Review of Dec. 16 Fantasy Merrytime - any questions?

[puzzledprincess]

A few days ago I sadly disembarked from the December 16 sailing on the Fantasy - it was a 7 night Merrytime cruise. It was just my Mom and I (girls trip!) and we had a wonderful time. Here are some of my general takeaways. Feel free to ask me questions!

• Stateroom 6170 (ocean view aft) - about 4 rooms from the elevator so very convenient. Very quiet. Only weird thing is that the bed frequently vibrates (the engine maybe?) but it didn’t bother us
• Captain Fabian and Cruise Director Peter were great! They are my favorites though so that was no surprise
• Favorite show: Aladdin! It was my 4th time seeing it and it was the best yet! The cast and show are so amazing. Don’t miss it.
• Main dining room team: Milton and Kade. They were very sweet and were great servers! We enjoyed seeing them every night. Plamen was our head server and he was very nice too (and accoromated our request to change tables at the very beginning of the cruise)
• Palo: LeAnne was our server. On our last time on the Fantasy she was our assistant server in the main dining room so we requested her in Palo. She is so fantastic! The dinner was wonderful, as always. My Mom completely demolished her osso bucco (her first time having it in Palo) and I adored my butternut squash ravioli.
• Remy: Sajo was our server and he was so fantastic!! Head server Benôit and sommelier Aris remembered me from my last time in Remy and it was so nice of them to come say hi. Sajo is so great! He is from Paris and is the perfect mix of fancy service and joking around. I have been lucky enough to go to Remy for dinner 2 other times and I have only good things to say about dinner there. The service is amazing and the food is delectable. It is definitely a splurge but the value is amazing (they give you a lot of surprises of extra things than just what is on the menu.) If anyone wants more details about Remy, let me know! Don’t want to spoil it if anyone wants to be surprised.
• Fun random thing to do: go to the kids’ clubs during open houses. I always sail with just adults and it was so cool to see what the kids are up to! Wow their areas are amazing! Plus I got to meet Thor!!
• Movies: a million showings of Star Wars since it just came out, in 3D and not in both theatres, so I think everyone got to see it if they wanted to. Also saw Coco and Thor. All great movies!
• They had cookies and hot chocolafe occasionally for Christmas. The star cookies are the best!! Similar to one of my favorite cookies in Switzerland.
• Santa was often available for pictures.
• The ship and Castaway Cay were beautifully decorated for Christmas and Christmas music was playing even on the island.
• Cruise staff: 2 of them were Michael and Caitlin.
• Variety shows included magicians, jugglers and contortionists mixed with comedy. Sometimes these shows are so-so but this batch was great!
• Live evening entertainment: Ciaran and Connell were a guitar/flute/singing duo from Ireland and were our favorite (especially with the acoustics in La Piazza.) We ended up buying their CD. Wow they play some beautiful music and show the crowd a good time!

Let me know if you have any questions! Happy sailing!

 

[Peanato1]

Was LeAnne from South Africa? We had her as our assistant waiter on the Fantasy in September and she was fantastic! So happy for her that she's in Palo now.

 

[puzzledprincess]

Was LeAnne from South Africa? We had her as our assistant waiter on the Fantasy in September and she was fantastic! So happy for her that she's in Palo now.

Yes that’s her!!

 

[Stew_Mouse]

Fun random thing to do: go to the kids’ clubs during open houses. I always sail with just adults and it was so cool to see what the kids are up to! Wow their areas are amazing! Plus I got to meet Thor!!

Great tip! I went on my first Disney cruise earlier this year and didn't know I could go in during open house. Us adults were bummed and joked we needed to bring a kid next time. So on our next cruise in January, we will be sure to do visit the open house!

I'm curious how much time did you spend in the open house? Was it fairly crowded? What time did you stop by? Thanks!

 

[puzzledprincess]

Great tip! I went on my first Disney cruise earlier this year and didn't know I could go in during open house. Us adults were bummed and joked we needed to bring a kid next time. So on our next cruise in January, we will be sure to do visit the open house!

I'm curious how much time did you spend in the open house? Was it fairly crowded? What time did you stop by? Thanks!

There are a bunch of different open houses for all of the kids clubs throughout the cruise. Sometimes all of them are open, and other times it’s just one or two that are open. They all have different hours. The infor about when they are open is located in your daily navigator. Usually the open houses don’t involve any activities, you can just go in and wander around, take pics and play with their game systems, etc. (I played a pretty cool Star Wars simulator.) Other times the open houses involve some activity. The one I went to with Thor (and on a previous cruise the one I went to with Dr. Strange) involved them teaching kids how to be superheroes (and adults could be a part of it too) and then afterwards we got to do pics and autographs. The normals open houses are pretty empty...0-5 adults in my experience but the ones where you can meet the Marvel characters are like 25 people (including adults and kids) so still not bad. I usually just wander around and take pics for a few minutes for a normal open house but for the ones with the Marvel characters I stay the whole time (usually around 45 minutes) because I think it’s fun. Enjoy!