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Did you do the excursion with the cruise line or found your own? As I am trying to find an excursion now that would just take me to the beach to save time but not seeing anything quite yet.

So I am looking at OV Balconies, and I see the 7574 and 7576 have the arrows on it. Will this be a connecting balcony? Because I didn't select that category as it had a higher rate. Is this a way to bypass paying extra for connecting rooms or will the doors stay locked since I didn't specify for a connecting room OR does the arrows mean absolutely nothing lol.

That place looks amazing. Do you remember how long it took to travel from the port to Trunk Bay?

The one thing I was saying myself was this is the Icon sailing, maybe less port days are better to take in the ship more.

For those who have done both of these itineraries, which one did you prefer? There's a $1,300 price difference between these for the month of June, with the first one being the more expensive: Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas San Juan, Puerto Rico vs Philipsburg, St. Maarten Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas I've been to St Marrten and Puerto Rico. We did the city of PR, and thought this was the worst stop. Though if we went this time around we would go to Isla Verde beach in PR. We love the beaches preferred to walking a city. The DR we would probably just do the monkey tour. We always do the monkey/sloth tour when we visit Roatan, so it wouldn't be our first time with monkey's if we did DR. We have little feet that would be 4 and 7 at the time. So wild excursions is something we unfortunately haven't and wouldn't be able to do for quite some time.

You are correct on that. Royal became a family cruise with the Oasis class. Which was a smart move because it increased their revenue as it got more people onboard. RCCL wasn't a talked about brand before Oasis class. If the descriptions of Icon is accurate, I think it will take maybe two years for the culture change to calm down a bit. All of the new cruisers that are pumped up about Icon are not hesitating to book the ship. Most people did their bookings during Covid and there you have the other large percentage that made their bookings this past winter. So 2025 will have slightly less excited people, and then 2026 and beyond will be normal cruisers. In the past people behavior overall imo have been great on Oasis class during the summer which is why I am only interested in cruising those ships. When I saw the tours of Icon the first thing I noticed were how small the pools were. RCCL will hear of the complaints and make small adjustments for Icon I believe. Because they're not going to want their reputation to go to crap considering the price people have to pay to sail with them now. They have been getting away with robbery but that's due to their reputation.

Yeah, I pulled up videos and realized they all had some sort of backing. I don't ever sit fully back to begin with so I never noticed. It's a weird thing to remove though unless they noticed everyone sits forward like me

The kids complaint I am not understanding. I've only sailed on Oasis class during the month of June and have done that about six times. I don't recall seeing so many complaints about kids. Now for those complaining about kids on Icon, what were your recent experiences on the Oasis class and was it during a similar month for a proper comparison? How many more kids are sailing on Icon vs. Oasis class? Because Icon doesn't even sail at full capacity yet I thought. So wouldn't Oasis have more children by default? What ages are we defining as kids? I've never seen an issue with kids that's worthy of commenting about. Maybe I don't pay enough attention to people. I do know the ships I've been on has always had a lot of kids because Oasis class is catered to families. The only reason I can think kids behavior could be crazier on Icon vs. Oasis class would be due to new families cruising for the first time. There has to be a much larger percentage of new cruisers going on Icon. The problem still lies with the parents. A lot of the poop incidents I've read here and elsewhere has been with adults, which how as an adult are we pooping on ourselves is a bit wild. I am definitely going to sail on Icon just because I have a family with little ones, but it's making me rethink encouraging my first time Royal Caribbean cruisers to join us.

Oasis class just had benches. How can anything be worse than benches?

Is there a difference in quality of the show since this is the first indoors? Is it a letdown compared to the other ships or equal quality? This has been our favorite show that we always look forward to.

Yeah, I think you’re right. I sort of felt like that the last time but was thinking maybe it was due to less energy with the audience being so small. I do think in general for shows and small events they could be marketed more through the app. For this specific show they should have different questions pretty often. I mean there’s at least an hundred different questions you can ask any married couple. There’s so many newlywed board games they can borrow from. Some of the entertainment is based on the participants, and if the host isn’t pulling information out of them to get a story the show can become very dull.

Sailing after Covid I noticed the Love and Marriage is a hardly attended event now, when pre-Covid, at least on my summer sailings it used to be nearly a full house. Anyone else experience the same? The host for Wonder of the Seas in June 2023 also did a horrendous job hosting. There was just a lack of entertainment on their behalf and lack of encouragement to the participants. My wife has encouraged us to do it but the only reason I do not participate is because my answers and behavior would be so boring, and I wouldn't want to poop the party for those watching. I know it's a bit cruise nitpicking but this is a discussion forum after all. It's my favorite show on the ship. I'm guessing Royal Caribbean had a lot of new sailors since Covid or people just lost interest in the game.

Pre-covid white nights on Oasis class ships was always a popular event. I only can sail in the summer as I won't take my kids out of school for a vacation. So it could be participation was high during the summer months. I don't recall there being a white party post-covid on the sailings I been on. I wear all white in general in the summer so it's no biggie either way for me. Caribbean night doesn't make sense because it's a cruise..so generally people are going to wear Caribbean outfits on at least 2 of their sailing days.

I always thought when they introduced ages 18-25 that it would be pretty weird. Mixing underage drinkers with drinkers doesn't make sense, neither does have 24 and 25 year old men chasing after 18 and 19 year old girls. Did Royal Caribbean finally update this to separate the ages more? 18-20 would be more appropriate in my mind. I do also understand 18-20 would be very niche, so there's that also. Anyone with children had experiences with the hyperlink meetups? What were your kids thoughts?

I just saw a video of Wonder of the Seas, is it true that Solarium Bistro is now charging for dinner? Pre-Covid I went on Symphony and Oasis, and neither charged for Solarium for dinner.