tries to use it

 

 

Wow. The cons list got quite long. But we still had a great time. As for our next cruise, I think we will be leaving kids home and try some other line, most likely Celebrity. With the kids next trip could be Orlando and Universal's theme parks. 
 

[OSUZorba]

How was the pool temperature?

[Doug S]

On 2/7/2020 at 11:16 PM, OSUZorba said:

I haven't met MJ, but I really liked Nadja too. I think she is in the DL right now, but she was in the SL in October.

Francis and Melvin were in the DL this week. We liked them both.

[Doug S]

Sorry we didn't meet up this week. Seemed like we frequented the same venues.  

 

- I had the same spa experience, so did the steam as well.

- Our tiny TV didn't rattle, but we couldn't change source as we previously have to watch downloads. Seemed blocked.

- Did get a bit choppy at times. Sorry you missed some excursions. We gained a nap or 2... 

- Our cabin was also more forward than usual. More walking / vibration than used to in our preferred mid-ship.

- I'm sure you know you can call and dispute Towel Tax. They should remove it.

- Also enjoyed Chops and Giovanis, as well as Sabor. We were less pleased than normal with the MDR.

- Yes, the smoking lounge /part time Casino was open for business. We made the mistake of walking through once.

- Our ride home was a bit shorter than yours will be... We got home at about 2:00 after a stop for lunch.

 

We rushed to Cozumel due to another passenger medical situation, which was also why embarkation was so rough this trip. I saw 2 separate ambulances take patients when we docked after Celebrity Edge left at about 3 on Thursday. I saw on the TV screen that our speed varied from 17.5 to 18.5 knots on the run north from the failed Costa Maya stop. Not record-setting, but timed just right to take the open pier. Made for a bit rougher ride. Carnival Valor (I think), Horizon, Independence, and a Princess ship were also docked there, and an NCL ship was at the other mid-town pier.  

 

Doug

Edited February 10, 2020 by Doug S

[TravelinGert]

2 hours ago, Doug S said:

Sorry we didn't meet up this week. Seemed like we frequented the same venues.  

 

- I had the same spa experience, so did the steam as well.

- Our tiny TV didn't rattle, but we couldn't change source as we previously have to watch downloads. Seemed blocked.

- Did get a bit choppy at times. Sorry you missed some excursions. We gained a nap or 2... 

- Our cabin was also more forward than usual. More walking / vibration than used to in our preferred mid-ship.

- I'm sure you know you can call and dispute Towel Tax. They should remove it.

- Also enjoyed Chops and Giovanis, as well as Sabor. We were less pleased than normal with the MDR.

- Yes, the smoking lounge /part time Casino was open for business. We made the mistake of walking through once.

- Our ride home was a bit shorter than yours will be... We got home at about 2:00 after a stop for lunch.

 

We rushed to Cozumel due to another passenger medical situation, which was also why embarkation was so rough this trip. I saw 2 separate ambulances take patients when we docked after Celebrity Edge left at about 3 on Thursday. I saw on the TV screen that our speed varied from 17.5 to 18.5 knots on the run north from the failed Costa Maya stop. Not record-setting, but timed just right to take the open pier. Made for a bit rougher ride. Carnival Valor (I think), Horizon, Independence, and a Princess ship were also docked there, and an NCL ship was at the other mid-town pier.  

 

Doug

 

This is the first I've heard of changing source being blocked. I guess theoretically it is possible certainly. Any chance you noted what kind of TV it was?

[hukoli]

4 hours ago, OSUZorba said:

How was the pool temperature?

 

I have no idea. Didn't go near. Kids say one was warm and other one was cold. And kids area was cold. Hot tubs were hot. 

 

2 hours ago, Doug S said:

Sorry we didn't meet up this week. Seemed like we frequented the same venues.  

 

- I'm sure you know you can call and dispute Towel Tax. They should remove it.

 

- Our ride home was a bit shorter than yours will be... We got home at about 2:00 after a stop for lunch.

 

I feel I mostly run after one kid or another, my gf and I had two escape style games with us, only managed to find time for one of those. But I met with few fellow cruisers, and I think this was the most polite crowd I have sailed with. Would have been nice to meet you too. 

 

I had no idea you could just call to make that tax disappear. I visited their towel station on deck 5.

 

It would be nice to live so close to port... And expensive. 

[Doug S]

12 hours ago, TravelinGert said:

 

This is the first I've heard of changing source being blocked. I guess theoretically it is possible certainly. Any chance you noted what kind of TV it was?

Samsung, not sure of model - tried 2 separate universal remotes, it would connect and turn on/off, but no response to source button. If anyone makes it work, I'd love to hear it, but it didn't work for us like it has in the past. tried both HDMI ports thinking that might affect. Also checked all channels as 15 once was sourced to HDMI1 on a cruise. No luck.

[CoolNickname]

9 hours ago, Doug S said:

Samsung, not sure of model - tried 2 separate universal remotes, it would connect and turn on/off, but no response to source button. If anyone makes it work, I'd love to hear it, but it didn't work for us like it has in the past. tried both HDMI ports thinking that might affect. Also checked all channels as 15 once was sourced to HDMI1 on a cruise. No luck.

 

Thank you. Wonder if they've nixed it to try to force purchase of movies. We'll just take the laptop in case.

[SG65CB]

On 2/6/2020 at 1:08 PM, wolfganghowell said:

Would you mind asking MJ how long he is onboard?  We sailed with him last year and coming back March 29th.  Hoping he will still be there.  Enjoying your review - enjoy your last few days.  And welcome to Texas!

Just received the suite guest concierge email for the 2/16 sailing, it was sent to us from Francis.