Legend of the Seas Reviews

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Our last vacation was our honeymoon in 2006 on the Costa Allegra. 2 kids came along in 2008 and 2010 and it became troublesome for us to travel for the first few years. As such, we were really looking forward to our 3 night cruise to Penang and Malacca. Sailaway was at 4pm but I was happy that guests could board as early as 11am. Check-in was seamless and the first sign of Royal Caribbean's exceptional "Gold and Anchor" service was demonstrated when a staff directed us to the express line for Suite passengers when he saw us struggling to carry our two kids. On board, the whole ship gives one the feel of a tourist class hotel. There is no "wow" factor such as a lobby as we boarded the ship on Deck 2. Luckily a panda mascot was taking photos with everyone, setting the mood for fun. The design of the various lounges and the shopping arcade had design from yesteryear. The toilets were simple and functional- most shopping center in Singapore would have nicer toilets than those on Legends of the Seas! Our balcony cabin, like the public area does not exude any sense of luxury although it is cozy and comfortable. There were plenty of storage space but some drawers could not be fully closed. We are not really particular thus this does not bother us. I like brightly lit room and I am happy with the number of lights in our cabin. Although there were plenty of news channel on TV but the movies aired were few and uninteresting. The channel showing the position of the ship was practically useless as the map showed the whole of Asia whereas we are only cruising a short distance up the Peninsular of Malaysia. As a result, we do not really know where we are. In light of recent cruise ship accidents, it is worthy to mention that muster drill was conducted before sailaway. However, life vest does not need to be worn during the drill. I tried it on myself and it was not as fool proof to wear as I thought! There is also a "Youth Evacuation Programme" whereby children are tagged with coloured wrist band so they could be brought to the correct muster station and reunited with their parents should they be in the Kids Club during an emergency. Dinner time came and we became apprehensive about dining in the main dinning room. Could our 2 and 4 years old boys sit still? We have to watch how they behave as we will be sharing a table with strangers! When we were shown to our table, I saw wine glasses and told our waiter that we would rather dine at the Windjammer Cafe lest my kids broke them. However, he kindly assured us that the glasses will be promptly cleared and high chairs for the kids were promptly brought out. However, there were no plastic dinning ware for the kids and no efforts were made to bring them from the Windjammer Cafe. To the children's delight, they were served a fruit platter while we ordered from the menu. Service was prompt with all our requests immediately attended to. It's the best any one could have asked for. My kids brought along a small car to entertain themselves and they were swiftly picked up by our waiters when they dropped it. Our waiter even performed a magic trick using tea cups for my kids! Although the food was nicely presented, it was not tasty. After dinner, we spent some time at the video arcade before we retired for the night. While the children were asleep, I went to check out the entertainment onboard. The casino was crowded. The minimum bet was US$10 and I didn't fancy losing my money so I left after awhile. The show was good and the cruise director is humourous and speaks excellent English although he is from mainland China. I also enjoyed the live performance by the various musical groups. On the other hand, the movie in the theater, like those screened on TV is not worth watching. Free room service is one of the major advantages of cruising with Royal Caribbean. Breakfast was delivered to our room and we enjoyed it in the balcony. The feeling is awesome! After breakfast, we tried our hands on the mini golf before we went to Adventure Ocean- Royal Caribbean's Kids Club. Both my kids enjoyed playing with the Fisher-Price toys there. There was a staff cleaning the toys for hygiene reasons but no one did a temperature check of the kids entering the premise. Taking the temperature of a child before they enter an indoor playground or a child care center is a standard practice in Singapore. For children between the ages of 3 to 5 ("Aquanauts"), there are Art & Craft and story telling sessions. However, this is a drop-off programme and parents are not allowed to accompany the child. For this reason, we did not participate in any of these. Hopefully, we will do it next year when the kids are older. We reached Penang on schedule. We did not sign up for any shore excursions for both the ports-of-call as we did not find it interesting. Although there were different itineraries, they were all similar. Instead, we had hired a car and driver to bring us to take the Ferricular train up Penang Hill. The following day was spent in the Solarium before we arrived in Malacca. Although the ship was tendered, the frequency of the tender boats was high and we ashore quickly. Once again, we prefer to get around on a combination of trishaw and taxi instead of joining any of the shore excursions. This wonderful holiday ended with an early morning docking in Singapore. Royal Caribbean has impressed me with its excellent service. Will I cruise with them again? Why not?

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First impressions of the internal deco of the cruise was slightly dissapointing - the clashes of funky carpets and strange geometric shards of metal strung together over the 'Centrum' proved to be a bit of an eye-sore.The staff are very nice and welcoming overall. Most of them are from the Phillipines and some are from China. I cant say the staff from China were not helpful but they were not warm either. One Chinese staff, I believe he was the house keeping manager, was very defensive when I pointed out to him that two female passengers jumped the queue when going through the face-to-face interview with the Japenses immigration procedure. The most frustrating part of the trip was that we were cut short for the on-shore time. We rushed to meet the "All aboard" time for both ports in Japan, only to spend the next 2 hours sitting around waiting for the people who joined the group excursions to come back. We also experienced a very rough day at sea as we sailed from Xia Men to Kagoshima. Many people were sea sick and the whole ship smelt off dull vinegar and sweat. Many waiters and performers could not work since they got sea sickness too! We were all eagerly waiting for an announcement or two from the Captain to reassure us of the rough ride, or perhaps to tell us how to deal with the sea sickness but we waited in vain. In fact, the Captain seemed quite distant throughout the whole trip - not only were his announcements rare, we didn't even get a speech out of him at the Captain's Welcome formal dinner! The itinerary was a let down, especially during sea days. I found that there was not enough to do and I spent more time than I would have liked in my stateroom not doing much. Activities mainly included napkin folding and jewelry making classes, dancing classes, music performances and game shows. Unfortunately, things like enrinchement talks were not to be seen. There were two movie nights, both quite late at night, as well as parties on the top floor were people we're allowed to smoke. There was one cooking class on how to decorate a cake, however it was not much fun since you couldn't see much through the crowds of mainland Chinese tourists who insisted on standing right next to the chefs and drooling down their necks. On a brighter note, as mentioned earlier on, the staff were very friendly - especially the waiters who worked in the dining hall. We had some good conversation with our assigned waiter and got some bonus napkin folding classes out of him during dinner. The entertainment was quite good as well. We had a big production every night starring named performers such as Marsha Volgji ( dancer) and Metro (acapella singing group). There was also a famous chinese singer which stirred up a lot of excitement in the crowd of a thousand mainland Chinese tourists ( who made up the majority of the people on the cruise). We often had singers and instrumentalists performing in the Centrum, from classical pianists to Jamaican party-rockers, so there was a good range of music to satisfy most peoples tastes. Our room was also quite big for a regular stateroom on a ship. The three of us could fit comfortably in our stateroom. There was enough room to walk around without having to navigate our way around our suitcases. There were also some relatively new movies playing on loop on our tiny ancient television. The whole ship was very clean and our rooms were made twice a day. Their 'save the seas' project to be a more environmentally friendly ship was reassuring and I appreciated that. At the end of the day, when I came home, I was more tired than I began with. To be honest, I was looking forward to leaving the cruise which is not how one should feel at the end of a cruising holiday.

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We found Legend of the Seas a little dated and tired in decor, but spotlessly clean. Check in was relatively good, although there was a fair bit of lining up, which is to be expected. The ship was smaller than we thought. We had a balcony room which was lovely and comfortable. Staff were over the top in helpfulness and friendlyness and could not do enough for you, English was spoken by most which made it easy. The majority of the other cruisers were Chinese and although a little pushy at times when it came to lining up, they were happy and kept to themselves, I certainly have no problem in cruising with them in the future. The food at the restaurants was excellent and the decore again a little tired, but clean and tidy. I was very disappointed in the quality of the shows, and walked out of the first one which was boring as did alot of other people, I gave it another go and found the next show - an Aussie magician a little better, but unfortunaley for him it was rough sailing and many people walked out with sea sickness. We had a few days of rough weather, but managed to sleep well as our room was at the back of the ship which made it smoother sailing. Shopping on board was good, drinks were expected bar prices. We pre-paid our gratitutes which made it easy at the end not having to calculate the recommended payments. We went on the day excurision to Xiamen for 4 hours, which was ok, for such a short time it was the best we could do comfortably, a temple and a quick bus ride. In Naha, Okinawa we decided to do our own thing and found this very easy after getting some advise on board from the excursion desk, where we were given printouts and maps. It was the best day, getting around on the monorail with a day pass and was cheap and easy, we managed to see most things that were offered on the excurisions and enjoyed doing it at our own pace, I recommend this to future travellers. We had a lovely holiday, 5 days was long enough on this ship. Great for a quick cruse or an introduction to cruising.

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We met the ship in Singapore, it's current home base, after two nights in a Singapore hotel,we travelled to Ko Samui,Bangkok and Ho Chi Minh City before returning to Singapore for our onward trip to Hong Kong. We found that embarkation was pretty painless, and our suitcases appeared at our stateroom quickly. The stateroom was roomy and clean, though we were disappointed that there was tea only supplied, no coffee,when we asked the attendant for coffee, we were told that it was not allowed in the staterooms(lucky we took our own). The ship is beginning to look 'tired'but we were told that it is soon to re-locate to Hong Kong and will be having a re-fit. The main complaint on the cruise was the food, admittedly, there was a very wide selection of food in the Windjammer, but it was aimed very much at the normal Asian majority of passengers. This was the Legends first 7 day cruise, so there was much more of a mixture of nationalities aboard, this was not really reflected in the food choice. All the food was kept in Bain Maries, and it was never as hot as westerners usually like their food.Also, the fact that plastic plates were supplied to eat from is a major minus. The food in the main dining room was also never hot, there also appeared to be mashed potato served with every main course, I never saw a whole potato for the duration of the cruise.We did complain over the temperature of the food to the head waiter,the next night we were warned of the 'hot plates' but the food on them was still only warm.The sweets were very attractive to look at but totally tasteless.

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Embarkation in Singapore was quick and we were soon on board. The staff servicing our cabin were excellent and nothing was too much trouble for our attendant Nina, who went out of her way to make sure we had everything we needed. We found the dinning room meals to be very good, with the exception that nearly every meal came with mashed potato, which we found a bit much really. Service was impeccable with our waiter Gong. We used the dinning room for some breakfast and lunches when at sea and also found these to be of a high standard. The ship had a good solarium but I felt it could have provided better food in this area as a small pizza station was set up there. The ports of call I felt where too far away from the cities Bangkok being 2 hrs and ho chi min being 3 hrs both by bus. We opted for closer places to visit. The buses where late collecting people for tours and wasted a lot of time for those on distance drives to the city, and passengers had to wait in the hot sun for them to arrive...At niether port were there taxis on the wharfe and so no freedom of choice to do your own thing. In Vietnam the port was Phu My (miles from anywhere and no taxis on the wharfe) we took a tour of Vung Tau with the ship which was really disspointing. We saw very little and had no oppotunity to stop anywhere for a relaxing browse of shops or even get a drink. Even the fishing village itself they just let us off the bus for a quick photo and that was all...However the guide provided usefull information along the route so we did learn a bit more of the country from his narration. At Leam Chabang the stop for Bangkok it was slightly better the ship offered a do it alone bus transfer to Pattaya for $18 which we did. From there we hired a private taxi to take us to the Nong Nooch Gardens. Which was the highlight of the trip. The cost of a taxi for 3 hrs was $1000 bart and the entrance fee was 500 bart. We arrived in plenty of time to see the shows leaving the ship before the ship excusion, they arrived after the shows had started. We had time to shop in Pattaya before heading back on the shuttle...Saved a lot of money doing the trip ourselves compared to the price the ship excursion wanted. At Koh Samui we hire a taxi to tour the island rater than get the ones on the wharfe we picked one up in a side street and that saved us some extra dollars as they where charging a wharfe fee for the taxis there.. we had 5 hrs to tour the island and had lunch on the beach on the far side of the island. The ships tours were expensive and did not offer a full tour of the whole island. We saw much more alone On the whole a good cruise but with slightly disappointing ports..one thing i did note was that the ship only carried one brand of cigarettes in the duty free shop,but some in koh samui at 7/11 for 80 Bart a pack of 20. so very cheap.. be warned that Singapore allows you no concessions in taking smokes back in there and will charge tax if you have got a lot and get caught. I did hear from passengers that their bottles of wine had been confiscated from their luggage upon boarding, for anyone trying to get it on board. It was returned at the end of the cruise. We didn't get ours touched as had syphoned it into smaller plastic bottles packed in cases. Royal caribbean being the only ones Ive heard of that will take things out of your luggage. If it looks like alcohol when scanned then be prepared to lose it. disembarkation was very slow and painful queuing for over 1hr to get off, they really need to speed this up. If you need to be off to get a flight. get express pass and take your own luggage ashore with you and get off at 7.30 or get stuck in the line. We would sail with RCI again but on a larger ship and with better ports of call. They are refurbishing Legend of the Seas in March. totally re-gutting it so would be interested to see how it looks once done.

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