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I really really love this site! I have been checking for days and at every cruise planet sale and the drink price for the deluxe has always been 55/ day for my March freedom cruise. I looked at sabrinas post and decided, ok I will look... won't be different but.... Well, it was down to $45/day for no reason so I hopped to buy. If I get 30% on black Friday I will cancel and re book, but that saved me 75 dollars a person! At 45 a day, that is 3 cocktails, a coffee and a bottled water... even my husband would do that (he drinks a Lot less than I do) so I can justify the 2 adult pkg. Wondering if pkg purchases were down with the 2 adult thing...but it's a long time till March. Nothing else was on sale. Thanks for posting...i never would have gone on today! Jane

Much to my amusement, the price on the dining + drinks combo was down a few more bucks today, ended up cancelling and rebooking for $50 less. That's some savings I can get behind.

OK, so I called up Royal and my package is all purchased. However, I definitely have to say that my experience mirrored @twangster's. I got a nice rep on the phone, and I made sure to explain right away that my wife had a note on her reservation that she is unable to drink due to medical reasons; because of that, I was calling to purchase the Deluxe Package for just myself. The rep confirmed he saw the note and put me on hold while he spoke with his supervisor. After he came back on the call, I was told that the "exception" they would make for me was that I could buy the Deluxe Package for myself, but I would also have to buy the Refreshment Package for my wife at the same time. Now, in my particular case, I was OK with this. My wife actually did want me to get the Refreshment Package for her, since she expects to be getting a fair number of specialty coffees, fresh juices, and bottled waters. I would have preferred to buy her package next month when I was on another new billing cycle, but the cost of the Refreshment Package (after gratuities) is a little over half what the discounted Deluxe Package costs and I felt I could swing the extra on the card this month. So, it does seem that the standard line you should expect from any CSR at Royal, even after speaking to a supervisor, is that you'll need to buy the Refreshment Package for the person requesting the exception. Maybe for most of you, this will be OK, but if it's not I would definitely make a point of bookmarking Matt's blog post that has the email screen shot. Then when you're on the phone with Royal, have that screen shot ready to read back to them and make them talk with their supervisor again and again until you have the specific purchase you need.

Come on Floski, where's your sense of adventure??? You could be a real RC hero, the kind the staff would tell tales about and children would sing ballads .......

I find myself ordering drinks I would likely not otherwise order simply because I have a drink package. Such as waiting for a show to start, when the waiter walks around at the pool, etc. To your point, my mindset when I have a drink package is "why not?".

Day 4 Sea day. Today was the second sea day in the cruise, Although the forecast predict a very cloudy day it was once again a wonderful sunny day, perfect for a sea day. I started early (well 9 am on a vacation for me its early) gong to a guest lecture about creativity, it was a one hour interactive lecture which was interesting and funny, I glad I been able to attend. For some reason RC (at least in this cruise) put all the lectures around 9 AM , not sure why. After the lecture I met with my spouse and we went to the sundeck area to catch some sun. Although the pool deck was fully occupied there were enough chairs on deck 12 , not sure why people insist on the pool deck (I know that some like to jump to the pool from time to time but it can easily done also from the upper deck). Actually we found some extra hidden decks that were empty so we used them as our privet deck (there is one above the bar which was kept empty all the time , my guess the proximity to the round antenna radome which is nearby may intimidate some people but they contain mostly satellite equipment and almost harmless comparing to the sun radiation. Although we are coming from a very sunny country I cannot really stay in the sun too long before becoming a lobster(one of the downsize of working at office all the time), since the lobster day is tomorrow and I did not want to find myself as the main dish in the Windjammer I finish my pathetic effort to get tanned very fast. We took some pictures to send home after getting complains that we only send picture that they can be download from the internet and they want to check that we are relay cruising. And now for the daily complain session J , not really understood why RC are insisting on this towel policy with the room card , the queues to get a towel become sometime quite long which is annoying, there must be a better way to handle it, its not that people have where to take the towels beside the ship. I understand that again we are paying the price for people that throw the towels over the board or something like that. For lunch again we did the Windjammer trying to focus on light things, I decide to try something healthy for a change so I took a Pizza. The good thing about lunch today was the fruits they brought , beside the regular apples they also served Rambutan and Longan , Rambutan you should already recognize from my previous post about Thailand but Longan (not Logan ok ? , its not made out of Adamantium) is a small round fruit which taste more and less like Litchi. The fruit stand was very poplar but there were plenty for everyone , it was good dessert. The time past quite fast on the sea day, we enjoyed several of the show in the pool area and some indoor activities. For dinner we went to Chops, the food was very tasty, loved the crab cake and the soups, the service on the other hand was ok , I mean when we got service .It seems they were missing waiters and each waiter had to serve too many tables , I will just say the dinner took us two and half hour and we had to wait 40 minutes between the steaks and the dessert .Hopefully it was aone time issue as I heard the service in this restaurant usually excellent. Tomorrow another sea day. FYI , if there are any request to get some more info about the ship or cruise or you want me to take a picture of something in the ship , let me know I will be happy to answer/take the pictures.

Well, despite my beeching and moaning about it, I opted for the package for the wife and me. I hate that they have done this, but once I broke it down and weighed the issues, I decided to pay now instead of at the end of my cruise. This still doesn't mean I'm going to participate in the belly flop, regardless of how many drinks I've had.

We have friends who just returned from Islay. They got tours of all 8 distilleries. I think Scotch smells like as* but Dan loves his Scotch. Yuk ! ??

My name is Emerson, and I'm a Cruise Pplannerolic. I've just realised I have a problem. I find myself checking the cruise planner 2 to 3 times a day pretty much from the time I book my cruise. The symptoms seem to get a lot worse 6 months out and come 3 months out... well, someone please take my keyboard from me. Am I alone? Do others suffer from this crippling condition? Is there any cure or should I just embrace my disease? If Royal Carribean comes out with an app that allows me to check cruise planner I may need to check myself into a treatment centre!

As Larry the Cable Guy says "now that's funny right there, I don't care who you"

rjac, you must have had the "buy nutin' and get 2 free" coupon.

When I have the drink package I tend not to use the supplied cup, but I save them and use them on cruises when I don't buy a drink package. As long as the ship has the freestyle machines, a never used "chip" cup seems to work on other ships.

Here's a photo tour of the Grand Suite on Anthem: https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2017/04/08/photo-tour-of-grand-suite-royal-caribbeans-anthem-of-the-seas The best place for it would be in the living room, where the coffee table is.

I see...You are one of those husbands! Love it! My poor husband doesn't even know where we are sailing half the time, no clue on ship or stateroom. I'm lucky if books off the correct vacations days off work. Probably no chance ever that I'm getting that surprise CLS or genie....

Not a C&A benefit must be the "nice people" one

I would have polished off the bottle! The drink package + single-malt scotch = heavenly indulgence!!

The combo deal just appeared in mine when I looked, $65 /day for me! Drink package dropped to $45 / day. I had already booked ultimate dining for about $24/day, so I cxled that and booked the combo. I'm netting a $14 / day savings (times two people, times seven days = almost 200 bucks!) Hooray!

Ditto on that! I am on Harmony in February, and have been checking once a week or so on drink packages. Was at $55 for ever, then after their policy change it dropped to $46. Now I checked today after reading the above posts and it is at $43. I have never seen it that low, even on black friday sales. They must be lowering the price a little now that they are requiring all adults to purchase it (if one does). With the gratuity that amounts to about $50 a day, which is pretty easy to get to.

Thanks for the heads-up on this! I re-checked this morning and mine has dropped overnight to $43/day! Timing is perfect, as I just started a new billing cycle today. Will be calling up Royal as soon as their service desk is open and I'm clear of my morning work calls. The Sip 'N Stream package is also discounted, but the internet part is only discounted by a dollar a day. Given that I need to buy a 4-device package anyway, and another post here noted the poster couldn't get that package for himself without also buying for his wife, I'll just get the Deluxe package for now and buy the internet another month.

Here is a Sky and Star class card next to each other. The hole on the Star class card was added when I had gotten back Another casual observation that the scanner doesn't pick up. The cards I got on Harmony and Anthem have a metallic look to them. The ones from Allure and Oasis just seem to be a flat color.

Lagavulin is my favorite scotch of all time. Toured the distillery in 2008. Celebrity claimed they had it and was bummed when we found none on board. I was very pleased to see it on Harmony

lol looking at beer list you posted. Looks like blue moon and Paulaner Weiss will be the 2 beers closest to something with flavor.

Beautiful ! So majestic. I envy you on this cruise. Please know that I am NOT making fun of you. Your English is sooooo much better than any [other than English] language I would try and communicate in. ...but I got SUCH a kick out of it. You referred to the "excursion" as an "excoriation". That is SOOO funny. I have been on MANY excursions where I felt like I was being excoriated ! If it hadn't been such a funny interchange of words I would never have even noticed, but excoriation for excursion is a HOOT ! Believe me when I say that this is sent to you with love. NOTHING but love. I am really enjoying this review. Keep up the EXCELLENT work ! I hope I haven't made you feel self conscious. I just had to laugh it was so cute !

Don't really know for that one but someone else might have a better idea. All I can tell you is that for our last cruise on Harmony it was $55 then for Black Friday it went 30%off and then it went to $46 and stayed like that until sailing. Perhaps it depends how well the packages are selling on a particular sailing? But I am big on FOMO so once it see it I don't think about it for long lol.

Day 3 Port day. Kaohsiung Taiwan: After a nice first sea day we finally arrive to our first stop at Kaohsiung , we got to the port around 7 AM and I Started to get organized as we had our shore excursions To avoid the rush hour of the buffet on a port day I went up and grab a plate to bring down to my spouse and me, our room is actually just one deck directly below the Windjammer so it makes live easier. After the quick breakfast we rushed to the excursion (thank you WAAYATOO) meeting point , it was 8:15 which was the time the meeting should tool place ,when arrived we have been told to catch the bus outside so we went out pass the immigration very quick (as the passport still with the ship we got yesterday a stamp photocopy of our passport, that was why RC asked everyone to bring a photocopy with them). As usual not everyone arrived on time so we were waiting for people on the bus until 9 AM ,maybe this is the punishment for people who come when they are being told too (that and also my spouse saying to me , told you so ,we should not have rushed J ) The excursions was for the Buddha temple complex in the city of Fo Guang Shna , I choose this one as the city of Kaohsiung is mainly industrial city and not much to see. The drive to the temple complex tool around one hour, each participate got bottle of water on the bus which was nice has it was a very hot humid day. The complex is spitted to two different areas, the first is where the monks are leaving and learning, it also contain a huge temple with three golden Buddha’s (sorry no photo were allowed inside the temple but here is the standing Buddha from the parking area). The second one is the more modern area which has a 360 foot Buddha statue and many pagodas tower. I found the second part to be very immersive although tending to more commercial, in the entrance there is something that look like a mall , it even contain a Starbucks (well maybe they sell there an holly tea , did not check). Although there were allot of people around the place is huge and it was very quiet and e feeling of serenity was surrounding us (and not the serenity now kind) , I really enjoy it, just sorry we could not stay there some extra time We were doing our way back around 12 PM as it was half day tour. By the way in the port there was an ATM machine and money changer, beside that there weren’t any other services. The way back to the ship was very fast without any queues or delays , nothing like to come back from the very warm day to the air-condition of the ship , love it. For lunch we did our way to the buffet, this time it was not as busy as yesterday and the food was excellent, again I was eating too much. After a very required rest we went to see the headliner show which presented a vocal group name “Dream Zone” they were performing different songs with the ship band which was entertaining. Tomorrow sea day ,

This to me is the added value of the drink package. I don't feel compelled to finish a drink I don't like, or any drink, really. Some might say that it encourages more drinking, which may be true to some degree, but it allows me to try new things, which is part of the fun!

Do you mean the replenish package at about $26? If so, it's the same as the ultimate package minus the alcohol. Virgin drinks, specialty coffees, soda, bottled water, etc.

Best guess is that the bed is by the balcony given that this is the arrangement on the deck above. See this YouTube clip of 11652, which should be the same:

So glad to hear that it all worked out ..... even to your advantage with a slightly lower price ..... I've said this before and I'll say it again, the customer service team with Royal Caribbean is some of the best I've ever had the pleasure to do business with. Have a fantastic time on your cruise, we all know you will. Welcome to the RCLBlog family. Mark

No deals for me (March/April Eastern Caribbean). But if folks on February cruises are seeing some deals, gives me hope that next month (maybe Thanksgiving weekend?), my ship will finally come in. See what I did there?