karl_nj

On 7/9/2022 at 3:25 PM, JLMoran said:

Are there are other folks here in the forum who have sailed similarly comparable ships, and could give similar reports on the differences and your experiences on each? I think there are really only two other comparisons like this that could be made:

• Voyager class on Royal vs Solstice class on Celebrity
  • I'm pretty sure the Solstice class is most comparable to Voyager class in size and capacity, but if Freedom class on Royal is the better comparison...
• Quantum class on Royal vs Edge class on Celebrity
  • The few reports I've read about Edge, Apex, and Beyond all clearly show that their designs took strong influences from Royal's Q class; but are they simply "Quantum plus" in amenities and activities, or are they a more significant step up?
  • So far, Q class on Royal has been our favorite; I feel like if I wanted to get my wife to try X, starting with an Edge class ship might be the best route (even if their itineraries are a lot more limited)

Voyager and Solstice classes are so very different though, even from a ship hardware POV.  Not sure you can really compare the two.

I agree about Radiance vs Millenium class and Quantum vs Edge though.  Quantum class and Edge class were even built by the same shipyard.  But they are still pretty different.  The "infinite balcony" cabins on that class are either "love it" or "hate it".

What do you and your wife like most about the Quantum class ships?

12 hours ago, ClarkNotClock said:

By about day 3, my entire party started to realize that the on-ship experience could have been better. I noticed that most things were because of staffing issues. (Anyone who was trying to get pizza at Café Promenade on day 4 knows what's up.) At best, service was attentive yet frazzled and at worst, clueless and frustrating. 

Honestly, I still loved this cruise anyway. A lot of the negative experience was mostly because of management. I can see myself coming back on Royal Caribbean, but maybe once things settle down post-COVID. Things didn't feel right, but nothing felt wrong either. 

I think you are likely right about staffing issues and service post COIVD.  I've been on 3 cruises since the cruise restart.  The first one was on Celebrity Edge in Aug 2021; the service was great on that cruise, but I think that was more due to the fact that there were hardly any passengers onboard then it being on Celebrity vs Royal.  The second one was Oasis of the Seas October 2021, the service wasn't as great, because the passenger load was increasing.  My most recent cruise was Anthem of the Seas during Christmas Week—you could totally tell the staff was overwhelmed by the passenger volumes.

Like you, I still had fun on all three cruises, but I'm certainly going into my next cruise in August, on Wonder of the Seas, with lowered expectations due to the staffing difficulties everyone is having worldwide, in every industry.

As a "Fan of Royal Caribbean" I'm glad to see that you realize it's difficult to compare any cruise lines right now, to service received before the cruise lines had to shut down over COVID.  I'm also a big proponent of encouraging people to try multiple cruise lines.  But I would recommend giving RCL a try again in the future.  Maybe in a few years check out one of the Oasis class ships, as they are certainly different than any other cruise ships out there (thought I think MSC is trying to go in that direction with one of their new ship classes.)  Or maybe try a Quantum class ship, my favorite RCL ship class.  By the time you might be ready to try RCL again, the Icon class should also be sailing, we should find out more about those ships this fall.

Looking forward to reading your blog post about your experiences with food on the ship!

13 minutes ago, Matt said:

How do you know they got it from the ship if they test positive when they get home? They could have gotten it in the airport, airplane, McDonalds, etc.

I keep hearing about people at work that are catching COVID from, uh, I guess somewhere that doesn't involve a vacation.  However, they don't post about it on Facebook, since there isn't a specific Facebook group for people who shopped at Publix some time during the week of June 26th.

Looks like NCL has now dropped pre-cruise testing where no longer required:

EU Healthy Gateways Ends Pre-Cruise Testing Requirements

For sailings beginning August 1, 2022, vaccinated guests sailing on a cruise originating from any port EXCEPT a U.S. port; Canadian port; or Piraeus, Greece are exempt from all pre-cruise COVID-19 testing requirements.

5 hours ago, TXcruzer said:

In March we had 12 people test at my house in less than 30 minutes.

Christmas week certainly did not do you any favors.

It really is as easy as I make it sound.

I'm glad you have had good luck; in my experience not everyone does.  Especially in households with those under 18 years of age, since they can't have their own accounts.  It's impossible to do 4 tests at once when 2 people are under age 18.

On 6/26/2022 at 3:39 PM, TXcruzer said:

I am sorry but I don't buy the cost issue from any of us that will spend thousands for a cruise, then complain about $25 for the test. 

As for timing, you can do the test in the parking lot prior to embarkation, if the WiFi on board isn't up to snuff.

There really aren't any excuses

It took me all day to manage to get though 4 online emed tests for my cruise the last week of 2021.  Between a covid wave, lots of christmas week travel, and amazon cloud server issues, it certainly was not as easy as you make it sound.

On 6/23/2022 at 2:33 PM, Ampurp85 said:

This is a YMMV situation. You brought the UDP for your child and paid a set price as opposed to adding your child at separate occasions for $10 each time. That $10 add-on is for children and mainly the children's menu. Which the waiter could choose to enforce or not. 

My experience has been that I was charged the adult price at the Steakhouse on both Celebrity Edge and Oasis of the Seas for my 12 year old in 2021.  I didn't question it, since she ordered from the adult menu.  I'm glad other people were able to get a reduced price for their kids in Specialty Restaurants.  

2 hours ago, HeWhoWaits said:

Your son can order anything and everything on the menu. Age of the passenger is not relevant.

 

Though keep in mind, at a specialty restaurant, if your 12 year old orders from the adult menu, you are charged the adult price, not the kids price.  Which makes sense, as they ate an adult meal.

On 6/10/2022 at 3:34 PM, TXcruzer said:

 

Testing is a qualifier to cruise at a certain lower level of restrictions; however it is NOT a CDC requirement to cruise period. 

Viking Ocean had been doing daily onboard COVID Tests, but they just stopped that as the US no longer requires testing fly back.  Interestingly, they also just made a change to no longer require COVID tests for boarding, except for sailings out of the US and Canada.

I wonder if Royal will do the same, and drop all tests to board except for sailings out of the US/Canada.

6 hours ago, Toby said:

This is not a complaint.  It is a mystery to me how taxes are calculated.

 

In December last year we were able to get a substantial reduction in the cost of our B2B cruises booked for August, 2022 via the price guarantee associated with the Cruise With Confidence program.  Looking at the first invoice when the cruises were first booked, and then the invoice after the reprice the taxes and port fees stayed the same.  I fully understand the port fees being the same amount no matter the cost of the cruise.  It is the tax portion of that line item I find curious.  Most taxes I am familiar with are calculated as tax rate percentage times the some cost amount.   The only thing I can deduce is the taxes paid are based on the full retail cost of the cruise before any and all discounts are applied which seems odd to me . 

I am happy with the reduction in price so I have never pursued the issue.

I don't think the "taxes" have anything to do with what you paid for the cruise.  I just did a mock booking for a cruise in a inside cabin, and the taxes and fees were $387.44.  Then I changed it to a balcony cabin, taxes and fees were $387.44.  Biggest suite, $387.44.

Perhaps they are based per passenger?

8 hours ago, PaulMcC said:

We are going on a repositioning cruise in late October on Celeb Beyond.  We embark at Cape Liberty, but our cruise ends in Ft Lauderdale, FL.  Obviously, if we park at the port (as we've often done in the past for RT cruises from there), we have to fly from Ft Lauderdale, FL to Newark, NJ to get back to get our car at Cape Liberty.  I have two questions:

1) Will there be enough parking (whether indoors or outdoors)?  Adventure embarks passengers on Sat, Oasis on Sun, and our cruise on Weds.  That seems like an awful lot of cars to be parked there!  Will we be able to find parking there with 2 cruise ships worth of parking already filled?  Anyone else ever encounter this sort of situation at Cape Liberty?

2) Since we will be flying into Newark International Airport after the cruise, we will need to get a taxi over to the port. Can you get into the parking building or the outside lot on a day when no ship will be in port?  What if it's late at night?  Will security allow you to get your car anytime, 24/7?  I know their model is based on RT cruises, but they've done repositioning cruises in the past.  Anyone else do this?

Thanks, Paul

 

Whenever I've done a "one way cruise" i've never parked at the cruise terminal; i've always used an uber or car service.  But I live in North Jersey so it's not super far for me to get to any of the NY Area cruise ports.

Maybe parking at EWR makes more sense?  Then uber over to the cruise port?  Then it should be easier to get to your car once you fly back to Newark.

1 hour ago, wordell1 said:

I consider a pull-out couch to be an upgrade over the old pullman's.  I think most would rather that than climbing up into a narrow bed.

Kids don't seem to mind "bunk beds"; they often prefer them.  Especially if it means they don't need to share a bed with their sibling.

1 hour ago, Peter D said:

You might want to consider booking two connected staterooms (or adjacent even).  It probably cost a bit more, but there are definitely benefits to doing so.

Sometimes the price difference isn't as much as you would think.  Often the rooms that can hold 3-4 are more expensive for passenger 1 and 2, compared to a room that only has double occupancy.

I thought that non refundable wasn't available for suites, did they change something recently?

8. Why was the decision made to enforce only non-refundable deposit fare options for Suite inventory (specifically Grand Suite or higher) and Guarantee categories?
In an effort to preserve our valued Suite inventory and to ensure availability for our committed guests, a non-refundable deposit will become the only option for those guests interested in reserving an upper Suite.

https://creative.rccl.com/Sales/Royal/LTYA_News/17056800_Nonrefundable_FAQ_News.pdf

3 hours ago, FF86 said:

What some people fail to calculate into their beverage packages is the DBP contains alcohol PLUS all the items in the lower tiers (sodas, coffees, water, fresh-squeezed juices, milkshakes etc.).  So when you are calculating if it is worth it, don't forget about those numbers as well.  You don't have to drink x # of drinks per day to get your value if you are also factoring in the other items you get.  And take advantage of it.  I would never naturally order the "fresh squeezed orange juice", but I do on the cruise.

Yeah, that is certainly one way to look at it—and if you are enjoying all the "extras" that you normally wouldn't order, you are certainly getting value out of getting the drink package.  And that isn't even counting things that many others have mentioned, like convenience, being willing to try new things (and abandon them if they aren't to your liking), and not having any bar bill surprises.  You can't really assign a price to those, but there is certainly some value there too.

However, the other way to look at the drink package is if it's saving you money.  If it's something you wouldn't order unless you had the drink package, and you are trying to figure out if the package is actually saving you money, then you shouldn't include it in your calculations.  I think this is where the discrepancy in opinions about the drink package comes from.

I've never bought the drink package on an RCL cruise; it won't save me money, and I prefer to explore the full wine list at dinner, instead of being limited to the wine by the glass menu.  However, on my last Celebrity cruise, the fare included the base drink package, and I even paid to upgrade it to the 'better' package.  I can certainly see why people enjoy having the drink package.  I certainly made good use of it!

I didn't sail on Royal in the 80's, but I did sail on an NCL ship in the mid 80's, so a dedicated buffet restaurant not showing up on new, bigger, ships until the late 80's sounds about right.  On NCL's Skyward in 1986/87, there was no buffet.  There were two seatings in the main dining room for breakfast and dinner.  On sea days they would setup a lunch buffet in a conference room on the pool deck, with some hamburgers and hotdogs and such.  I assume you could also go to the MDR for lunch, but I was 12 and in no mood to go sit down in the MDR for lunch.

Kids were also banned from using the elevators!   But I was allowed to visit the bridge on sea days!

And there was no "kids club", but they did have some activities for kids on one of the open decks in the morning on sea days.  I still have a metal that I won when my team won some kids cruise ship olympics thing.  

Yes, you take your masks off for photos.

I've never had any luck combining Amex Cruise Privileges and whatever the sale of the week is going on with Royal Caribbean.

I've had much better luck using it when sailing Cunard.

27 minutes ago, twangster said:

But did he get UA points?   

Yeah, actually, it has a UA "flight" number and everything.  Counts as a segment for elite qualification, etc.  It's kinda crazy, actually.  Since it's a bus from ABE to EWR.  And the flight was cheaper than it would have been if he booked out of EWR and skipped the bus.  I was kinda annoyed, but I certainly wasn't going to drive out to PA just to take a bus back to NJ, just to get a cheaper flight.

4 hours ago, twangster said:

For May it looks like the Amtrak train is a bus.  At least on the day I need it.

There is a "flight" on United Airlines from some airport in PA to EWR that is actually a bus...

One of my friends took it once, because the fare was cheaper then booking the flight he needed out of EWR.  Even though he wasn't thrilled about the taking the bus ride.

On 12/14/2021 at 1:35 PM, twangster said:

I'm also of the opinion that for the most part the double points promo isn't creating a change in overall numbers that wouldn't have occured anyways. 

The C&A points from my Christmas cruise on Anthem just hit my account, and now I'm (finally!) at the Diamond level.  The double points certainly helped, but I would have ended up at Diamond by now anyway, if all of my planned Royal Caribbean cruises didn't get cancelled by covid.

Interestingly, I hit Diamond with 9 cruises, one being a "double point" suite.  Which, I believe, would have been the number of cruises needed to hit in order to reach Diamond back before they changed the program in 2011.  Of course, my cruises were all 7 day (or more) cruises, whereas back in the day one could get to Diamond after taking 10 3 night cruises (perhaps only 5 if they were all suites, thought the double points for suites wasn't a thing from the start of the program).

29th cruise overall, counting all cruise lines.  9 on Royal, 7 on NCL (but alot of those were 1-2 night cruise to nowhere's, which barely count), 5 Disney, 4 Cunard, 2 Celebrity and 2 Carnival.

Now time to plan more cruises...

1 hour ago, twangster said:

Answer: Omicron!  Are you kidding me!  Ugh.     

At least I'll be quarantined in "modern luxury"!  

I was reading on Cruise Critic that for quarantine on Celebrity, you get moved to a Balcony cabin (vs an oceanview on Royal).  And if you do have a drink package, they will still send you drinks via room service.  I donno if they will send you free Elite drinks during happy hour or not—lets hope you don't need to find out!

10 minutes ago, BrianAlt said:

I agree with what you said here @twangster.  I really enjoy Celebrity.  I also really enjoy Royal.  They want to be a "luxury line", but they're still mostly mainstream.  Just a bit of a step up from Royal.  Definitely not a giant leap.

One thing you left out (or two) are the Aqua class dining room and the Suite class dining room, Blu and Luminae.  Costal Kitchen on Royal is great, but to me both of these are a step above.  Aqua class cabins are regular balcony cabins with a special dining room designed to be "healthier".  In practice, the food is as healthy as you make it.  You can still eat a plate of bacon every morning if you like.

I guess that makes sense, since the MDR food is also often "a step above" on Celebrity too.  My daughter had the everyday NY Strip on Celebrity Edge most days in August.  When we were on Oasis at the end of October, the quality of the NY Strip was noticeably different on Royal.  I don't think she noticed or cared though, and enjoyed it on both ships.

On the other hand, the menu descriptions do seem to be very "fancy" on Celebrity.  More fancy than they really are.  They like to talk about truffles all the time.  Wife and I aren't huge fans of truffles.  Luckily it seems like all Celebrity does is whisper "truffle" above the plate of food, while vaguely waving one around, sealed in a plastic bag....

10 minutes ago, BrianAlt said:

Also, on Celebrity if you're in a Sky Suite you're considered a full suite guest.  The Sky Suite is like a Jr. Suite on Royal and on Royal you're treated like a semi-suite guest in a Jr. Suite.  

One thing missing on Celebrity are the Broadway style shows.  The shows tend to be more of the revue style shows.  But they also incorporate some terrific acrobatics in some. 

Their ships also seem to have fewer (but larger) bars.  On Edge my wife and I kinda missed having a large number of different bar venues to visit during the cruise, compared to most Royal ships.  Indoors, there was really just the martini bar, eden, and the nightclub (which was dead until late at night).  So basically two bars to switch between.

I did like that they have more of an Enrichment/Lecture program on Celebrity.  Not as in depth as Cunard, but still nice to have as an option.

4 minutes ago, Mike.s said:

Re Royal V Celebrity, once you add in the drinks package and wi-fi the price difference is suprisingly small, that was our experience on our recent UK cruises.

 

The delta is bigger if you are traveling solo (like @twangster) or taking along kids too young to drink (like me), as you are paying for a drink package for people that don't exist, or can't use it.

4 minutes ago, dodgestang said:

Was on Anthem for Christmas....they wanted you to wear a mask in solarium.

Didn't seem like anyone paid attention to that request though.