The New Behemoth Cruise Ship, Icon of The Seas

I have taken 6 cruises and they were fun. The largest ship had 4K passengers and the smallest 500. I preferred the ones with 2500 since there’s enough to do without being overcrowded.
I believe that 2,500 was about the capacity on the Celebrity ship we took for our family reunion cruise in 2019. I enjoyed being on the ship more than sightseeing (what little we could) on hot Bermuda days.

@MrPants I believe you are right that the size of the ship matters. The travel agent who helped me book the package for our family reunion cruise said not to take Carnival or Royal Caribbean because they are party ships and could get quite noisy. And of course, we wouldn't have chosen Disney due to the number of children that would be cruising.

@RadishRose One of the reasons I subscribed to Paramount+ was so I could rewatch the entire Love Boat series. I really got hooked. When I was younger, I never realized how handsome Gavin MacCleod was. @Magna-Carta
 
I believe that 2,500 was about the capacity on the Celebrity ship we took for our family reunion cruise in 2019. I enjoyed being on the ship more than sightseeing (what little we could) on hot Bermuda days.

@MrPants I believe you are right that the size of the ship matters. The travel agent who helped me book the package for our family reunion cruise said not to take Carnival or Royal Caribbean because they are party ships and could get quite noisy. And of course, we wouldn't have chosen Disney due to the number of children that would be cruising.

@RadishRose One of the reasons I subscribed to Paramount+ was so I could rewatch the entire Love Boat series. I really got hooked. When I was younger, I never realized how handsome Gavin MacCleod was. @Magna-Carta
I have heard awful stories about people being very drunk and obnoxious on carnival. We never encountered that on royal Caribbean and loved their cruises. My son and Dil are taking their first cruise on holland in a few weeks.
 

Yesterday I finished a 7 day cruise on the Holland America ship "Zaamdam." It was wonderful. It has 1530 passengers but at meal time it felt like a "feeding frenzy for pigs. Noise and noise at every meal.

However, there were a lot of seniors. During those 7 days I only saw 2 drunks at the bar. The ship staff was wonderful.

People are crazy for going on these monster ships.
 
Yesterday I finished a 7 day cruise on the Holland America ship "Zaamdam." It was wonderful. It has 1530 passengers but at meal time it felt like a "feeding frenzy for pigs. Noise and noise at every meal.

However, there were a lot of seniors. During those 7 days I only saw 2 drunks at the bar. The ship staff was wonderful.

People are crazy for going on these monster ships.
We cruised on that one too. A very reasonable size. There were no issues with noise in the dining room at dinner time. There was an expectation for people to wear business casual for those meals. Do they still have a formal night?
 
I believe that 2,500 was about the capacity on the Celebrity ship we took for our family reunion cruise in 2019. I enjoyed being on the ship more than sightseeing (what little we could) on hot Bermuda days.
Oooh, Celebrity! I heard one of their ships—I can't recall which one off the top of my head—has some original paneling from the Olympic. I would love to see that.

These modern cruise ships look like stacks of pizza boxes compared with the classic trans-Atlantic liners; there is simply no comparison. I went on a Royal Caribbean cruise once, and it was OK, but I never would have paid for it on my own. It was a treat to me and my kids from my father.
 
That new bemoth had it's first incident after an apparent fire and power loss. The fire was extinguished quickly and back up power kicked in.

Fire breaks out on world’s largest cruise ship Icon of the Seas
That fire was preceded by an explosion. And was in an area of the ship not involved in operations. This is also the second time this ship as lost power after an outage in May.

It was also reported the crew seemed to act professional and responded in gear.

Fire Reported on World's Largest Cruise Ship in Mexico

I guess the ship still has kinks to work out.
 
I've only been on one cruise and it was enjoyable from Seattle to Alaska and back. Thought about going on another such cruise, but then Covid sort of put the kabosh on those thoughts. I definitely would not be comfortable on that big ship being discussed here. I have a real problem with crowds and don't enjoy big cities much either. With our current lack of popularity in the world such a vessel looks just as risky and being in a crowded stadium or Times Square at New Years.
 


Back
Top