Fantasy Eastern Caribbean May 19-26 '12; super brief

[dlf246]

Fantastic cruise. We loved this cruise and this is 3rd cruise on DCL, and 9th overall for me. DW and me in 50's; DD 22, DS 20, DD 11.

Now, due to being out of town for DD BAylor graduation the weekend before, and going to medical meeting this coming weekend, I only have time for quick notes. Some of what is below is negative... just as I used the Boards to be prepared and have realistic expectations. So, please, please, please, know that we loved the cruise overall. for example, with the kids getting older, we had pretty much decided to switch to royal caribbean for our future cruises... but now are on the fence... may stay with DCL... more on that later.

First category: biggest things I agree with posts on this Board:

1) If Character interaction is very important to you, you need to discover the handy navigator section and not be late. There are more characters about than on the classic ships... but there were many times our line was truncated with us just a few people away...

2) Food portion sizes can be small, so if you are a hearty eater, be sure to order multiple items, or multiples of single item. (strange exception: the lobster was the largest I have encountered outside of RSSC).

3) The servers really struggle to get their work done. It seemed to us that AP was the hardest... (Our servers were slower than others... AllWyn and Alexa... mainly because they didn't seem to be a team...)

4) Aquaduck, Midship detective, animated paintings were AWESOME.

Things I kinda disagree:

1) elevator opening in Cabanas... to me was no big deal. everyone casual and fixed on their meals...

2) It seems that the posts on the shows have been mixed. All 5 of my family members were wowed by Aladdin, Wishes, and Believe. fantastic. It is for this factor alone, we are on the fence about "jumping ship" to royal caribbean... Don't have to decide for some years...

Category: rant and rave:

Just one: it still kills me how unreasonable the payout on bingo. I am a bit of a math whiz, and figured that on the non-last bingo days DCL got neighborhood of 20,000$ each day... payout of 160-300 for some of those games is robbery.

Other items:

1) My family is evangelical Christian, and we LOVED the Sunday service. Best one we have ever attended.

2) We were briefly bummed when we kept smelling cigarette smoke on our balcony (always a risk... you have to be prepared).. however, later found that the smell was transient if ship was moving.

3) We hated that the questionnaire had only one line for the variety show acts. We thought juggler Michael Holly was great. Several of us were bothered by "Magic Dave" Williamson's acts... his humor seems to be at the expense of kids. We didn't want to put down either excellent or not good...

4) Strongly recommend Bernard's Tours on St. Martin.

Uh oh.. getting paged away.... I may add some more later.

 

[All American]

1) My family is evangelical Christian, and we LOVED the Sunday service. Best one we have ever attended.

Are there Sunday Services on all 7-day cruises or is it a random thing? We do our best to not travel/be on vacation on Sundays, but in this case there is not much we can do about it. Any info on this would be helpful.

Thanks!

 

[John21601]

4) Strongly recommend Bernard's Tours on St. Martin.

I'd love to hear more about Bernard's. We've decided to go on our own in St. Martin but haven't settled on what we are going to do.

 

[LuvEeyore]

Joining in to hear more. Tell me about the Sunday service. I too work in healthcare and work most every weekend as my brother and I are helping to care for Mom who has early Alzheimers. never get to church anymore. Went from being in the church 40+ weeks to never getting to be there. Need some worship expecially as the holidays will be upon us.

 

[dlf246]

Are there Sunday Services on all 7-day cruises or is it a random thing? We do our best to not travel/be on vacation on Sundays, but in this case there is not much we can do about it. Any info on this would be helpful.

Thanks!

(LuvEeyore: hope you can read too... I haven't learned how to do multiple replies)

yes, in my experience on all cruise lines, there is a Sunday service. ONce we traveled on an Easter, and the service included some traditional easter hymns. I must say that we had the same leader for 2 princess cruises... and I wondered if he was just going through the motions...

I suspect that even on 3 or 4 day cruises, if Sunday is a "middle day" (i.e. not the first or last day), that they have a service; but I do NOT know this for sure.

As for details on the service. There were about 4 music videos... 2 you would sing along, 2 you would listen. 2 contemporary/ 2 older hymns.

But the zinger was the preacher. He was a junior officer. Sorry did not get what area nor name. He is from Philippines. He preached with passion and humility. Quoted scripture constantly.

Unlike Princess, there was no "offering". (I actually like Princess doing this... the money goes to a sailor help fund).

hope this helps

 

[dlf246]

I'd love to hear more about Bernard's. We've decided to go on our own in St. Martin but haven't settled on what we are going to do.

John21601, please let me defer to the many excellent threads on Bernard's... you can do a search.

Will just say that the tours are in 2 flavors: group - very inexpensive, but you then are on fixed tour. private - kinda expensive if you are small group (<5), I think the cost very reasonable if you are large group (> 7). We were 5-some... so in between. But YOU then tell them what you want, and you decide when you want to leave one place, or stay longer in another.

We had Gizmo who did good job. I've yet to hear of a bad driver though, so don't think you need to request someone specific.

 

[disneydork3]

Thanks for sharing about the service, we'll definitely check it out!

 

[texfinn]

We were there with you and on Bernard's Tour!!!

We too found it amazing. We were lucky in that we were a group of 9 and they put us in our own van so we basically got the private tour for no extra cost. Visit to Maho beach was a favorite and the rum punch -- well....be very very careful.

Can't wait to go back!!!

 

[JessyWang]

Definitely agree with the main dining room servers .. Ours were terrible and slow .. They forgot to bring sauce for our entree and only brought it when everyone was finished at the table. Water cups were always empty .. Food quality overall poor in main dining room ... But service and food in palo was absolutely amazing lucky enough to enjoy two meals there

 

[Redeemed&Loved]

Is the Sunday Service mentioned in the Navigator?
I looked at the most recent one from the Fantasy that has been posted on DISboards and could not find anything about it.
Do you remember the time and location?

 

[reimero]

On our cruise it was at 9:30am in Outlook. It's in the Navigator under "Fun for All Ages".