We booked a cruise on Royal Caribbean's Enchantment of the Seas for our 25th wedding anniversary. The cruise left from Baltimore for a tour of New England and Canada in October 2010. This was my 4th curise and I wanted it special for my husband. This ship is anything but enchanting! It is an older ship with few ammentities.
When our tickets had not arrived 5 days prior to departure, I contacted our travel agent and was informed that the "Seapass", which had to to be downloaded from the Royal Caribbean web site, was our ticket. There is no mention that this "Seapass" is the ticket and the web site stipulates where to mail the tickets. Since we had not downloaded the Seapass and mailed in the notice we did not have luggage tags. They did provide luggage tags at the port of Baltimore.
The "Any Time Dining" is a joke. On the first evening we arrived at the dining room and I requested a table for 2. The waiter took us to a table for 6 and after dinner HE decided that since we all seemed to get along this would be our assigned table for 6:00 P.M. dining. One couple at our table ordered a bottle of wine. The wine steward poured the wine for my husband to taste. Not knowing that we had not ordered the bottle, my husband tasted the wine and when the wine steward tried to pour a glass for another female passenger, the mistake was apparent. Her husband had ordered the wine. I requested that another bottle of wine be provided to this couple. The wine never arrived.
Every night we got into a line that reached back to the staterooms and waited. Even the bartenders could not understand what was wrong with the dining staff. The last night of the cruise we were advised that since we were assigned to a table we could have just walked into the dining room and taken a seat. This information came from a passenger not the crew.
We ate in the Market Place, which is a cafeteria style restaurant. The food is a step up from college food. It would serve Royal Caribbean well to contact Golden Corral. At least Golden Corral has decent food. The powdered scrambled eggs, the stale bread and the coffee were horrible! The dining room was not much better, they are not serving gourmet food, not even close!
The odor in our stateroom was like an outhouse. This was disturbing since we did not have a balcony and could not air out the room.
The Bar Harbor adventure was a real adventure. The "Compass" gave a location for departure via tender. Noone was there. After walking around the ship, four staircases were crowded with people trying to exit the ship. A passenger advised that 2 tenders were being used and one had mechanical problems. I observed the crew trying to lower 2 more tenders that got hung up in the riggings. This was very upsetting since these tenders are really life boats. If we had a real emergency 450 people would be left on board the ship. The passengers on the ship were mostly elderly and infirmed with wheelchairs and walkers.
The return cruise was extremely rough (not Royal Caribbean's fault) as a nor'easter was heading up the eastern coast. I was apprehensive since the crew was having problems with the life boats.
It was extremely cold and windy in Bar Harbor and when we arrived at the bus for a carriage ride through Acadia National Park we were told that the bus would not load for another 15 minutes. The bus sat there with the engine running while we stood in the cold waiting.
The stateroom staff and the bartenders were very efficient. They did an excellent job. The dining room staff and the cruise director (where was she?) were terrible. McDonald's gives better service. Except for the "Compass" there was no communication with the passengers. And the information in this newsletter was usually wrong!
I contacted Customer Relations via email when we returned from the cruise. A polite email was received thanking them for my letter. This cruise line needs a major overhaul of staff and real training.
I will never book another cruise on Royal Caribbean!