Wonder 2-Night A Mess

[mmouse37]

I have had fantastic service on the Wonder (actually all the ships). I truly think it has something to do with the 2 night cruises. I did a 2 night on the Magic back in 2012 out of NYC with a group of 8 friends and I was horrified at bad the service was in the MDR's. I had built up the service and entertainment on DCL for years to my friends and we had terrible service. I think everything is too rushed and my guess is that the staff realizes they are only going to see these people for a short time so don't go all out like they do on longer cruises. I felt I had to keep emphasizing to my friends that "this is not the norm!" The 2 night was the only one out of all my cruises that I could say the service was not up to par.

So, I think the OP had a double whammy.....new crew plus the 2 night.

MJ

 

[cruisehopeful]

I've done a couple of the 2 night cruises before and did notice the staff seemed very rushed and stressed. I thought I'd never book another, but I am doing another in september. After my other experiences, I am just planning on fending for myself the whole time and not count on having excellent service.

 

[Sparky47]

I can't speak for a two-night cruise, but I have been on 4 cruises on the Wonder with a fifth one this summer. I would never hesitate to go on the Wonder. We were even on the Wonder's last cruise before dry dock last year and although you could see that work was being done and/or would begin soon, I didn't have any issues on that trip either. Based on my personal experience, I would not reschedule a cruise "just because" it was scheduled for the Wonder.

 

[amberwc]

This was our third 2-night cruise on the Wonder, fourth time on the Wonder. What a mess! The good: the improvements are great. Crown and Finn improvements were subtle but enhanced the experience, Azure is great, and Tianna's is fabulous!

The bad: DCL and the Wonder crew felt like they were "phoning it in." The MDRs were clearly understaffed. Our assistant server was working double the normal tables, poor thing looked like she was going to pass out. We never met our head server. Two at our table had allergies, it was like dining had never encountered an allergy before. Our meal was 1hr-1.25hr longer than everyone else, we walked out after they closed it down both nights. Food quality was not as good as usual.

Entertainment was awful. The Walt Disney Theater was great as usual, but cruise staff put on relatively few events. What they did have were half-hearted, "B-team" type experiences. Bingo was race to finish each. Few jokes, limited interaction, none of the usual fun (B-11 completely ignored 8 times). No Match Your Mate, adult club host raced through the evening events so fast she ran out of material before the show was supposed to end.

I really got the sense they gave a lot of folks the weekend off and filled in with back-ups. Altogether very disappointed, completely inconsistent with a DCL experience.

We were also there. I can't say that I agree with this. It seemed like their pace was off. Maybe trying to jam too much in to 2 days. Everything felt rushed, but we had a great time.

 

[3Down1Up]

Really good feedback from all the 2-night cruises - thanks for sharing. I live in SoCal and have never done a 2-night but was thinking of booking one this week. Good feedback on setting our expectations if we end up going.

 

[calrider]

We were on the Wonder 5 Night Mexico cruise just before your 2 Night cruise. Service in the MDRs and Palo was nearly flawless, and entertainment was pretty darned good. Same ship, just before your experience, and it was probably one of the better cruises we've been on, service-wise.

So, short-term staffing issues (ie with crew being given time off), or just a natural result of these very short cruises, but either way I'm going to stop considering these short 2-3 day itineraries.

 

[hanscarlet]

maybe they just leave the 2 nighter cruises to the newbs on staff... we loved the Wonder and found it was the best service out of all the ships (except we've never experienced the fantasy).... OP what about the shows? Frozen? How about Tiana's place?

 

[2disneycruzrs]

So sorry you had this experience. I was on the Wonder the last cruise before PC and service was best ever from SR host, server & head server (worst by Asst). I will say they had 200 crew leave after that 4/20 sailing and 100 came on.

I did the 2 nt two years ago and never felt rushed or short-changed. I was amazed at the overwhelming number of first-time cruisers there were. I didn't do adult activities so I can't speak to that. Hope your next one is much better.

 

[nancyjo1998]

A little off topic but does anyone have a copy of the Navigators from the 2 day on the Wonder? We are doing the 2 day in September and I am curious to see what activities will be offered. Also, was Palo Brunch offered?

 

[st0nehedge]

Love the rest of the feed back I can understand how a 2 nighter would be a prime time for a new crew to get their bearing for duties. Makes sense to me!

I've read many trip reports about the wonder pre and post dry dock, and I "feel" that I will love the smaller ship (which will fee HUGE to me!).

One week to go and we will be on our way to Alaska. Super super excited.

 

[bbel]

Sucks you found this on your cruise.
Its not necessarily anything to do with the Wonder
Its not necessarily anything to do with the crew
But I can safely say it has a lot to do with the fact its only 2 days!

Yes, there is a slightly higher than normal CM turnover pre and post Panama, but nothing to make a cruise a 'mess' (the majority would be returning, theres usually max 10 new hires a cruise split across departments).
I heard stories of these cruises weeks before I worked one, and lets just say it didn't make me excited for them...
Yes CM are slightly 'stressy' on these cruises, they have guests wanting to experience everything in a few hours, which is usually spread over a few days, which means a lot less time between activities than normal, and sometimes even an overlap.
Also, these cruises have a high ratio of new cruisers, for a lot of people its a taster cruise, they can try out a cruise without having to fly halfway across the country, so naturally everything takes a bit longer because for the majority, things are completely new.
You have to remember too that the CM have just come from a really slow, chilled cruise where they have literally weeks to get to know the guests and everything about them, now they're on cruises where for a lot of departments they'll be lucky to see the same guests twice in a cruise haha.
Had a little laugh at the post suggesting crew were getting a couple of days off on these cruises, your lucky to get half a day off in an entire contract, no ones getting any time off on crazy two day cruises haha!

 

[Club Disney Chandler]

As you know that cruise that we were on with you WAS our first and honestly, it nearly was our one and only but I managed to convince my dh to book a second one and so glad I did. The Fantasy this past January was amazing. So hopefully this August on the Wonder for Alaska is miles above what we experienced in September 2015.

I really think it had to be an off cruise. So many people rave about the Wonder so I'm sure Alaska will be great, let me know what you think of her for the second time.

 

[bcwife76]

I really think it had to be an off cruise. So many people rave about the Wonder so I'm sure Alaska will be great, let me know what you think of her for the second time.

You know it

 

[bluetmg]

Its always interesting how people can have different experiences on the same cruise. We were on this 2 day cruise and found it great. Our servers were fantastic and very interactive with us even though we were are large group with no children. The cruise staff were also attentive and we enjoyed the activities. I am a platinum cruiser and have been on the long (15 nighters) and short (2 nighter) of it. Sometimes I think it is just the luck of the draw on who you get as your staff. We all agreed this was one of the better we had. There was brunch on Saturday and it seemed crowded but not overwhelming. My only downside is debarkation. Wish there was a way Disney could make it a little less hectic and crowded. Other cruise lines are much more organized and adept and handling this part. There doesn't seem to be as much chaos on other lines and debarkation runs much smoother making for a better last memory of your cruise. Overall the cruise was great, the improvements to the Wonder were spot on with one exception - the Outlook café deck10 being changed to Concierge, such a disappointment to lose this space.

 

[Rabb it]

Man that's a bummer, I'm sorry for the bad experience

 

[richkaryn]

I'm sorry to hear that!! I would be really upset, the 2 nights are pricey. I hope you make sure they get that feedback.



Concerns me for our Alaskan cruise on may 22 as it's the first one. Hopefully they figure out the kinks by then.

We were on the second Alaskan of the season last summer and everything was flawless....we had no issues whatsoever, so I wouldn't let it discourage you too much.

 

[LSUfan4444]

This was our third 2-night cruise on the Wonder, fourth time on the Wonder. What a mess! The good: the improvements are great. Crown and Finn improvements were subtle but enhanced the experience, Azure is great, and Tianna's is fabulous!

The bad: DCL and the Wonder crew felt like they were "phoning it in." The MDRs were clearly understaffed. Our assistant server was working double the normal tables, poor thing looked like she was going to pass out. We never met our head server. Two at our table had allergies, it was like dining had never encountered an allergy before. Our meal was 1hr-1.25hr longer than everyone else, we walked out after they closed it down both nights. Food quality was not as good as usual.

Entertainment was awful. The Walt Disney Theater was great as usual, but cruise staff put on relatively few events. What they did have were half-hearted, "B-team" type experiences. Bingo was race to finish each. Few jokes, limited interaction, none of the usual fun (B-11 completely ignored 8 times). No Match Your Mate, adult club host raced through the evening events so fast she ran out of material before the show was supposed to end.

I really got the sense they gave a lot of folks the weekend off and filled in with back-ups. Altogether very disappointed, completely inconsistent with a DCL experience.

We had a similar experience on another line with a ship right out of dry dock. Since then, I have been following reviews and seen that experiences of other cruisers has been better than ours. I can't say with any certainty that the Wonder had the crew turnover out of dry dock that we experienced on the other cruise line but I guess it's possible

 

[calrider]

Its always interesting how people can have different experiences on the same cruise. We were on this 2 day cruise and found it great. Our servers were fantastic and very interactive with us even though we were are large group with no children. The cruise staff were also attentive and we enjoyed the activities. I am a platinum cruiser and have been on the long (15 nighters) and short (2 nighter) of it. Sometimes I think it is just the luck of the draw on who you get as your staff. We all agreed this was one of the better we had. There was brunch on Saturday and it seemed crowded but not overwhelming. My only downside is debarkation. Wish there was a way Disney could make it a little less hectic and crowded. Other cruise lines are much more organized and adept and handling this part. There doesn't seem to be as much chaos on other lines and debarkation runs much smoother making for a better last memory of your cruise. Overall the cruise was great, the improvements to the Wonder were spot on with one exception - the Outlook café deck10 being changed to Concierge, such a disappointment to lose this space.

I don't want to derail the OPs topic, but yes, I totally agree that debarkation in San Diego on our cruise was also pretty bad. We had a ringside seat to watch the Panama Canal cruise debarkation before our boarding, and it looked like it took them quite a bit longer than usual to start releasing passengers. I would have chalked it up to the length of that cruise, amount of luggage, ports of call, etc, but we ran into the same delays on our short 5 day cruise debarkation as well. Not sure if it's a Disney problem, or an issue with US Customs in SD. Your experience seems to indicate other lines do it better, so maybe the Disney folks at port need to get up to speed.

 

[we"reofftoneverland]

This

This was our third 2-night cruise on the Wonder, fourth time on the Wonder. What a mess! The good: the improvements are great. Crown and Finn improvements were subtle but enhanced the experience, Azure is great, and Tianna's is fabulous!

The bad: DCL and the Wonder crew felt like they were "phoning it in." The MDRs were clearly understaffed. Our assistant server was working double the normal tables, poor thing looked like she was going to pass out. We never met our head server. Two at our table had allergies, it was like dining had never encountered an allergy before. Our meal was 1hr-1.25hr longer than everyone else, we walked out after they closed it down both nights. Food quality was not as good as usual.

Entertainment was awful. The Walt Disney Theater was great as usual, but cruise staff put on relatively few events. What they did have were half-hearted, "B-team" type experiences. Bingo was race to finish each. Few jokes, limited interaction, none of the usual fun (B-11 completely ignored 8 times). No Match Your Mate, adult club host raced through the evening events so fast she ran out of material before the show was supposed to end.

I really got the sense they gave a lot of folks the weekend off and filled in with back-ups. Altogether very disappointed, completely inconsistent with a DCL experience.

This was the same on our last cruise on the wonder about a year ago.

 

[amberwc]

A little off topic but does anyone have a copy of the Navigators from the 2 day on the Wonder? We are doing the 2 day in September and I am curious to see what activities will be offered. Also, was Palo Brunch offered?

Sorry I didn't keep them. We did have Brunch at Palo, and it was great (DH almost had to miss because of the pants rule, but he threw on a dirty pair and they were fine with that).
The only offered 3 movies, the shows were Frozen (AWESOME!) and Dreams. They had the Pirate night the first night. All in all there was a lot going on and of course not enough time to see/do it all.
I would do another 2 day -- I'm not off them. Just recognize that we are not going to get to know the staff especially in the MDR--nor are they going to get to know us and our preferences. I would also try to find more time to nap, I am exhausted at work this week!