Had a blast by
J K G from Fort Worth, Texas
Sailing date: Apr 2008Pros:
The Cruise Director Ralph
Cons:
Waiting to refill my colas (prepaid)
We just got back from a 7 day cruise to Jamaica, Cayman Islands, and Cozumel.
This was our first cruise and we had a blast. We enjoyed the ocean view room.
The steward Oscar was one of the nicest persons I've met in an accomodation service environment. During the first day, he was the one staff member that really stud out, and it just seem to be his personality, not an act. Every time we met him in the hallway, it was always a smile and quite hello.
The waiters were fantastic, Galya, Tupu, and Ratna were fun and we looked foward to dinner each night. Oh, the food was outstanding as well, that helped.
The pursers were not quite as friendly, but not rude either. The excursion desk person that we spoke to the first time seemed to be bothered to be doing his job. He repeatedly let us know we could order our excursions from our television in the room. Don't know his name, but he's more cut out to be a male model, then providing customer service, imo.
The one and only "slightly" aggravating part of the trip was getting our colas refilled in our big red "Carnival" cups. We purchased "two" of the drink plans on the first night, for $96 total. It seemed pretty obvious that we, having prepaid for unlimited colas, were being skipped over by the bartenders when trying to get refills. It seemed to really take a long time. We caught on by the third day, and started hiding our refill cups below the bar until the bartenders would ask what drink we wanted. It was amazing how much faster service we got once we did this. It was also fun, but disappointing, to watch the smiles disappear from their faces when we pulled up the cups. I might repead that this was a very, very slight "con", and only a minor issue.
The true joy for me was the cruise director. From the moment we met him at the Captain's party, to the last day assembly, I looked forward to hearing from him. He seemed completely real, and full of fun. He was completely into the cruise, dancing and singing with the teams, playing games, out and about the decks. And he made me laugh outloud several times, including the first time when he commented on our name tags and called us by our names. (examples of his humor: The mayans invented underwear: "Fruit of Tu-lum", "I have good news and bad news. The good news is the captain decided to detour around the thunderstorms ahead so that we may enjoy a final day of sunny weather. The bad new is we're now completely lost. ..We think we're somewhere near Hawaii"). His name was Ralph, he's Scottish, and he's brilliant.
The ship is beautiful, and I spent (too) much time photographing the small details of it (I'm a photographer).
So I pretty much enjoyed the seven days, wasn't looking foward to getting off the ship, and can't wait for another cruise.
Ship Quality
Dining/Food
Stateroom Quality
Ship Staff Quality
Entertainment & Activities
Azamara Cruises