May 31, 2007

By TheSkipper

• June 17, 2007

Cruise Review

Legend of the Seas

May 31, 2007 ? April 12, 2007

Ports of Call:

Rome; Italy, Genoa, Lovorno, Split, Croatia, Venice, Dubrovnik, Croatia, Naples, Messina, Sicily.

Cruise Experiences:

This was our 14th cruise with Royal Caribbean and our 49th cruise overall.

This was our second time aboard the Legend of the Seas.

Embarking/Disembarking:

We flew into Rome a day before our cruise and spent a night in a hotel recommended by travel advisor Rick Steves. Great hotel in an excellent location. We had arranged for a car to pick us up at the hotel at 10 AM and he was right on the dot. We arrived at the port at 11:15 and enjoyed the fastest, most pleasant check in that we have ever experienced on any of our cruises. We were on the ship in no time flat; however, the water-tight doors to the stateroom areas were closed and we were not permitted to go to our room until 1:00 PM. No problem really, grabbed some lunch and then found a comfortable place to sit on Deck 6 and waited until the appointed time.

Disembarkation was one of the best we have experienced in all of our cruises. Our disembarkation color was called as scheduled at 7:45 AM and we were on our bus to the Rome airport shortly thereafter.

Stateroom:

We had an ocean view stateroom, #6026 on Deck 6. The room was a very nice size and well equipped. We had the queen bed configuration upon arrival, but had it switched to twin beds after the first night to give us more floor space. Bathroom was small. Shower was the small but very functional I experienced no change in water temp. Supplied amenities for Diamond Members were excellent.

Restaurants and Food:

There is a single dining room aboard the Legend: The Romeo and Juliet is made up of two levels on Decks 4 and 5.

Open seating breakfast and lunch were served in the Romeo and Juliet Dining Room and in the Buffet (Deck #9 forward). The quality and variety of the food was no more than average throughout the cruise. We ate most all of our dinners in the Romeo and Juliet. Our breakfasts and lunches were split between the buffet and the dining room. The food was our only disappointment of this cruise. I would rate the selections, presentation, and taste only cruise line average. On recent cruises we have found that Carnival and Princess food better than the food aboard the Legend.

Entertainment:

There were the usual mix of musical revues and guest entertainers spread throughout this 12 day cruise. Only the production shows were truly outstanding.. I felt the Legend Singers and Dancers did an outstanding job. The Theater had excellent sight lines with no obstructions and it functioned well.

Cruise Director ?Javier? did a good job, although his heavy accent was sometimes a little tough to understand. The Legend Orchestra was very good.

Shore Excursions:

This was a very port intensive cruise with only two days at sea. Will not go into details of the various excursions except to say they were well run and went off like clockwork. They are however, quite expensive. The dollar is very weak against the Euro, so an all day tour costing $124 per person was pretty much the norm.

Other:

The gift shops were well stocked and stayed open most nights past 10 PM. The photographers were around the ship constantly.

Speakers in staterooms have been disconnected even though they are equipped with volume controls, so you hear no announcements in your stateroom.

Overall:

I would rate the Legend of the Seas a 8.5 on a scale of 1 to 10. The overall experience was very nice, but not outstanding. I have deducted for the food.

As mentioned earlier this was a very ?port intensive? trip with new ports almost every day. So, it was quite tiring which caused us to miss a couple of the shows through sheer exhaustion.