JasonOasis

2 hours ago, johnt83 said:

From a fellow loyal Royal cruiser and travel agent -- chances are high that the November 15th sailing won't be the inaugural that many of us are booked on

 

I don't see Royal letting that ship sit idle until November especially if cruising resumes as early as next month. 

If they open it up for bookings I for sure will be looking at booking a cruise on Odyssey in September, this is what I've been saving my vacation days for this year.  My Las Vegas trip was short and need for mental health I needed a break, but I've got a ton of vacation days remaining and if they open up Odyssey I'm jumping on it and booking a September cruise immediately.

Okay President Biden thank you for letting it be known you intend to sign the bill.  Perhaps the cruise industry does have a friend in the White house.  Now all we need is for The President to get the CDC under control and have them do away with this ridiculously outdated CSO.   President Biden wants to open up America in July well Mr. President I hope those plans include the cruise industry.  I hope to see an end to the unfair treatment the cruise industry has had to deal with for over a year.

9 minutes ago, TXcruzer said:

I agree 100%.  I fully expect accommodations for the unvaccinated that have been booked prior to vaccines being available.  It would be a PR nightmare rivaling the $18 drink package to handle it any other way.

Exactly, now anyone who books a last minute cruise after RCG made their announcement about requiring vaccines the normal cancellation policy should appy.  But for those who made their reservations prior to this announcement I think RCG should allow them to move their cruise or offer a full refund without penalties.  It just good policy and good customer service you don't penalize your customers for a policy change that took effect after they booked their cruise. I completely understand why cruise lines are requiring vaccines, but the requirement seems to be temporary so do the right thing RCG and you will have loyal customers for life and this is coming from a fully vaccinated individual. Don't make your customers pay for your policy change.

On 5/22/2021 at 3:49 PM, TXcruzer said:

But that is not what was being discussed, what is being discussed is. It knowing the policy and booking now.  
 

Those of us booked prior to the change have to comply or else. I don’t see where RCG did anything wrong, this has to be the policy at least in the short term. They didn’t do anything sneaky, the new policy has been plastered on social media every where I turn, plus was emailed out. 

Since this is the policy I think RCG should offer either a lift and shift or full refunds to people already booked but who for personal reasons have decided against getting vaccinated.  Other than that RCG is basically forcing people to choose between canceling their cruise and perhaps loosing some of their money or making them get vaccinated just so they can cruise and not loose their money.

For anyone who is currently booked on a RCG cruise between July and I would say perhaps December RCG should offer them options because being vaccinated against COVID was not a requirement when they booked their cruise, fair is fair.

9 hours ago, SteveinSC said:

Since, it seems, RC will be requiring proof of vaccination in your documents, I guess that means no cruises out of Florida? Am I missing something? 

In Florida Department of Health's responses to RC's request the department stated Florida has limited statute authority with respect to cruise ships and it does not need to give its permission for cruising to resume from the stat of Florida.  However the state officials went a step further and stated nothing in state law stands in the way of cruise ship operations.  This information was also on the homepage on this blog site. 

When I first read the response I  immediately thought about DeSantis's new law banning vaccine passports and I wondered if the statement from the Florida Department of Health could also be applied to the law banning vaccine passports?  I don't see Royal abandoning the Florida market so it would seem as if Florida's new law does not apply to cruise ships.

Although I'm fully vaccinated I'm hoping this requirement is temporary and will fade away by late 2021 or January of 2022.  Should cruising resume in this country in July I 100% understand why cruise lines are now onboard with requiring most passengers be fully vaccinated.  There will be an immense amount of scrutiny on the cruise industry once sailings resume, they can't afford to have an outbreak on any ship.  Right now public opinion is with the cruise industry, even people who are part of the never cruisers understand how unfairly the cruise industry has been treated.  No other industry has been shut down do to COVID except the cruise industry so public opinion is on the cruise industries side because a lot of people are seeing this as government over reach by the CDC.  But it would only take one COVID outbreak on a ship to turn the tide against the cruise industry, and if there is another shut down I'm not sure this industry will survive.

4 hours ago, twangster said:

Technically Serenade is closest by about 5 days but with a costly canal transit.  

Ovation and Radiance are roughly 20 days away.

Serenade around 15 days away.

So basically it may appear as though Carnival has a head start but Royal can quickly catch up and salvage part of their Alaska season with relative ease.  The biggest hurdles if and when cruising resumes would be re-crewing ships and Royal getting their hands on enough vaccine which hopefully won't be a problem.  States from Washington State down to California should have enough supply to share with cruise lines.

Which ships can Royal quickly reposition, re-crew and fully vaccinate the crew in time for a late July or early August resumption of cruises to Alaska?

44 minutes ago, steverk said:

I certainly agree that we have no idea what is going on behind the scenes.  

Whatever it is,  the cruise lines appear confident it will allow them to open up pretty soon. That's encouraging! 

I certainly hope so.

I just got home from a 6 day vacation in Las Vegas and except for concerts and Cirque du Soleil every thing  on the strip and Fremont street is wide open without capacity limits. I've been putting off using any vacation days this year hoping cruising will return but I needed a mental break, and the funny thing was when the CDC announce no mask for the vaccinated within the hour people at the Venetian were taking off their masks. By the next morning I would say 95% of people had no mask on and this was at every hotel we went to. Our last vacation was to Cabo late last year everyone inside the resort was masked. But it was amazing to be in Vegas inside these fabulous hotels in the casinos going to comedy shows, the nightclubs are open no social distancing and no one is wearing a mask while indoors, yet I still can not set foot on a cruise ship.  What is the difference between the Venetian and the Oasis of the Seas?  I hope something happens to help the cruise industry out in this country because if Venetian had to adhere to even half of the restrictions the CDC has put on cruise lines they wouldn't be open right now especially not at 100% capacity.

Thank you @twangster I appreciate all the information, very thorough and the screenshots are a nice visual for people to see exactly what you’re talking about so there is no confusion at all.

1 hour ago, jticarruthers said:

Wish they would look elsewhere  Miami is my leas favorite port in Florida. Lauderdale is about as far away but is just a much better experience to get to for me.

Excited to see Disney considering more of a presence at Lauderdale along with their Canaveral base and Carnival putting some presence in Canaveral as well (Mardi Gras).

As long as Royal shares the fleet across them all i will be fine but a heavy Miami focus makes it easier to consider others options

 

 

I agree Port Everglades is a much better option and offers a superb arrival experience in terms of traffic.  PortMiami is a nightmare the last few times I’ve left out of PortMiami on an Oasis Class ship it took us over 50 minutes to reach Royal Caribbeans terminal and that was after we arrived on Dodge Island.  Luckily we had hired a private car but I felt bad for people in taxis because a certain point you just start seeing people jump out of their taxis dragging their suitcases because the meter continually runs, and when traffic isn’t moving for 15 or 20 minutes at a time it’s atrocious and a simple $30 dollar cab fare can quickly turn into a $70-$90 dollar cab fare for those not coming directly from the airport.  Royal Caribbean has a stunning terminal at PortMiami I wish they had something equally as stunning  at Port Everglades but I will happily cruise out of Port Everglades if the traffic situation at PortMiami worsens.  

4 hours ago, Matt said:

As it was explained to me... Some of Miami's "terminals" have multiple "berths". Berth 10 is in the area between Terminals E&F...F&G being Royal's old terminals which MSC sometimes uses now. The prime driver for revamping berth 10 is to include ShorePower.

I’m confused as someone else was earlier so are you saying berths 9 and 10 are the two cruise terminals behind Carnival’s terminals?   I’ve sailed on MSC on both the Divina and Meraviglia and the terminals they used were ancient.  If those are the terminals and berths then yes they are in dire need of an upgrade but with MCS‘S aggressive expansion plans out of PortMiami and Royals continued growth as well it is strange to see them partner up with Royal under an agreement where Royal would have preferential use of the berths. 

This bit of information just came out in the airline industry.

Viking Ocean Cruises (I know expensive) will resume operations out of Malta this summer and they have partnered with Lufthansa to operate special charter flights from New York (Newark’s Liberty EWR) to Malta for Americans booked on their cruises.  These flights are specifically for American’s booked on a Viking Ocean Cruise any one who just wishes to vacation in Malta, well you are out of luck and will have to find their own way to Malta.  

More and more options for Americans looking to cruise this summer no matter the price point as more and more governments around the world give cruising the green light for summer 2021 and allow American’s to enter.

Also another tidbit of information that may have an effect on the European Cruise industry is Spain will decided over the next few days or perhaps a week or two whether to reopen to American’s and if they are going to reopen Barcelona’s Cruise Port this summer.  If they do reopen the cruise port I don’t know if American will be allowed or not, we have to just take it one step at a time and the first step is reopening Spain.  If Barcelona does reopen its port it could provide Royal with opportunities to set sail in 2021.

According to NBC News there could be new travel guidelines coming in the few days it will be interesting to see what if anything the CDC changes to help the cruise industry. 

One other thing according to Christine Duffy Carnival’s 2022 future bookings or booking a year out have already exceeded where they were in 2019 looking a year ahead. I’m thinking with this type of pent-up demand cruising will be a bit more expensive for at least the next year to 15 months.

9 minutes ago, Tarheel0907 said:

whats the point of vaccines if nothing changes for receiving it....

This is exactly what some of the Senators in yesterday's hearing were talking about, the CDC's refusal to update policies and recommendations has eroded the agency's credibility and the more the CDC digs in its heals the more it contributes to  vaccine hesitancy or worst people saying they will never take the vaccine. 

The CDC and the NIH are no longer independent organizations politics has found a home within their walls especially at the top, and I am by no means a conservative but even I can see the agencies (especially its leaders) are no longer above the political fray.  It will take years to restore public confidence and trust in both the CDC and NIH, when NBC News is airing a segment saying CDC's credibility is eroding faster than COVID cases are dropping you know you have a problem.

2 hours ago, UNCFanatik said:

I dont know enough about it to make a reasoned discussion on it. I am with you though on sovereignty of other nations but wonder why the CDC put requirements in there in first place for port excursions if they felt they didnt have jurisdiction. 

Either way, I am glad the new guidelines erase the need for that masked madness.  

I'm happy the CDC has realized they have no jurisdictional authority over what cruise ship passengers do once they step off the ship in another country including private islands when those islands are not US territories. 

Now we need them to get rid of the mask mandate while eating and drinking what indoor dining restaurant on land has to deal with these types of restrictions where patrons have to mask in-between every bite or sip of their drink?  And what does the CDC have against buffets on a cruise ship?  Here in Illinois most buffets are reopened and some especially in grocery stores reopened last year before the vaccines were in circulation and not a single COVID case attributed to those restaurants or grocery stores.

1 hour ago, twangster said:

Carnival sees hope for July for three ships but cancels other ships in July.

https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2021/05/11/carnival-cancels-some-july-2021-cruises-hopes-restart-some-ships-us-july

It is only a matter of time before Royal follows suit, and cancels most of their July sailings from US ports

38 minutes ago, Craig 01020 said:

The CDC have lost their minds.

I'm glad my next cruise is from a non-US port.

I was holding out on booking a cruise out of the Bahamas because I thought cruising would resume in this country at some point in July.  But every time I have hope the CDC finds a way to crush it.  I think I'm just going to have book a cruise on Adventure in August because at this point I'm starting to loose faith that my October cruise on Symphony will happen.

16 minutes ago, Fairlynew said:

The New York Times had an article today about the outdoor mask mandate.  I have linked it below.  The gist of it is that the less than 10% outdoors transmission rate quoted by the CDC is true but very misleading.  The actual outdoors transmission is below 1 %.  They use the following analogy:

Saying that less than 10 percent of Covid transmission occurs outdoors is akin to saying that sharks attack fewer than 20,000 swimmers a year. (The actual worldwide number is around 150.) It’s both true and deceiving.

Here is the full article:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/11/briefing/outdoor-covid-transmission-cdc-number.html

Exactly even before we had vaccines the outdoor transmission rate was extremely low, the CDC and Fauci knew this but decided it was better to lie to the American people about how COVID was spreading and in the process they cost hard working Americans their jobs.  Now that over 110 million Americans have been fully vaccinated people on both sides (conservative and liberal) are starting to ask questions because of the CDC's intransigents even when it comes to child at camp.  

Back to cruise industry none of the restrictions the CDC is requiring cruise lines to adhere too is based on science or data, it is based on the CDC's bias against the cruise industry.  If 98% of crew and 95% of passenger must be fully vaccinated for a ship to sail from a US port why is it then that I still have to wear a mask at dinner, where is the danger.

This is absolutely asinine,  the CDC has a vendetta with the cruise lines and it appears as though they really are trying to shut them down for good in this country.  And where does the CDC get off on telling cruise lines how they must operate at their own private island when those private islands are not part of any US territory or under the control of the US government? 

Either the vaccines work or they don't you can not require 95% of customers and 98% of crew be fully vaccinated but keep these ridiculous restrictions in place.  

20 hours ago, Burghball said:

I would like to cruise RCL's Odyssey out of Rome in September. Has anyone taken an overseas cruise recently? Italy doesn't currently allow US citizens as far as I know. RCL offers the cruise on it's website. Does RCL have a workaround that allows US citizens to travel? Thanks for any help! Any info about US citizens cruising out of Barcelona, Rome or Athens would be helpful.

 The person I spoke with today at RCL didn’t really sound like she knew. 

I'm no expert but I would suggest if you are serious about taking a European cruise that you look at 2022 and not bother with 2021 at all.  Even with Europe potentially reopening to Americans there could still be restrictions put in place by local governments on who can cruise out of their home ports. 

Israel is a perfect example, the country has already begun a phased reopening to Americans and by July Israel will be fully reopened to fully vaccinated Americans.  However, if one thinks as a fully vaccinated American they will be able to sail on Odyssey out of Haifia one would be greatly mistaken and I think the same is true in the UK which is also making plans to reopen to Americans.  I think the only people who can book a cruise on Anthem out of the UK for now are UK residents only.

I'm not sure if NCL is grandstanding or if they are 100% serious but yesterday NCL's CEO suggested the line my have no choice but to temporarily move all their cruises out of Florida and homeport them in other states or even at ports outside of the US as a result of Florida's new law.   

NCL's Frank Del Rio reportedly told Wall Street he hope this does not become a political football and although he is not a lawyer NCL's lawyers believe federal law not state law applies to cruise ships because they spend most of their time in international waters. While NCL's lawyers continue to wrestle with this conundrum created by Florida's law Del Rio is standing by his cruise lines decision to require all passengers be fully vaccinated to cruise through October 31st.  He believes temporarily requiring vaccines is the only way to safely resume and rebuild confidence in the cruising industry in this country but the vaccine requirement should go away on November 1st.

Question: If NCL's lawyers conclude that Florida's law does indeed apply to cruise lines and begin moving ships out of Florida at least through the end of  October will we see Ron DeSantis cave and exempt cruise lines from the law?  Or will it take a cruise line like Royal Caribbean or Carnival to begin moving ships out of Florida to get DeSantis's attention?  I think it is fascinating that not even the lawyers know for sure who has the authority over cruise lines until they hit international waters.

https://thepointsguy.com/news/norwegian-could-pull-ships-from-florida/

23 hours ago, smokeybandit said:

Odds of July sailings just plummeted after the CDC's newest "guidance"

I just read NCL's response to the CDC's newest guidance and it looks like they agree with you on this, there CEO is saying at least for NCL a July resumption is unlikely at this time. 

7 hours ago, alamode123 said:

I want everywhere possible to require a vaccine passport for entry when they are available. Flights, restaurants, theme parks, international travel.

It's safer for everyone, and would give an incentive for antivaxxers to change.

I am fully vaccinated but I 100% disagree with your position on this.  No disrespect but COVID is a virus nothing more and as much as they would have people believe it is so different from the flu it really isn't.  There are so many variants of flu which is why scientist have to change the flu vaccine every year and encourage people to get their flu shot.  COVID is no different it is here to stay and will continually mutate requiring booster shots but it should be a choice not a requirement and keep in mind 99% of people who contracted COVID survived just like the flu. 

The idea that we now need vaccine passports to keep people safe from a virus is ludicrous and vaccine passports will just strengthen the antivax movement.  The government state or federal should not have the power to take away peoples freedoms or restore freedoms based on a persons vaccination status.   

19 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

Remember this is the same CDC that just came out with outdoor summer camp guidance saying kids have to wear masks at all times, even if they spend their entire day outdoors.

This is what Ron DeSantis is talking about the CDC knows transmission is low out door but yet they put out these outdated policies that are completely contradictory to the science and data the CDC has sworn they are following. 

Back to cruising the CSO is completely unworkable by most cruise lines and even though I'm fully vaccinated I think it is shameful for the CDC to try and use the cruise industry as a vehicle to force people to get vaccinated which is what it appears as though they are attempting to do. 

I wan't cruising to resume but if the CDC stands firm on 95% vaccination rate for passengers then the expectation that I have is there should be NO masks, NO capacity limits, NO social distancing requirements.  I should be able to eat and drink while walking around the ship and not have to deal with the restrictions we see in place on ship sailing out of Singapore. If the CDC is driven by the science and data, the science and data shows vaccinated individuals can not transmit the virus.  Therefore if 98% or crew and 95% of passengers are vaccinated there is no need for ANY restrictions onboard a cruise ship.  But of course we all know this isn't what the CDC is recommending they want people to get vaccinated but still put up with restrictions.

2 hours ago, Matt said:

You're not banned, you're unable to go.  I'm in the same scenario with my kids.

My thoughts are initially, I'm not going to worry too much about any possibility until we see something more firm in terms of a plan.

I also recognize these are extraordinary times, and I really believe protocols for cruises in July 2021 are not necessarily going to be the same as September, November 2021 or into 2022.

I agree I think the restrictions we see in July will be relaxed if not by November 2021 then for sure by January 2022.  

I think the first main concern for cruise lines is first and foremost get the industry back up and running once they've done this they can probably go back and and negotiate with the CDC.