KJones

4 hours ago, PPPJJ-GCVAB said:

I just checked for my upcoming cruise on Allure and the price is $158.99/pp for the 2 hour tour.  I would absolutely love to do this because it has so much included but the downer for me is that everyone must wear a N95 mask for the duration of the tour!  I just can’t spend 2 hours with a mask on anymore!  That is the deal breaker.

Could you book now to lock in the price just in case the mask requirement changes? Can always cancel later...

On our pre-pandemic sailing, all slots for the rest of the cruise were full by the 2nd day of sailing. We tried to switch our session to a different day but there were no openings. Would recommend you book on the cruise planner as soon as possible, if it's available to pre-book. If it's not, make it one of the first things you do after boarding. We kept our original session and really enjoyed it.

You could also ask about getting your meal to-go if the smells are too overwhelming in the restaurant

Yes, you should be able link reservations before boarding in the cruise planner to make it easier when making reservations onboard

1 hour ago, Ampurp85 said:

If you have the free government test and need to test for a cruise you can use OnPoint or similar testing website as they charge $15-20.

This is what we plan to do.
But you can also go to CVS/Walgreens etc and buy the OTC tests there too if you don't have any of the free ones left.

@deep1Well, you could cash out the leftover OBC at the casino and start a new bank account specifically for the cruise slush fund. Plus *in theory* you could be earning interest on that account too

Our Verizon plan has an international option that is either $5-10 per 24hr period per line. It worked just like our regular service back home - unlimited text/calls/data - and we had no issues with poor reception during our excursions in either of those ports.

@mgoyanesthat interval is your boarding time. They'll do the wellness check as part of the boarding/check-in process. No need to arrive earlier.

We did the Gumbalimba tour with the zipline package. Overall we enjoyed it, plenty of interaction with the macaws and monkeys. They pointed out a couple sloths that were in the trees but that was the extent of it. We were personally okay with that. We liked that we could stick around after the zipline & tour, and just hang out at their private beach (there's also a fresh water pool) until the last bus left to return to the ship.

You can try to find the cruise compass from a similar sailing here: https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/cruise-compass
Showtimes should be about the same.

Excursions typically won't take up the entire time a ship is in port. Royal & its vendors want to have some extra time between the end of the excursion and ship departure,  in case of any delays (traffic, bus breaks down, etc)

Call back to speak to a different agent who might be better informed

Yes, the tag call is the earliest you would leave, which is when you're luggage would be ready for pick up.
I think 8am is already pushing it to still be in your cabin. I would imagine the cabin stewards know what the time the room departures are (since they deliver the luggage tags), and will expect the rooms to be vacated by then.

As long as they have the ingredients (and a blender for the frozen drinks), any bar should be able to make any drink request, regardless of the "menu."

Maya Chan is fantastic! On our 2019 visit, there was an abundance of seagrass in the area (may have been just after a storm). Maya Chan let us know via email the day before, and offered a full refund if we wanted to cancel. We kept our reservation. Before we boarded the taxi, they reminded us of the seagrass. They said if we changed our mind when we got there, they would bring us back to port at no charge, plus the full refund, which was a nice gesture. 

Staff were very attentive, and came by regularly for drink orders and to drop off chips & salsa refills. Lunch was delicious. Each group of guests are spread throughout the beach so it never felt like other groups were crowding us. Plenty of snorkel gear, kayaks, floats to go around. Towards the end of the day one of us was starting to be bothered by the seagrass smell, so we spent the rest of the day relaxing in the pool. Our one regret was not getting massages (additional cost). We will definitely go back to during future Costa Maya stops.

3 hours ago, MaryCS62 said:

If Harmony has a free standing Starbucks, I know they take payment only via the app, gift cards, or I assume regular credit card (haven't been on that type of ship yet, but I know charges do not go to your onboard account). It certainly won't hurt to try!!!

On our pre-covid Harmony sailing, the free standing Starbucks was charged to our onboard accounts.

Generally they're the same. But you can get a better idea of what the schedule might be by looking a past cruise compass similar to your sailing:

https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/cruise-compass

@CruiseMom82thank you for the review!

@CruiseMom82@robostock how was this excursion? We are thinking of doing it as well since our flight doesn't leave until later in the evening.

7 hours ago, Julie.a said:

Their website asks that cruise passengers not book through them directly. 

Agree with @HeWhoWaits - just go ahead and book directly.

On 6/23/2022 at 4:29 PM, Julie.a said:

  I wanted to do the White Pass Scenic Railway, but didn't book before they all sold out. 

Have you tried booking the train directly through White Pass Railway?

I've never seen the coffee card for anything other than $31 in the cruise planner. I guess maybe they're more expensive onboard?

Unless you booked through a TA, I think you may have to keep calling RC to move your cabins closer together. This close to the cruise it may be difficult since I imagine there won't be many unoccupied rooms. I wish you luck!

9 hours ago, RedCruiser said:

I'm going on an Alskan cruise in September and through Royal caribbean they seem a bit pricey. I'm just wondering what people's experience is on this subject

We are also doing an Alaska cruise in September and the excursions are definitely more expensive than the Caribbean excursion pricing we've been accustomed to. However, I've also looked at independent tours for the same ports with similar activities and RC isn't that much more for most of them.

9 hours ago, RedCruiser said:

Also roughly how long do the ships dock for?

The hours that the ship is scheduled to be in each port should be listed on the itinerary and your Cruise Planner calendar.

Our return flight doesn't leave until 7:30pm, which gives us a good amount of time to kill after disembarkation. There are (3) RC excursions listed that include airport transfer, but all are fairly short and would have us at the airport by 2pm. Any suggestions for a company that could do a tour of the city with airport transfer (including storing luggage)? We're considering a rental car, but would rather not.