Rackham

After cruising a multitude of times in the past two years and treating it partially like a class in Royal Caribbean cruising, I personally prefer the Windjammer over the MDR. In exchange for a couple menu items per evening (either more expensive offerings, like lobster tail, or things which don't work on a buffet) there's a wider range of options than what's presented on the MDR menu with which you're free to mix and match. Service is at your speed. Portion sizing is under your control. However, the Eggs Benedict is better in the MDR and the presentation of the French onion soup is better there too (though I find it easier to eat when having it in the 'jammer since there isn't a broiled mess of cheese on top). Depending on the ship class there's fantastic views from the Windjammer; that goes double in Alaska. My biggest issue is/was getting over the mental hurdle of "I'm passing up a table service meal for a buffet," even when I'm finding the buffet to be better.

Can't imagine Royal getting rid of that one. The servicing charge on drink vouchers, based on personal estimates, isn't that much (and is easily incorporated into fare pricing without significantly impacting them), yet gets people really, really fired up to be "Loyal to Royal" for those future benefits. Even people who would be better off aiming for the lowest total cruise price with any line, doing the itinerary they want, which includes Diamond and up style benefits, or at least drinks, want to cruise with Royal for loyalty status. My guess is the biggest overall change will be you have to remain active, sailing once every so many years, with the primary RCG brands to keep your loyalty status with any of the lines. Disney quietly implemented the requirement of once every 5 years early this year and MSC has had theirs set at 3 years before that. So with the RCG, something like at least one cruise every five years with either Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, or Silversea to keep your status in the newly combined program. This would be part of the reason why they're aligning loyalty programs as keeping truly separate accounts would make deactivation (and reactivation when things go "oopise") more problematic. I'm also going to speculate that they'll be transitioning C&A points to the Captain Club's system on Celebrity where cabin category determines how many points are earned per night. While it's true that no other mass market line uses such a system, this doesn't mean they cannot. With the differences in pricing between Royal's newest ships and oldest alongside pricing differences with interiors versus suites, this could help Royal promote their whales quicker and encourage people desiring C&A benefits to book slightly more expensive cabins than they might otherwise have.

In addition to. There's also roller skating offered during select hours.

While I can't see Royal cannibalizing DBP sales by offering a 10 punch, any drink card in the cruise planner, I could see them offering a 10 punch card good on glasses of beer and wine up to $10-11 each for around $60 ("SAVE UP TO 45% ON BEER AND WINE BY THE GLASS!") People who want cocktails will skip it, people who were wanting a beer and wine package will consider it, and light drinkers might bite since they don't know how much they'll actually drink aboard and don't want to commit the money to the full DBP (among a multitude of groups).

Same suitcase positioned 90° to the previous. 27.25 in of height including the wheels.

Arrived before us and you get an extra hour or so at Perfect Day?

Greetings from Anthem.

This is a medium sized, TravelPro hardside with a height of 13" underneight a standard bed on Anthem. There might be another inch of usable height here.

Greatings from Anthem.

Currently onboard Anthem. Here's how it appears in the cruise planner. It's under "Clash for the Crystal City" and not "Laser Tag". I haven't been tracking this, but it appears to appear the night before like the complementary iFly and NorthStar reservations. Other Sea Plex activities, such as skating, also seem to be populating then too.

The only penalty, at this point, is your son won't receive an extra loyalty point per night. Port taxes and fees and such should be refunded for the other person.

I'm not seeing brunch offered this week aboard Anthem. It's always breakfast and lunch on the in app menus.

Without knowing the Royal's internals, the goal of any loyalty program is customer retention. Royal needs people booking interiors just as much as balconies. So if someone enjoys interior cabins, Royal wants them booking them early and often with the company. Suites and solos receive an extra point per night in recognition of the significantly higher fares associated with them. With that said, I wouldn't be surprised if long term Royal's loyalty program adopts Celebrity's tiered point system based on cabin category.

When the drink vouchers were first introduced, every tier receiving them had one less per day to use (i.e. Diamond received 3 instead of 4). Royal upped the daily count to its current amounts during the first year in place. Along with posters on multiple boards saying they either don't use all of their vouchers per day or using them on things like canned soda and bottled water, the drink vouchers don't really cost Royal that much*. Even ordering premium cocktails which are covered (up to $14) the cost to Royal is measured in dollars; maybe $3 or so at the most in ingredients. Yet when people are discussing the benefits, it's always $56 in drink savings every day of the cruise for Diamonds, rarely is it how much savings are actually applicable for most. And many Diamond and up still buy a drink package of some sort based on form postings. Thus, I don't think Royal will be eliminating this benefit simply because people seriously overestimate how much the vouchers are worth, but it generates serious excitement towards climbing the C&A ranks. There used to be frequent posts asking how can someone climb the ranks faster and cheaper because DRINK VOUCHERS! * A post I made back in October about Royal's voucher costs.

Gut feeling is it allows Royal to capture some pre-cruise spending from seasoned cruisers who know how the card works and drives sales of the refreshment package from those who don't. Here's a screenshot from one of my upcoming cruises. While the water package lists bottles, the coffee card doesn't list coffees the card entitles the purchaser to. It appears from this screen (at first glance) that it's like the refreshment package, but only for coffee. Most people will start at the top with the refreshment, see that coffee is included, wonder why anyone would get the coffee card for the same or more money, and purchase the refreshment instead of the card. And before someone chimes in that people wouldn't think like this, consider the amount of questions which are asked here and elsewhere where the person would have had an answer by reading what Royal provides on their website or could be found by dropping their question into an online search engine and clicking the first link. Or the number of people who are angry because something didn't work the way they assumed it would because they didn't bother reading the materials Royal provides.

To be fair, the song states "When I get to you..." from the singer's point of view. There's nothing there about when YOU get to CocoCay.

At maximum capacity, and I'm assuming 7-night sailings to make this slightly easier (though it's not correct), the number you're looking for is 81,941 passengers to fully sell out Icon, Oasis, Quantum Ultra, and Quantum classes. However, it's been mentioned somewhere from Royal that they only need around 30%-40% of max. capacity to break even on ship expenses for their large, modern ships. So at 30%-40%, Royal needs 24,582 to 32,776 passengers across all ship classes mentioned, or an average of 1,891 to 2,521 passengers per ship. Not really that many people when they can draw on international visitors as well.

The 95% RTP on video poker is with perfect play. It's possible to learn how to play perfectly at home before your cruise. The casino aboard may or may not allow a how to play cheat sheet while sitting at the machine (I haven't tried). I haven't bothered paying attention (since I play low values), but since the video poker machines allow you to pick your credit denomination, you might be able to wager $50-$100+ a hand. Each hand can be done in seconds once you're in the groove.

Economies of scale and modern engineering. From what I recall, and someone please correct me if I'm wrong, a modern Oasis-class ship only uses 30% more fuel than a Radiance-class ship yet caries around 3x the passengers. Then for services aboard the ship, the it's not a linear scale between sizing either. There's an increase moving to a larger ship with the higher educated and paid positions, as you'd expect, but it's not 3x the positions either. Then there's all the additional features which can be included in a larger ship thanks to the captive audience and available space. i.e. additional revenue generating opportunities, stuff which looks cool in ads and home videos, and things which impress general audiences to draw them back again versus trying the competition.

One thing Disney World has going for it, which Royal doesn't, is the ability to reduce major expenditures such as staffing through reduced hours of operation and reduction in scheduling, hotel rooms available, and ride vehicles in use during predicted slower times. On the other hand, Royal is aiming to fill 100% of the cabins, 100% of the time as major related expenditures don't change much with less occupancy aboard a cruise ship. Not to mention the reduction in ship occupancy means a reduction in post booking spending by the total passengers booked for a sailing. Which leads me to this. I don't think we'll see the bargain basement pricing again (baring a major event which reduces leisure travel), but I also don't believe we'll continue to see these massive year-over-year increases either. Royal needs the bookings, and while Royal's ships are unique in the industry, they're not as unique as a whole compared to other lines as Disney theme parks are to the majority of theme parks in the USA. Basically, Royal has actual competition in the mass market cruise line space which can't be completely ignored long term.

It's one to two pieces per sushi item. The sashimi and hibachi steak was full sized though. The sushi was more of a drinking snack than a full / half roll.

20 days to go! If you're trying to decide when to take advantage of a complementary NorthStar reservation (once aboard the ship), here's the golden and blue hours for when we'll be in port. In general, the view should be splendid (weather permitting) for reservations starting between 5:00 pm to 5:30 pm. Cape Canaveral, FL (December 26) Sunset: 17:34 Golden Hour: 16:58:54 — 17:50:12 Blue Hour: 17:50:12 — 18:00:09 Nassau, Bahamas (December 27) Sunset: 17:28 Golden Hour: 16:55:00 — 17:44:23 Blue Hour: 17:44:23 — 17:54:01 Perfect Day at CocoCay (December 28) Sunset, golden hour and blue hour should be roughly the same as Nassau on the 27th.

AHAHAHA... NO.

Engine issue has been fixed. We should be good for all ports on the itinerary. https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2976238-speaking-of-anthem/

I'm expecting either The Key having private hours or a priority line pass instead of straight up charging for waterpark access. This provides a unique draw on the front end (book Icon class and your kids have an accessible waterpark aboard every day!) and an up sale opportunity (You want to play more than wait more, right? For only $15 per person, per night of your cruise, you can skip the regular lines at Category 6 during operating hours.)