we love the way they do it now.
Its one of our favorite and most memorable parts of the cruise. the food is good. but, we really enjoy the service and "show-time"
Originally posted by vacationbound:
I was just wanting to know people's opinions on the your time dining. I know it is a trial offer on some ships, but what do you think of it compared to the traditional times(early and late seating)?
We like the traditional dining. Having the same wait staff makes a big difference especially when you have some specail needs, such as gluten allergys, or whims that you order 2 salids. Since we usually have a need to get my daughter off to the first show having the same staff that knows that makes the traditional dinning a preference for us.
The big negative to the traditional dining is when you get stuck with a 'dead' table - people whove been on so many cruises that they're almost bored with the entire ' Hi - where are you from ...' thing. We're very outgoing and love to get to know new people so we love the chance to meet new people each night. We've also enjoyed not having to go eat just because it's time to go and not when we're actually hungry or rush back and shower in 2 minutes after an excursion to make it to the table in time. I do agree that there have been times when we have to wait for a table. If you luck in to a great table of folks, you can''t beat it - happened to us only once on the Legend and it made the cruise.
Another plus for anytime is, if you really do meet people that you enjoy, you can always make plans to meet and dine together. We've done that before, too. We've only run into a "dead" table once, and it was basically because they didn't speak English and we didn't speak Spanish well enough to converse. I have to admit we've had some tablemates that were, ummm, unique. But, it's hard not to enjoy meeting new people, at least for me.
ah never heard it called a dead table but we have certainly been at one.
our first cruise we were seated at a table for 8. It was my sister and I and we love to visit with people and get to know them, but the other 6 were a family and they made no bones about it, they were not intrested in getting to know us.
but the others have been a great pleasure. we still e-mail people from our tables. The table mates are some of our favorite memories.
I hope they never totally do away with assigned seating.
One time we were seated with three sets of newlyweds. One of the new brides kept complaining about every thing being served, and then would order something that wasn't on the menu, and then complain about that. The poor groom would just look down when she did it. The rest of us thought the food was amazing. I know it's not nice to talk about people, but the other table mates would make comments about her when I'd see them on the ship. It became comical with us jokingly wagering how long it would take for her to complain about something each evening.
This was before auto-tips, and needless to say they didn't show up the last night. We all felt so bad for the waiter she had put through heck, we chipped in to cover their tips. He was so grateful to us, and he sorta let us know he would be glad for her to be gone. If it wouldn't have became entertaining, and everyone else so enjoyable, I would have requested to have been moved.
I just like that her ridiculous negativity didn't effect the rest of the table, and she ended up being the joke.
We ought to start a thread in the General Section about tablemates, we've had some grand experiences I do like the same wait staff, and you can do that with anytime. It's just that we do like meeting a variety of people, and I love not having to rush to get ready when we've done an excursion that's late. We had one excursion that they even had to hold the ship for us, thankfully it was a ship sponsored excursion. We had anytime dining on that cruise and boy did it come in handy that night!
Once we found ourselves seated at a table in which everyone else was a part of the wedding that just occurred prior to sail away except us. Very awkward!! - we ended up trading tables with one of the wedding party that was at another table - got a free bottle of wine for our trouble and great new tablemates. That's cruising!
Thanks Jim! With the new topic in the General Chat section we should get back on topic here. Carnival has updated their dining FAQ. It now reads that those with *Your time/Open Seating will be able to request any size table by just showing up between 5:45 and 9:30pm.
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