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I tried "Show me cruises where I don't need a second mortgage to book one" and no results came up

We both have "head colds"???? We missed St Maarten like we missed St Thomas. Sad about that. Really wanted to go to tropical beaches. Have a deposit on next year, so here is hoping. After dinner Wednesday night at Chops I had to go to bed. St Maarten was 830am next day and I stayed in bed till noon. Then chills went away and we pressed on with day. Like 10 people in solarium so that was nice. Swim, sun, and looked at island views. Did Mason Jar and 2 shows. Not bad for people with "colds". PS this ship sounds like a TB ward. LOL. But we each have 6 shots. So not much can live for long in us. Also the AC in our cabin is fantastic. Colds could be from freezing room overnight. With the exception of the missed excursions it's a great trip. Not complaining. Just reporting. And we put deposit on Icon day it came out. So will be paying way less then everyone else. Still gotta pay it off. Tomorrow's problem. So glad we only got 3nt dine package. Any more would just be too much food. More to come.........

I knew it !

That's the automated bot I created.

We are arriving in Ravenna on the 28th and they are offering shuttles to Bologna and Venice because the train station in Ravenna is closed due to damage. Departure was pretty smooth. They checked us in at the old Venice terminal 107 and we boarded buses to Triste where we got right on. Added some time, but was neat to see Triste and everything leading to the ship.

How about an option to sort by what *I* think is most relevant to me?

So, it's working??

Kinda like choosing between the lesser of 2 evils, only this is the reverse of it. The greater of 2 goods. I've never been on either ship, and both of those itineraries do look good. I would however personally choose the Vision of the Seas cruise perhaps for the main reason being that I've only visited 1 out of the 5 ports she visits. On the Anthem of the Seas cruise, I've visited 3 of those 5 ports.

Closer port, extra day, extra sea day, less expensive. That's four in the positive column for Baltimore. Unless a particular port or two on the other itinerary really sway it the other way, seems like a no-brainer to this "doesn't care about the bells and whistles" cruiser.

Rhapsody is a sister ship to Vision, here is a video tour of Rhapsody. Here is a fleet guide with details about venues on board all ships. 22006272_Fleet_Guide_2022_Update_LR.pdf Vision has Chops, Giovanni's and Izumi. Entertainment will consist of Royal Caribbean singers and dancers versus a broadway style production. Vision is not even half the size of Anthem so naturally there is a lot less on Vision but she has all the core items for a classic cruise experience.

Missed Megan's Bay and St Thomas all together. 30 minutes before we were to leave the ship we got call about dog. He had been having the poops all night. They wanted the OK to take him to Vet. By the time we called they already brought him. He was on IV for dehydration. We spent the day on the phone every hour on the hour. Long story short he has a condition that creates bad bacteria and we told the doctor to put him on pro biotics. The next day he was feeling better and ate some food. But St Thomas didn't happen. They kept apologizing saying they know we are on a cruise, but then would ask how long we would be gone. After we told them, they would say "are you sure". This prompted us to check airfare from St Thomas. We were looking at $1500 each and 12 hours of travel. Then they would say they could handle it. But would ask our return date. And after we would say it, again they say "are you sure". So Wednesday was hard. Thursday they said he was doing better. LOL.

Wow, have I been wrong. All this time I thought your job is answering questions on this blog.

It'll switch to Alaska time.

For those that want to bitch about the new menus or the food aboard (or, the lack there of) I suggest you rephrase your argument on your post cruise survey. Tell them the food is not what they are capable of doing. Tell them they they are not utilizing the talents of the kitchen staff. Tell them they are not utilizing the millions of dollars they have spent in every galley. Tell them they have narrowed the serving staff and they are capable of so much more. This is a much more poignant and painful argument than "I want my French Onion Soup every night". And, everyone from the corner offices in Miami to the blue scarf wearing dishwashers knows that this is true. A much more of a direct stab to the heart if you will. Costco of the Seas is unacceptable.

Why can’t we take posts at face value and not do a personal “Columbo” forensic check on their posting history? Not sure it’s relevant myself.

I just spotted a new function on Royal's booking page. It's a "write in" search box right up near the top of the page. I was sceptical but I asked it to find me cruises to Europe in June 2024 and it did. I did try asking it to find me one-way cruises as that's something I'd like to see as a search option but, unfortunately, that overwhelmed it: "We're sorry, but we couldn't find any results that match your search. Please modify your search and try again"

We are sailing on the 7-Night Greek Islands cruise September 17-24 staying in the Panoramic Suite. Anyone know what time we will board, or when we will find out. Staying in Florence for a few days prior, and will be traveling to the port by train/ and whatever else we must. Any travel tips appreciated, too.

One of our group will have a long, white beard. I've got very short gray/white hair. My husband is thin and nearly bald. Not sure about the rest. I'm sure you'll find us.

When you 'check-in' to the ship (usually 30 days or so before sailing) you will get a time to come to the pier. Also since you are in Star class you can coordinate directly with the Genie about a week out and fine tune your arrive time since they like to walk you onto the site.......at least I think that's a star class suite.....I get them confused sometimes. If it isn't.....then just show up at the time you get on your setsail pass when you check in and look for the suite lane

Also all freestyle cups have the same shape and size and you have to put them on the sensor before pouring beverages so there's no way it can touch the dispenser directly.

Shorter drive, cheaper price, longer cruise. I think you made your decision

On Vision, take advantage of the Centrum. We don't do a lot of specialty dining, but we enjoyed our lunch in Chops on Vision in November. Sailed many times out of Baltimore. I will note that for our first Junior Suite, Vision wasn't as fancy as shown on larger ships. If you go Anthem, I'm not sure when you will arrive in San Juan. Arrival time can affect your ability to enjoy that port. Our only port experience in Bayonne wasn't that great, so I will put in a vote for Vision out of Baltimore. Either itinerary seems like a lot of fun.

Given the number of sea days, I'd myself would be doing the Anthem out of Bayonne.

Who is cruising? Kids? I also like Q class so I would be predisposed to going to Bayonne, but that's me. Vision is a fine ship and I sailed on her for 16 nights but I can find things to do on any ship.

I don't know what happened to the crew but today all of a sudden, they all seem to have the hump. Lots of very unhappy faces. Wasn't this way at all till today???

I just got back from a cruise on Harmony OTS. The crew was definitely nice and friendly, but one of the things I noticed (after sailing Celebrity last December), was that every single employee I passed on Celebrity Apex smiled, and most greeted me with "good morning", "good afternoon", etc. Not so much on Harmony. Most didn't even make eye contact in passing. Not that I need greeting, or smiles from the crew. It's just a big difference that I noticed. It's the little things like this that makes Celebrity stand out for us. Yes, most on Royal are friendly if waiting on you, or encountering you more than once. Our Harmony room steward was in our top 3 room stewards ever. But Celebrity has little touches that Royal doesn't. We sail Celebrity when we want great food, adult company, personal touches and a fantastic martini bar. We sail RCI for the energy, the shows and a variety of things to do. Both fit a niche for us. We also sail Celebrity whenever the suite prices are down, and also for some of the itineraries that are more unique than the same-old same-old Royal seems to be doing.

I have noticed the food quality varies vastly from ship to ship since the restart, not sure why? The food on Mariner was absolutley terrible (both the Windjammer and MDR) but last month on Liberty the food was great, I think my favorite meal was in the Windjammer one night.

I can only see it on my desktop, not on my mobile devices.

Did he look like this?

The answer to your question is "no". It is supposed to be used only for a new booking....but with all things Royal Caribbean, YMMV. There is one situation where your trade-in value can be combined with another offer and that is if you and your spouse earn certificates on the same cruise, you are able to combine them but I do believe it still has to be for a new booking. We did this recently. I had a relatively good certificate while Dan's was useless....so we booked using mine and used his to help with the cost of upgrading the booking. It is my experience that they are getting stricter and stricter on these kinds of things and I think using your certificate trade-in value to apply to an existing booking is getting harder and harder to do.

That list of benefits is the complete list of benefits. There are no hidden perks that they do not tell you about upfront and make you discover on your own.

Hmm, op doesn't have a lot of posts, but their first post back in may 2021 claimed they already did 35 cruises. Also said they had one booked for Oct 2021, but above says this Feb was their 35th cruise. Complaining about the food from a cruise 4 months ago, then saying they're going to Carnival

Great review! Excellent video! Loved it.

Wow, I have to watch this in small portions because I'm at work, but first question is about Cape Liberty...we are sailing out of there in october for the first time, all of my previous cruises have been Port Canaveral or Miami... everything I have read about NJ was that it was a really smooth embarkation process, from parking all the way to on the ship. When did you sail from there....and what was the issues? Hoping it's all sorted out when we go since it will be almost the end of the "season" up there. Anyway- looking forward to the rest of this video, wonder will probably be our next cruise so I'm looking forward to this!

Wonderland is good to do once. I could eat 50 spoonfuls of the liquid lobster. Also really liked the shrimp with the crusted noodles and the short rib was really good. Beyond that it was really just part show part dinner. One and done. Oh yeah, the World is a really great dessert. Yummy. Thanks for bringing us along.

So.......drum roll............. I did it!!!!!!! I'll get into more post trip. But the psychological effects of many bad hard tight years vs the long anticipation vs reading too much of people's opinions vs the build-up vs the need for it to be perfect after a really long time, etc. Well it made the perfect storm. If it wasn't perfect it at least could have been in my head. Not living up after a decade of not being able to go anywhere was terrifying. You could right a book on it. Lots to say. Nothing bad. Will be updating. Wasn't planning on buying internet and broke down an hour ago and did. Didn't want to deal with the real world (and the cost), but it's hard to not look at your phone. Who sang that song that goes.........etc was driving me crazy. Little things like that get to you. Unfortunately, the real world came with an issue. The pet hotel left a message that my little 9lb boy is not eating. He gets like that. We told them. 2 pages of typed information and instructions. They know where we are and said they understand if we can't call but they are looking for ideas to get him to eat. We are trying to figure out if with T Mobile and wifi ( if and how ) we can call and potential cost? At sea now. St Thomas tomorrow. DH is messaging with T Mobile rep right now. OK he is telling me rep is saying to download whatsapp and we can call over that via wifi and not accrue any costs. This sound right to anyone?

Have we seen actual evidence of this? As a bargain shopper I'm assuming my solo $600 interior booked two years ago would be the first on the table when they have someone willing to book a GTY interior for two guests that is selling for 3 x what I paid.

If you NEED a specific cabin type with specific features, don’t play the GTY game.

Think about your Solo Cruisers. You don't have many solo cabins and they sell out very, very quickly. I would make sure the new ships are designed to take care of Solo Cruisers. The cabins do not have to be big, but I would have a mixture of inside, ocean view and balcony cabins for Solo Cruisers. On my older ships I would have specials during off season for my Solo Cruisers. The last thing is having a Solo Cruise Director like NCL has that can coordinate events for Solo Cruisers.

This is the info I was hoping for on this thread. Thank you for sharing. I will definitely look into this when I’m Aruba.

Bring back Portofinos !!

Parents just booked for the celebrations. Celebrating 65 years of marriage. Oh happy anniversary to my parents.

I've never had a good pork chop on an RC cruise. Always way overcooked. But agreed on the Jamaican chicken. That was an unexpected big winner.

It may show up on the app on the morning of boarding but before you actually board. Once you are connected to the ship's wifi (which you may be able to in the terminal while waiting to board) you should be able to see the full rotation. I agree that they can sometimes change. I had a rare itinerary (8 nights out of NJ on Anthem) and did the exact same thing you did. I was planning to book our specialty for night 6, which on the previous identical cruise had been the Mexican menu. Lo and behold on my cruise that night was the Asian menu, which is very new and, for me, so much better than the Mexican, so I was glad I checked immediately after boarding before actually booking the specialty restaurants.

We'll be on board celebrating 50 yrs whew!! Chops first night then lots of time in the solarium and casino never been to curaco or Aruba or coco cay "ain't no party like a senior party"

Maybe we’ve just been lucky but we have included every kind of clothing item in our complimentary Wash&Fold laundry service and have neither been denied nor charged. Basically, if it fits into the bag, it goes. I send Dans Docker khaki pants all the time. I have heard plenty of warnings about clothing being ruined in the ships laundry but never had any issues whatsoever. Regarding timing, it is best to consult with your room attendant. Some attendants have allowed us to send out a bag on day 5 (of a 7 night sailing) but on SY, we were told that we could send out no later than day 4. On our recent B3B on OA, we sent out a bag on day 1 of the third leg which was laundry worn during leg 2….my point being, you might consider waiting until the beginning of leg 2 to send out the laundry, giving you the most time to get it back.

I think it's rude to hold up a ship full of thousands of people who were on time because of whatever reason they couldn't make it back in time. I think it's rude to cause a cruise line to burn more fuel at significant cost to make up for lost time to reach the next port because of whatever reason they couldn't make it back in time. I think it's rude to the dock workers at the port who want to go home after a long day of work but can't because of whatever reason they couldn't make it back in time.

We'll be going on this cruise for our anniversary; we're Jared & Shannon from Kansas City

You can't prepay gratuities with the OBC. However, whatever you don't spend in the Cruise Planner pre-cruise will transfer over as a credit to your onboard account once you are on the ship. Gratuities get charged against this same account daily when you are sailing if you do not prepay. The OBC credit will offset these daily charges. The on-board system doesn't treat this OBC any different from an OBC you got from a promo or from your travel agent.