Thoughts, impressions, and observations for the World Cruise.

[mo&fran]

7 hours ago, marquisite said:

I have seen reports that there are only 700-800 guests onboard for the current Dubai to Cape Town sailing. If true that must be one spacious ship! 🙂 

I didn't think that cruise was offered for booking to new passengers.

[Luckynana]

@CSHS1979  Thank you for posting John's pictures and his where-abouts, Laura!  I hope you are doing well.

[CSHS1979]

13 hours ago, time4u2go said:

Never Canada or Alaska?

 

 

Canada at the end after Greenland 

 

We were on west coast in February, Alaska was closed🤣

[CSHS1979]

14 hours ago, Arzeena said:

Thank you Laura and John for the pictures. They are lovely! I hope you both are doing well.

Laura, if  remember correctly, you will be on a X cruise soon? Bon Voyage!
 

Someone mentioned a building reminding them of Atlantis.....yes, that is the Atlantis Dubai.

 

Beyond next weekend

[Rassa]

19 hours ago, marquisite said:

I have seen reports that there are only 700-800 guests onboard for the current Dubai to Cape Town sailing. If true that must be one spacious ship! 🙂 

I was on the mini segment from Brisbane to Hong Kong (after our Suez mini segment was a no go) and the ship didn't appear anywhere near full capacity then.  You could walk into the evening show 5 minutes before start time each night and there were plenty of seats to choose from.   It was still a good cruise, however, and I come back here to reminisce.

[CSHS1979]

24 minutes ago, Rassa said:

I was on the mini segment from Brisbane to Hong Kong (after our Suez mini segment was a no go) and the ship didn't appear anywhere near full capacity then.  You could walk into the evening show 5 minutes before start time each night and there were plenty of seats to choose from.   It was still a good cruise, however, and I come back here to reminisce.

 

Only doing one show a night until we get to Ravena 

[sgmn]

28 minutes ago, Rassa said:

I was on the mini segment from Brisbane to Hong Kong (after our Suez mini segment was a no go) and the ship didn't appear anywhere near full capacity then.  You could walk into the evening show 5 minutes before start time each night and there were plenty of seats to choose from.   It was still a good cruise, however, and I come back here to reminisce.

Pretty sure the European segments will be at or close to capacity. The prices have been high for months. 

[CSHS1979]

10 hours ago, sgmn said:

Pretty sure the European segments will be at or close to capacity. The prices have been high for months. 

 

I'm coming back in Barcelona 

[sgmn]

2 hours ago, CSHS1979 said:

 

I'm coming back in Barcelona 

Me too , hope to see you on board 😀 

[marquisite]

On 5/11/2024 at 3:49 PM, CSHS1979 said:

 

Only doing one show a night until we get to Ravena 

Oh, interesting. I guess it must be a late show then to cater for both early and late seating diners. 

[LadyZolt]

On 5/10/2024 at 3:38 PM, DelMom18a said:

Wow, so few passengers!  I hope that means the crew gets extra time off and even is able to get extra port times.  

Because there are so few passengers for this Africa segment, Royal Caribbean released some crew members who were originally not set to leave until Ravenna or another later port -- I know of several who left in Dubai. 

[CSHS1979]

1 hour ago, marquisite said:

Oh, interesting. I guess it must be a late show then to cater for both early and late seating diners. 

 

7pm most nights

[BPyser1]

The Serenade has made it to Victoria, Seychelles on the island of Mahe!  Enjoy your time back in the tropics everyone! 🙂  This was taken from a webcam as the ship docks in Victoria Bay.

[CSHS1979]

Found on FB

 

[lovesthebeach2]

On 5/11/2024 at 2:19 AM, CSHS1979 said:

 

Only doing one show a night until we get to Ravena 

That’s where we get on,  do you know what changes they’ll have then?

[CSHS1979]

Seychelles, one of the only granite islands in the world. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 14 by CSHS1979

[dahirsh]

Remember way back towards the beginning of this cruise when all those tictokers not even on the ship were trying to stir up all sorts of trouble?  There was one I remember specifically who had some story about how there was some exclusive meeting and only the full cruise cruisers were going to have an opportunity to the northern lights.  Who knew she would basically be right.  Only based on the exceptionally rare geomagnetic storm and the fact that for the most part there are only full cruise passengers for this segment.   

[BonTexasNY]

On 5/9/2024 at 11:12 AM, Ocean Boy said:

One of those buildings reminds me of the Chrysler building in NYC and another reminds me of Atlantis on Nassau.

My thoughts exactly, plus this one that looks like 1/2 of an Oasis class aft where those huge aqua suites are located.

 

 

@CSHS1979 Laura, thank you for posting John's fabulous pictures.  He looks well rested and enjoying all the sites to the fullest.

[orville99]

8 hours ago, lovesthebeach2 said:

That’s where we get on,  do you know what changes they’ll have then?

Everyone gets new underwear😇

[drjohn4]

2 hours ago, orville99 said:

Everyone gets new underwear😇

[CSHS1979]

Lots of weather in area. Skipping two tender ports. Headed early to Mauritius 

[BecAus]

Just checking in……finally! We boarded in Dubai for S3 only.  We flew in from Australia the night before the cruise started. Just had the one evening in Dubai which was enough for me - VERY warm there.

Stayed at the Ramada Downtown and they upgraded us from the 5th floor to the 30th into a 2brm apartment with a balcony overlooking the Burj Khalifa and water fountains which was very nice.

Flights with Singapore Airlines were very good, processing through Dubai airport and taxi to hotel was all very quick and straightforward. 

 

Took taxi to the port and check-in to Serenade was quick and easy.

We are in a mid-ship ‘hump’ balcony on Dk 7 and the room is great.  
We managed to only bring 1 suitcase each (mine was right on the 30kg limit!) and we can fit everything nicely in the cupboards.

 

We are on day 8, all sea days except 1 day. Not sure what we’ve been doing with our time, amazing how quickly you settle in to doing not much at all to fill your day!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 16 by BecAus

[BecAus]

Might have to work on my photo uploading as I’m not sure the photos I added have uploaded properly 

I only have my phone with me which is a bit of an annoyance, not that I know how to upload photos from my laptop anyway!

[BecAus]

Balloon drop to celebrate the start of S3

 

 

The ship looks great and all the staff have been wonderful. Every single crew member greets you and many want to stop and have a chat.

We started with about 750 passengers in Dubai and just under 100 re-boarded in Mahe, Seychelles so the ship is feeling pretty empty!

No wait for lifts or to find a table in the WJ.

It is great to be back on a smaller ship - we’ve really only cruised the Quantum class the last few years as that’s mainly what they send us down in Oz land!

[BecAus]

We had 4 sea days to start and then had our 1st (and only so far!) port day in Mahe, Seychelles.  It was a lovely sunny day but VERY humid (in the 85-90% humidity range if I remember correctly) so it felt super hot and we were pretty sweaty.

 

i booked a private day tour / driver for the day through’Get My Guide’ - $280 AUD (~ $180 USD), just the two of us in a nice, air-conditioned van.

The guy was really lovely and gave us a really comprehensive tour of the whole island. He explained everything about the place and stopped constantly to show us plants, all the spices they use like vanilla, cinnamon and many, many more.

We saw pink bananas and pineapples just growing alongside the road!

We also got to visit with some 100 year old Giant Tortoises!

 

We saw many lovely beaches, lookouts, walked around the town of Victoria and the local market. A lovely waterfall, stopped at the Tea Factory, tried the various rums at the Rum Distillery and had a very nice, but expensive, lunch on the beach. A pizza, coke & 2 beers was ~ $50 usd - we paid for the beach location I think!

 

We had a really great, relaxing day and I was happy with the tour I booked, it worked out really well.

I’ll try and upload some pictures but I seem to be a little hopeless at it. I got a few to post above but not all the ones I intended 🤪

 

The Clock Tower in Victoria - modelled on Big Ben