Serenade December 2, 2006 Review!

[jhawk25]

This was such a great cruise! We were a party of 5. My husband & I were 2nd time cruisers - went the previous year on Explorer & won Win a Cruise Bingo! So this was the cruise we chose, with our waiter's recommendation. (Sidenote: we were not so lucky at Win a Cruise Bingo this year)! :(

 

We arrived in San Juan on Friday & stayed at the Sheraton Old San Juan using my hotel points. I really enjoyed the hotel - we were lucky enough to have a room with a little balcony overlooking some of Old San Juan. We got a double room & packed 5 people in there - pretty tight, but still manageable. Friday evening, as one of the previous posters mentioned, they were having a celebration in Old San Juan. We went there, & also ate at Senor Frogs.

 

The next morning we had the hotel hold our luggage & walked through San Juan, eventually ending up at the El Morro Fort. The walk was beautiful - we didn't want to spend the money to go into the Fort, so we just walked around the outside of it & then back to the hotel. We also stopped at the Coach outlet on the way - got fantastic purses for quite a good price. My sister & I ventured into the Dooney & Burke store, but it didn't appear to be any cheaper than in the USA.

 

We got to the ship about around 12:30. I think we boarded around 1:00. The wait wasn't too bad, & everything was pretty organized. We had cabin 9096. It was the perfect size for 2 people - but we had 4 people (adults) in there. All in all, it wasn't that bad - seemed to have enough room to hang the clothes that needed to be hanged - & the couch was a pullout so we didn't all have to sleep on the bed. :D We went to have lunch in the Windjammer & then explored the ship. We took a spa tour - looked great inside, but we never ended up using the services. Dinner was 8:30 sitting - we had the BEST WAITER IN THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD. His name was Johann, can't remember the last name. My sister last night commented how she misses him - it's so sad, but so true.

 

Second day was St. Thomas (formal night). We did some shopping in the AM, & then headed to Magen's Bay for the rest of the day. BEAUTIFUL beach - didn't get approached by anyone selling anything, which was a plus.

 

Third day was St. Maarten - again, did shopping in the AM, & then headed to Orient Beach for the rest of the day. The beach itself was so-so - not extremely beautiful, & tons of people trying to sell stuff (we saw the same people OVER & OVER again - so politely saying no didn't exactly work). We were about halfway down the beach - for those interested, I saw about 4 fully nude men & about 4 topless women. No big whoop.

 

Fourth day was St. Lucia - did the Cosol tour. Such a beautiful island - one of my favorites. We actually rode with Cosol's brother (can't remember his name). The tour was fantastic - lots of great things to see. And the bread is simply the most wonderful bread in the world. One disclaimer for this tour - you are in the car alot on very windy & steep roads. So I would suggest you limit your alcohol intake to a minimum. :p All in all, I would definitely recommend this tour as a great way to see St. Lucia.

 

Fifth day was Antigua - did the Pineapple Beach half day passes. Beach was nice, but nothing compared to Magen's Bay. The drinks were good, but were served in incredibly small cups, & you had to walk a bit to go get another. The lunch served was okay, but to be honest I think it would have been better to just go get a free hamburger & fries. While the food was good, it was too "heavy" to go right back out & sit in the hot sun. For those interested, the cab ride was $8 per person one way to the beach. On the way it took a little over 45 minutes because our cab driver had to stop & get gas. On the way back I think it took just a little over 30 minutes. I personally would not do this excursion again, & probably wouldn't recommend it either. But I do know several people over on the Antigua board who simply loved it, so maybe we just went on a bad day. One good thing about this beach - my husband & I won a bottle of rum in the water balloon throwing contest!:)

 

Sixth day was Barbados - we did the Silver Moon tour. We signed up & paid for the Silver Moon II (the larger boat), but ended up on the smaller Silver Moon (which was just fine with us). The boat is beautiful, the water was so blue & warm. Snorkeling with the sea turtles was a highlight - they are so darn cute! (Although I must admit I was apprehensive at first - they are HUGE - but harmless, as I found out once I got in the water). We then snorkeled 2 "shipwrecks" (they are actually small barges that were sunk purposefully to help create new coral reefs.) The lunch they had for us was really, really good. And there was an abundance of drinks - watch out for the rum punch, they used spiced rum which gave it a big kick! I would absolutely recommend this tour to anyone - but watch out for the sun! It was so hot - make sure you lather up with sunscreen!

 

Seventh day was a sea day - we slept until around 9:00, went to the Windjammer for breakfast, & then went back & packed - finished up around 11:00. When we went to find a chair, there was absolutely nothing to be found, unless you went all the way up to the rock wall. I would say about 60% of the chairs actually had bodies in them. So eventually we just sat next to the pool in the water, which tons of people did. I knew it was going to be crowded, & granted we could have (& probably should have) gone out at 7:00 & saved seats. But we didn't - so oh well!

 

Other items about the ship: there were 2 theme nights to my recollection, Caribbean & '70s. I can't remember our head waiter's name, but he was really great, much better than the one we had on Explorer. My friend visited the casino quite often - her motto (in hindsight) is "Quit while you're ahead". Apparently the slot machine she was at hit quite well, but blackjack ended up not being so nice. Quest was hilarious, as always, but not really easy to do in the location they held it in (Safari Room). Make sure you get there early to get a seat in the lower sitting area. We went to the Battle of the Sexes game & thought it was pretty stupid. Would not go back again to that. The magicians were fantastic, & the Royal Caribbean singers & dancers were pretty good as well (singers were great, dancers were a little off sync, but much better than I would have done!) We did go to the singer/comedian the 2nd night of the cruise - I felt so bad for him, but he really wasn't good at all. Sorry I can't remember his name at the present. I think he must have been very good in his prime, but his show didn't really connect with anyone in the audience.

 

Disembarkation was so smooth, it was unbelievable. We were supposed to disembark at around 9:00 (I think, let's use it for an example). Within 15 minutes we were thru customs & had found our baggage. They just lay all of the baggage out in a big room by your color coded tags - so I would definitely advise you don't take a plain jane black or brown bag & not attach something to it to help you identify it. We had a prepaid ship transfer - it was okay, but next time I might just get a cab. We were off early, but they made us wait until the bus filled up, which took awhile. I would also suggest paying extra (I think $10?) to have your baggage sent automatically to the airport. When you do this, you get your boarding pass already, so you don't have to stand in the INCREDIBLY LONG lines at the airport. We did not do this with the hopes we would find an earlier flight home. Alas, not only did we not find an earlier flight, but I stood in line for over an hour waiting for someone to help me.

 

Quick food comment - dining room food was excellent - I was impressed. I especially loved the stuffed chicken. Windjammer food was good as well, with one exception...the cheesecake was just awful. Had the consistency of sponge cake, with very little flavor. Other than that, I was very impressed with the food on the Serenade.

 

Whew - I'm done. :cool:

[critterchick]

Thanks for your review - I'm glad you had such a great time!

[finnegan14]

Thanks for the review -- we're going on the Serenade next month. Who was your cruise director?

[jhawk25]

Her name was Ashley - redheaded young lady. She was pretty funny, full of energy - held her own on the dodgeball court. :p

[Fitnessmaniac]

This was one of our favorites!!! We did the Serenade...then got off at San Juan and boarded Celebrity's Constellation and went back to the Souther Caribbean for another week! It was AWESOME!!!

Thanks for your review and the memories. :)

[SeaBreezy]

Her name was Ashley - redheaded young lady. She was pretty funny, full of energy - held her own on the dodgeball court. :p

 

 

 

Can you tell us what is going on with Dodgeball on the Serenade? This is not the first I've read about playing with staff/officers. Is that what's going on? Where the heck do you play? On the basketball court? Sounds fun!!

 

SeaBreezy

[Nyco]

Thank-you for taking the time share you trip with us

Sorry you didn't win the Bingo cruise again :p

[Deaner13]

I'm glad you had fun last week. I was very jealous to be stuck in the office while you were off in the Caribbean. However the tables will turn in 6 weeks when I will be the one in the Caribbean and you will be the one stuck in the office. :D I want to see your pictures! I can't wait to get on the Explorer!

[jhawk25]

SeaBreezy,

 

The dodgeball game was played on the basketball court. It wasn't as organized as on the Explorer (there they had actual brackets, & cruise employees didn't participate), but everyone still had fun. Basically, there were a couple teams made up of passengers, & one team of cruise employees. They had a couple games each (passenger 1 team vs. employees, passenger 2 team vs. employees, passengers vs. passengers, etc...). Somewhere in the middle of all that the head of the employees determined which passenger team had "won" more, & how many more would then be played between the passengers only to determine who got medals.