Plumlee2028

They choose day by day whether to allow cruise passengers. By that I mean, that generally they are looking at the number of positive cases onboard (generally speaking, for most Caribbean nations or islands this has been a percentage of total passengers) and they make a decision in the days leading up to the cruise or maybe day of. Aruba and Curacao have each allowed several ships and denied others over the past month. I was supposed to be on this cruise but elected to cancel I'm sure the cruise will go and everyone will have a great time, I just wanted to wait a couple months as this blows through a bit.

All three Norwegian Cruise Holdings brands announced they are opting in to the program.

https://www.cruiseindustrynews.com/cruise-news/26539-galveston-sets-expansion-course.html Interesting Article about Galveston expanding with some port director quotes. As discussed before, but just recapping: This year in October, Norwegian Prima sails for 2 short sailings on their port hopping season this year. In 2023-2024 winter season they will homeport for 7 night sailings. Allure of the Seas starts in November, replacing Liberty of the Seas. Carnival Jubilee starts in 2023. I suspect that will replace their Carnival Vista program, although probably without the route going to Jamaica and Grand Cayman (tendering in Grand Cayman is not ideal with that many passengers).

I know. I was just pointing out there seems to be a few different odd things with restaurants right now.

My Allure of the seas sailing in May is missing most of the restaurants in the cruise planner. Only Izumi is showing and the multi-night packages.

I think Celebrity could be a winter brand in Galveston once their fleet gets a bit bigger. They always seem to make Tampa work so I think there are options. I imagine they may have a higher percentage of fly-in guests than Royal so opening up embarkation ports outside of Florida is a little more tricky, especially with the Fort Lauderdale terminal investment. In the summer the vast bulk of their fleet heads to Alaska and Europe.

I usually am solo in my room, so the bogo type sale is not helpful to me. The drink package pricing lately is making celebrity a better price option for me all the time. I have a 5 day on the summit in a few months for $1200 with their highest drink and wifi options and $500 onboard credit to use

Availability is growing constantly. Carnival Corp in particular has been very aggressive with LNG ships. They have 6 service already (Carnival Mardi Gras, AidaNova, AidaCosma (delivered or shortly delivered), Costa Toscana, Costa Smeralda and P&O Iona). Carnival has 5 more on order as well (2 for Princess, 2 for Carnival 1 for P&O). MSC has 6 or so on order (4 world class and a Meraviglia class that will be LNG). Carnival Cruise lines uses theirs out of Port Canaveral currently and is adding Miami and Galveston as homeports in the next 2 years for LNG. Aida/Costa sail from Italy, Barcelona, and Grand Canaria with these and Iona sails from Southampton. I have read about ports such as Amsterdam and others coming online. Any port that is big in cargo and cruise will likely relatively easily be able to handle adding LNG operations as LNG has been part of the cargo industry for longer. For Icon, the size is limiting just as the LNG component.

Yes, I booked it for an explorer of the seas sailing in a few weeks. It may show up once you're a bit closer. Some of those types of items tend to show up after drinks, excursions, etc.

I peeked at the protocols for San Juan and it said that the mask policy is through Jan 31. Im sure they are prepping more emails

That was my first thought. Carnival's ships (AidaNova, Mardi Gras, Iona, etc) that are LNG have large tanks that are shaped like tanker trucks or rail cars. But there's also the large sphere's that are on LNG tankers so maybe that's the best shape overall and royal found a way to make that work instead. That said, looking closer at the picture the opening seems rather intentionally large and architecturally designed, which makes me think more of a sky-pad type thing.

Its amazing how different things are from when they announced this transition in November. Hopefully in a few weeks we are back to the pandemic normal as things calm down a bit.

Hello all, Did anyone on here sail Explorer of the Seas last week out of San Juan? I am booked for Jan 23, and wondering how they handled post-cruise testing, such as providing testing to disembark etc. Thanks!

Primarily. Of course sailing in April across the Atlantic, full speed, at night, has been known to be problematic and can rate high on the worst cruises ever top 10 list.

Just watched a Serenade ship tour video and the thermal suite is exactly as picture above. About 5 of the stone beds facing the ocean. Based on the color scheme, the pictures above do seem to be serenade, but if not, it is identical. I don't go to spas ever, so can't comment beyond the aesthetics, but that's what is there.

Im doing the Fun sailing with open bar cruise in January. Primarily picked that one because it is after my first excursion of the day. I think they are largely the same as you say. One difference may be the time, on my sailing the Boca snorkel is in the morning and the Fun cruise is in the afternoon (I suspect it may even be the same operator). If you want to get out in the morning, saving the money and doing the boca may be a bit better.

Ive heard of worse cruises. There's several movies about them. They often involve ships named after oceanic gods or names bragging about their size.

Same here. One of the biggest surprises lately to me is how excited people are for Windjammer to be open for dinner. For me, it has always been a lunch or breakfast only option anyways. Of course I have no kids, so that plays a role Im sure.

Wonder would be interesting, because I hear from my travel agent that the suites in Allure out of Galveston are always cheap relative to the other Oasis class. Not sure if that's a market, or an un-revolutionized ship causing that. If Royal feels they can't fill all the bigger suites, then maybe Wonder makes some sense despite it being bigger. Otherwise it could be Icon. Carnival is bringing Jubilee into Galveston, so we know that the LNG process will be set up and ready at some point. Down the road if the market supports it, could see something like a Voyager class doing the classic 4-5 nights, another voyager or freedom doing the 6-8 nights (maybe just seasonally), and Icon or Oasis doing the 7 nights. Before the pandemic, carnival was planning 4 ships (Vista, Dream, Breeze, and Radiance). Of course, those are all smaller than what Royal has there now (Breeze, dream, Vista are all similar to Adventure or Liberty in size), but Jubilee will be a big increase in size and I assume replaces Vista.

Royal has cruises departing basically every day. There is no way to announce new immediate effect policy without impacting some people close in. It seems to me that they did a great job getting you set up pretty well for the relatively small policy change.

My next cruise is end of January, so not part of the new dates. I am totally fine if they lengthen this to include mine. Yes its disappointing, but is completely a reasonable, practical, and proper response. We don't get to pretend this is over just because we are tired of it. The crew and the business deserve the extra layer of protection this policy provides. I work for an airline, we have federal mask requirements for our passengers and have since near the beginning of the pandemic. Our flight attendants and our business deserve that extra layer of protection that policy provides. No different for Royal, so Ill happily keep it on. That said, Ill be wearing my Celebrity mask I was given on that cruise, because it is very nice.

I too am heading out on the Summit next year, but in April. The Black Friday deals were nice. About $1200 for a five day with Indulge package and $500 onboard spending. 2023 I'll head back onto the Edge for 10 nights heading to the Southern/Eastern Caribbean. Haven't sailed longer than 7 days, and I'll be trying out the solo infinite verandas.

I saw Grandeur at St Maarten a few months back and it was pretty rusty looking with some other appearance work needed. The pictures that have shown up from Barbados look like it is normal again. Im sure the plan is to polish up a bit before service.

Was there much shade on Pearl Island? Looking at the pictures, I just worry about being able to cover up. Nassau is the first day of the cruise so I don't want to get baked and have problems. I am going on Celebrity next April. Did Blue Lagoon last time, so wanted to try Pearl Island and do the snorkeling there as well. For the Blue Lagoon input, it was nice there as well. Pearl Island looks smaller, so it may be less crowded. With Blue Lagoon, much of the attraction for people is the animal shows etc. I don't do those, so I did just the beach. The beach I was on was in the ocean lagoon section. Nice, but not a sweeping ocean view. The lunch was BBQ flavored chicken and some sides. Drink prices etc I remember were about $6 or so for Kaliks and $7 or so for imports such as Coors light etc.

In addition to seeing it on the Set Sail pass, there is a spot on the sea pass card for "Beverage" and it will say "Deluxe" next to it.