Mike.s

Quick update, the court has ruled against the ban, ruling it was illegal and beyond his authority https://crew-center.com/nice-mayor-overruled-court-blocks-cruise-ship-restriction-order

https://crew-center.com/royal-caribbean-ship-gets-cold-welcome-mayor-nice-you-are-not-allowed-be-there-you-are-nobody

It is, though I thought he was on a boat trying to board and deliver a letter, Captain wouldn't let him board

When were on board we had paid for the basic wi-fi (no streaming or video calling), however the internet team on board set up a seperate account so I could use the free enhanced minutes when I wanted (video call the grandchildren) and used the basic service the rest of the time. Worked really well.

Ouch, with prices like that I guess I'm not the target audience

It worrys me that the man who is now in charge of of Royal Caribbean group doesn't have the best track record when it comes to decisions most on this board like. Seems to put the bottom line above anything else.

When I click on manage reservation I can see the details but get a note that this reservation is not linked to my account, I get this for both my upcoming cruises, I'm confused.

The drinks perks on Celebrity are slightly different on Celebrity, you have a daily happy hour (it's 2 hours long) that gives you a limited range of drinks from a limited number of bars, we much prefer the way Royal do things. You also get a limited number of free Wi-Fi minutes, unlike Royal when you log off they stop counting down so if you're a light user of the internet this may be useful. Re the ports Ephesus is amazing but can get very busy, Mykonos very pretty but also busy. Haven't been to Rhodes and can't remember if we've been to Thessalonki!! so can't comment. We stayed in Piraeus the night before sailing, found a couple of nice bars to watch the world go by, a very short cab in the morning to get to the port.

Looks like all the Solstice class ships are to be modernised, starting with Solstice in 2026. https://travelweekly.co.uk/news/celebrity-cruises-to-spend-250m-refurbishing-solstice-class-ships https://www.rclinvestor.com/press-releases/release/?id=1762

Me also, I now have 2 bookings for lunch at Giovanni's on the same day at the same time!! Also very confused as to why Royal repriced my cruise as I'm from the UK, my TA couldn't explain but as we saved over £350 we agreed to go with the new price.

It's a shame they don't operate the same way Celebrity does, you get free internet minutes, but if you log off the clock stops counting down. We managed to make our free minutes last for most of the cruise. Having said that we're not big internet users and only used the minutes on sea days.

Sadly Celebrity still have them on Millennium

We did all our research for our trip, we're visiting Japan and South Korea, neither of which have a 6 month requirement or a requirement that the passport is less than 10 years old (as much of Europe does). Hence our suprise that Royal has a 6 month requirement, as it's their rule should they not of flagged it when we checked in?

Depends where they're sailing from, ships sailing from the UK and Australia have non smoking casinos (according to Royals website) Onboard Casino Casino Royale® allows smoking and has designated areas for both smoking and non-smoking guests. There will be visible signage indicating the smoking and the non-smoking area in the casino. Ships sailing from China and Hong Kong will not have a non-smoking area in the casino. Smoking is not permitted in the casino for any ships sailing from Australia and the United Kingdom.

We're due to sail in Japan with Celebrity in a months time. We received an update to the departure terminal and while reading the rest of the mail stumbled across a requirement that our passports must have 6 months validity from the end date of our cruise. This was news to us as neither Japan or South Korea have this requirement (passport must be valid up to and including departure date). My passport, not a problem, my better half, her passport has 1 day less than six months. Luckily for us we can renew her passport but we were nearly the couple who were denied boading Not sure why Celebrity didn't flag this when we checked in, all I saw was a recommendation that we have 6 months validity after our cruise, should it not of been a red flag?