Royal Caribbean International, Quantum of the Seas, Far East Review

The RC loyalists won't like me, but this was an average cruise. The main dining got repetitious. and while usually fine we ended up on the Windjammer and Solarium Bistro often. Service was good - they obviously try to please. What really sucked was the lack of information on the ports we visited. We were very pleased with RC's Arctic from Amsterdam to NYC because a college professor gave talks on the ports, culture, and history of Iceland, Greenland, and Canada. This cruise had one 1/2 presentation that briefly described the excursions offered. The worst example was at the Meet The Officers when a fellow in a wheelchair explained that RC had no way to shuttle him into Akita from the terminal. On his here found out that the port has a cruise ship terminal train that is handicapped accessible and cost $2.00 ( the RC shuttle that he couldn't take was $20). The officer said he was as sorry but it was the first time in Akita. What a terrible excuse! Maybe you could talk to the port authorities for five minutes? Or maybe RC just wanted the shuttle money? Anyway, very poor performance.

I got off in Tokyo, where we continue to use the Suica app on our phones to pay for most everything - we watched cruisers taking forever to get train or bus paid, while we breezed through. We luckily did our own research and l will make it a point to put information on Hong Kong's Octopus Card on the Quantum Facebook page - it's super easy to use for transportation, stores and restaurants. And guaranteed RC won't mention it.