Open seating dining

[-ClevelandRocks-]

How's this work? Just booked my next cruise and they gave me a choice between early, late, + open dining. I usually request early, get late, and hate it. This anytime dinner seating ROCKS!

 

Also, having trouble getting the countdown clock in my sig (Liberty 11/28/2009). I cut + pasted it exactly as it appeared under the listed cruises, but no go. Any suggestion?

[-ClevelandRocks-]

Anybody?

[cb at sea]

Open seating is where you go to dinner any time during the dining room hours....your choice. You can sit alone or with others. You can make a reservation, or just show up.

 

It's a good option for those who don't like the "set" dining times!

[smurfm69]

I couldn't get the cruise critic countdown clock on my signature either so I went to tickerfactory.com and made one there. I may try the anytime dining on my cruise next month.

[-ClevelandRocks-]

Thanx much, I've always got them to work in the past but I'm using Firefox now. That must be the culprit!

[smurfm69]

Ohh maybe that is the reason I can't get it either. I use Firefox too. It's way better than Internet Explorer.

[mrsbean1990]

We will be doing anytime dining on the Fantasy. It appeals to us because we can choose the time we want to eat, and we can choose to eat just our family, if we want.

[PaulieG13]

My bride and I will be trying "anytime Dining" for the first time on our next cruise. The idea sounds great since we have both expressed the cons of early and late seating. We want to see the shows after dinner, which lends to early dining being more convenient. However, on the sailing that we have had early dining, we missed the sunsets and port exits. So, we will now have the options of hanging out on the top deck while the ship leaves port and watching the sun set before heading down to dinner in time to make it to the late show. Hopefully it works out according to our plans (probably won't but we are not going to let it ruin our vacation).

 

About the countdown clock problem, it may very well be a Firefox issue. A quick message to the cruise critic web support might get that resolved. Or you could check "tickerfactory" or "ucruiser". I think they have better looking countdown clocks anyway.

[DallasCruisers]

A ton of Carnival ships are offering this option, but according to the Carnival webiste, not the Freedom, which I am booked on for next month. I wonder why? I would love to give it a try.

 

I asked for the late slot and have been put on the wait list.

[judyzoo]

A ton of Carnival ships are offering this option, but according to the Carnival webiste, not the Freedom, which I am booked on for next month. I wonder why? I would love to give it a try.

 

They are phasing it in a few ships at a time, rather than making the change fleetwide all at once.

[Familyforce6]

A chart for you...not sure how accurate it is...

 

 

http://www.bookccl.com/irman/bookccl/shipboard_knowledge/DiningRoomAssignedReservations.htm

[mosaic_mom]

A ton of Carnival ships are offering this option, but according to the Carnival webiste, not the Freedom, which I am booked on for next month. I wonder why? I would love to give it a try.

 

I asked for the late slot and have been put on the wait list.

 

Freedom is supposed to have it late spring / early summer 2010.

[jfe724]

We did the anytime dining in May on the Pride. We loved it. We were traveling with our son and girlfriend. They went to dinner by themselves at an earlier time than my husband and I and 2 or 3 nights the 4 of us went together. The night we went to the supper club, we ended up in the dining room for our desert. ( We didn't like any of the deserts offered at the supper club and were tired of all the "pampering") It was a pleasure to see our regular waiters and have our "Plain" desert.

:)

[PlanoDebbie]

We had the Anytime Dining on Conquest last month and LOVED it! Each day we could select the activities we wanted to do FIRST, then decide when dinner would fit with our activities.

 

Last time on Conquest we had the early dining in Monet at 5:45. With 3 of us in the cabin we needed to start taking showers and getting cleaned up for dinner no later than 4:30 each day. We were in port until 6:00 at both Montego Bay and Cozumel. That meant we had to be back on the ship much earlier than we really wanted to be.

 

We never waited more than a minute to be seated. Had the same waiter for 5 out of the 7 nights.

 

The ONLY downside for us, was being stuck in the upper level of the Renoir dining room which only has a view of the Muster Drill stations and life boats! Since we had a beautiful balcony cabin, we were ok with the crummy dinner view.

 

The Anytime dining is definitely more flexible. Since we were already a group of six, we never sat with any others since there were no tables larger than six. Would definitely do it again, regardless of the view!