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Raise your glass or shot of Tequila in honor of your favorite travel agent, it's National Travel Advisor Day! Not sure how any of you have survived throughout this but thanks for everything you do!

I'd like to see 100% vaccination mandatory for adults At this point in the US you are choosing to get COVID if you choose not to take the vaccine and that's fine with me, just sit on the sidelines so we can all return to living. Have a 50 year old in the ICU today...if they ever wake up I bet they'll wish they got vaccinated.

Me too! I'm often wrong, just ask my ex.

Nope, no updates yet. When I get anything, I'll post it on RoyalCaribbeanBlog

Very depressing. Time to head over to a local bar, have a few drinks and eat a meal all with no mask.

"CDC Guidance for US cruises- 98% Crew, 95% Pax vaccinated. Are you OK with that?" I'm fine with it, in fact I prefer it but I'm also OK with the alternative the CDC has laid out. Given a choice, I'd choose a sailing where vaccination is required to board.

Thank you to all the travel advisors out there. What a difference a year makes, and I hope things bounce back quickly for all of you!

Hip Hip Hurray for great Travel Agents! I would have never come through the fire of this past year with a positive attitude about future cruising without Michelle Cunningham at MEI? She was focused, Informed and dedicated to handling your cancellations, rebooks, FCC’s, Lift & Shifts and refunds. I can’t tell you what that meant when you have multiple bookings and lots of $$ on the table. Thanks for all you do, and how easy you make travel planning.

Nice. We really appreciate everything @michelle has done for us, ESPECIALLY over the past year+. Thank you.

I would rather work on a Royal ship than be a guest on a Carnival ship.

Not really much new to report. I'm able to keep the leg lowered and sit normally for 20-30 minutes at a pop now before it gets too uncomfortable. But because it's still so limited I spoke with the doc about my return to work date. He agreed it would make sense to push that out a week to May 17 instead of this coming Monday, and we'll see about restrictions on initial hours if even that doesn't get me to a point where I could pull off an 8-hour day at my desk right off the bat. In the meantime, I've found out that the guy on the airplane at the start of Die Hard was right. Making fists with my toes on the rug while I'm sitting really is a great stress reliever! ?

"I Survived the CDC Protocols" t-shirts.

Health Canada (our version of the FDA) just approved Pfizer for 12+ this morning. Bring it on. Now I don't have the leave my kids behind in the dust, but I totally would have ?

You're not banned, you're unable to go. I'm in the same scenario with my kids. My thoughts are initially, I'm not going to worry too much about any possibility until we see something more firm in terms of a plan. I also recognize these are extraordinary times, and I really believe protocols for cruises in July 2021 are not necessarily going to be the same as September, November 2021 or into 2022.

For reference: Carnival Platinum level cruiser. I've cruised exclusively Carnival since 1997. My age group 30-40. What most have already said is true. I can confirm an environment that really caters to the party crowd on Carnival ships. The vibe on the ship is incredibly laid back, dress code is rarely enforced, and most people get away with doing things they really shouldn't. Depending on your expectations, or where on the ship you will be at any given time will greatly influence the vibe you'll get. One part of the ship may be filled with drunks, however there's likely an equal group of people chilling in a bar listening to live music. IMO, the most influential moments will be the interactions you will have with other cruisers. I can say in my experience the cheapest priced cruises trend toward more negative interactions with other guests. i.e. Witnessing more fights, arguments, rude people in general. The best cruises I have had have been on the newest ships in more expensive parts of the year and these cruises have had incredibly positive experiences. When it comes to raw facts, food is good, service is good, newer ships are very clean, older ships are clean (much better if they've recently underwent dry dock), older ships WILL show their age through damaged areas that haven't been refurbished. Most ships will feel very similar in the Carnival fleet, from the carpet to the decorations it's actually difficult to remember which ship has what because they are so copy/paste. TLDR: If you set the proper expectation and give yourself the opportunity to be in the right place at the right time on the ship you'll have a good time.

I started sailing on Carnival and enjoyed all the cruises that I took. The main three lines (Carnival, NCL, Royal) are more alike than different and I've been on all three. The best way to find out is to give it a try, but if you go into it looking for problems you will definitely find them. There are just some tiny nuances that make me prefer Royal to the other two. Equally as polarizing as this Carnival vs Royal debate is the Pepsi vs Coke debate. Royal is the only of those three lines that has Coke products. NCL and Carnival are both Pepsi ships.

One thing that IS keeping me positive is the number of photos that Michael Bayley is posting ..... just over the last few days, he's been posting pics of Operational Crews from Explorer, Navigator, Freedom, Liberty & the Celebrity Equinox getting their vaccines #progress

PC has opened their vaccine program to anyone in the port community including port workers. Drive up, no appointment needed. Moderna. May 10 and June 9 for second shot. https://www.portcanaveral.com/About/Recent-News/Drive-Thru-COVID-19-Vaccine-for-Port-Community-on-

I'm betting the cruise contract has some verbiage that covers them when a government changes a rule or regulation. But I'm not a lawyer and don't play one on TV.

I have Symphony coming up in July. Booked over a year ago. Vaccine requirement was not part of the contract i booked under. That has to be grounds for a refund. For the record, I am vaccinated, but am not interested in cruising with any of the apparent protocols.

This is the stupidest of stupid stuff going on with the CSO. Restaurant's and bars have been doing fine with no masking while eating or dinking the entire dining period without any problems for at least 6 months. I'm confidently waiting on the Federal Judge hearing FL's request for a preliminary injunction against the CDC enforcing it's Conditional Sail Order (CSO) on the cruise industry ruling that it is unlawful. May 12th!!! If it's granted the bull-shit walks and the CDC's house of cards along with it's stupidity involving all manner of stupid COVID mitigation measures and guidance all comes crashing down.

Garbage in, garbage out.

The bot is wrong? Say it isn't so! lol

It does put cruise lines in a bad spot. It forces the cruise lines into a position where they have to approach everyone, including guests who booked a cruise before this requirement was known and ask if everyone is vaccinated. I'm sure the cruise lines don't want to be in that position, it's a terrible thing to have to do. The silence we are hearing right now is probably from the cruise lines trying to figure out how to get this done. What are the legal impacts? What is the best way to create the messaging? What options should be available to cover all scenarios? Offer L&S or FCC or refunds? It's a government condition so how does that impact the cruise contract? And so on... All that needs to be determined before they can announce anything.

The worlds gone mad, it will soon be 'show us your papers' to do anything! I can only hope I get one more cruise in before this all happens.

I find it no coincidence that National TA Day is also Cinco de Drinko.....er, Mayo. Cheers to the best TA there is @krhardy !!

Toast to John at MEI and well all the wonderful TA's at MEI

I won't get into specifics, but in my time in the Coast Guard I was "behind the scenes" on three different Carnival ships. That experience led me to never board one as a customer. Granted, this was nearly twenty years ago, but my decision still stands.

I always park on property because off property doesn't save that much money, and I absolutely hate the tram service they provide. Specifically, they are not run enough and I have no interest in waiting in a line for a bus.

Here's to all the travel advisors, especially ours who has been a true blessing and help this past year.

Just saw that the Ops Crew from Independence is getting their shots this morning. #progress

? Here is our toast to Michelle for all her hard and continual work!!!! We would have been lost without her this past year. THANK YOU MICHELLE CUMMINGHAM!

One thing is becoming clear. If the cruise lines can't make these latest "simplified and easy" CDC revisions work, there will be no US cruising until Nov. 1 because the CDC doesn't want it.

Sailed once because of a family commitment and determined we would never sail them again. Service - none, food quality - poor, public areas were not maintained / dirty, noisy, not a relaxing environment. If you're a kid on spring break - its a wonderful environment. (It didn't help that we sailed during Hurricane Sandy, when we got back to port, everyone cheered.) Had my first cruise been on Carnival, I would probably not be sailing today.

We have 60 days to go for our cruise. The 4th of July on Allure. We have a back up plan. My son and is girlfriend have started new jobs and don’t know what dates to give for vacation requests. I say if you are going to cancel do so people know how to plan their lives. Not fair to the consumer.

Why don’t skeletons ever go trick or treating? Because they have no body to go with.

The only way to know if its your cup of tea is to try it. I could explain why I stopped sailing them but it doesn't matter. It's your vacation money, only your opinion matters. It's not like you are putting your lives at risk by trying them and it's the only way to know for sure.

I will share a different take. I find the major cruise lines to be more alike than they are different. The big differentiator for me is which ships, itineraries you compare. Carnival was known for the short weekend booze cruises on older, smaller ships ... surprisingly if you book one of those ship/itinerary combos you end up on a cruise with a bunch of people that are just looking to get drunk as inexpensively as possible ... possibly the "walmart" analogy above. However, if you sail one of their big, new shiny boats on a week long cruise the crowd looks a lot more like you would see on a Royal or NCL cruise on a similar ship and itinerary combo .. If I list out my top ten ships it is heavily dominated by Royal (primarily the Voyager and Super-Voyager aka Freedom classes) but sitting on the top of the list is Carnival Vista .. we had a great Europe cruise on her as well as a Southern Caribbean that was awesome. My recommendation is too look at the age/size of the ships you are considering along with the itinerary and not focus exclusively on the cruise line.

I have been on both cruise lines and I don’t think you are off the mark in your analogy. I use the Walmart versus Target analogy as the clientele are very different. That being said, it depends on what ship and what time of the year. If you go spring break on a Carnival lower priced cruise you are going to amazed by some of the sightings you’ll see as I have been in the past. But I’m in my late 50’s so my tolerance for drunks is pretty low. On the flip side Royal has its share of dress code violations at the pool and on excursions so it’s not immune. I just think Royal is a cut above Carnival in the cruising market. With the Carnival Mardi Gras coming on line soon that may tighten the competition market but only time will tell.

Just being on a ship sometimes is enough. Personally I’m a morning person and need light lol. In college I did an interior that fit 5 girls, 2 years in a row. At $137, that left plenty of beer money! Our (hubby and me) first Royal cruise was on Song of America (corporate cruise) and we had an ocean view. We were in our 20’s and after an interior, this was HIGH DOLLAH! Now we are regulars with plain old balconies because we do love sitting watching the water and mimosas in the morning. We have our first Aft Junior Suite next may in Alaska only because our 22 year old is graduating college and she wants to come. Bottom line, pick what you most enjoy. Life is short. 5 years ago I was given a 15% of making it to 2021. I’m here and have my bucket list cruises booked! Of course we eat a lot of chicken at home! ?

Absolutely! We’ve gotten this reputation as being a bunch of idiots. Masks are worn everywhere and I’m in conservative north Florida.

But we all know that never happens ?

I guess it's good to get the research out of the way in case a wicked new variant starts impacting younger age groups in a way we haven't seen yet.

From what I'm keeping track of, I have no doubt that RCL and Celebrity ships are quick-turning in Port of Miami and PEV. These are not likely to be provisioning or fuel stops although those could be a secondary reasons for the stop. The primary is more than likely boarding crew members to go through the companies quarantine and vaccination process. I think the movement of crew from their homes to board a specific ship on which they are going to serve as crew for the restart has been detailed somewhere in this message board. Here's a link to an article describing the re-crewing process from an interview that appeared in Cruise Industry News (forget the file photo that headlines the interview article. Has nothing to do with current crew movement). The article lays out the technical aspects of crew movement - its complicated and time consuming: https://www.cruiseindustrynews.com/cruise-news/24849-happy-to-have-a-job-crew-excited-to-return-to-cruise-ships.html Equinox and Edge will be sailing out of PEV when the re-start commences. Equinox has a quick-turn at PEV on 5/06/21 from 0700-1700. I believe one of the most productive ways to get a feel for what RCG is doing and when a restart is likely, is to follow cruise port schedules. I'm about 90% positive RCG knows precisely when they are planning each ship's restart. Given the 60d time frame from warm storage to revenue sailings, RCG has probably already identified start date windows for the ships that will be involved in the first phase of the re-start. They have to have done that in order to plan for ramping up ship's crew manning levels, completing quarantine and conducting crew training. https://pevvesseltraffic.broward.org/webx/

Navigator in town for their vaccines

There are all types of people who cruise with all different levels of disposable funds to spend on their vacations. Some people have arrived at the point where a suite is a must have to cruise. Many people, the majority, don't cruise several times each year. For many it remains a special annual event or every two year event, something worth spending a bit more on. Some people are retired and have some money for cruising but need to be more aware of how they spend their retirement to make it go the distance. There is no wrong way to cruise. At the moment I am willing to go in an interior cabin sometimes if it means I can get in an additional cruise given my annual cruise budget being near it's limit. I've gone from a loft suite to an inside guarantee cabin a month later. I certainly enjoy the good life in a suite but it isn't a requirement for me. Same goes with a balcony. If it's close in price, why not. If the balcony upgrade is the cost of another whole cruise, nope. To each their own. My "lifetime" stats: Interior: 19.7% Ocean View: 11.5% Balcony: 44.3% Suites: 24.6% Twice in Alaska in interior cabins that saved me thousands which I put into expensive excursions including a helicopter flight so I could walk on glacier. That remains one of my best cruises and most memorable experiences. Over five Alaska cruises I could have put more money into my cabin and cut back on excursions for the same budget. So glad I didn't.

Double book people in the same cabin? That would only happen if Royal IT made a mistake. On the flip side maybe I could get lucky and booked into the same cabin with a hot, single woman. And I mean hot, not one with hot flashes.

Just as long as your infant is 48 inches and 75 pounds! ? God Bless your wife!

We arrived to the station about 1:15. Checking the cars was a breeze and we were assigned car numbers 123 and 133. Once inside there was no line to checkin and we were given our train car number as well as asked which dinner delivery time we would prefer. The choices were 5pm and 6:30, we opted for the 6:30. In pre-pandemic times sleeper car passengers got full dining in the dining car. Until May 21, 2021 those passengers in sleeper cars get their choice from the menu delivered to their room. The station is Lorton is spacious, but I could see it getting easily filled up during normal times. Right now for the next few weeks they are still running the train at limited capacity. Right before 2:30 they started announcing the sleeping car’s boarding starting from back to front. After our boarding pass was checked we were given directions to our room, Family Bedroom 15 at the front of the car on the bottom level. The family bedrooms are advertised as sleeping 4 but that fourth would have to be comfortable sleeping in four feet or less of space as that side is very small. the room also has a closet, it don’t get any delusions of grandeur, it’s not deep enough to store a backpack or suitcase. It’s basically a place for coats or jackets The room has two pull out tables that also double as checker boards, but you’d have to bring your own pieces. The room feels more narrow than the pictures on Amtrak’s site and also know that the family bedroom cars are on the lower of the two levels of the train. At 3:23 the train moved to do the little dance where they load up the cars. At about 3:45 we got on the rails and headed south towards the Potomac river. The conductor came on to do announcements. In total there were about 250 people and 134 cars and 1 motorcycle. Because of the car carriers the auto train is advertised as the longest Amtrak train at about 3/4 of a mile. Wifi is available throughout the train. Don’t expect to be streaming HD Netflix movies as wifi is slow, was running about 2Mbps up and down. Amtrak also operates a Train Track website that you can use along the way to monitor tour progress. We took the train version of a shore excursion up to the cafe car to get a drink. Walking from car to car on the train is very much akin to the motion when a ship is really rocking as you are getting thrown into hallways. We also got to walk by some of the bedroom and roomette cabins. We also walked through three of the coach class cars. I’m not one who can ever sleep in an open area so traveling that way would mean being up all night for me. Also, at this time being in a coach seat means leaving your mask on at all times when not eating or drinking. We also checked out one of the vacant bedroom types which has it’s own shower/bathroom inside of your room The cafe car has your basics in snacks, drinks and basic food. Prices are reasonable but don’t expect anything deserving of a Michelin Star, unless there’s a Michelin starred restaurant exclusively featuring microwaved food and peanut M&Ms. Dinner arrived about 6:45 and wasn’t terrible. The pork shanks were bathed in BBQ sauce which was a little much. I’d wholeheartedly tell you to avoid the vegetables, they had zero flavor. Would be interesting to see how different the meal would feel is served sitting in the dining car rather than cramped in your sleeping quarters Freight gets the preference on the rails so on several occasions we had to slow down or stop so freight could speed past us. It took almost 3.5 hours to get to the North Carolina border from our departure in Lorton, VA. Driving that would have been 2 and a half hours. It took us till about 8:15 to get to Rocky Mount, NC, which you drive right through the middle of town. A little after 11 we made the one stop along our journey, Florence, SC. No guests get on or off at this stop, it’s a technical stop to change conductors and pick up additional supplies. Our sojourn was brief and by about 11:25 we were picking up steam heading south again. Sleep was nearly impossible on the train, way too much movement and noise for me to ever get comfortable. So I spent the night listening to podcast and tracking our whereabouts on Amtrak’s train tracker. Since I was already up I decided I would try and get a shower around 6am. It’s a very cramped area and even only being 6’1” the shower head was probably six inches below my eye level. Also, in that tight space with low water, I got out feeling dirtier than I did when I went in. Breakfast was a grab and go occasion up in the dining car and you were handed a bag full of cereal, coffee cake and bananas. I forgot to take pictures, but it probably looks like you can imagine. After breakfast was time to pack up as we were running about twenty minutes early for our arrival at the Sanford, FL station outside of Orlando. At 8:40 we were allowed to disembark and headed into the station to wait for our cars. The station in Sanford was nearly identical to the one in Lorton. 9:21 both of our cars came off the carriers and we were on our way to check out our new home for the first time. While the house won’t be done until July, it was fun seeing it right before the drywall goes up later this week