More about Radiance of the Seas

Royal Caribbean always has great lounges. The Colony Club has a rugged elegance making it seem like the kind of place Ernest Hemingway would go after hunting jungle animals, and a terrific classical guitarist could often be found plucking a beautiful Spanish or re-imagined Beatles song in the nautically themed Schooner Bar. One of my favorite places for sail aways remains the Crown and Anchor Lounge perched high atop the ship. I have to admit the table tops, after nine years of service, were a bit scuffed. Similarly, the carpets in the hall on Deck 10 where our room was located could have used to be newer, but overall the ship remains in excellent shape, and I'm sure, based on Royal Caribbean's adherence to standards, that these small gaps in excellence will be refurbished soon.

Another area of small disappointment for me was the Seaview Cafe, which is the little fish and chips restaurant on the fantail of the ship. On this trip, there seemed to always be a line, and in order to get a table on the deck, we had to lurk and swoop in on a table crowded with dirty dishes. It's the price of popularity.

I didn't take advantage of the dedicated movie theater with stadium style seating, but it is good to know I could have.

From what I can tell, a lot of other experienced cruisers also consider Radiance a great ship. This may be a reason why there's never a problem finding a seat for one of the production shows in the large Aurora Theater: they've already seen the shows and are busy with other entertainment elsewhere. The four featured singers on this trip were all excellent. Frequently, there will be one or two great ones and the others are passable, but they were all stars. The dancers delivered energetic performances as expected. We thoroughly enjoyed all the shows, all of which were new to us. Actually, a juggler named Dan Bennett was a guest performer, and we had seen him before, but we were eagerly anticipating his show, because he is extremely funny and talented.

Long-time clients Jane and Bill had such a great time on Radiance in March that they returned for this voyage in April, attributing their quick return largely to their fun interactions with other seasoned cruisers onboard. It really does make a difference who you cruise with. I met Bill and Jane face-to-face for the first time in the Colony Room one evening, after years of working with them over the phone. I'm happy to say Jane said she was surprised at how much younger I appeared in person than in my blog photos. I sure know I always feel a lot younger than the guy who looks back from the mirror, and to me he looks younger than the photos.

To try something totally new, Julie and I sacrificed our normal fixed seating for dinner, which is something we always enjoy with Royal Caribbean, to go with My Time Dining. My Time Dining requires paying gratuities in advance, but otherwise it is similar to that offered by Princess as Personal Choice. I had previously decided that Princess far surpassed Norwegian Cruise Lines, which had introduced the concept of anytime dining to mainstream cruises, and in some ways, I think Royal Caribbean might have an even better handle on it. We sat one evening at a table for two, but most of the time we ended up being seated with our same waiters, Sal and Smiley, and the same group of people, because we came in at about the same time each evening. However, if we wanted to sit with others, we could have. When traveling with more than just the two of us, fixed dining is a better way to go, as it gives us all a specific table at which to meet at a specific time, making it much easier to meet for dinner, but this time we were just a couple on holiday. By the way, if you ever want to switch dining times or go from my time to fixed time dining or vice versa, be sure to make the change on the first night of the voyage, as the table charts and dining plans are based on that evening, making change thereafter difficult or impossible.

To sum it up, Radiance of the Seas remains a favorite, but I'm also excited to try more cruise ships so that I can share what I've learned with you. It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it.