Royal Caribbean's Sovereign of the Seas - Cruise Review

Date: Thu, 7 Nov 2002 21:03:53 -0500
From: jetpilot@direcpc.com (Bill Gates)
Subject: Review

I just arrived home from a 4-night trip on Sovereign of the Seas. Ports of call included Cococay, and Nassau.

I arrived at Port Canaveral at 11AM and had about a ½ hour wait on line before checking in and boarding the ship at 11:30 AM. Check in was simple and quick.

The ship is extremely well maintained, but her design and décor are dated. The ships is clean and in good shape, but signs of wear are evident.

If your measuring the size of the stateroom by comparison to train compartment accommodations then the staterooms are large. If you’re comparing the size of the stateroom to hotel accommodations then they are small. However I found them to be of adequate size, and was not cramped.

The buffet food in the Windjammer Café was disappointing to say the least. The welcome aboard lunch offered a good selection to choose from including a roast beef carving station, but as the days past fewer, and fewer selections were available. A typical lunch included pasta & tomato sauce (buffet filler), seafood Newburg with green peppers in it???? (Yuck!!!), hot dogs, New Orleans style chicken breast (Fair at best), Fried rice (looked dry and unappealing), and various deserts such as blueberry cheese cake, and assorted cookies.

I HIGHLY recommend eating in the dinning room at every meal. The food was of much higher quality, and the service excellent. Portions are small. Not to be missed… the prime rib, the Jamaican jerk chicken, shrimp scampi, and escargot. The deserts could have been better. However… the apple pie alamode was excellent.

The service in the dinning room is a little rushed but the quality of service was superb. The kismet and Gigi dining rooms could use a makeover, as the room décor isn’t very appealing.

We arrived disembarked at Cococay at about 8:30AM. Upon arriving at the dock on Cococay I was surprised to see the island so developed. A beautiful fountain of a mermaid greets the tenders arrival. Upon disembarking from the tender you can walk straight ahead towards the beach and grab a chair, which is what I did. On the way there I went to the snorkel shack for the mandatory buoyancy control vest required if you’re going to snorkel…. Why? I have no idea. It’s $6 and charged to your ship card.

Snorkeling was poor. There isn’t any coral. I did see a barracuda, and a southern ray. But the marine life was few and far between. Water temp was a slightly chilly 82 degrees. It took a few minutes to get acclimated to it.

The BBQ for lunch was OK. The BBQ chicken should not be missed. Other than that you had your burger, and hot dogs, and standard salads. The fresh fruit was terrific.

If you walk around the island you can find hammocks strung between palm trees in the shade, which people seemed to be enjoying.

The island is under construction but did not interfere with out activities at all. Overall the private island was relaxing and very well developed, but don’t expect good snorkeling.

Nassau is Nassau… not really part of the cruise, which this review is about. BUT don’t miss the www.powerboatadventures.com tour. Not to be confused with Thriller Powerboat Tours. In one word AWESOME. It’s expensive but well worth it if the price was twice what they are asking.

Aging ship, good service, good food (dinning room), bad food (Windjammer), and a very nice day at their private island.

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