Biff215

I’m waiting on the next cruise planner sale as well, it’s been about a month since the last one. Hopefully it will be this weekend!

While I do think cruising will resume from some US ports this summer, it’s going to be a slow rollout which leads me to believe the Vision cancellation was mostly due to money. Sure they may be hoping to redeploy her ASAP out of a US port, but that’s still an unknown at this point. You can bet that if the numbers worked, those Bermuda cruises would still be happening. Of course I still fear a similar fate for Adventure as none of us know the true numbers that make this worthwhile for Royal. Even if sold out, the reduced capacity will no doubt hurt the bottom line. Only time will tell, but as others have said, I’ll feel a whole lot better once everything is officially released for the first sailings.

You have to imagine Royal will be similar, sounds like we may hear tomorrow. We’re traveling with two kids so we’re especially interested in seeing how they handle the policies that affect them. One can now get the vaccine and will so hopefully they’ll also consider that and not just lump her in with everyone 16 and under. We’re happy to wear masks if needed and follow any protocol necessary, but it will be interesting to see how this goes!

When we got Evian it was always in plastic bottles. We never really cared for it and it would go to waste. Same think would likely happen with Dasani so I guess we might go without now. I’ll just miss having something readily accessible in the room.

Two fun bits of info for Adventure I haven’t seen posted yet... Kieron Cox is the pub performer. He’s been on Royal ships a bunch in recent years including longer stints on Harmony. Make sure you check him out if you like some great guitar and singing. He’s already on board (in quarantine) and goes live on Facebook every Monday. www.kieroncox.com Also, looks like Hugo Arenas is Adventure’s cruise director for the restart (per Kieron on the Ship Show tonight).

I can’t comment on Quantum class, but we went from Harmony to Mariner back in 2019. While there is a significant difference in size between them, it wasn’t as disappointing as we had feared. Royal does a nice job designing ships around capacity so we’ve always found plenty to do without feeling too crowded. Our kids absolutely loved Harmony but even Mariner had its unique aspects that they may have even preferred in some cases.

Here’s one for you. My wife can access everything for our July Adventure sailing while I can’t get past the “we’re working on the fun” message for the same cruise. I even uninstalled and reinstalled the app but same thing. I’m hoping this gets fixed once we’re closer.

We’re also sailing July 3 and checkin has given us the same variety of messages and errors since we booked. As others have said, Royal is waiting as long as they can to fully lay out all the rules. You agree to most of these at checkin so it’s in their best interest (and ours) to wait. I’ll also feel a lot better once we can check in but don’t worry, it’s not a sign that it’s canceled.

The cruise planner fine print tells you to book for the total number of people in the party and pay for them as adults. Then they refund the kids to you as an OBC. Really dumb in my opinion and probably just bad website design that it requires that. You can try just booking the adults but you could run into problems with your first “courtesy” reservation. We enjoyed specialty dining with our kids on Mariner in January 2020 but it was a 3 night sailing so it was affordable and allowed us a different restaurant each night.

We did this on Mariner in January 2020 and went to Jamie’s, Chops, and Izumi. They allowed our kids to order whatever they wanted off the regular menu, but if there is a kids menu, they can force them to order off of there. It seems it can vary from ship to ship.

Just got this backpack for my birthday yesterday. I’ll still bring my larger backpack as my carryon, but this one seems perfect to pack and use on excursions. It’s designed by travelers so it has some nice features. Travel Backpack- Packable lightweight daypack for hiking, gym, and airplane https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06Y3DGCL2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_CX06BAHE6SP0709ATP49

Looks to be about a 25-30 minute ride.

I’m debating this as well. We’re flying in on embarkation day and out on debarkation day (I know Matt, taking our chances!). Would a taxi still be practical or would the Air2Sea transfer be a better bet? We have some flexible time on both sides but we’ll be dragging our luggage around with us so we may just have to spend that time waiting at the dock or airport.

Might be. Did you try this link? It’s not always easy to find. https://secure.cruisingpower.com/choiceair/protected/home.do?brand=R

Agreed. We used it in August 2019 on Harmony. What we also found at the time though is iMessages would go through without us having the wifi package as long as we were connected through the app. I’m hoping this loophole still exists although I doubt it if they’re charging for it on Quantum.

For a private island, there’s quite a bit of options, but most center around the beach, pool, and water park. There’s also the balloon and some other excursion type activities at an extra cost of course. There’s also complimentary food throughout the island that is worth the walk off the ship in my opinion. Worse come to worse, however, you can always just enjoy a fairly empty ship!

We just used Air2Sea for the first time a couple weeks ago for our July Adventure cruise (just prior to final payment). I found it almost too easy to use at first, and was totally confused when it didn’t ask me for payment. Michelle from MEI quickly confirmed that the cost would be added to final payment, which we made about 10 days ago. I then checked my reservation on American Airlines site but it still said “ticket pending” and “call your travel agent”. I called AA and they said everything looked good on their side and we even had seats (automatically assigned). Michelle called Air2Sea and they told her the same thing. I called and got someone different who confirmed that our tickets “were never issued”. She took care of it and within an hour everything was fixed and we were able to finally adjust our seats. So in the end it was more complicated than it needed to be but it all worked out. Just glad I caught it as who knows what would have happened come July if not. Still happy we used Air2Sea as it saved about $100/person.

Originally they said the no sail order would stay until November and then they sail it might be possible to sail in July. True, but that’s likely assuming that cruise companies are willing to jump through the hoops of the CSO (which it appears they aren’t). I think this is more political theater, they know bills like this won’t go anywhere. They’re just hoping that enough pressure will make the CDC cave. It’s likely to happen at some point, I just think the CDC is going to hold out as long as they can. One (unlikely) outbreak and everyone will be pointing at them again.

That certainly sounds reasonable since Freedom class are really just stretched versions of Voyager class ships. Great decision Royal made there in my opinion. As cool as it sounds to lengthen existing ships (Original Enchantment was our first cruise), there’s nothing like a brand new ship. Although we love Oasis class, Icon should be a really nice size ship with the best existing features plus new innovations!

Definitely make sure you have everything you need for the friend. Family members of ours took their grandchild on a cruise out of Florida (not on Royal). They were denied boarding and had to have paperwork sent down electronically and almost missed the cruise. I’d contact Royal directly about what they require.

So sorry to hear this Chris! We’re looking forward to seeing more of your vlogs from the ship and hope that happens soon!

We decided to do the same with our July Symphony cruise that we already had flights booked for (will have to use them another time). At least the Adventure cruises are likely to happen and we don’t have to play “wait and see”. It will be our first time flying internationally but we’re super excited to be cruising again!

I agree, we purposely don’t purchase Voom for that reason. Harmony and some other ships had a beta feature where you could message others in your party through the Royal app without wifi. It was great when you needed to separate and check in with each other. My daughter will turn 13 two weeks after the cruise and I assume we can’t fake her birthdate since Royal obviously knows it.

We have a 12 year old with her own device who is none too happy that she can’t sign into the app herself. We were actually hoping she could in case they allowed the messaging option like they had on Harmony as we don’t plan to get a wifi package. Any suggestions for communicating with a preteen who might get a little more independence than in the past?

I understand the concern about equating backyard barbecues and cruising, they’re certainly not the same. But let’s be honest, there are many who have been hosting and attending much bigger than that since the start of the pandemic. The cruise lines are simply using that date as the “return to (some) normalcy”. Cruising is a choice, not all that different than most other vacations. If thousands can pack into a theme park every day, I believe that cruise lines should be afforded the same option to reopen. Just my opinion though.