Last year when my husband and I were planning our honeymoon we were thinking about doing a Mediterranean cruise. While we were on Royal Caribbean’s website we saw that their new ship, Symphony of the Seas, would be debuting a few months after our wedding, and would be in the Mediterranean. Our excitement was real!
We ended up booking a 7 night cruise, on Symphony of the Seas.
Fast Forward a year and a half of planning:
The ship was docked in Barcelona, and we arrived to the cruise terminal around 11am. Getting on the ship was smooth and easy! We put on our luggage tags, that you print from home, and dropped the luggage before we checked in. They deliver it to your room later in the day! After this we went through security and checked in. You get your picture taken for your Sea Pass cards, and you are on your way!
*Sea Pass cards are used as your stateroom key, charging onboard the ship, and scanning to exit and enter at cruise ports throughout your cruise.
After this we entered the ship with our Set Sail Pass, and immediately our photos popped up on the screen and we were good to enter! We entered onto the Royal Promenade of the ship and WOW! If you have even been on a Royal Caribbean ship before you know in the promenade they have their regulars, Sorrentos for Pizza, The Cafe for desserts, small sandwiches, teas, and coffees, and more depending on size of the ship. Symphony of the Seas also had the new Bionic Bar, a Starbucks, and Royal Caribbean retail shops, and duty free shops!
Of course after exploring the promenade we went up to Windjammers! Windjammers is a buffet style restaurant that offers breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Now because this ship was so large Windjammers was always extremely busy. Throughout the week they surveyed us multiple times on our experience in Windjammers because seating was becoming a problem. Hopefully by now, they have all the kinks worked out!
While leaving Windjammers we heard an announcement that you had to make reservations for your entertainment/shows for the week. Basically because the ship was so large they couldn’t seat everyone in the theatres. We love live entertainment so we ran down and set ours up. They had plenty of opportunities to see each of the shows, with different days and different times so you could plan it around your excursions, dinner, or other activities you may have planned.
Shortly after this we went to our stateroom, which was an interior room because I am not going to lie…. I do not like to see the ocean from my room. It sometimes gives me anxiety especially if we are going through rocky waters. Anyways, our room was very cute and modern! Basically same set up as the other interior rooms inside Royal Caribbean ships. Our luggage had already been delivered to outside our room as well!
After this we decided to head back to the promenade and check out the Bionic Bar! We get to the Bionic Bar and they have a few iPad looking things, they could have been a tablets I don’t remember! But you could browse through different categories of drinks or create your own! I ordered a citrus drink and my husband ordered a drink that had his name in the title. You used your Sea Pass card to pay and thats how they knew whose drink was whose. We went and found a seat and waited for our drink to show up on the queue! People kept getting confused about when their drink was up, and would get visibly upset when they thought someone took their drink. It was quite amusing to watch, outside of the fact that robots are making your drink!! Anyways when it was time to get your drink you would scan your Sea Pass card on the end of the bar and the drink would slide down! The drinks were absolutely on the stronger side, which was fun and set us in the right direction for the week!!
We walked the promenade a little more and headed to our station for the muster drill. These are done for safety incase something were to happen in an emergency situation. When you get there you check in with a crew member and they have you stand in a spot and wait for everyone to get there. Our muster station was in the fitness room on Deck 6 which gave us a chance to check it out. It was a clean and large fitness room, located behind the salon and spa area all the way at the front of the ship. After everyone arrived the muster drill was a short clip on what to do in emergency situations.
After this we explored the ship more:
Deck 4- Royal Theatre, Ice Rink, Casino, and Main Dining Room
Deck 5- Spa Center, Royal Theatre, Sorrentos, Boleros, Starbucks, Retail, English Pub, Cafe Promenade, Bionic Bar, Main Dining Room
Deck 6- Fitness Center, Picture Spot, Schooner Bar, Boardwalk, Aquatheatre
Deck 8- Central Park- featuring restaurants and shopping
Deck 9- Where our stateroom was located!
**We loved being one deck away from Central Park because it had Park Cafe which is a quieter spot with a bagel bar for breakfast in the morning!!
Deck 14- Solarium, Adventure Ocean, Card Room
Deck 15- Solarium, Solarium Bar, Whirl Pool, Main Pool, Beach Pool, Waterslides, Sand Bar, Pool Bar, El Loco Fresco, Teen Hangout, Mini Golf, Sports Court, Flowrider
Deck 16-Hooked Seafood, Master Bar, Windjammers, Zipline, Wipe Out Bar, The Ultimate Abyss Slide
Definitely did not see all of this our first day, and did not get to all of this during our full week on this ship either!
Royal Caribbean Deck Plans -Here’s a link if you would like to see the deck layout!
Our dinner time was 6:30 every night in the Main Dining Room. The other option I believe was 8:30, and you set that up when booking your trip. Now of course you have other options for dinner. You can make reservations to eat at one of the other restaurants where that food is not included in what you already paid for, or you can head to Windjammers and eat at the buffet and that food is included.
Food in the Main Dining room was delicious and our waitress was fantastic. They had a portion of the menu fixed every night, and then there were separate dishes that changed every night. You would order an appetizer, meal, and dessert. If you did not like your meal, you could always get a different meal. Our waitress would sometimes bring us an extra dessert just for the fun!
We then grabbed a drink a headed over to the Casino! The casino was split in half, with a non-smoking side and a smoking side, with a bar in the middle. We chose our luck with the slot machines, my husband lost what he started with, and I doubled what I started with. Always fun to brag about being the winner!
Shortly after this we went to the Royal Theatre and checked into our reservation for Hairspray! It was a great show, singing, dancing, acting all extremely talented.
After exploring all day, we were exhausted and wanted to get up early the next day for the first port of call so we did call it quits after the show! We ended up missing the Sail Away party that afternoon, and we missed the balloon drop that evening. I recommend NOT missing those when sailing with Royal Caribbean!!
Stay tuned for more posts about Symphony of the Seas, and it’s port of calls!
Here are the links for my other blog posts on Symphony of the Seas and its port of calls!
Barcelona!
Marseille, France- Cruise Port!
Capri Island!
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