We joined our dear friends Kevin and Tanya for a miraculous cruise on the Anthem of the Seas, enjoying relaxation in the Solarium, wonderful shows, delectable dining, a spectacular ringing in of the New Year, and most importantly, each other!
If endless entertainment, unlimited and varied dining experiences, and fun, fun, fun are your thing - you've come to the right place onboard Royal's newest Quantum-class ship - the Anthem of the Seas!
We are blessed to share this extraordinary voyage with our dear friends Kevin and Tanya who flew all the way from the Great Down Under to sail on Princess' 50th Anniversary cruise (an adventure which merits its own Blog entry!), then join us for a weeklong Christmas celebration before boarding for the 2016 Holiday cruise!
The Good
Dining is varied enough between restaurants to satisfy a multitude of tastes. Reservations (once completed, see "The Not-So-Good" below) are punctual and seating is nearly instant upon arrival at the maître d's podium.
The rooms are well-appointed, and a standard balcony cabin has more than ample outlets, USB ports and storage for a 7-day cruise (and even a 14-day on with the additional cabinets above the bed). There are, of course, secret cabins on this ship as so many others - "obstructed" cabins which are rather lovely in their round framed window surrounding the balcony - a photographer's dream rather than a hindrance, these can be had for a fraction of the standard balcony, and then, of course, there are those with angled balconies that are 25 - 50% larger for the same price, a tip I always happy share when selevting staterooms for my valued clients!
Entertainment is spectacular and on a par with anything on Broadway. Catch We Will Rock You or Cabaret, or both - you are sure to be amazed! Sets and talent alike are indiscernible from their landward counterparts.
And between bumper cars, the Northstar observation pod, surfing and skydiving, there is precious little anyone of all ages will find wanting!
The Not-So-Good
Royal should line up their web design team and summarily dismiss the lot, and that is being generous. The "Royal IQ" app would seem to have the intellect of a 2-year-old, again, generous.
No ship's map in this Royal IQ (really? even Shipmate has one!), so 4180 passengers carry a paper map throughout the voyage. We couldn't log in for the first 2 hours - evidently, capacity planning for 3000+ passengers is beyond this geek squad! (My other career is in IT, so I am just staggered at how a "smart ship" could have been implemented to be so...not!)
As was the case with Quantum, the dinner reservations I spent literal hours online reserving (when the site was accessible, and it was down for the entire week pre-sailing) are now Swiss cheese.
I try one dining hostess, who alleges she has "fixed" everything, then another upon learning this was only bolluxed up some more. This hostess tells me to go see the hostess for the "right" restaurant, even though I can see on her web screen she has access to all dining venues, as did her counterpart earlier. I do my New York thing - ask for a Manager and advise her that I am not about to spend the first half of my day prancing miles across several floors to remedy something simple as dinner, at which point her Supervisor arrives and closes the deal.
Pity - she was merely following orders, and clearly, the staff are not sufficiently empowered to fix what should be unique and varied dining options far exceeding traditional ship's traditional fare.
That said, multi-generational groups and families will be thrilled - plenty of things to keep the little ones occupied while mommy and daddy enjoy a little "us" time.
More on the adventure and a glimpse of our ports of call tomorrow...Bon Voyage!