Any recent Freedom cruisers- have a few ?'s

[divaofdisney]

Just a few questions to any recent freedom cruisers:

 

1.) How was the embarkation process? have heard it's been lengthy. If you arrive early is it better or actually worse?? When have they been allowing folks to board??

 

2.) How have the waters been lately? Have heard from several cruisers that seas have been very rough.

 

3.) For those who have stayed in any of the Promenade rooms- any noise you noticed?? Since I am not a late person- was wondering if this is a problem.

 

4.) Any difficulties make reservations at Portofino's or Chops??

 

We will be traveling on the December 10th cruise....and just wondering about these things....thanks in advance. ;)

[AFT_LOVER]

Freedom doesn't move, no motion at all. She doesn't even drop anchor when we tender, GPS does it all.

 

At 12:30PM the line was to Carnival's terminal entrance. Being Diamond members, our pins were seen by a porter who took our luggage & told us to enter at the navy blue walkway doors. So we did & were on in 15 minutes when immigration gave the OK for folks to board. So we had no line.

 

D1 is nice, but I prefer AFT CORNER sooner than 5th from the front Starboard. But surprised the balcony was close to 90 sq ft, but we were barly out there but to check our arrivals at ports or at night. 98 was the norm with lows of 86 & very humid. SO AC was set on lowest & door shut.

[cruznlion]

WE just got off Freedom 10/22/06. Ship was smooth all the way. One night we felt a large movement, Captain said it was head winds, just like turbulance on an air plane and it was only for a minuite. Then smooth sailing.

 

Embarkation was fine also, we arrived at pier at 10:30 (we are from Florida so we drove down) on the ship by 11:30. We are diamond members so we had priority , but others with us not Diamond were about 10 min behind us.

 

AWESOME SHIP ! You will love it .

 

We didn't use any of the alternate restaurants, (kept forgetting to call for Reservation ) bur saw many people on first day signing up.

[lv2cruisgrl]

Just got off Freedom Sunday. We had no problems getting on the ship but we are Diamond, we arrived at the ship about 10:45 and the regular lines were not long. We were on the ship quickly. We also did both Chops and Portofino's with no problem. Get your reservations as soon as you are on the ship, we ate at 6pm each night and there were some empty tables so if you eat early you should have no problem. The food was excellent. The water was a little choppy one evening as mentioned but the staff said it was the first time for Freedom to feel the motion. It was not bad, it didnt seem to bother anyone. You will have a great time, the ship is wonderful!!:)

[pearlie]

We are just off the Freedom also, Our embarkation was easy and quick... We were on board by 1:30, and chops was pretty full, so make your reservations early!

I have to disagree w. the others, 1 nite it was really rocky, and quite a few folks in my group were seasick, as were many we ran into, including staff. There were cancelled reservations that nite in Chops, due to the rocking, and even the staff felt sick.. Tho they all said it was the 1st time this had ever happened on the Freedom.. We had strong winds and higher than expected waves...

Debarkation for us, well we were called off at 7am, but when we arrived inthe terminal for carousel 1, we had to wait and wait and wait for our luggage, we got it at 9am, then sat on the bus for Fort Lauderdale for another hour +, I will probably take my own luggage off next time.

The ship however is great! you will love it!

[divaofdisney]

thanks everyone for your replys. I guess we'll plan to get to the ship around 10:30. We're staying in Miami night before. This way at least we're in the first group of folks waiting to get through the check-in process....and we'll already have our set and sail pass so that'll make it somewhat easier also. hoping that come December, seas will be calm. I 've cruise 7x times now and I have never had a problem but have heard recently seas have been rough.

Plan to check out dining room table # and then make reservations at Portofino's. Any other suggestions appreciated...thanks again.

[tulips952]

I see that you are preparing to cruise on RCCL in December - how exciting for you!!!

 

I have some RCCL future cruise vouchers that I am not going to be able to use and am needing to get rid/transfer to someone else. I wanted to know if you could use them - can you please email me at laurac952@yahoo.com so that I can share the details?

 

I see you are from Ocean Pines - we are down there all the time, with a condo on 60th! The SunFest was fun this year!

 

Tulips

[tulips952]

I see you are from Ocean Pines - we are down there all the time, with a condo on 60th! The SunFest was fun this year!

 

I also see that you are preparing to cruise on RCCL in December - how exciting for you!!!

 

I have some RCCL future cruise vouchers that I am unfortunately not going to be able to use and am needing to get rid/transfer them to someone else.

 

I wanted to know if you could use them, it would be beneficial to you - can you please email me at laurac952@yahoo.com so that I can share the details?

 

Tulips

[cb at sea]

There is a website you can check, to see what the ocean swells are and will be. Its: Medeosail.com Once you are there, click on the area you wish to check and it will give forecasts! Great site!

[big al]

There is a website you can check, to see what the ocean swells are and will be. Its: Medeosail.com Once you are there, click on the area you wish to check and it will give forecasts! Great site!

 

CB-are you sure about that website?I have tried it 5 times and it says"could not find"....could it be something else-like .net or .org?

 

Big Al

[FitzLA]

We were on the Oct. 1 cruise. Embarkation was easy. We were there at about 11:30 and the check in was a breeze. We got through everything in about 40 minutes including luggage check, security and check in. The only problem we had was the machines that take the pics for sea pass cards went down, so when we got upstairs to board, we had to wait for a while for them to get the machines back up. The whole system went down so all the machine were down. Even with that delay, we were IN our rooms by 1:00 and ready to explore.

 

We had some night of strong (50 mph plus) winds. Even with the rough seas, the ship stayed fairly stable. There was some movement that we could feel one night in the dining room, but it was for the most part VERY smooth. We had a corner aft and rarely felt any movement.

 

We tried to make a reservation at Chops for a large group of 20 people on the 1st day, and were not able to get any. Smaller group and they could have accomodated us, but I would get your reservation in early.

[TNC010100]

1.) How was the embarkation process? have heard it's been lengthy. If you arrive early is it better or actually worse?? When have they been allowing folks to board??

 

2.) How have the waters been lately? Have heard from several cruisers that seas have been very rough.

 

3.) For those who have stayed in any of the Promenade rooms- any noise you noticed?? Since I am not a late person- was wondering if this is a problem.

 

4.) Any difficulties make reservations at Portofino's or Chops??

 

We were on the Freedom (Crown & Anchor Cruise 10/15-10/22) and to answer your questions:

1) embarkation was awful from a length of time standpoint. The actual process was very easy. Supposedly the Coast Guard would not release the ship for 90 minutes, so when we arrived at the Port at 12:15pm, the line stretched quite a ways back. It took us an hour and a half. So you can get there early and you should not have any problems so long as the ship is released as normal. But be aware the the documents say they don't board until 2pm, so by all rights they do not have to let people on until then. Because of the delay we did not leave port until 5:45pm because all the people were on board, but their luggage wasn't!!

 

2) I didn't find the water rough, per se, but I definitely felt movement every day, most of the day. I have only cruised one other time (Celebrity, Mercury Western Caribbean in January) and even though it was a smaller ship, I felt less movement then than I did on the Freedom. It never bothered me, but I am also not one prone to seasickness.

 

3) We were not on the Promenade level so no help there. We were very near the elevators and only heard noise from people a handful of times. Our one year old is a light sleeper and what little noise we heard never bothered her.

 

4) We headed right to Portofino's once on board and had no prob for a reservation for 2 on Wednesday and our ship was very full and had lots of repeat cruisers who are likely to have taken advantage of Chops or Portofinos. So, if you get there early you sould not have a problem unless you are a large party - then I heard you can actually try to reserve something before you get on the ship.

 

Enjoy - you will love the FREEDOM!!!

[divaofdisney]

tulips952- Yes, we have lived here in Ocean Pines for the last 6 years. We like it...it's alot less hectic than being in Baltimore. And of course, the ocean is nice too. Yes, I would love to utilize the coupons you have....you can email me at divaofdisney@aol.com. Thanks so much. We are looking very forward to this cruise. Have had it planned now for almost a year so I am ready to go now!!!!!

Waiting now this last little bit is soooo hard. But, soon we'll be there with drink in hand. Take care and thanks all for you input

[nlcentralchmps03]

CB-are you sure about that website?I have tried it 5 times and it says"could not find"....could it be something else-like .net or .org?

 

Big Al

I found it by going to meteosail.com.

 

Try that and let me know if it works.

[MAPASPOILS]

Just a few questions to any recent freedom cruisers:

 

1.) How was the embarkation process? have heard it's been lengthy. If you arrive early is it better or actually worse?? When have they been allowing folks to board??

 

2.) How have the waters been lately? Have heard from several cruisers that seas have been very rough.

 

3.) For those who have stayed in any of the Promenade rooms- any noise you noticed?? Since I am not a late person- was wondering if this is a problem.

 

4.) Any difficulties make reservations at Portofino's or Chops??

 

We will be traveling on the December 10th cruise....and just wondering about these things....thanks in advance. ;)

 

Oct 15 -22

Yes we saw the lines but we arrived at 130pm from Hyatt and by 215 we were walking onboard, not bad

Cruise was smooth, one night was moving and it was very windy but to us that type of movement is relaxing , each person is different, go to customer desk and they will give u bonnie tablets if you are prown to motion sickness.

We stayed in back 7696 and even with veranda it was extremly quite.

Make your alternate dinning reservation as soon as you get on they go fast.

 

The cruise was wonderful, We met alot of new freinds both C&A and cruise critics. Enjoy yourselfs.

[cruiseonly]

Freedom doesn't move, no motion at all. She doesn't even drop anchor when we tender, GPS does it all.

 

At 12:30PM the line was to Carnival's terminal entrance. Being Diamond members, our pins were seen by a porter who took our luggage & told us to enter at the navy blue walkway doors. So we did & were on in 15 minutes when immigration gave the OK for folks to board. So we had no line.

 

MaCop:

 

We are just Diamond members now, and will be on the Freedom next Dec. 2007.

 

How do I get the pins. Will RCCL send them to me, or do I have to request them, or will they come with my documents.

[Badgertr]

I have a question about the windjammer. In the first reviews quite a few people complained about seating and lines in the windjammer. I thought we should try Liberty because maybe they improved the situation after the Freedom. However, Freedom dates work better for us. How bad is the Windjammer area?

 

Thanks,

Karin

[penguin6969]

Hello Divaofdisney, we will also be on FOS on Dec 10 thru 17. We have an aft cabin (our first one) and we can't wait to get on board and let the good times roll and the drinks a flowing.....

[divaofdisney]

penguin6969- Welcome....please visit our Roll Call board and please join us at the pool bar after the muster drill for the Sailaway and the Meet and Mingle. Please don't forget to register for that.

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?p=8202335&posted=1#post8202335

[Katrina]

I have a question about the windjammer. In the first reviews quite a few people complained about seating and lines in the windjammer. I thought we should try Liberty because maybe they improved the situation after the Freedom. However, Freedom dates work better for us. How bad is the Windjammer area?

 

Thanks,

Karin

 

Hi Karin,

THe windjammer can get pretty crowded at times by my DH and I never had a hard time getting a table. We would get a table first then one of us would go and get our food while the other sat at the table.

 

I did not find the windjammer any more crowded on Freedom than any of the other ships.

[Katrina]

I made reservations for CHOPS the first day on board and got the last table for Tuesday. The hostess did tell us on Tuesday that they were completely booked for the week.

 

Chops was fabulous!!!! A must try for everyone.

[TomCat32174]

The noise level from the promenade is almost nothing. You will hear most during the parades or any sort of ship functions in the promenade. Normal guest traffic or normal use, you should hear nothing.. this being someone who has only been in promenade cabins on all my cruises with RCI.

[janrj7]

Diva, we were on the Oct 15 sailing in a third-story promenade room. It was very quiet! Couldn't really even hear the parades.

 

Karin, I agree w/Katrina, I didn't find the Windjammer any more crowded than on other ships. The "island" configuration of the food service areas helped a lot; we never had to stand in a long line. Sometimes it took a while to find a table, at peak hours, but we always found one. (It would have helped if people had moved on after eating, but some people insist on sitting there playing cards or visiting ... which they could do ELSEwhere!)

 

You will love Freedom! The staff is just terrific, and the ship itself is amazing. Enjoy!

[divaofdisney]

A big thanks to all of you for your replys. I am sooo looking forward to this cruise after almost a year of waiting. Now, if I can only live thru the next month I'll be fine. Thanks again. ;)

[AFT_LOVER]

and December 2005 a large envelope showed with Diamond luggage tags & pins, a great letter welcoming us to RCCL C&A Diamond membership & all the benefits. I noticed the line "Be sure to wear your pins at all time onboard, boarding, etc. How else will you be noticed" and they are correct!

 

 

Freedom doesn't move, no motion at all. She doesn't even drop anchor when we tender, GPS does it all.

 

At 12:30PM the line was to Carnival's terminal entrance. Being Diamond members, our pins were seen by a porter who took our luggage & told us to enter at the navy blue walkway doors. So we did & were on in 15 minutes when immigration gave the OK for folks to board. So we had no line.

 

MaCop:

 

We are just Diamond members now, and will be on the Freedom next Dec. 2007.

 

How do I get the pins. Will RCCL send them to me, or do I have to request them, or will they come with my documents.