need2cruz

What a mess! I'm so glad I got the earliest embarkation time for our cruise next month. We cruised Symphony out of Miami in Feb, but. at half capacity. The lines to check in were non-existent. I know full capacity is different, but It was so nice to get on the ship, switch into our swim suits, enjoy waterslides and pool. I made all the show reservations poolside. I'm hoping to duplicate this experience w/ the earliest check in time, to at least avoid some crowds and chaos, like this video shows.

That's disappointing. I checked in for Liberty this morning out of Galveston and was able to get a 10:30 time slot. It must be different w/ the check in time slot availability based on departure ports.

My check in time is in a few hours for Liberty. I really hope I'm not having to check back every day at Midnight, for this to open up.

I've had the same experience with ordering water cans and getting bottles delivered to the state room. I hope the same experience happens on my upcoming July cruise. Canned water is just weird.....Your soda package will work on the private islands and you could just use their cups provided. When I was at Coco Cay, we brought refillable water bottles from home and used ice and water from the buffet machine. I liked it,, but YMMV. We don;t drink soda, so we did;t have that package. or those refillable cups.

If it's raining ,while on the ship, we enjoyed the outdoor movie showing in the aqua theater. There are high top chairs that you can scoot back and be covered by an awning.

Thanks. It’s been difficult. The worst has been the lack of justice. Still no arrest made in 7 months. Despite hundreds of witnesses and police interviews. Not only do we all, including her 4 brothers miss her immensely (she was my only daughter). She was a very close friend to so many girls. They’ve been over a lot to share stories and show off their new tattoos. She was on a full scholarship in art school and a lover of tattoo art. She inspired so many people to go out of their comfort zone and get their 1st tattoo. Including me, I got my 1st tattoo in her memory. It’s large in a prominent place on my forearm so I can share her story every where I go, whether on land or at sea.

I really connected w/ our waiter. We were talking about you never truly know how long your years on the earth will be and you need to make each day matter. I was telling him how my daughter was murdered recently at a shooting at her college. We never thought she would only have 18 years on this planet…. He was telling me about how his father died when he was 5 and how that has impacted him his whole life. He shared how his 3 year old daughter thought he was her uncle when he returned home from the ship. He said “No, I’m your daddy!” He said he now does FaceTime with her every night that he is onboard so she will always remember her daddy. I made sure to give him more tip because crew pay for their internet.

It most likely is. It might depend on your party size and how fast you eat, so they can have your table ready for the second seating of diners. When I was on Symphony in February, our head waiter was very accommodating early 5:30 dining time. He just wanted to know if we were running late. He said he could accommodate us pretty much any time before 7. He said that would be too late. We came at 5:30 the 1st night. Our wait staff always wanted to know if we were going to come back the next night. It was helpful for them to prepare. We ate in the MDR 4 out of the 7 nights and 2 of the 4 nights came later than 5:30. One time at 5:45 and once at 6:15 with no problems. I did call him the night we were coming at 6:15 to tell him, and ask him if my husband could have a room service burger in the MDR, which they went out of their way to accommodate his request.

I ordered room service breakfast on Symphony in February only once. I was prepared to pay the $8. We ordered pancakes, eggs, bacon, and more... We were never charged. IMO, $8 plus tip is a very small fee for the convenience and ambiance of eating on the balcony on an early port day. I say order the room service, be prepared to pay the fee and who knows, it might be there or not, but the small charge is worth the convenience. My next cruise isn't until July, but we will be ordering breakfast room service again...with or with out the minimal charge.

I was on Symphony in Feb and got lobster in MDR night 6 and loved every minute of it. The table behind us all 6 of them got an extra one, too. My FIL did Harmony and didn't like the lobster prep on that ship. Maybe it's more of the chefs prep?

No it didn't. A previous OBC for $50 showed up but that was from an earlier reprice that came with OBC. This one was different because I was within the final payment date. It showed up as soon as I connected to wifi on the ship.

I'm sure I don't have as many cruise reprices as you've had, but when I repriced my Feb. cruise and got $400 in OBC 30 days before sailing, it never showed up on my end. I was nervous and called Royal. They assured me that they could see it on their end and I would see it once I got onboard. I remained nervous that it would never show up.... but it really did once we got on the ship.

I'm hoping to book this for July. Is anyone going to Costa Maya before then? I'm hoping you could ask at the port and see what the current situation on the reopening is looking like.

We got on our ship at 11:30 before the rooms were ready and went straight to the pool deck. It was nice to make a purchase and get towels without having access to our sea pass card and just giving our cabin number. To me personally, if someone gave the wrong cabin number (either by mistake or fraudulently) and made an unauthorized purchase, that would not be a something I would be upset about. I would just go to guest services and get it fixed.

This sounds like a good idea. This way your crown and anchor points from the current sailing could be applied before booking the next cruise. I think I'm going to try this.

My husband ordered 2 desserts each night on our Feb cruise, but he would always get 1 now and 1 to go. On the last night he told the waiter he didn't need the "to go dessert" that night. But our eager to please waiter insisted.... and brought 4 large chocolate chip cookies. I decided to put them in a ziplock bag and we ate them on the flight home the next day. It was nice to have.

Maybe OP has a very young child that they are afraid will roll off of the Pullman and get injured.

Those look so good. I had ordered the "24 cans of water" on Symphony back in Feb. They sent us 48 10 oz plastic bottles of Evian at no additional charge. We much prefer a bottle to a can. We gave our cabin stewart the extras because we couldn't drink them all.

But as for the Symphony, we sailed her 2/12. It was at 50% capacity. We ate in the MDR most nights and had excellent service and food quality. We did 150 Central Park one night and the meal and service was superb. We considered doing more specialty restaurants. But I really like the experience with the wait staff in the MDR. We loved our head waiter, waiter and assistant. We felt like we were cheating on them going to the specialty restaurant. Now that the ships are at higher capacity, maybe they can't give quite the same service or get to know you the same way. I love hearing the crew talk about where they're from their family. You bond with them.

Wow, I had no idea you could do that. I had 70 posts before I got off of moderation.

We went to Daniel Johnson's Monkey and Sloth Hangout back in February and are going to go back in July with our teen boys. I'm not a zookeeper, nor have I been to any of the other sloth encounters, but I was unbelievably impressed with the way Daniel Johnson runs his operation. He has only his family working for him there. He tells everyone that comes there that the sloths come 1st . He said they will only let people hold a sloth that wants to be held. You were not allowed to pet them, you just had to stand there very still like a tree. He started the place as a sanctuary and would take the sloths to schools to show the children that the animals aren't dangerous. He said that most Honduran people are scared of sloths and find them dangerous and they kill them. I can't convey in this small paragraph how much we liked him and his business . You could see how much himself, his mother, his brother his sister, and the whole family loved and cared for their animals.

terminal A. You'll want to tell the driver that , too. Although a lot of the uber drivers do have limited English, they'll be able to drop you off at terminal A.

We sail on 7/17. I bought the package when Royal was having their last cruise planner “sale” on 3/17. I’m not sure how often they run the sales. Maybe someone else can chime in when the next one should be.

Any mention of fixing the big movie screen before then? We sail in July and we're really hoping for a working movie screen.

On “Cruise Mapper” it says both Symphony and Odyssey are scheduled for 4/22.