WAAAYTOOO

Some good ol' NOLA oysters on the half shell. ummmm

We have never had any uncomfortable sea conditions coming out of Baltimore making for Bermuda but then again, neither of us are sensitive to ship motion. There have only been 2 cruises where we felt repercussions from sea conditions and that was coming out of Bayonne during a nor'easter and doing a TA to Europe. Neither of us got sick but we were not carefree, happy cruisers some of those days, either.

I wish I could help, but I have never sailed on Enchantment. ? I have sailed on Grandeur, which is the precursor of Enchantment. It’s a very different experience on a smaller ship than on the mega ships. @Matthad an excellent blog write-up on the virtues of the smaller ships.

I'm sure she would be willing to "take one for the team". ??

Those casino rates are the only reason I ever got hooked on SC. It's a good way to get started. Congratulations !!

BTW, @Yesiamtherethere is a Star Loft Suite that has opened up on that March 14, 2021 Allure sailing ! Up until very recently, all of the STar Class suites were sold out o that cruise.??

It will !

AWESOME ! So glad to have you in the "Club" and I think, without a doubt, if you officially start a blog on your trip, you WILL get the trophy for longest lead time for a live blog ! Also, welcome to the blog and we are expecting big things from you !! You will love the Deck 8 ATS. There is nothing like them in the entire fleet. Unless I'm mistaken, I do believe that @Lovetocruise2002has one of the Deck 8 ATS on Allure booked for March 14, 2021 so be looking for that live blog ! ...and yes, we are very bad influences...and proud of it !!

Welcome, David !!

Glad to see you back !!

Yes

^^This^^

This is precisely how we ended up on Epic ! It was a group of friends and at that time, Epic was a brand new ship. There are a number of our cruise friends who prefer NCL so we’re always happy to go on NCL when it’s their turn to plan the trip. Epic was the last NCL cruise for us and it wasn’t a great experience. We’ve stuck with Royal pretty much since then

To be honest, I am confident that this would be mentoring situation. They are trying to prepare for the future and that’s smart. Frankly, while my credentials are important, it’s the longevity aspect that is the show stopper. There’s really no substitute for that except to get someone in there to learn and put in the time so that they will eventually have longevity, too. I’m happy to help.

We made it to our hotel in PSL but dead tired. Very long day.

We sailed on Epic a few years ago and I HATED that bathroom setup. Water splashed all over in the room. It was just too bizarre. I liked the ship although I think it’s ugly from the outside....but the rooms were small, the balconies were small and that sink out in the middle of the room was just too weird.

?

Hmmmmm....now that you mention it, these are some of the more recent bookings I’ve made. I find it VERY hard to believe that a casino comp (which one of these is) would qualify for any kind of booking bonus. But truly, it’s the best guess I’ve heard to explain the mystery OBC. Thanks for mentioning it !

We’re sitting in the AA Admiral’s Club waiting for our flight to Miami. We have 2 appointments (tomorrow, (Friday) and Monday) to do our new build “options and upgrades”. I have a headache already knowing that we have to make so many ($$) decisions. Then we get to cool our jets for 11 months and wait for it to be built. Ugh. Believe it or not, there has been yet another curve ball in the “will-she-or-won’t-she” employment saga. It seems that my colleague, to whom I had willed sole control of my previous DoD project, is leaving her position to go over to the dark side (leaving the contractor world to become a Fed...<shudder>). This leaves the contract out of compliance with the “critical personnel” requirement. I received a frantic text from another colleague on Tuesday afternoon asking what it would take to get me to come back - even part time. CRAP ! We chatted yesterday on the phone. I explained that I was up to my a** in moving boxes and am headed south, permanently. “Not a problem”, he exclaimed ! “We don’t care where you live, we just need your credentials....errr...I mean...we miss you so much” ! I said, “I have 101 cruise nights booked in 2021” ! “We’ll work around that. Work whenever you want, if you don’t want to travel, we will hire someone to do that for you.” Oh sh*t. I told him that we were heading out of town for 6 days and that I would think about it. The secret truth is, the part of the job that I truly miss is the awesome travel that we did. Having sites all over the world, we got to do some really fun things. So if I DO decide to do this, no way am I gonna let anyone else do the fun trips ! The ones coming up next would be back to Bahrain and over to Australia. So....maybe. I guess I will be a mercenary and let $$ do the talking. If the money’s good enough and they don’t care where I live or how often I’m around, can I really say “no” ? But then, we’ve been THERE before, right ? A job too good to refuse ? This is different though. These are my peeps. I know the players, the clients, I created the entire program from nothing, worked it for 17 years... Anyone out there willing to guess how this will go ?

I checked the Ovation TP this morning and suddenly there are only a few JS left in the suites category. Yesterday there were rooms in all of the Suites category except maybe the Star Class suites. So either they have moved a bunch of people from Quantum or people from Quantum have jumped over to our sailing. I SURE hope that they price protected the Quantum refugees.

Boooooo

That's pretty cool ! At least they are trying to do the right thing. I had the same thing happen to me on 1 cancellation (I had asked for the 125% and they gave me a 100% refund instead). As far as I know, they never gave me the other 25%. None of my mystery OBS's were for cruises that had been rebooked or were the result of a cancellation. 1 is a casino comp and the other 2 are Empress L&S.

So, Scott - is your cruise just changing ports of origin ? Instead of leaving from Sydney, it is now leaving from Brisbane ? They did not offer to let you just stay on that cruise and change your originating port ? I have been looking at these cruises myself b/c we were thinking about staying in Honolulu for a couple of days and then catching Radiance to the west coast....but obviously, Radiance will not be making that trip. I wonder if another ship will be, or if we are "stuck" on Ovation for the full trip to the west coast. I can't believe they wouldn't just move you over to the Brisbane departure and then let you decide whether you wanted to do that or not. Piss poor.

If you are staying on Deck 17 and plan on spending a lot of time in your suite, then the access to the Suites Lounge and its complementary beverages would probably serve your drink needs. If, however, you plan on being out and about on the ship most of the time, or you are in a suite that is not located on Deck 17, you may find visiting the SL to grab a coke or a bottle of water or even a beer or glass of wine, to be inconvenient. As @twangstermentioned, it's difficult to be spontaneous and get a drink when and where you want it if you have to stop what you're doing and run to the lounge every time you want a drink. I am not a big drinker....but I do like a canned coke (hate fountain cokes) and bottled water. I always purchase a DBP and even though I'm sure I pay more that way, I am able to get whatever I want to drink whenever I want it. I find that to be worth whatever financial penalty I might pay. Neither of us drink wine (much) and Dan will get the occasional beer, but sticks primarily to high end single malt scotch which is rarely rarely rarely available in the SL. Even during the SL "Happy Hour" most, if not all, of the lounges do not have a blender, so a blended cocktail isn't normally available in the SL. With the DBP, however, if I feel like having a mud slide or a pina colada with Amaretto (yum) then it's included. You'll never get either one of those in the SL at ANY time.

I agree with @sk8erguy1978. It's all about personal choice. Whether you choose to tip anyone is completely arbitrary. It's a matter of debate as to whether the Genie's tip is included in the cruise fare for Star Class. Most people say that it is not. ....but you're not going to get a bill at the end of the cruise if you choose not to tip the Genie...or anyone else.