Any Rhapsody cruisers home yet?

[Sophie]

There are a lot of us anxious to hear the latest, so tell us future Rhapsody cruisers about your cruise!! :D BTW...Welcome home!

[brn2crz]

Hey Sophie...

 

Me too, I always look for the incoming cruisers too see what they have to say!

I don't remember if this weeks roll call was very active?

Looks like they may have hit some bad weather yesterday.

[jordanaire]

We, too, are anxious to hear about your Rhapsody cruise! We will be aboard her in 10 more weeks! Looking forward to another exciting cruise, which will be our 11th since '95.

 

Bill & Leila

Georgetown, KY

[FlorenceItaly]

Hello Bill and Leila- See you in 10 weeks!!!!! . We are so looking forward to this cruise. I am cruising solo this month, with my sis in September, and finally with DH in October. Looking forward to meeting you on board.

 

Marie

[blyle]

Can't believe no one has posted!

[Sophie]

Maybe the cruise was so great they wore themselves out and are sleeping late! :)

[TXSailor]

Hi Everyone:

 

They will probably be in here later today or tomorrow. I'm curious to know who the new CD is as well as who the new DJ in the Viking Crown Lounge is.

 

Fausto

[Sports Mama]

WooHoo!!!! What a great week. :D I can't say enough great things about our trip. I promise within a few days I will have a very long and wonderful review about the Rhapsody. The new cruise director's name is Peter and he is from England. He was absolutely hilarious!!! I laughed so hard some nights I thought I would tinkle on myself. I know everyone who is fixing to sail on her is in for a treat. My whole family was very depressed when we had to get off this morning and head home. I wanted to stow away some place and go again. If you have any questions I will be glad to answer them. I tried to experience as much as I could physically do so I could report back to all those anxious cruiser. I must say one of the hilights of our cruise was our discovery scuba dive in Cozumel. What an awesome experience that my family and I had. Well worth every dollar we paid.

 

Happy Sailing,

Sports Mama

[Firefighterhoop]

I am glad you had such an awesome time! FOr all that is written on the boards on the Rhapsody VERY seldom (Almost never) do i come upon a negitive review!

Scott

[NiniB]

Hey SPORTS :>>> Glad you made it back safely.. We too had a wonderful time,, no complaints at all. I was already trying to book my trip for next year:>>>/// I missed the last opening of the Crown lounge:<<< SPORTS thanks for volunteering for the review,,,

with my typing skills they would never get it from me.... ALL of you future RHAPSODY sailors will have A BALL.......

THANKS again SPORTS for the hookup info on that Cozumel excursion!!!!!!!!!!

[mikefast]

We have been on her twice, and expect to book another cruise for a family reunion next fall. We love that ship. It is beautiful, and the food has always been great.

[Tapped Out Again]

My wife and I just got back from the Rhapsody this morning. It was a great trip! This is our second cruise, but since our first was a 3-day mini in europe, it felt like the first.

 

Here's some comments:

 

1) We got to boarding late, at 3:30pm or so. We missed lunch, but there was no line at all. I'd heard from other early cruisers that it was a zoo from 1 to 2.

 

2) Overall the weather was pretty calm, on the forward 3rd deck, we felt motion only if we concentrated on it. Some people who were very sensitive got seasick on the 8th, but all the time we were on the upper floors eating, sitting etc we barely noticed anything.

 

3) There's food available for 19 hours out of 24. There's the 3 meals at varying times in the formal restaurant and the Windjammer buffet, and outside those times the solarium served lasagna, hot dogs, hamburgers, fries, salad, and fruits all other times, except 10:30 to 11am and 2am to 6:30am. You can order room service food 24 hours a day but that takes 30 min-45 min.

 

The main dining room food was great, didn't hear about any undercooked lobsters or over cooked steaks. Make sure you save room for desert though, that's the best done part of the meal! Make sure you hit your 2 lbs/day weight gain assignment!

 

3.5) We wouldn't recommend the $42+tip soda card. You can only get soda in a cup at the bars and the dining room, not at the windjammer, and you can't use it to buy bottled anything including water. They don't even include Dr. Pepper as that's not a 'coke' product. I suggest you bring aboard some 12-packs of your favorite drink and a few bottles of water if you want to save some money. Alcohol is also really expensive, $6 for the 'special' of the day and $8+ for cognac etc. I can see how some people run up $1000 bar tabs. Casino drinks are NOT free.

 

4) The entertainment was great overall, especially the shows. The headline singers were wonderful, plus the magic, dancing, ventriloquist, and juggling acts. The only show we found so-so was the comic, who performed on the first night and the last.

 

5) Make sure you are on time! Everything starts right on time. If a show is 7:00pm, at 7:01 you'll have to find seating in the dark. If a line dancing lesson is 12:30, you'll miss the whole thing if you get there at 12:45. For the popular contests such as Ping Pong tournament, teen rock climbing competition etc, you should get there 20 minutes ahead of time and quite a few who showed up 5 minutes prior to the calendar time had to be turned away because it was full.

 

6) The service was great overall, everyone worked really, really hard. I didn't find any exceptions.

 

7) Key West was kind of bleh, unless you like bar hopping and tourist shopping.

 

8) Grand Cayman was fun, everyone liked the sting rays, but the snorkeling which was just next door was so-so. We'd been to much better reefs in Cancun and other places.

 

9) The Cozumel dune buggy tour wasn't much fun. It's supposed to be a long 4.5 hr trip. However there was no adventurous driving, 99% of it was on the highway around the island, with a 1-minute section where they let you drive on the beach sand in a circle, whoopi-do. The snorkeling was for real, real beginners. Everyone was forced to bunch together and 'not stray off', even though you were 50 feet from the shore you can't wander back before they guide you back, everyone was so crowded half of the work was avoiding getting other people's flippers in your face. Bring your own snorkeling gear because the rentals suck.

 

10) There were a lot of kids (700+ out of 1600 passengers), but they didn't get in the way too much. If you want to use the ship pools however, use the adults only one in the solarium. The center pool is always full of kids.

 

11) The casino opened every day except for the night of Key West. There were 4 blackjack tables open most of the time, 1 with $5-$200 limits, and 3 with $10-$300. The $5 is usually full in peak times and you'll have to wait 10-20 minutes for a spot to open on it. There is a single deck game but it pays 6:5 for blackjack instead. You should avoid that game unless you know how to count. The regular tables are 8 deck, dealer hits on soft 17, no surrender, split up to 4 hands, double after splitting, one card to split aces, and penetration of 70-80%, depending on the dealer. This entails about a 99.39% return on your money if you play basic strategy perfectly. If you count you can spread 1-5 with zero notice and 1-10 fairly easily unless you're alone, since the floor supervisor doesn't pay much attention to bet sizes. I didn't see a single decent player. 50%+ were in the bottom feeder category of splitting 10's, staying on soft 16's, not doubling at all or staying 13 vs. 10/A.

 

12) If you want to win the blackjack tournament, buy more than 1 ticket. To make the final table of 7 you'll probably need to end with 2100-2300 in chips in 7 hands starting with 500, with 500 max bet per hand. Basically you'll need to win at least 5 out of 7 hands betting the max. Entry fee is $20 each, and the prizes were $530, $320, and $210 for 1, 2, 3. (55-60 entry tickets).

 

13) The climbing wall was a disappointment. It's so crowded that most times you have to get there 20 minutes in advance to sign up for the 20 person/hour limit. You'll get to climb twice in that hour. You'll need to sign a waiver every day, and you need to be there for while your kids climb if they are younger than 12. Any of the three ropes serve easy climbs, with the center one a bit tougher than the left and right.

 

If you stick to one color only, you can make it harder, but no one tried that except for me and my wife. The colored lines were from left to right, blue 5.4, white 5.11+, yellow 5.8+, blue 5.9-, red 5.5, green 5.4, red 5.4. The white 5.11+ is a really contrived line with only 2 big dynos for the 1st and 3rd moves. Apparently I am the only cruiser since the wall opened to have done the white without using the wall gap or additional holds, the only other being a X-Games medalist who helped set the wall up. I pat myself in the back for being in elite company lol. The climbing competition is to see who can climb the wall fastest. I was able to win that with 7 seconds(also a ship record :D ) but usually you'll win if you can do it in 12-15 seconds.

 

14) Disembarking in Galveston was relatively painless. You just wait til your color section is called, once for immigration and once for disembarking, between 6:30am and 10am, and there's no more than a 5 minute wait for immigration to stamp you.

[Tapped Out Again]

Oh yes, if you don't know this already, if you are on the lower decks in extreme forward (or back?) oceanview cabins, and the deck plan show the ship hull slightly curved where your cabin is, that means your window is 2 2-foot 'tunnels', not a real window. Avoid these cabins at all costs unless you don't care about a oceanview and just want sunlight to tell you day and night.

[cruisedude4]

Hey! I just came back! Had a great time! I watched the rock climbing competition and I can say for a fact that Tapped Out Again did climb VERY fast! Peter was amazing, and the food was excellent!!

[Sports Mama]

Did you enjoy your snorkeling trip with Eagle Ray Divers? Our scuba dive was just awesome. We saw so much - sea turtle, many different species of beautiful fish, eels, and colorful coral!!! We got to dive about 50 feet. What an experience. It may take me a few days to get the review written and typed, but I promise it will be well worth it and I hope that my fellow cruisers for that week will add to my review. It was such a pleasure meeting you and your daughter and I enjoyed sailing with you guys.

 

Sports Mama

[NiniB]

YES!!!! THanks sooo much for all your help....:D It was so much fun meeting your family too!!! I hope your underwater pictures come out.. Post them?

 

I agree with everything that was said above the RHAPSODY is a GREAT ship I cant wait to sail her again..... :) The Crew goes ABOVE & BEYOND to make sure everyone is attended to,, I was also pleasantly surprised at how beautiful the ship is... As far as booking tours with RCI I would opt for the private ones again,,, THAT was the ONLY thing I HEARD several complaints about,, The folks in our M&M all used private tours and they were AWESOME!!!!!! If you need the info it is still on our M&M site for the ROS 08/01/04, You wont be dissappointed....

 

That was NO EXAGGERATION on the ammount of children/teens on the ship. While most of the children where well behaved the Teens were AWFUL...:eek:

Now I know first hand why so many people complain about children/teens boarding "their" ship...;) Every time I got into an elevator it was loaded with teens & preteens lying on the floor, or hanging out of it, and before you could exit or enter they were pushing buttons nearly causing elders to fall...:mad: They were EVERY WHERE!!!! & LAYING DOWN EVERY WHERE>>>

 

Well I had an exellent time and I WILL BE BACK

[NiniB]

I almost forgot Get to the pier EARLY,, we planned on getting there early but did not and PAID FOR IT... The lines were SUPER LONG..

We arrived at approx. 1-1:30 and the traffic in Galveston was a MESS...:eek: You also have to contend with the Carnival Cruise pax traffic because the piers are SOO CLOSE. There was a TRAIN GOING BY.. :eek: ,, that slowed things down even worse.. I planned on arriving at 12pm BUT did not,, :o ,, so make SURE to ARRIVE EARlY!

HAVE FUN!!!!!

[Boo's Mom]

I am enjoying reading all of your comments! Thanks.

 

Did anyone do the "Passion Island" RCI Excursion in Cozumel?

[RHDZ]

We also returned on Sunday. We has a wonderful time. We did go to Passion Island and loved it. It takes about 45 minutes to get to the island. First you get on a bus then a boat. Our tour guide Andy was great. The food and drinks are all included. As we were getting ready to leave a lady showed us some beautiful shells she had found. She said she walked to the end of the island. Go right when you are looking at the water. Our only complaint was not having more time on the island. The bus driver will drop you off in town or take you back to the ship. You will have to find your own way back to the ship. We took a cab and it cost us $6 for 4 of us. We had a wonderful time and are talking about going back!

Thanks to everyone for all the wonderful information. It made this first time cruiser feel like I knew what was going on.

Hello everyone from the M&M.

[cruisedude4]

Anyone booked for next week's cruise is in for a special treat! It's an olympic cruise that has special olympic themed events just for that cruise!!!

[justmeDi]

We also returned on Sunday. We has a wonderful time. We did go to Passion Island and loved it. It takes about 45 minutes to get to the island. First you get on a bus then a boat. Our tour guide Andy was great. The food and drinks are all included. As we were getting ready to leave a lady showed us some beautiful shells she had found. She said she walked to the end of the island. Go right when you are looking at the water. Our only complaint was not having more time on the island. The bus driver will drop you off in town or take you back to the ship. You will have to find your own way back to the ship. We took a cab and it cost us $6 for 4 of us. We had a wonderful time and are talking about going back!

Thanks to everyone for all the wonderful information. It made this first time cruiser feel like I knew what was going on.

Hello everyone from the M&M.

Glad to hear you had a terrific first cruise....would you mind giving further information on the Passion Island excursion? Did you book it on the ship? How much time did you have on the island? Were there facilities? Was the snorkeling any good.

 

Thak for any of these questions you can answer.

Just me, Di

[RHDZ]

Di

 

We did book through the ship. From our understanding it is a private island and you can only book through the ships. We were on the island for 3 hours. There are facilities and a shower. There is also a shop, hair braiding, and massages. On the bus they kept telling us how cheap the shop was. I thought it was expensive. We found the same items in town much cheaper. We only saw 2 kids

snorkling.They do have canoes, volleyball nets and hammocks. I hope that helps you.Let me know if you have any more questions.

[justmeDi]

Di

 

We did book through the ship. From our understanding it is a private island and you can only book through the ships. We were on the island for 3 hours. There are facilities and a shower. There is also a shop, hair braiding, and massages. On the bus they kept telling us how cheap the shop was. I thought it was expensive. We found the same items in town much cheaper. We only saw 2 kids

snorkling.They do have canoes, volleyball nets and hammocks. I hope that helps you.Let me know if you have any more questions.

thanks for the information...my DH wanted me to ask about the food? what was it and how was it? And what drinks were available. Thanks ;)

 

Just me, Di

[RHDZ]

We had chicken,Mahi Mahi,rice,guacomole,chips,sliced tomatoes and cucumbers and lettuce. They had different sodas,water,Corona,passion punch and margaritas. They had another mixed drink but I can't remember th name. I do know it was very good. The food waawas good. I didn't care for the guacomole, it had way to many onions.

Let me know if you have any more questions.

Have fun!!

[justmeDi]

We had chicken,Mahi Mahi,rice,guacomole,chips,sliced tomatoes and cucumbers and lettuce. They had different sodas,water,Corona,passion punch and margaritas. They had another mixed drink but I can't remember th name. I do know it was very good. The food waawas good. I didn't care for the guacomole, it had way to many onions.

Let me know if you have any more questions.

Have fun!!

Sounds like a pretty good spread!!! Thanks for all the great information....I think we might book this tour.....usually we just go to a beach......Mr. Sancho's or Chaukannab..... this sounds like a nice diversion from the usual!:D We have also considered Paradise Beach...we haven't been there and have read nothing but good things about it.....

 

Just me, DI