Brilliance of the Seas Review

4.0 / 5.0
1,565 reviews

Excellent Girls Trip

Review for the Western Caribbean Cruise on Brilliance of the Seas
User Avatar
lauramae31
2-5 Cruises • Age 50s

Rating by category

Cabin
Value for Money
Embarkation
Dining
Public Rooms
Entertainment
Fitness & Recreation
Service

Additional details

Sail Date: Nov 2018
Cabin: Ocean View Balcony

Brilliance of the Seas provided a great cruise experience for girls trip celebrating twenty years of friendship. Tampa is an easy port from which to embark. We stayed in the port area the night prior and enjoyed delicious dinner and great service at Jackson's Restaurant. Courtyard by Marriott was good lodging option and provided free shuttle to the ship.

Although the lines were long, the check in process moved in a fairly efficient manner, and stateroom was available by the time we boarded shortly after 1 PM. The first afternoon went as expected with muster drill (easy and well-organized) and sail away. For me, a plus is also the smaller ship size as I don’t care for the mega ships with large passenger capacity.

Stand-outs on the ship were definitely main dining service and entertainment. Even though dining service is typically high quality, this was the best service I’ve had on a ship. My traveling party of four was delighted to have a private table and the exceptional service of Praful, Charles, and Mario. They were so attentive and personable that we really looked forward to dinner each evening. We found this level of service to be consistent across meals in the main dining room. Other service of note was provided by Vladyslav who had a good sense of humor and patience as we asked many questions and weighed the options as well as Nitil who checked on us even at meals for which he was not our assigned server. Food was also consistently good. Same breakfast menu each day, but lunch and dinner provided good variety. My taste runs primarily to seafood, so I had fish of the day for three dinners. Two (barramundi and hoki) out of the three were excellent. Only one with an Asian flavor/presentation did not suit my palate. Seafood linguini was also tasty, but mushroom risotto fell a little short as the vegetarian selection one night. My traveling companions had several red meat entrees, which they enjoyed. Excellent desserts with every meal! Only concerns with main dining was the early seating time of 5:30 PM (seems a little too early, especially on port days; 6 PM would have given a little more time) and lack of creamer for coffee. Two of our party are coffee drinkers. It was always a big production to get creamer for their coffee. It appeared to not be available in the dining room, and they had to wait for staff to go all the way to the coffee station outside of the Windjammer. This seems really short-sighted of RC not to have it readily available any time coffee is served.

Cabin Review

Ocean View Balcony

Cabin 2D

My traveling party had adjoining rooms with balconies, which we found comfortable and adequate for our needs. There is not an over-abundance of storage, but enough for two to a room. Although the cabin will sleep more than two, in my opinion, it would be much too small for any more. I had only two minor complaints with the stateroom. One, there was an uncovered toilet bowl brush right under the towel rack and we had to discard use of a couple of hand towels/washcloths when they fell on it. Gross! Royal Caribbean, there is no excuse for not providing the enclosed containers for the brushes. Two, the refrigerator was not cold enough to adequately cool beverages.

1 Helpful Vote
previous reviewnext review

Find a Brilliance of the Seas Cruise from $348

Any Month

Get special cruise deals, expert advice, insider tips and more.By proceeding, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

© 1995—2024, The Independent Traveler, Inc.