The Cruise Junkie

This move makes a lot of sense for Celebrity now since Laura Hodges Bethge is the new CEO of Celebrity Cruises, and if you are not familiar with her work in the industry, she spearheaded the Perfect Day at CocoCay makeover when she worked over at Royal Caribbean.

One thing I wish Royal did is add more options for the three-night weekend cruises out of FL to other ports in the Bahamas such as Bimini or Freeport, so it is not always Nassau every cruise. 

Great blog! Sorry to hear about your bad disembarkation experience in Port Canaveral! Usually, Canaveral is one of the smoothest and quickest ports to get from the ship to the road. I visited the port that day in the afternoon around 2:00 pm to see Wonder depart for the first time and traffic was the worst I have ever seen on George King Blvd (the road that cruise terminal number one is located on). And I head down that road all the time and there is never a problem every Sunday in the past with Harmony and Oasis being there. It did not clear up that day until 3:30 pm.

1 hour ago, twangster said:

Hmmm.  Where did I say they are backing away from PCN?   I expect they are looking to EXPAND capabilities in PCN to two Oasis/Icon class.  Terminal one is there.  They need another similar sized terminal where they have priority rights.  

That is the problem right now the port is facing. As of right now, Oasis class can only dock at three terminals (CT-1, 3, & 6) but really only two out of the three can handle an oasis/icon class embarkation (CT-1 & CT-3) however Carnival has rights over using CT-3 for their ships. The major problem Royal faces with using CT-1 is the parking situation. The lots get very full with just a Freedom class ship plus Oasis. With Allure next fall it will get interesting. I know there has been talks for many years of moving the Casino vessel out of CT-2 and making into another cruise terminal, but I think those plans have not gotten anywhere due to them having to move a lot of things such as where that vessel departs from as well as the pilot headquarters. 

On 11/13/2022 at 6:49 AM, twangster said:

As they phase out small ships they'll likely do the same in other ports.  Port Canaveral and Port Everglades comes to mind.  

I don't think they are leaving Canaveral anytime soon. It is a very good market for the brand. Just look at the three night cruise out of Canaveral. As of right now it is the only market that will have an Oasis class ship doing those sailings. If Canaveral was not popular and selling, they would not have four ships based out of Canaveral this winter. It has actually gotten to a point where royal had to start using two terminals at the port due to the amount of calls they were making on the port so often that they overlapped with the 7 night and the 3/4-night vessels at CT-1. 

As of right now this launch is now targeting a late October launch attempt with most of the windows being early in the morning (around 2-4 in the morning). 

This means that it should not be a problem for passenger traffic at the port until the Oct. 23rd launch attempt as it will start to impact disembarking passengers. The biggest impact from this launch will be right after it take off or scrubs as hundreds of cars are all going to be trying to head back towards Orlando. If you are embarking any of those days and are coming to the port, you should not have a major problem. I was at the port for last Saturday's launch attempt that had at L- of 2:17 pm and the port was not congested with vehicles even with four cruise ships being in port. BCSO did a great job making sure the traffic was able to flow in and out of the cruise terminals smoothly. 

As someone who lives in the area I would personally recommend staying at Cape Canaveral before your cruise as the area is better than staying in Orlando. There is a service at this port called Go Port that offers a hotel package that offers airport transportation and cruise transfers for pre cruise stays.

16 hours ago, Matt said:

cruises going to Bahamas and/or CocoCay will require everyone to vaccinated.  

I don't think so as other lines such as Virgin Voyages & Margaritaville at Sea both offer cruises that stop in the Bahamas at ports such as Freeport & Bimini and both allow non vaccinated cruisers to sail without any medical exemption. 

1 hour ago, smokeybandit said:

Also their coverage map, which would currently cover all north American sailings except the ABCs and south

 

https://api.starlink.com/public-files/maritime-coverage-map.pdf

That map will change in the future as they a launching about every week and when they get Starship up and going with V2 it will be a game changer for sure!

Here is a good read on how the "SpaceX Navy" has been able to use starlink onboard their vessels.

https://api.starlink.com/public-files/SpaceXNavyStarlink-case-study.pdf

This just in from CNBC. FCC approves SpaceX Starlink service to vehicles, boats, planes (cnbc.com)

I have also seen a big increase in cruise commercials from Royal Caribbean with their Come Seek campaign. However, the ads I have been seeing a major increase with is the Carnival Funderstruck advertisements that was shot on Mardi Gras.

Sadly, as other posters have stated, Ebay is the mostly the only place you can buy official ship models after the cruise. 

Here is a pretty good interview with Jason that is very recent.  

Good to see Royal doing things with Youtubers! Hopefully we can see more awesome things like this with other Cruise Tubers and cruise lines giving back

3 hours ago, cruisellama said:

Can Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos launch and recover a rocket from a helipad?

I mean they could do that

16 hours ago, twangster said:

Don’t think we’ll see any Oasis class in the Panama Canal any time soon as they don’t fit.  

There is a pic of the Oasis Class in the Panama Canal. It looks like a very tight fit

Stunning photos as always Twangster especially with the night shots of the stars!

As Matt said if the current rules are still in place with the CSO any ship that does not sail under the 95% route of the CSO will be required to conduct test sailings. Hopefully the CDC will drop the test sailing requirement and just make it so it is up to the cruise lines to decide if they want to do test cruises for all their ships or just do the simulated sailings for only a few of their vessels. 

That is awesome to see Royal doing this as other lines such as CCL has not been able to offer on-Site COVID-19 Testing Option for vaccinated guests.   

I think that is most likely the case that Wonder will use the Space Coast as her 2022 winter home port as the date that she gets to Port Canaveral is on a Sunday which is the day which Royal uses for turnaround day for the Oasis Class at the port. 

Awesome pics! Thanks for sharing 

My video from the day of the Mardi Gras & Odyssey. The RCI coverage starts at 2:06 in the video.

Great photos @ConstantCruiser! It sure was awesome to see her finally in the USA.

Awesome video from a Travel/Cruise Vlogger of Indy's arrival into the port. 

https://youtu.be/L1TUM9lLsgw