Monarch--The Last Days in the Caribbean
Written: Mar 18 '03
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Lots of Activities
Good Service
Good Food
Cons: Costs add up
Not enough time to enjoy it all
The Bottom Line: Royal Caribbean service was very good and the ship was a very good value for our vacation dollar.
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| jtfourh's Full Review: Royal Caribbean Monarch of the Seas |
My wife and I just returned from a four night cruise on the Monarch of the Seas with four other couples. We had been planning this trip for nine or ten months so it was nice to get it completed safely during the current unrest.
The Basics
Monarch is one of three ships in the Sovereign class (Sovereign of the Seas, Majesty of the Seas are the others.) Although it is twelve years old, it is in pretty good shape. The absolutely worst thing we saw was that several of the chairs in the biggest entertainment area are broken. The ship has tons of different places to go and enjoy though.
If you want a view, the Viking lounge is the highest point and is a great place to relax and enjoy a cold beverage.
If you want sun, there are decks on 11 (with the pools), 12 and 13.
If you want bars, just stick your hand in the air and someone with a coat on will bring you a drink. And there are bars, lounges and more available all over the ship--9 total I believe.
If you want great food, eat in the dining rooms. If you want good food, eat at the Windjammer on the front of the ship on deck 11 (with more seating above on 12).
Destinations
The current four day cruises go to Key West and Cozumel. The five day adds Playa Carmen. The offer several pages worth of excursions in each location. I would recommend none in Key West but consider a snorkeling or beach excursion at Cozumel. The dock in Cozumel for us was the International Pier and it was very busy. There are almost 500 taxis available though and the prices are posted at all locations. The ship will be moving to California in June.
Traveling Tips
We paid for specific inside cabins for two in our group and specific outside cabins for the other three. The prices drop about alot as the cruise date approached and we were able to upgrade the two inside cabins to guaranteed outside cabins. This was fine with us since they were right next to our friends cabins. Our travel agent said we will even get the difference in price back. My tip is--have a really good travel agent or book through www.rccl.com.
Second tip, consider the travel insurance. At the very least, get in a a day early to the port area. Our flight out after the cruise was delayed by storms all over the south. The plane we were to leave on was two and half hours late and caused 20-30 people on the flight to miss the next sailing of the Monarch. They didn't allow for any problems when they set up their schedule and missed the boat.
Third tip, pack a nice outfit for dinner each night and one formal night but other than that, pack very light. It is really casual except at the dinners or shows.
Fourth tip, expect to spend and extra $250 or so once you are on the ship. They have a cashless card to pay for everything besides the food and noncarb meal drinks. We spent $19 each on the soft drink card, $78 on the suggested tip and my wife had a really nice massage (just this once). We also bought the video highlights because we were in a few of them (it was $25) and two of the photographs. The photographs they take are numerous and usually very well done.
Last tip, go to cruisecritic.com message boards and learn about the trip, the destinations, the ship, the hints from previous cruisers.
Entertainment
We're married with kids like the other four couples in our group and don't get out much when we are at home and living our "normal" lives. We all really enjoyed the entertainment put together by the fantastic cruise director, Allan Brooks. He's a young guy but very energetic, informative and fun to be around. We had dancing, puppets, magic, singing, juggling, contest, and more.
Service
The three primary service providers are your cabin steward, waiter, and assistant waiter. All three of ours did a very good job. Our cabin steward noted that we had asked for ice our first day and thereafter, we never asked again--it was always done. The cabin is done up twice a day, once when you go to breakfast and once when you go the dinner (beds pulled down). Fresh towels both times if you need them.
The food service is tremendous. We ate with our friends at dinner so and had the same two guys at each dinner. Lunch and breakfast are open seating so we had different ones then but only did that once for each. (We ate most lunches and breakfasts at the buffet at the Windjammer). These servers hustle and anticipate your every need--they spoil you basically.
Final Words
This review is somewhat generic because of the upcoming move of Monarch. It will actually be going through a $20 million renovation in April-May so some of these details may change. Overall, we didn't want to get off the ship and were fairly impressed with how the company operates. I'll encourage you to read up on message boards to learn more.
Recommended:
Yes
Best Suited For: Couples
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Epinions.com ID:
jtfourh
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Location: Indy
Reviews written: 69
Trusted by: 80 members
About Me:
Christian husband and father of four; Excel & website developer from Indy area.
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