twangster

The next several scheduled cruises for Brilliance:

April 4 - 8 Night South Pacific

April 17 - 17 Night Transpacific

April 28 - 8 Night Hawaii

May 6 - 6 Night Alaska

Keep checking.  Sometimes they open up earlier times later.

Does he have your CAS status or his own based on his actual points?

If they recognize him as your dependent he may have your status but his own points counter has been running in the background.  

In the case of a dependent child the policy isn't precisely clear and there have been two experiences reported.  The first is that he is frozen at your CAS status upon turning 18 and will only progress to the next level once he earns the next level based on his own cruising.  The second is that he is reset to his actual level earned by his cruising to date and all future progress is based on his own cruising.  

The verbiage leaves room for interpretation but it appears once they decide one way or another, reports of challenging the decision seem to indicate they won't reverse whatever they decide.  

6 minutes ago, Chili said:

Edge is.nice I was on it a couple of weeks ago. It’s bit like a smaller Quantum.

One I noticed was the ceilings where higher than RCL ships so they could reduce the overall height of the ship there so it could get under a few bridges.

More importantly Edge class goes through the Panama Canal.

Sounds like the Radiance propulsion issue from last year. 

Anyone who has owned an older car knows stuff breaks out of the blue.

Time to sell them off.  

34 minutes ago, F1guynz said:

I am also curious, if Royal cuts a cruise short do you still get the full allocation of C&A points or only points for the days onboard?

In the past it has been typical to provide full CAS points for shortened voyages.

Technically after final payment they don't have to allow the $100pp change fee.  That fee applies to NRD deposits and once you reach final payment due date, the type of deposit is irrelevant.  All that matters after final payment due date is the cancellation fee schedule which applies to everyone, all deposit types.

Having said that sometimes they will allow the $100pp change fee after final payment due date but generally not close in to the sail date.  That's never a sure thing though.  

You best bet would be to make the change before final payment due date and not the day before, rather a few days before.  

My money is still a variation of the Celebrity Edge class platform.  Instead of engineering a hull from scratch they'll take the Edge class hull and modify the interior space to Royal-ify it.  Probably flex fuel engines like Xcel as I don't think a new low emissions engine platform is ready today which is when it would needed for a building a ship that will debut in 2028.  

That should put it around 3,000 passengers or a bit more but it does make Tampa and Baltimore no-go ports which I suspect is inevitable.   

For the longest time I've had issues with domains that use rccl.com when on board connected with Voom.  

In the days before the app you couldn't check in on the website using Voom, unless you had a VPN service which circumvents the issue with rccl.com domains used in the background for check in or obtaining luggage tags.

Since the app days I've recently still seen the weird issues with check in when on board using Voom.  The last time was two cruises ago (a few months ago) when I tried to snap an early arrival time for an upcoming cruise and it reported it hit a snag or check in wasn't available.  Then I used my VPN and check in worked fine, arrival time selected.

So it still seems Royal has issues with check in when connected by Voom.   If you are in a port with cellular data as an option disconnect from Voom and it should work, or use a VPN service.

6 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

The captain hinted (my interpretation) that the decision to ditch labadee for now is purely PR because people don't understand Haitian geography.

Yes.  The optics of sitting on a beach enjoying a Labradoozie doesn't work well on social media when gangs are killing innocent people in the streets a nearly impossible drive away.  

8 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

At captains corner,  the captain noted RC is going to deliver some diesel to the area for humanitarian relief. 

This little corner of Haiti has prospered from the presence of Royal and the Labadee private destination.  Somewhere around 400 locals are employed.  Royal built a school in the local village.  Housing tends to be better built with real construction material.   This community is not your typical Haiti village and they know that.

Like any small town with a large employer the community tends to be very pro-company.  

I can see why Royal would want to maintain that sentiment.  It's in their long term interest to see the local community gets some relief and their standing maintained.

The local community must be really feeling the lack of ship visits.  Their livelihoods once snatched away from them just like it was during the pandemic.  Innocent victims out of work facing incredible hardship supporting families.  All thanks to distant gang violence.

One thing about this class - they have the smokiest casinos from across the fleet.  Majesty used to be really bad.  With her gone the Radiance class take the award for smokiest casinos.  

They try to place a small portable HEPA style standalone filter somewhere and call that the non-smoking area but ships this old don't have the ventilation systems in the casino and as you can imagine a small portable standalone filter in a wide open smoking space accomplishes nothing.  

No ship in this class has a better or less smoky casino.  Learn the deck plans and find another way forward or aft to reach the theater if smoke bothers you.     

Hey Joe!  Welcome back!

I've always favored Brilliance and Serenade.  Both were updated with LED lighting in the Centrum and a few other discrete upgrades that may be missed by many.

Radiance always feels a little tired to me in contrast to her sisters.  I still sail Radiance and would again in a heartbeat but to be honest and fair it does feel the most tired to me.

Jewel is probably my least favorite and that is in a large part due to the NASCAR bar.  This bar is open to the casino so basically it's a smoking area.  Good luck enjoying a drink if you don't smoke.  The others in class have a distinct pub that has passages to the casino but are not wide open to the casino.  The first few feet of these pubs may get smokey but the bar area of these pubs do not.  The NASCAR bar on Jewel just feels very dated and is usually empty except when a show lets out and transitory guests going somewhere else stop to acquire a beverage.     

There are subtle differences such as a Centrum staircase on some, deck 11 balcony cabins on one but not the others, an oceanview suite off the Centrum on some but not others, Centrum hanging art on one, and the number, location and types of specialty dining venues varies.

Having said all that I do have 27 nights coming up on Jewel so even though her NASCAR bar sucks it's not enough to prevent me from sailing her.  Itineraries matter.  The ship less so. They are more alike than different.  Pick based on itinerary and price.

47 minutes ago, Chili said:

I’m hoping we get a Radiance class in Sydney along with Anthem.

Has anyone worked out where Voyager is going after Brisbane season?

Now that’s the big question,It won’t be going to America and I don’t think it would suit Asia .
Is it staying here year round???

Maybe Dubai. .??

I don't think Royal knows.

I suspect they are testing the market in China and I suspect they are monitoring Brisbane's market to determine the right size ship.  They will watch booking trends and based on a few more months of data they will make decisions about these ships over the coming months.

When I have seen clear evidence of a new deployment and inquired at NextCruise they typically are clueless.  For something like Icon there were probably sales conferences to explain cabin types and so on so NC may have head some inside knowledge but probably not deployment dates or home port until it was imminent.

As far as existing ships moving to new home ports over the years I've yet to see any evidence NC has any insight before we do.  The rumors they've suggested have more often been proven incorrect in the end.  

It's always interesting to hear what they say but I wouldn't put a lot of value on their rumors.  

On more than one occasion I've raced down to NC and they didn't even know a ship was available for booking yet on a new deployment.  

7 hours ago, jbrinkm said:

I'm not sure who Royal would even pay right now

I don't suspect Royal makes payments directly to one president or another elected official.  That's like saying I don't know who to send my federal tax payments to in year when a different presidential party wins an election in the US.   It will always be the IRS.

There will be contracts in place with named departments or companies where payments are sent.

The departments of the Haitian government haven't been dissolved.  Once a transitional government in Haiti has been formed various department heads will report in and at some point the transitional government will learn of a major revenue gap absent in tourism stemming from Labadee. 

The transitional government will have its hands full trying to stop the gang violence.  At what point they will become effective with that and can begin to focus on something less critical such as tourism revenue will influence the outlook for a return to Labadee.    

The problem with vigilante mob violence in a lawless and corrupt system is getting them under control.  The gangs don't have a distinct leadership or direction from an organized head.  The gangs are making this up as they go along.  Soon they will run out of perceived enemies such as government leaders or more affluent Haitians and they will begin to turn more on the average Haitian.  "The guy who charged too much to fix my broken down car last year" or "that store that charges too much for groceries" will become targets.  We haven't seen the end of the gang violence and only when we do will we see a path forward for Haiti.   

This is usually related to restricting access to a loyalty or suite lounge since that denies access to the coffee machine within.  

Or the crown lounge coffee machine is broken so they offer a coffee voucher.

If so that isn't new, experienced it in 2019 on elite top heavy transatlantic cruises.

They can't keep all the terminal staff available for multiple shifts around the clock.  Terminal staff are local contractors, not cruise line employees, in addition to customs and immigration who are government workers, all who have limits to their work day.   They can't tell any of those people to work 18 hour days.  To cover an extended check in window that would mean multiple shifts of each set of people doubling or tripling the cost.  From forklift drivers, xray technicians, luggage handlers on land and on the ship, security, police, customs, immigration, check in counter workers and more.  There are a lot of people in the terminal involved in boarding new guests onto a ship.  

 At a certain point the local terminal people who process new guests will go home leaving a small security staff to screen existing passengers coming and going to the ship.   That's relatively easy and immigration knows those guests have already been processed.  

The best thing to do would be to fly in day before and spend a night in the hotel.  That also protects you better from delayed or canceled flights.  Flying in the day of the cruise is a rookie mistake that often causes people to miss cruises.  I have missed a cruise thinking I could fly in the day of the cruise and my flight was supposed to land at 9am.   Never again.   

1:55pm international arrival?  Wow!

On 3/20/2024 at 2:37 PM, Marc Van Niekerk said:

Booked this when it was first announced but we are 50/50 on whether we will be going.

First glance at potential flights makes this a tough sell.

Consider Air2Sea.  If possible a US gateway city may further reduce costs as Canadian airports have wicked taxes and fees.  If you aren't too far from the border and a major US airport that can make a huge difference.   

A2S recently had a $500 discount on many European destination for this year.  They negotiate wholesale rates and commit to seats on some airlines so it really does make sense to leverage that IF you can make it work for your situation.  

23 minutes ago, RockerDom31 said:

I vaguely remember something about PDCC being able to accomodate 10000 people? My memory escapes me but that sounds familiar.

And has Celebrity started calling at PDCC now too? I am not too familiar with the size of their ships.

Some of the early projections while it was under construction referenced 10k but as it was built out those grew to 12k to 13k. Looking back in hindsight Royal had already designed much of Icon around this time so they knew.  Then Hideaway Beach was added and hints that there could be more development further adding capacity.  

Capacity is a number that is not precise.  It's partly a tool used in the business models that became a marketing label thrown out in various Bayley speeches.  In other words it's a made up number.  

How many people can fit in a phone booth?  Answer: One.  Alternate answer: Twelve drunk college students.  Trick question:  No such thing as phone booths anymore (mostly).  

Celebrity ships are much smaller than Royal's.  A Celebrity ship across the pier from a Royal ship is a good thing for Royal guests.

7 minutes ago, DoomSlayer said:

Sounds like a game of Cruise Port Tetris that Royal Caribbean is having to play.  Tendering Freedom was the only possibility I could think of, but did not know if the port had logistical support for it.  I only thought of it because this past January, I saw a ship moored just off the neighboring island and it looked like they were tendering.

NCL's Great Stirrup Cay doesn't have a pier.  Like the old Little Stirrup Cay (a.k.a Coco Cay) was back in the day.  

Coco Cay's former tender harbor and dock system was removed once the pier was competed.  The main pier is too exposed to attempt tendering to the pier at PDCC.

9 minutes ago, kkjcrew said:

So the cruise planner online still shows Labadee as the port. All the excursions now say SOLD OUT in the corner. In the App on my phone it has changed to Falmouth and lists a bunch of excursions but I can't select any of them to get pricing and more info. I guess they're working on it at least. Maybe a few more days until available to purchase.

That's progress! 

Platinum and Emerald are stepping stones one must progress across to reach higher levels.  

With any tiered loyalty program rarely can someone go directly to a higher level.  The exception are status matches with another program.  Generally speaking everyone progresses through the tiers of a loyalty program over the course of the act of being a returning customer.  

Everyone was once new to Royal.  Everyone has progressed through the tiers and/or earned their way to whatever level they are.   

My son did not inherit my top elite status, he is progressing from zero like any new Royal guests does.  He will soon make Emerald.  His eyes are on the prize, Diamond.  He can't get there with progressing through Gold, Platinum and Emerald.  That is how the program is designed.       

Granted some ship godparents have been gifted Pinnacle but if you can get yourself named as a ship godparent, I'm okay with that.