My friend and I recently went on a cruise with Royal Caribbean. Not our first cruise but the first with this company. We booked an 8 day cruise around Japan leaving from Shanghai. Having spent 4 days in Shanghai we boarded the ship for the worst holiday experience ever. The cruise was only designed for Chinese people and not Westerners and should NEVER have been offered to non Chinese. 80-90% on board were pushing loud Chinese people whose menfolk constantly cleared their nasal passages very loudly and proceeded to spit it out wherever they were. This included the dining halls and right next to me whilst in the pool! The staff were only interested in pushing their highly overprices Michael Kors bags,, jewellery, make up and other designer gear to everyone who walked by on the main deck and often to over loud music and shouting (when the sales were on which were the last two sea days) There was never anywhere to sit in peace & quiet in the evenings due to loud music emanating from every place, including the library!!. The only quiet area at night was out on deck or in our cabin. The food was disgusting being 98% Chinese - not Western style Chinese. What Western food was on offer was very limited, over cooked & dried up. I lost 8 pounds in weight (I dont need to loose weight as I’m not over-weight). We were treated like cattle at meal times as nobody had their own table and the Chinese just push and shove and start queuing 30-40 mins before the waiter service restaurants opened. The buffet was a free for all with rarely anywhere to sit unless you came very late after ‘they’ had had their fill. We were looked upon and treated as 2nd class citizens throughout with 3rd rate facilities. All the Brits & Australians we spoke to complaimed bitterly. Several Diamond & Emerald RC cruise couples we were talking to were appalled at the standards of everything . The ship docked at the 3 biggest cities in Japan and their tours were overpriced and took in NOTHING of interest and showed nothing of Japan apart from more shopping malls - all of which the Chinese love. This was a complete waste of money and a huge disappointment. We plan to do an Alaska cruise next year but it wont be with RC as they obviously dont care about their customers or else they would never have offered this cruise to anyone other than their Chinese market. I have done 2 of their own reviews which they emailed but have had absolutely no response - this also tells me that they dont give a damn.
