WAAAYTOOO

Mike_ it is so much fun to watch new cruisers come to the realization that ....one Caribbean island is pretty much the same as any other...and that the ship itself is the real attraction. I'm sure I'll get lots of rotten tomatoes thrown my way for that...there are lots of beautiful islands and each one has its own charms but truly...sooner or later the ports become a nuisance and you just want the ship to keep on sailing so you don't have to get off ! I truly love the sea days the best ! I have my favorites (Curacao !) and I love going to the Caribbean, but.... If you were on the Jewel out of San Juan then you were on one of the island hoppers which is a GREAT way to see lots of islands if that is your goal, but an island a day is way too much for me these days. I HATE having to get up early EVERY morning (that means leaving the casino early and that is a bummer !) and go see more of the same thing I saw yesterday. I am also very annoyed that the casino is closed while in port (in MOST ports anyway) :) I think you will enjoy Bermuda. I put that trip off for years b/c I didn't think I would like it much...seemed kinda boring. ....but truly, the water is more beautiful in Bermuda than ANY tropic Caribbean island (IMO). It is VERY expensive in Bermuda so you probably won't want to do too much shopping unless you have money to burn but I think you will enjoy it. September should be a lovely time to be in Bermuda as long as a hurricane doesn't get you. It should still be warm enough. I like the NCL ships very much. I have not been on the newest ones (Breakaway or Getaway) but I was on the Epic and I loved it. The rooms were a tad snug but I found that RCCL did the same thing with their biggest ships....so it's a "trend" of sorts, I guess. Bigger ships...smaller rooms....more people...bigger profit. In fairness, I understand that the rooms on the Quantum class are a little roomier than the Oasis class. I haven't been on a Quantum ship so I can't attest to that...just what I've heard. So back the point of this missive. The ships ARE the attraction. Some people don't like the really big ships but I do. I love Oasis and Allure. LOVE them. There is so much to do and the casinos are SOOOO nice. I don't have small children to entertain but if I did, I think I would want to have the distractions...I mean attractions...that the big ships have to offer to keep them amused. ...and there are a lot of them on the big ships.

Matt, add us to the Feb 21 2016 Allure cruise as well ! Couldn't resist the Tax Free special combined with the awesome Club Royale discount.

May 3, 2015 - Freedom December 19, 2015 - Grandeur October 3, 2016 - Harmony October 23, 2016 - Harmony

Don, how was your transition from RC to Celeb ? I know they are supposed to honor your equivalent loyalty levels. Did you find that to be the case ? I also know that they will NOT honor my D+ balcony cruise discount, which kinda sucks...but it's a small price to pay for a short while, I guess. Do you know whether Celeb has a VIP casino program ? If I could find some parity there it might be of more benefit to me than the D+ discount anyway. Have you found the Celeb service to be more reminiscent of the old RC service ? Any drawbacks or regrets for going with another line ?

Hmmm...for reasons far too complicated to get into here, I do not participate in social media. I have neither a Facebook nor Twitter account and do not intend to ever have one. I guess I will have to leave it to others to voice displeasure using those tools. I will have to come up with something else. Great idea though.

I completely agree. That was obviously planned. As you say, these kinds of renovations had to have been known well in advance of the final payment date. To wait until everyone had made their final payment and then offer some pathetic OBC to compensate is very underhanded. One more example of slipping RC standards and customer service.

I love sailing out of Tampa. They do not get the big ships in Tampa but I find it a convenient port and I love the Radiance Class ships. They are very elegant, IMO. Tampa is a BIG harbor and it takes quite a while for the ship to reach open sea. Baltimore has the same problem...and New Orleans was the worst for that...but NO is no longer a RC port so no need to worry about that one anymore. I have only stayed overnight in Tampa once, and I stayed at the Hard Rock Casino Hotel. I honestly cannot recommend the Tampa Hard Rock. I absolutely LOVE the Hard Rock in Hollywood (Fort Lauderdale) but the Tampa property is way below the Hollywood property in amenities. Since we always fly in from DC I've never had a car to park. So I guess I'm not much help to you. Sorry. But I do like sailing out of Tampa. Have fun !

Don, I hear ya. I have really resisted making the "jump". I know that what you are saying about being "welcomed" by the competition is true. I was given a "free" cruise on NCL after just 1 cruise with them. They have continued to pursue us fairly aggressively. They truly WANT our business and may soon get it. I just HATE to think about starting over somewhere else. I have spent SO much time and money to get to Diamond Plus. I also agree that it is much more than higher drink prices. I have noticed the same reduction in service quality and one by one the benefits that we have been getting are slipping away...and what I HATE is that they are so sneaky about it. When they introduced the "new and improved" paperless coupons they took away a lot of things we had been getting (mostly associated with the casino...which is what we would notice). One thing that I have NEVER forgiven them for is taking away the personalized luggage tags. I still get them when we book a "gold card suite" but other than that, only the Pinnacle Club members get them now. That was a completely unforced error on their part, IMO. How much could personalized, pre-printed luggage tags really cost the cruise line ? $10 ? $15 PP ? Ok. Just charge me for them. I'd pay it. But no....they just took them away from us yet still offer them to the BIG BUCKS suites and the thousand-year-old Pinnacle Club members. And when I mentioned this before, I get back the excuse, "...they are trying to appeal to a younger crowd". Really ? It sounds to me like they are only catering the old farts that are getting everything for free now anyway ! I truly do not think they care about my business at all ! I think they see the green in the orient and are putting all of their efforts over there. I am not familiar with any of the names that you included above. I guess I will have to research to find out who they are and what lines they represent.

Do you mean that they informed everyone of these "issues" after the deadline for full payment ? If that is the case, this is truly unacceptable.

That brings up a good question. What IS the best way to "voice your concern to Royal directly" ? I always hear people saying that they are writing Adam Goldstein personally (how ?? really ???) and chatter like that. I think most of that kind of talk is just Concierge Lounge babble - people trying to make themselves sound important....but I do not know how to really make them HEAR what we are saying....if they even care, and I have to believe that they DO care - especially those of us like bcarney who are truly old timers who have just about HAD it ! I guess I should have asked, what is the most EFFECTIVE way to voice your concerns directly to Royal ? I'm sure their "people" read these kinds of blogs from time-to-time but I don't know how truly effective complaining here will really is. Any suggestions ?

We are on the Freedom next month. Flying into Orlando the day b4 and driving (renting a car) to Cape Canaveral...staying at the Cape. Even though my husband worked as an aerospace engineer on the Shuttle program for years, he has never been to NASA at CC (go figure) so we are going to go there first for the tour. Then we'll take the hotel shuttle from the hotel to the port on sail day. That little adventure is costing us 1 day's car rental ($45+ taxes...not counting hotel room, of course) so it really was a much better deal than staying in Orlando and taking transport to the ship from Orlando. We are, however, doing the RC transport on the back end from the port back to the airport. It really isn't glamorous transportation but it's a bit of a distance from the Port to the airport in Orlando. I prefer, in that situation ONLY, to use a "guaranteed" form of transport. One thing I will recommend....nothing to do with the transportation to/from the airport. I highly recommend using RC's luggage valet service. I have NEVER spent a better $10/pp than this ! When they pick up your luggage the night before disembarkation, they take your luggage to the airport for you and see it on its merry way and then you do not see it again until you pick it up at the luggage pickup at your home airport. AWESOME service. There are restrictions on how early your flight can leave from Orlando (I think it's maybe noon or 12:30) and not all airlines participate but most do from Orlando. Check it out. It's one of the FEW new services that RC is offering that is WORTH the money !

If you do an onboard booking while on a cruise that was booked through a TA then the onboard booking will be under that TA's control. If you later decide that you do not want to use that TA for some reason it is something of a hassle to get it released from the TA's control and placed under your control. I recall having to write a couple of letters. I guess if you want it to remain under the control of the TA then there wouldn't be any problem. To be honest, I have forgotten why I wanted the reservation released back to me...but I do know that it wasn't a very simple process. I have always been able to take advantage of a rate reduction even if I booked the cruise using an onboard booking. I cruised on the Oasis in January. That booking was done onboard the Grandeur more than a year prior and I was able to take advantage of a very significant price reduction that occurred for the Oasis cruise many months after I had booked it on the Grandeur. I was able to get the price reduction as well as keep the OBC that was given to me as a result of the onboard booking. Sometimes, if you change the date/ship associated with an onboard booking you can lose the OBC. However, I have changed onboard bookings completely - changed the date, port of embarkation AND the ship and still retained the OBC so it depends on the agent that you get when you call to make the change. As a matter of fact, I actually received an INCREASE in my OBC when I recently changed a cruise for this coming Christmas that I booked onboard many, many months ago. I was originally cruising out of San Juan on the Adventure (7 days) and ended up changing it to the Grandeur out of Baltimore (8 days). They coincidentally have the same sail date (Dec. 19) but that could have changed...it just didn't. My OBC went UP from $200 for the 7 day on the Adventure to $250 on the 8 day on the Grandeur. I'm sure that is b/c it went from a 7 day to an 8 day cruise but I was very surprised that they actually gave me the OBC increase....ESPECIALLY since I had lost ALL of my OBC once before when I changed my original onboard booking once I got home (I was a bit of a rooky back then and didn't know any better...I think I would fight for it now !). So it's a bit of hit-or-miss about whether or not you keep or lose your OBC if you change your onboard booking reservation once you get home. I have had both happen....and obviously it is better if they let you keep your OBC. Bottom line...I would not let them take my OBC whether it is to take advantage of a price reduction or to change that reservation completely.

No way !! What you think is freak out and melt down is just pure anticipation. You are going to have SUCH a wonderful cruise. You are starting on an awesome ship. Have fun, relax. I'm sure you've thought of everything. Just enjoy it.

DD is Dynamic Dining. That is the new dining scheme on the Quantum class ships and was scheduled to be implemented on the Oasis and Allure but has been indefinitely delayed as far as I know. They are advertising it on Harmony so I assume they will have it on that ship once it begins service. Rather than having a Main Dining Room (MDR) that serves a different menu every night, DD will have separate, smaller individual restaurants with static menus - meaning the menus will not change from day to day..they will always serve the same things night after night. The reservations system is different for MDR dining and DD as well...

This is going to be one of those "savings vs convenience" kind of thing. There is -0- doubt that taxis are the cheapest option - especially at Port Everglades/Fort Lauderdale. The trip is quite short and direct....and there are lots of taxis available at the terminal. HOWEVER, if you are concerned about keeping the group together and you fear a communications issue or for whatever reason you just don't want to break the group up I suggest making a reservation for a private shuttle (I assume that is what the above link is all about...didn't try the link so I don't know for sure). I will say, from personal experience (this occurred in Miami, not FLL) that the private van option for a large group I was with a couple of years ago on NCL Epic turned into a nightmare. We waited and waited out in the cold for the van and finally ended up having to take taxis in the end and nearly had to sue to get our money back from the shuttle company. Don't let my one bad experience scare you. I'm sure there are plenty of others who have used private shuttles and had wonderful experiences. My very last recommendation would be to book the transportation from the ship to the airport through RCI. I use their bus service ONLY at Orlando/Port Canaveral and overseas b/c it is expensive and well...it's a bus. No class whatsoever. You cannot take your carryon inside the bus with you unless it is VERY small. It's kind of like a cattle call BUT it will get your group there all at once and it is guaranteed to get you to your flight on time. So if keeping your group together is more important than cost, I would say private shuttle or RCI bus.

Wow, that's something I've never experienced before ! Doesn't make any sense at all to seat diners at the table but have no waiters to wait on them !! Sounds like a very bad management decision on a particular boat !

Doc, I completely understand what you are saying about why do My Time if you're going to eat at the same time every night ?? I ALWAYS do MTD and I ALWAYS book the very earliest time. It has been my experience that there are more "private" tables (2 person vs multi-person) in MTD than there are in the main area (usually downstairs) for the traditional dining. My husband and I nearly always sail by ourselves and we prefer a private table....I know many people enjoy meeting new people and sharing a table. That's a matter of preference. So we use MTD b/c it generally gives us a better table location than traditional dining does. In the very few situations where we have either not made a reservation or missed our reservation time and had to go to the MTD "wait" line, I have had similarly very good results with very few exceptions... So I agree that NOT having reservations for MTD is not critical. WE just do it b/c we want to get dinner done early and have found that going first thing limits the wait time and the inevitable delays that come with screw-ups that are always unavoidable no matter how organized it might be. In first, out first and then you have the rest of the evening to do what you want !

Woohoo ! Great news !

Chopps is up to $39 PP now ??? My goodness that is outrageous ! I quit going when they went up to $35. The upcharge restaurants were originally supposed to be a place where you could go and pay a nominal extra fee for an extra nice meal. Now, with the prices they are charging, you are basically paying outside fine dining restaurant prices. I refuse.

I guess it must depend on the ship as to whether you get a sticker or a pre-printed card. I have had both...but if you purchase the package after you get on board you will DEFINITELY have the sticker.

WhiteSoxFan - If you find that you have leftover OBC that you need to use or lose, just go to the casino and get chips at a table for whatever amount you need to spend. Example....if you have $100 of OBC left unused, go to a table at the casino and as for $100 on your seapass. Now, they WILL charge you a 5% "convenience fee" (so there will be a charge on your account for $105) but you can turn right around and get cash for those chips at the cashier's cage if you don't want to use them to gamble. Sure...it will cost you $5 but at least you won't lose the $100 OBC.

It makes complete sense to me. It's called the ol' bait 'n switch. It's not unique to the cruise/vacation industry. It happens everywhere.

Well, that brings up a question. I thought that both persons in a cabin had to purchase the drink plan...that you could not have 1 buy and 1 not buy. True or not true ?

Only once (from Bayonne where the longshoremen cut off our luggage tags...they did it to a lot of other cruisers on that cruise...ongoing labor disputes. Don't tell me that they didn't do it...they cut off not 1, not 2 but 3 luggage tags from one suitcase...one of them being a metal tag with metal straps. No way did they all just happen to "fall off"..and YES, we did tip the baggage handler at the pier very generously, as we always do) did we ever have any trouble getting luggage delivered in a very timely manner. On that particular trip we had to go down and claim our luggage from the lost and found. Other than that, luggage has always been delivered by early evening at the latest. We have, more often, had luggage trouble on the other end. Sometimes we have found our luggage in a completely different end of the luggage area at the terminal. Once we had luggage in 3 separate areas of the terminal. That can be a nightmare...but usually luggage handling is pretty smooth considering the number of pieces of luggage that they handle day after day. The end of our association with Car-ni-val was over a botched luggage issue. Too long a story to tell here but we had a nice personal "interview" with Port Security which easily could have produced a very bad ending to our otherwise rather enjoyable cruise..closest my husband has come to being arrested since his unfortunate brush with the air marshall on a flight to a Christmas cruise a number of years ago. Also a very long story. LOL

There is virtually -0- chance that they would sail an empty ship from Sydney (or anywhere else) to Seattle. If there are no cruises scheduled, it is probably b/c the ship will be going to drydock somewhere. Even then it seems like they would have some kind of shortie cruise into or near the drydock port so that they wouldn't have to sail an empty ship ALL the way. I think they are just still juggling schedules around at this point. They probably don't know what they're doing yet. If you have friends/family already booked on a cruise that is now showing N/A then chances are they are going to be getting the bad news sometime soon. I'm guessing that cruise has been cancelled.