Sharon’s Royal Caribbean Independence of the Seas Eastern Caribbean Cruise (March 2013)

Thanks to our client Sharon from Georgia for sharing this trip report on her and her husband’s Eastern Caribbean cruise on Royal Caribbean’s Independence of the Seas.

The Independence of the Seas (IOS) was a beautiful ship – our stateroom was lovely.  It was my first time having a Promenade view room and I was apprehensive about the potential for it being noisy, what with the Promenade street parties and whatnot.  It was actually very quiet and the window seat was a great feature for us.

The itinerary was great – I enjoyed the pacing of the sea days and the ports.  The only thing I didn’t like was that all aboard in San Juan was 1:30pm…it was a very quick day in Old San Juan.

I was curious as to how the implementation of the all-you-can drink alcohol packages combined with Spring Break season would affect our cruise.  Thankfully, we didn’t have that many Spring Breakers on our sailing…but the majority of adults purchased the drink package and the alcohol was flowing quite freely – visibly more so than on other sailings and cruise lines I have been on.  No rowdiness or uncouth behavior…the only hiccup was they ran out of liquor at some of the bars and some of the bars never opened [like the Solarium Bar which was disappointing as that’s the one we normally go to].

This was my first time doing My Time Dining (MTD) …and, to be honest, I think I may try to be wait listed for regular dining next go-around.  I made dining reservations each night for the same time – the ship was HIGHLY suggesting everyone reserve times to eat to minimize wait times…and, while we never had to wait long, it seemed that those in the reservation line had to wait to be seated and those who just walked up were seated immediately.  The MTD experience seemed a bit rushed as well…servers were literally running up and down the aisles in an effort to get people fed and on their way.  I’ve cruised on a NCL cruise with their Freestyle dining and they seem to have a better handle on things and/or their ships are better set up for that style of main dining room meals. We were lucky enough to sail after RCI introduced their new menus and the food was markedly improved and the portions were huge for most of the meals we ordered.  Everything was delicious!

Also, Independence has removed the RCI Logo gift shop which was disappointing.  What IOS themed merchandise they had was edible [fudge, clotted cream biscuits, chocolates] – no IOS clothing/knicknacks/etc.  A lot of the souvenirs were themed toward the British crowd since I think it often sails out of the UK – this didn’t bother us, but I did hear several people complain at the overabundance of duty free cigs and liquor and stuffed Wallace and Gromit toys.  I try to get a magnet and a Christmas ornament from each boat I’ve been on and I was disappointed I couldn’t find an IOS magnet or Christmas ornament…

All in all, it was a great vacation on a beautiful ship…I’ll just have to go again sometime in the future when they hopefully have the IOS magnets/ornaments back for sale. 😉

Thank you, again, for helping us out with the planning process.