This week the focus is on Royal
Caribbean's Adventure of the Seas. In April, Adventure underwent a
refit, which added several new features to the ship. Thus, it is an
appropriate time to take another look at Adventure. To this end, we
recently did a transatlantic crossing on her followed by a short
European cruise.
Adventure is a Voyager class cruise
ship. In fact she was the third ship built in that class, entering
service just after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Accordingly, she was named in New York by Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and
her god parents are six New York City firefighters and policemen.
Despite her New York City connection,
Adventure is not Royal Caribbean's New York ship. (Somewhat oddly,
her sister ship Explorer of the Seas was given that role when RCI
decided to base a ship in New York harbor year-round). Instead, she
has spent most of her time in the Caribbean sailing out of San Juan,
Puerto Rico.
The last few years, however, Adventure
has been spending her summers in Southampton, England, sailing to the
Mediterranean, the Canaries, the British Isles, Northern Europe and
Scandinavia. She is doing that this summer but plans for 2015 call
for her to revert back to year-round San Juan sailings.
Adventure is a very big cruise ship.
At 137,000 gross tons, she is no longer the biggest cruise ship but
she is still bigger than the vast majority of ships. Her size allows
her to have many features including some that are not at all
traditional on passenger ships. These include a pedestrian mall,
lined with shops, bars and a cafe, running a considerable length down
the ship's center line and a large ice skating arena. These are both
used as entertainment venues as well so that there is more to an
evening on Adventure than what is going on in the theater and the
casino.
Normally, in the Caribbean,
Adventure's passenger list is dominated by young families. However,
on the two week long transatlantic crossing, there were few children.
This left the ship's facilities almost entirely to her adult
passengers. As a result, the adults had lots of choices and lots of
space to indulge themselves in.
The crossing was not a straight run
from Miami to Southampton. Rather, the ship took her time going
across with Caribbean stops in Nassau, San Juan and St. Maarten to
start the voyage and a stops mid-way across the Atlantic in the
Azores. Thus, there were elements of a Caribbean cruise and a
European cruise in this crossing. But most of it was long, lazy sea
days, which makes these types of voyages so popular with experienced
cruisers.
The weather going across was fine.
Adventure took the southern route across, which tends to have better
weather than the more northerly, traditional ocean liner route. The
only grey skies were after the ship left the Azores and was skirting
the Bay of Biscay.
For her European cruise, Adventure had
a mix of sun and rain. Sun in Zeebrugge, Belgium and rain in Le
Harve. Whereas on the crossing, there had been many British
passengers, many of whom were going home after wintering in Florida,
the vast majority of passengers on this cruise were British. There
were more children than on the crossing but still not many as the
schools were still open.
I used to find Royal Caribbean's
success with the British public somewhat surprising. Royal provides
an excellent cruise experience with nice ships, friendly service and
quality choices in entertainment and dining. However, it is very
much an American-style product, bold, informal and sometimes flashy.
I have since come to the conclusion that this experience is
successful with the British precisely because it is not British.
Just going on one of the RCI ships is like going abroad, a break from
the everyday routine.
The cruise was a different experience
than the crossing. In Europe, the ports play a much more significant
role as there is such a variety of things to see and do in the ports.
The new additions to Adventure include
a giant video screen overlooking the pool, flat screen televisions in
the passenger cabins, a new lounge for Diamond-level members of
Royal Caribbean's Crown and Anchor Society loyalty program and
interactive electronic signage in the public rooms telling you such
things as what is happening aboard and how to get from where you are
to where you want to be. The Portofino specialty restaurant has
become Giovanni's Table. These additions are only some of the
features that will be added to the ship in the next few years under
the line's Royal Advantage program, which is bringing features from
the Oasis class ships to the rest of the Royal Caribbean fleet.
I was pleased to see that the ship is
being well-maintained. In fact, new carpeting was being installed
unobtrusively as we sailed.
We have updated the Adventure of the
Seas section on Beyondships. http://beyondships.com/AOS-Profile.html
The photo tour of the ship has been updated to include the new
features and expanded with more photos of the ship's interior and
open decks. http://www.beyondships.com/AOS-tour.html
There is a new menus page with menus from the main dining room and
specialty restaurants.
http://www.beyondships2.com/adventure-of-the-seas-menus.html
We've added a daily programs page with examples of the Cruise Compass
from past cruises and of other informational materials distributed
aboard Adventure.
http://www.beyondships2.com/adventure-of-the-seas-daily-programs.html
There is a new deck plans page.
http://www.beyondships2.com/adventure-of-the-seas-deck-plans.html
Finally, we have a new photo feature with exterior photos of
Adventure in eight different ports.
http://www.beyondships2.com/adventure-of-the-seas-photos.html
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