Oasis-class ships offer so much that it can be hard to explore them even when you have a full week onboard. It’s easy to miss a venue, especially when it’s not located on the Royal Promenade, in Central Park, or on the Boardwalk.
On Utopia of the Seas, which is solely sailing 3-4 day “weekend,” cruises, it can be even easier to overlook something. That ship, along with Wonder of the Seas, has a new venue that first appeared when Wonder of the Seas began sailing in 2022.
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To be fair, passengers may know that this venue exists as an eatery for sea-day brunch and dinner restaurant, but not know all the things offered there.
Come Cruise With Me Executive Editor Dan Kline and PostCard Travel Planning’s Dennis Post sat down on Wonder of the Seas to share this hidden gem.
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Hidden Gems: Mason Jar on Royal Caribbean’s Wonder and Utopia of the Seas
Dan Kline: Good afternoon, cruisers. I am Dan Kline, Executive Editor of Come Cruise With Me. That’s comecruisewith.com on the internet, or comecruisewith.me.
And we are on the beautiful Wonder of the Seas. I’m sitting here with Dennis Post. Dennis is our partner. He is the co-owner of PostCard Travel Planning, our travel agent partner.
And we are doing some videos on this ship. And today, we’re going to talk about sort of hidden places. And it sounds weird to think that there could be a hidden place on Wonder of the Seas, which is the arguably second largest cruise ship in the world.
But we’re at the Mason Jar. The Mason Jar is a new venue for Royal Caribbean. It’s on this ship. It’s on Utopia. It’s going to be added to Allure when Allure dry docks this summer. And as a restaurant, it’s really well known.
It’s a southern barbecue restaurant. It’s actually not my favorite restaurant. But as a bar, I think this is Royal Caribbean’s best.
Aside from some of the bars on Icon, I think it’s their most spectacular bar. Every drink on the menu is a bespoke drink, is very beautiful, has garnishes, has a little bit of food with it. It’s all kind of special.
And every night in this bar, a country trio plays. And I’m not a big country music fan, but they’re absolutely fabulous. Dennis, what have your experiences been here in Mason Jar?
Dennis Post: So first off, great venue. The views are amazing. Very clean.
It’s a country atmosphere. Fun, relaxing is the things that jumped out at me. Of course, amazing drinks.
They have some specialty drinks that are absolutely amazing.
Kline: And during the day, so on a sea day, this is open generally the entire day. And the brunch is open. It’s a better brunch, in my opinion, than it is a dinner.
And as Dennis mentioned, it overlooks the sea. So we were going to shoot in front of the ocean, but the sunlight didn’t really work that way. But the other thing we’re going to talk about is my favorite drink on any ship is in this venue.
And as some of you know, or could probably figure out from reading, I’m a whiskey drinker. And I tend to drink a Manhattan. So this is a twist on a Manhattan.
It’s called a Far From Manhattan. So it is bourbon. It is vermouth, and it is bitters. And it comes with a slice of candied bacon. Very, very simple.
And what I like to do is knock the slice of bacon into the drink. And you get that sort of salt from the bacon. It cuts through the sweet of the vermouth.
So it just gives you a little bit of a different experience. I will point out that we are after work hours when we’re recording this. Dennis, what drink do you have in front of you?
Post: I got the PB&J. It’s the PB&J Old Fashioned, which I just learned about this drink, so we’re going to be trying it today. So it’s a screwball peanut butter whiskey mixed with a bourbon, Kentucky bourbon.
And then it has a, which I never knew they had, a strawberry jelly and walnut bitters. And they put that in there. And then they make this little peanut butter and jelly sandwich mini, and they put it on a stick.
So you can see it’s a, it looks like an awesome drink.
Kline: There’s a drink here sold with a little empanada. When the band is playing, there’s a late night menu that has some chicharrones and some other snacks. This is a really nice, and I know it’s weird to say hidden menu, but people don’t come here during the day.
And because it’s up on 15, which is, that’s right next to the Windjammer Buffet, they don’t know that this venue exists at night, because a lot of people don’t come to the buffet for dinner.
From the Mason Jar, I am Dan Kline. Come visit us at Come Cruise With Me.
That is comecruisewith.com. Thank you for watching. Cheers, everyone.
Post: Cheers.
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