Best family holiday

Great family vacation. Traveled with partner, children and grandchildren.Food good, great meal at Jamies especially, Windjammer, main dining and Solarium. Large selection of food choices in the Windjammer and plenty of it. Never any problems getting a table for four. Main dining room had a limited menu selection but every dish I tried was excellent. Wait staff went out of their way to make the dining experience even more enjoyable and ensuring that our 6 year old granddaughter got extra attention. Shows were fabulous again no problems with getting a seat for all of us to sit together. There were a lot of people on the ship. a large number of teenagers and younger children, but with all the facilities available the ship didn’t feel crowded. Lovely clean ship, great friendly crew, excellent balcony cabin and wonderful cabin attendant. Nothing was too much trouble for him. Will be back onboard in March.

Fabulous, relaxing experience.

Overall an excellent experience. The service at Windjammer was very good, but the experience is still underwhelming and one we tried to avoid. The main dining room was efficient, food good and staff very attentive. The Pizza cafe, Sorrentos, needs to be a bit more flexible in its toppings, on Virgin cruises you can get a wide variety of pizzas and ask for different toppings and they oblige. Entertainment was of a high standard and the ship dancers and singers were fantastic. Sorting people for their ship excursions was still a work in progress, with some milling around of passengers in the theatre trying to jump the gun. Ports of call were very good but there really needs to be a better option at Saigon to get people to the local areas, even a cheap shuttle to Vung Tau town close to where the ship docked, similar to how a paid shuttle was provided at Jeju island to Seogwipo townsite.

Alaska the last frontier

The weather wasn’t the best but we made the best of it. Food was fantastic. The crew was really friendly and accommodating. Shows were spectacular. We went to the Mendenhal Glacier and it was awesome. We saw humpback whales, orcas, otters and seals from our ship. We love cruising. I would go year round if I could afford it. It is very relaxing. It can be very busy if you want it to be. I’m 66 and don’t really do the late night parties and dancing. Love the sunsets and sunrises. This was our second Alaska cruise so we chose to just stroll around the ports we had been to before. We took pictures and shopped in the stores. The scenery is just beautiful and I could sit there and stare at it all day. Eagles and waterfalls. What more can you ask for. One of the most beautiful places I’ve been too. We were hoping to see the northern lights but it was too cloudy. Maybe next time.

An Amazing Royal Cruise into the Last Frontier

We are currently wrapping up a 7 night sailing on Quantum of the Seas in a Sky Loft Suite (Sky Class). My wife and I are 40 years old, and we traveled with our 10 year old daughter. We visited Sitka, Skagway, Juneau, and Victoria. Embarkation in Seattle: Really easy! Just make sure to print your luggage tags and attach to your luggage prior to arriving at the cruise terminal, and make sure to have a few bucks to give to the porters. Make sure to have your passports/boarding passes on you or your carry-on. With Sky Class, we received priority boarding, which cut our time-to-board down significantly. It probably only took about 15 minutes, where everyone else might have been 20-30 minutes. Not a bad start. Disembarkation: Suite only guests get priority disembark, meet up in Wonderland and get immediate disembarkation once we get there. Royal makes it easy! Shape of the Cruise Ship: There was a little rust showing on the exterior, or paint falling off, but not that bad. The crew does get out and paint the ship at times, it looked fine. I did notice that the overhangs above the side balconies did have some paint flaking off, so that might have been the source of some of the complaints on here. Our suite paint job was in great shape. Getting from the gangway and into the ship, the ship is in great shape overall. The paint, flooring, decorations, etc were all in amazing shape. The Bionic Bar was down for most of the cruise, but didn't affect us, it was moving when we first boarded, so that was cool to see. The North Star is down until they dry dock the ship for repairs, but I knew about it being down from other reviews and YouTube travel vlogs. I did want to experience the Northstar, but wasn't surprised, so it wasn't a huge loss. There's still a ton to do on the ship. Overall grade for Exterior: C. Overall grade for Interior A+. Suite Review: Our room was so nice and in great shape. No issues. Tip: The in-ceiling tv controls for the loft bedroom are controlled from the tv remote (green for down, red for up). The curtain and lighting controls take some time to get used to, but our room attendant did walk us through it. The sky loft gave us so much room, and the view out the aft of the ship was amazing, especially during the Dawes Glacier viewing. One thing that was reported in other reviews was the soot/ash that hits the rear balconies, it's no joke, there was always a lot of ash out on the balcony, however, our room stewards Tobagus and Doddy were awesome and cleaned the balcony every day for us, and always provided us with extra pool towels to lay on top of the furniture, but you also need to lay something over your clothes so it doesn't fall on your clothes while laying there. Also, having food and drink on the balcony is hard with the ash falling onto it, so we didn't really try that during this trip. However, we had many fun times out on our balcony despite the soot/ash issue. I am writing this review from the balcony, and it's fine at the moment, it depends on the direction of the wind. Tobagus and Doddy (room attendants) created some great towel animals, re-filled the ice buckets daily, setup and took down my daughter's bed each night, and provided a mattress topper each night, they kept this place in great shape. All of the furniture and finishes are in great shape. We had one issue where the toilet upstairs wasn't flushing, called maintenance, and they were at our room in about 5 minutes, fixed it within 5 minutes. Overall Grade of Suite: A+!!!. Internet: The suite came with the surf and steam package. We experienced zero issues with it, it's a slower internet like 8-10Mbps DL/3-4Mbps upload, but it gets the job done. I setup my laptop for the family to watch a few films in the suite, and we streamed Disney+, and Netflix flawlessly. YouTube worked great. The app worked great on and off the ship, maybe a few hiccups with it, but nothing game breaking. Concierge Lounge: The concierge Dionata was awesome during every interaction with him. He answered all our questions, got us a free tour of the bridge (amazing!!!), made my daughters day by doing some specialty things for her. We didn't hang out in the lounge, but if you drink alcohol, there are free drinks after 5pm, so that would make it worth it for those folks. Restaurants: Coastal Kitchen (Suite Only Restaurant): We had lunch here on our first day, and while we enjoyed the meal, we didn't return to the restaurant for the rest of the cruise as the menu didn't excite our whole family. Nice views of the ocean in this venue. Buffet: We had the majority of our meals in the buffet, and only the dinner on the first night was bad, the rest of the time, the food was great (for buffet food). Lines weren't crazy, be courteous of other guests, don't rush. Room Service: We had the main dining room food delivered on two nights to our table in our room (great perk of being in a suite!!!). We also had breakfast delivered daily as well, and it was awesome. The food was always hot and tasty. We tipped a couple of dollars each time. Main Dining: The atmosphere in all of the dining rooms is excellent. My favorites are Grande and American Icon. We only dined in Grande during a special event, and the food was really good. We got to do a galley tour/brunch, and paid $33/adult, kids free, and the quality of food was great. We had the main dining room food delivered to our suite on French and Italian Night, and had great experiences each night. Sorrento's Pizza: Ate there once, it was fine, but nothing great. Seaplex Dog House: The hot dog is fine, but the bratwurst was weird. With all of the other food on this ship, I would skip this one unless you are hanging out in the Seaplex all day. Cafe 270: Never ate here, the food didn't really look appetizing most of the time. Cafe Promenade: Snacked here a few times, and it was alright, the ham and cheese (Bree) sandwich was really good. Wonderland: We had an excellent time here, we were laughing so much. It's so different, you just have to enjoy the fact that some of the food is weird and might taste weird, but it was a great experience. Service was excellent. The waitress let us choose all of the food that was brought to us instead of her choosing it. Entertainment: Starwater - We had a reservation, but didn't end up needing it as there was a suite only area reserved at the 2nd floor/balcony level of the theater for suite guests, so we sat up there, and got a fantastic view of the show. The show wasn't good (dancers were amazing, it was the content/theme was bad), I wanted to give it a chance and like it, and we did stay for the whole thing, but it was pretty bad, and our family does go to a lot of shows. Overall grade: C-. Sonic Odyssey - This was a great show. The earth harp was really cool, but wasn't really the sole focus of the show, it was the fantastic musicians, dancers and production quality that made this show something truly unique. You can tell that the cast had a fun time working on this production. There's a lot of talent on that stage, and you can tell that there was a lot of talent putting the show together and the special effects and choreography on stage. Overall Grade: A+!!! Headliner - Jennifer Singer: Wow!!! She's a talented lady, but didn't flaunt it (She's Humble), she spotlighted her back-up singers in the production on several occasions. The music selections were well chosen for her, and she gives the audience background of why she chose specific pieces to perform. This was a solid performance, so make sure to catch this one, if she's on your cruise. Overall grade: A+++!!! Music: We were able to catch Iryna (Violin) a few times, and she was fantastic. We were able to hear Latin Dance Music with the VIP Band once, and that was fun. We listened to Piano Melodies with Inna - she's incredible, so make sure you see her if you can. Overall, I would say you can't go wrong with music on this ship, the entertainers are so talented. Venues: Two70: We hung out there a few times, and it's a great space, especially for Aft views. Royal Theater: Nice space, and great acoustics for shows. Also, this is generally where you go for staging for excursions. Schooners: This is a nice space, but gets full really fast so get there early if you want get a seat. Music Hall: Didn't get to experience anything here, but wish we could have because it's a great space. Royal Esplanade: Busy place on sea days with all the shopping and activities happening, but it's fun, and we enjoyed our time there. The shops and shopping desk give out free jewelry and charms throughout the cruise, so look into that if you are interested, my wife and daughter got quite a few free things, there's also free jewelry at the ports, so make sure you check into that too. Boleros: Nice space! We listed to some salsa music in here, and an Art Seminar about Thomas Kinkade, which was really interesting and fun. Seaplex: We spent a good amount of time at the Seaplex. My daughter befriended two of the crew members at the Seaplex (Ren and Madde). My daughter said that they were her favorite part of the cruise, so that shows how far they went to make her trip special up there. We experienced bumper cars 3-4 times, laser tag once (I got the top score during our game), rock wall 3 times, iFly twice (make sure you make reservations months ahead of time for iFly as these sell out fast, and are much cheaper if you purchase early). There's so much more to do in the sea plex as well, we just didn't do it during our trip. Everything was so fun, safe, and worked really well. Suite Sun Deck: This was a nice space that was relatively empty during the sail away party, and we got in an outdoor day bed, and it was a really nice experience being in there for the sail away. Didn't really visit this spot again since we had so much else going on. Adventure Ocean - we didn't experience this. My daughter didn't even want to check it out. But there's enough to do on the ship for kids without the kid's club. Pools - all the pools are very nice, but crowded, so get there early if you want a spot. We didn't swim at all, but it looked nice. Excursions - Sitka - The cruise works with Sitka and setup bus transportation to town since the port is several miles away from town. As a suite guest, the concierge was able to get all of the suite guests onto the buses without passes. We took a 15 minute ride to Sitka, and it was a great time. It did rain a bit, so make sure to bring all that rain gear. They had a little main street area next to the old Russian Church, and it was really fun. We then went on a tour Sea Otter & Wildlife Quest, and it was a waste of money. The tour guide spent most of the time talking about rocks, trees, moss, and such. We saw a bald eagle, they pointed out otters but they were about 200 yards away in rough waters. A lot of people got sea sick during this excursion due to the rough water, and we didn't see any animals. Overall Grade: F. We ate at Halibut Point Crab and Chowder which is right at the cruise port, and it was excellent, my wife and I both got the clam chowder and it was great. My daughter got the mac and cheese and it was really awesome as well. Skagway: We did the Goldrush Sled Dogs & White Pass Train Adventure, and this was an amazing excursion. It was cold and rainy, so dress warm. The sled dogs and puppies were so fun to learn about, but it was quick, like 30-45 min quick. Then a 30-45 min drive up into Canada on a bus (bus driver was amazing), and loaded the train up in Canada. The train ride is about 2 hours long, and was really beautiful. Make sure you get a seat on the right side of the train, as that has the most scenic viewing. The train took us back to Skagway station (within 15-20 min walk from the cruise ship). We walked from the train station through town and back to the ship, we shopped in the town and got some good photos. There are buses at the train stop in Skagway that will take you back to the ship if you can't walk that far. Juneau - Did a self-guided Jeep tour, and went up to Mendenhall Glacier and hiked into Nugget Falls. The hike from the visitors center and back is about 2 miles round trip. It was cold and rainy all day. We were so glad that we got there early because it got really foggy, and the glacier wasn't visible anymore by the time we were done with our hike. We ate at Hanger on the Wharf, which if within walking distance of the cruise, and would highly recommend the shrimp baskets (they make their own cocktail sauce, and it was incredible!). Victoria: My wife and I booked a horse drawn carriage through a 3rd party called Tally-Ho Carriage Tours, and the customer service was amazing. Our ship arrived to Victoria a little later than planned, so we called them to push our time out, and they did it and were really nice about it. Victoria was really nice and we had fun. Overall Grade for the Cruise: A+. My family enjoyed the heck out of this ship and the ports/most of the shore excursions.