Keeves

We had a discussion about the Texas liquor a few weeks ago. Here is more information than you might want:

It has always annoyed me when I am at a buffet and the staff tries to take my empty plate, forcing me to get a new one for more food. I've always felt it to be a waste of dishwashing resources, not to mention pretentious. (Dahling, we're not the kind of people who use dirty plates. / But it's MY dirty plate!) And this is especially annoying when they start to run out of clean plates. I consider myself fairly health-conscious, but it never dawned on me that this is required by health regulations. And now that you've educated me, I'm embarrassed that I didn't think of it myself. Thanks!!

Definitely! Maybe even the police.

Sorry, I didn't mean to step on any toes. You seemed unsure, so I was just trying to resolve the uncertainty.

I was in a balcony on Harmony. We got little bottles on the sink, not dispensers in the shower.

Wow. Interesting. Thanks!

Which choices are limited? Are certain drinks illegal in Texas? Just curious.

Might mean the big screens near the elevators. Full of lots of information, changing all the time... I was halfway through the cruise when I saw someone touch it, and that's when I realized how much you can do with it.

I just measured my Coke Freestyle Souvenir Cup, and it is 16 ounces. The ones in Windjammer and Cafe Promenade are definitely smaller, but I can't say exactly; my guess is about 10-12 ounces.

1) When I called Wells Fargo to tell them my travel plans, they said they don't bother with that anymore. 2) I've been keeping my wallet in my front pocket for the past 50 years or more. Never understood why people like sitting on top of it.

I don't know about other soda machines, but the Coke Freestyle will give you water and ice even without a beverage package. No idea if that water is filtered. If you drink your wine outside of your cabin, they are supposed to charge you a $15 corkage. But both of my bottles were opened by a waiter in the main dining room, and they didn't charge us either time.

This sounds quite bizzare. Someone can get all the way to the credit card page, and only then is he told what he gets for the price??? So I'm trying it myself, as an experiment... Let's see, let's go from Miami to Bahamas in March 2019. It tells me that this will be on Mariner, stopping at CocoCay and Nassau, there are 5 dates available, and the *average* price is USD $399 per person. So I click on it... And now it shows me five different dates (March 1, 8, 15, 22, 29) with five different prices for an Interior room. The average is not $399, the *lowest* is $399. Huh? Oh, now I see, the previous screen had said "from USD $399 Avg per person". Gotta watch those "from"s!!! Caveat emptor! So the 5 prices range from $399 to $470. I'll pick the middle one, $420 on March 29 2019. I'd like one room for 2 adults. I'm now at a screen titled "Select your room type". That surprised me, because I thought I had already selected an Interior room. But this is actually a good thing, because this screen gives me some useful information about the price: "INTERIOR / from $395 Per Person / $50 Stateroom Savings Included / + $25 Free Onboard Spending Credit" I don't know what "Stateroom Savings Included" means; my guess is that they are advertising this room somewhere for $445. But where did the $420 figure comes from? It seems that the $420 that I saw a few screens earlier means that if I pay $420 up front (remember, we need to pay RCCL in full way before the vacation begins) then they will give us a room worth $395, and they'll also give us $25 to spend on board. A real cynic (such as myself) would say, "So what's really happening is that I'm giving RCCL a $25 interest-free loan for a couple of months, which they will pay back via liquor and cappucino." But wait, that calculation works only if I will actually pay then $420, like the other screen said. But THIS screen says I'm paying only $395. Which is it? I don't know. We'll have to see... But THIS PART is really important!!! Before we go to the next screen, please read the fine print at the bottom, which says: "*Price is per person, cruise only, reflects any promotional savings, and is subject to change and availability until booked. Non-refundable deposit booking ("NRDB") cancelled prior to final payment due date will receive a future cruise credit in the amount of the deposit minus a $100 per person service fee. FCC is non-transferable and expires after 12-months from issue date. 100USD/100CAD per person service fee applies to changes to NRDB ship or sail date." So I don't know how much I'm paying, but I DO know that it is NON-refundable. Okay, let's press the yellow "SELECT" button... Drum roll.. (it took a while for the next screen to appear) I now have two options: $395 USD Per Person ... includes $50 instant savings ... Non-refundable deposit [SELECT] $445 USD Per Person ... includes $50 instant savings ... Refundable deposit [SELECT] Regardless which option I choose, the next screen asks me to choose between a standard Interior Room (for $395 or $445), or a Promenade View Interior Room (for $40 more, i.e., $435 or $485). I now consider this experiment over. I still haven't picked out exactly which room number I want, and quite a way until I have to enter my credit card number. But IF I READ THE SCREEN CAREFULLY, then I have already chosen whether or not to pay an extra $50 for the privilege of a Refundable ticket. WAIT! It's a good thing I didn't press "Submit Reply" yet. Is $395 the actual non-refundable price, or is it $420. I am so confused. Now I understand some of the complaints that I've been reading on these messages boards. Let's go with the $395 price, and pick a room. There are 3 rooms remaining on the forward section of Deck 10, and I'm picking 1531. I am finally at the screen with the total price, which is: "Subtotal $790 + Taxes&Fees $183.86 = $973.86" That would make total sense if the price was $395 each, so that two is $790. I also see that it includes "$25.00 Free Onboard Spending Credit - FREE", meaning that the actual price (after they pay back this $25 loan) is only $370. (Pretty cheap for a three-night vacation that includes meals, if you ask me.) But I am going to totally ignore the line that says "BOGO NO REF DEP - $414.00 discount". I didn't see anything like this on any previous screen, and I am too tired to look into it.

45 years! Congratulations!

Depending on one's point of view, they are either cheap tightwads or thrifty budgeters. Or maybe they are just good vacation planners. I would point out that this conversation is NOT about how much one spends beyond the basic cabin price. It's about how much one spends on board, after all the stuff that was purchased before the cruise in the Planner. One can buy all sorts of excursions, restaurant meals, drink packages, etc, beforehand, and then what else? I'd think that people who are careful with their impulse spending the rest of the year, will do the same thing on vacation, or close to it.

Suppose there is a cruise that has a $1300 fare that comes with $100 on-board credit (I'm just making up these numbers) Then the prices go up. Do I care whether it goes to $1450 with $100 OBC, or if it goes to $1350 but zero OBC? No, I do not care; either way, I have to pay $150 more than otherwise. In fact, I actually prefer the zero OBC, because that will make it a little easier to meet the payment deadlines. (And people who plan to spend zero on board will certainly prefer that setup.) Or maybe I just don't understand what the attraction of on-board credit is to begin with...

I was on Mariner 3 weeks earlier. We went to the ice skating show one evening, but I don't remember it being open for us to go skating. There's so much to do, its easy to miss stuff! I'll take another look in my Compasses when I get home.

Yes, I agree with JLMoran. That's who I meant by "everyone else".

It seems to me that there are two distinct gratuities here, and some people in this conversation might be confusing them. There is a gratuity that is added to the cabin rate, which is shared among lots of people, including the MDR staff, Windjammer staff, housekeeping staff, etc etc. There is also a gratuity that is added to whatever packages you also buy, and those gratuities are shared among the relevant staff. My understanding is that you are allowed to pick and choose, and opt out of whichever gratuities you want to opt out of. For example: Suppose you buy the all-alcohol-included package. There is an automatic gratuity added to that package, and that means that you don't really have to tip the bartender. If you got great service (or want great service in the future) then it is nice to give an additional tip, but this is acknowledged as going "above and beyond". You also have the option, technically, to opt out of this automatic gratuity, but if you choose this option, you really ought to give something to the bartender at time of service. (If I am mistaken about any of that, I hope someone will correct me.) Now, let's apply that to the dining situation: If someone never eats in the MDR, then he might consider opting out of the gratuity on the cabin, while happily paying the gratuity on the dining package. Such a person should keep in mind that while it is okay to stiff the MDR staff (because he is not using their services), it is NOT okay to stiff everyone else in the process, and he should consider making an extra effort to give tips to those other people personally.

I'm not a coffee aficionado (personally, I value the caffeine and the vanilla/hazelnut, and couldn't care less about the other high-falutin' stuff) but if I was, I would take all the above comments very seriously, and this is what I'd do: I would not get a coffee card until I was aboard. Then I'd get my favorite coffee, even though there's no discount. Then, IF I liked it, I would talk to the barista about that ship's policy for how many punches each coffee will cost me. If I still thought that the coffee card was worth it, I'd give the barista a nice tip and ask what her on-duty hours are.

I brought a wad of $1 bills for tips, and ended up bringing most of them home. I gave a few out here and there, especially to the bartenders. But for the staff that really went out of there way for me, I didn't think that was enough, and I gave them larger amounts, so the fives and tens that I had came in very handy.

It drives me crazy when I go into a convenience store at night and there isn't any decaf. I do understand the importance of caffeine for those who need to stay awake. But is there really a bigger market for decaf at 9 AM than at 9 PM? (sorry for the rant, but its one of my pet peeves)

I don't know about the other ships, but there's a Coke Freestyle in the Promenade on Mariner. If you have the souvenir cup that means you can get soda 24 hours. And even without the special cup it will give you water and/or ice.

Note that this was not a regular cruise, but part of the repositioning of Mariner, from the Asian cruises it had been doing previously, to the drydock and refit in June. I don't know if that's bad news [was the crew inexperienced regarding pirates?] or good news [despite the inexperience, they seem to be well-prepared].

Starbucks cards can be used on some ships but not others. It depends on the specific deal between starbucks and rccl.

The critical word here, of course, being "typically". So they didn't break any rules, because this situation wasn't typical. ? Gotta wonder how much they paid RC for that.....? You have my sympathies, for all the good it will do....