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Crown Cruise Line

MS Crown Dynasty

Your Rating:
Reviewed by:Mike Lorton
# previous cruises:10+
Date of Trip: NOvember 25, 2000
Itinerary: Caribbean - Southern

The travel arrangements through the air/sea package were horrible. The few Crown representatives we found were of little or no help. We didn't get tickets until Wed pm to leave Fri at nearly midnight to catch charter flight out of Miami at 6AM. We found no porters in Aruba airport. Return: off the ship by 9AM with a 7:45 PM charter flight (Allegro Air did a nice job here) to Miami. Much confusion about clearing customs in Aruba--no Crown rep to be found. Arrived in Miami at 10:30PM, took 1 1/2 hours to get bags and to hotel, then back to airport for 8:30AM flight out. Many older passengers had trouble due to inadequate, inaccurate info from Crown reps (where available). Overall, we, and several travel agents on board, would NOT recommend this cruise line until some significant changes occur.

Most public areas were nice. The ship itself is very nice, a comfortable size. She is rather flat bottomed and so does not ride very well in seas that are more than slightly rough. There is a promenade that goes all the way around. The casino was good, on board shops were limited, and you could not purchase duty free liquor for use in cabins--although cigarettes seemed to be available that way.

Dining Room food was fine. Not gourmet or exciting, but a good variety and well presented. Most complaints I heard were about the beef. Seafood and chicken dishes and cold soups were very good. Service in the dining room was mostly good. The Dockyard Cafe had breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea. They were adequate. Some midnight buffets (at 11:30PM) and some evenings just snacks in the lounges (to encourage the purchasing of drinks?).

We had a suite with large verandah. It had the same closet space as other cabins way down the price list. The butler was nice, but didn't provide any service we've not had from cabin stewards and room service on other ships. The phone was on the wall completely across the cabin from the beds, making a wake-up call a chore. Our bath was sufficient in size. Terry cloth robes are "loaned" (and available for sale) but were removed from the cabin during dinner the last night--just when they would be useful, since most of your things are packed and the bags put out in the hallway for disembarkation.

Most entertainment was good. The kids in the revue worked very hard and had a lot of talent. One act, a comedian/singer had rather dated material. Cruise staff was about average. One performer, Bert Stratton, was great. Plays piano and sings--only one or two songs requested were not in his act.

The hot tubs are large-one was way too hot. Pool area is nice. Decent workout room, spa staff is typical Steiner. The shore excursions were rather pricey, and the ones we took were only average. Many passengers did much better is small groups by hiring local taxi/van drivers (and avoided the ship connected shopping stops). Port stops were varied. Curacao is great, but mostly closed on Sunday afternoon. In Barbados it rained/flooded and all shore excursions were cancelled. A movie was shown in a lounge and shuttle service was provided to a nearby enclosed shopping mall--nice gestures. Grenada and St Lucia are lush, green and appear to have much poverty. Bonaire is picture postcard beautiful, friendly and casual.

Mostly typical retirement age folks on board, with a decent mix of younger people from a few teens to the 50's crowd. All seemed to get along well. In fact, we have invited and been invited to visit some of the folks we met on board.