steverk

On a related note. I was on Allure recently and discovered a US plug under the bed. Very handy for charging your phone.

Sorry to burst your bubble, but Kona can't dock cruise ships at all. It is a tender only port.

If we're going to speculate about Royal's direction, and we want to sound intelligent about it, we need to look at it from Royal's point of view. That means developing a list of requirements and working from there. For the requirements we need to know the mission of the new ship? Does it go to cold weather ports like Alaska and Norway? Does it need to transit the Panama and/or Suez Canal? Is it going to be used to open new markets or ports for Royal? A bigger ship has better economy of scale, but only if you can fill it. How big should it be? I'm sure there's much more to this, but you get the point. IMO, Royal needs a new class of ship that can go to cold weather ports and should be able to transit the Panama Canal. It will be as large as possible and still meet these requirements. That still gives it a decent, but not great, economy of scale. Not everyone agrees that Royal will build this. They very well could make yet another warm weather monster in the 300,000 GRT range, but I'm going with my theory! The requirement to transit the canal limits the size of the ship dramatically. The Celebrity Edge class ships can and do transit the new canal. They are about 130,000 GRT, so that's probably about the size of the new class. Since most of us are more familiar with Royal's ships, Voyager of the Seas is 137,276 GRT. Being a cold weather ship implies a thicker hull with thicker propellers. It also means an indoor pool would be a big nice to have. Norway has passed a law saying that all cruise ships going into the legendary fjords will need to be zero emissions. I expect the new ship will comply. Given that this is Royal, we can expect a bunch of new and creative bells and whistles on this ship. So there's my prediction for the next class of ship: 130,000+/- GRT neo-panamax Indoor pool Thicker hull and propellers to deal with chunks of floating sea ice "Zero" emissions. Lots of new clever toys on board. I'll even go one step farther. I predict the lead ship in this class will be sailing before the end of the decade.

Keep in mind that Pride of America is about 1/2 the size of Ovation. That gives it much greater flexibility in ports. Also, NCL has a much bigger commitment to Hawaii. The local authorities are probably more likely to go the extra mile for them.

Charging for Sorrentos, or any venue is always a possibility. However, I think it would be self defeating for Royal to do so. Yes, revenue would increase from those willing to pay. But expenses would also increase. Why? Because Pizza is one of the cheapest things they can serve. For each person that decides to skip paying for pizza, they'll fill up on other, more expensive, food. Add the impact on customer satisfaction, and you've got a bone headed decision.

I have. It depends a lot on the sailing. Most of the time it is not crowded outside of happy hour. However, I was on a panama canal cruise where they closed the viking crown lounge to accommodate all of the diamond members. It was still crowded during happy hour. So it seems adequate for most sailings, but not for sailings with lots of diamond members.

I once found my favorite captain on Facebook and asked him

I can't speak in detail about the relationship between Royal and the port workers, but I've observed several things that I believe are relevant to this. Royal uses Intercruise at every port that I've visited. This includes Ft. Lauderdale, Miami, San Juan, Galveston and Vancouver. Intercruise is indeed a contract company. Therefore, Royal does not directly employ the people you meet at the port. Carnival uses Carnival employees in Galveston. Therefore, Royal could do the same, or hire a different contract company for shoreside services. That also means that Royal does have leverage over the company and could use it to reign in the most troublesome port personnel. So why doesn't Royal use their leverage to make the shoreside experience more customer focused and friendly? Beats me!

I'm sorry to hear about your experience. I too have had issues with the Intercruise people at the port. Not as bad as uour experience, but bad enough! Unfortunately, they act like they are God's or something. Royal needs to get rid of them! Carnival did. Royal needs to as well.

Actually the nuclear cruise ship Savannah was built in 1959, so this isn't unheard of

I've had great experiences with Air2Sea, but please keep in mind that the airlines aren't what they once were. Air2Sea can't change that. Specifically, I've had 2 experiences where Air2Sea was able to move mountains and really saved the day. I'll explain them here. (YMMV as Air2Sea cannot force the airlines to do anything) Back in June 2021, we were flying home from a cruise from St. Maarten with a connection in Miami. We made the connection without issue, but sat on the plane at the gate for 5 hours. At midnight, the flight was cancelled. American said they have a policy of booking hotels, but none were available, so we'd have to sleep in the airport. Even worse, the next flight American would book for us was in 4 days! I called Air2Sea. They put us up in a hotel at their expense and got us at the top of the standby list for the first flight out in the morning. We made that flight and were very happy. On another (family) cruise at Thanksgiving 2021, my son was flying from Birmingham AL to San Juan PR. He drove to the airport and realized he forgot his COVID vaccine card. There was not enough time to go home and get it, so he missed the plane. Unfortunately, there weren't any flights from Birmingham to San Juan that would arrive before the ship departs the following day. He called Air2Sea and they were able to help out. They pieced together a segment from Brimingham to DFW with a tight connection to a flight to San Juan. This was not a published itinerary. Once again, they were able to move mountains. Because of these 2 experiences, I always use Air2Sea if at all possible.

Thanks for the heads up. I'm not sure exactly what is happening with this booking, but it sounds like one more good reason to avoid making any payments ahead of final payment date.

I've now sailed on 30+ cruises and I've only been allowed access to the staterooms before 1pm twice. Once on Princess and once on Celebrity. The Celebrity sailing was June 2021. It was the first sailing from North America after the pandemic, so there wasn't anyone to offload. In other words, I've never once seen Royal Caribbean allow access to the rooms for any reason before 1pm, or even later. Please note, I've sailed out of Galveston 15 times. I agree with @SpeedNoodles. Drop them with the porters or at the bag drop. Carrying them around for hours is simply not worth it.

I've always thought this was the ultimate in waste. Have the digital kiosks and still print out every single photo! To be honest, why do they have the kiosks or photo centers at all? Why can't you browse and purchase your photos through the app?

Yes...we're going to have to have a discussion

You get access to the diamond concierge. Email is the 2 letter ship code followed by [email protected] Best of luck getting it resolved. I've had mixed luck with that.

In my case, it is per cabin.

I'm probably cheap, but I usually leave an extra 20 for the stateroom attendant and waiter. An additional 10 for the assistant waiter. I'll adjust upward if service is exceptional. It frequently is. I never remove tips.

Thank you for the very thoughtful response. One thing that I would have thought to have been a wake up call for Carnival was Royal Caribbean International out pacing Carnival Cruise Lines in every department. Just looking at those 2 brands and not any sister companies, Royal has 26 ships compared to 25 for Carnival. Royal has larger ships. Royal has more births at sea. And recently, Royal overtook Carnival on total passenger boardings. Including all of the sister brands, Carnival is still larger in every measure than Royal Caribbean group though.

My wife's SetSail pass says "Diamond Plus - Choice" while mine says "Diamond Plus." Does anyone know what the "choice" phrase means? I've never noticed this before, but looking back, some, but not all, of my wife's SetSail passes have had it.

My biggest concern with Carnival is that they aren't replacing ships fast enough. Between all 9 of their brands, they have just under 90 ships. To keep a fleet of that size under 30 years old, they need to replace 3 per year. Last I heard, they had cancelled several new ship builds and now only have 6 planned within the next 10 years. Unless that changes, or they get rid of some of their brands, they will have such old ships that they simply won't be able to compete going forward.

Good point. I guess I overstated it, but here goes. My concern is Royal will enjoy the good times a little too much and allow their costs to get out of control. If that happened and demand decreased, then Royal may not be able to repay the massive debt. That would be bad for everyone.

I'm thrilled the Royal is doing so well. But I'm also concerned we might still be seeing hangover demand from covid times. It's a truism that the longer demand holds, the more likely it is permanent. As far as increased prices, I still think the value is there, especially if you book as soon as itineraries are released. However, I certainly understand that some people are priced out

Wow. I've never received such an email. Instead, I've always had to look on the website. One quick hint. When I download the pdf of the tags, I can open them in a browser and add our names in the blank. That way, the names are clearly legible when printed.

I don't recall how they could tell. It's been a few months