Dana H

Age: 29
Occupation: Sales and Marketing
Number of Cruises: 5
Cruise Line: Royal Caribbean
Ship: Serenade of the Seas
Sailing Date: March 6th, 2004
Itinerary: Southern Caribbean

If I was asked to review Royal Caribbean and Serenade of the Seas they both would receive failing marks.

We had 5 family members traveling with us, myself, my husband, our 7 month old son and my parents. We had connecting cabins on the eighth floor with balconies. The staterooms were very nice with wonderful storage space and the balcony was a great size. That is the only positive thing I can say about our cruise experience.

The staff was extremely rude - One evening in the formal dining room my mother ordered Lamb Roast from our waiter and as he made his way around the table accepting everyone else's order - he got to a gentleman sitting across from us (at our table) who also ordered the Lamb Roast. The waiter told the man that he does not recommend the Lamb and he proceeded to bring the Lamb out to my mom and brought the man the Lamb and the chicken dinner, "because he knew the man was not going to like the Lamb." He never said one thing to my mom. So I guess the Lamb was good enough for my mom but not for the man.

Another example of total disregard was our first night on the ship we were told we would get a crib for our son. Their idea of a crib is a play pen with a mat that is less that 1/4 inch thick for him to sleep on. We tried for over an hour to set the play pen up but one of the sides kept collapsing. So I called our Room Steward at 10pm. I called again at 11pm and again at 11:15pm. We got no responses! By 11:45pm my son was sleeping in our bed. The next afternoon our room steward "stopped by" to see what the trouble was. Apparently, he had better things to worry about then us.

One thing I still don't understand is we paid $500 for our son to come on this cruise. He is 7 months old and did not eat any of their food or participate in any activities. Then I had him in the baby pool for his first experience "swimming" and a pool attendant came up screaming at me in front of a crowd of people saying that he can not be in the pool because he is not potty-trained. He was wearing the Huggies Swimmies so there was nothing getting in or out of the diaper. The attendant was so rude that I asked to speak with a supervisor - who was very condescending. It was VERY obvious they did NOT want children on this cruise. We were treated like outcasts.

The food on this cruise was terrible also. The fruit was from a can. They didn't even have sliced oranges. Twice when I was getting breakfast and put strawberries on my waffles the strawberries were still frozen. It was a joke.

On the last day of the cruise, we had to be out of the stateroom by 8am and then we had to wait in one of the bar areas until we could depart the ship. By 10am my son was getting very antsy and wanted water. There was nothing open on the ship so my husband went to the Guest Relations desk to ask about purchasing a bottle of water. He was told to take our son to the bathroom and let him drink from the sink. That is APPALING. To expect that anyone would drink from the bathroom sink makes me sick.

I have been on Celebrity and Carnival Cruises and would recommend both highly.
I will NEVER sail on another Royal Caribbean cruise again.

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