Al Miller

Anyone know what the heck is going on at Cape Liberty with parking now? You need to set up yet another account and app? But nothing on Cape Liberty Parking website that I can find. And of course nothing from Royal about anything. Cruise Critic boards have a thread but its all over the place. Seems like a solution looking for a problem and causing even more problems. Any insight as to what I'll need to do before I go to Cape Liberty this Saturday?

I'll be on!! Love cruising out of NJ when its cold. I love experiencing the climate change hour by hour.

Do you think these would be LNG powered ships? If so, since they burn cleaner with less soot, perhaps they don't need stacks as tall. Just a thought. I'd love a mini Quantum class in Baltimore for sure.

It was the worst BBQ I've ever had back in October. And ever since Mr Liberty saw fit to basically double to cost of the menu across the board, its an even worse value proposition. By the end of our sailing it was woefully empty even during peak times. Word gets around fast.

I am guessing that occasionally they need to unload lobster tails as they approach the "use by" date. I've heard tell that sometimes on Symphony they will have some on the Embarkation day buffet. But its not every sailing, so no guarantee.

If the plan is to jack up prices and lower selection and quality for specialty dining to the point that I don't spend ANY money on it anymore, then mission accomplished. Bravo Food and Bev team!

In 2022 there were four "Hot Food" Islands on Anthem for Dinner. The last several cruises its only two with very noticeable reduction in selection and quality. And they just spread the salad and bread/sandwich selections over a couple extra stations. I've never been a MDR fan so I'll defer to others if that's better or worse. I do know Jamie's Italian has had their menu revamped and IMO a noticeable drop in all around quality and selection. For our family it went from a must do to a never again. And like the MDR, Chops has never impressed me. I've had decent meals there but it just seems very uninspired anymore. Unless I catch some super duper sale price, I don't see me ever going back to Chops either. It saves me money in the short term I suppose but I do miss specialty dining. Maybe with Odyssey and Symphony coming to NJ, I'll give them a shot again in the future. But the way things have been trending in this regard, I have a feeling it wont be much different.

Yep. We had to do this once. The Previous people left the safe with the door open but the locking rods or whatever they are called in the locked position. Making the safe impossible to close and lock without knowing the code used. We had to wait an hour or so for the officer to come with the tool that unlocks it. He said he has to do a few nearly every embarkation day and a couple of times during the sailing. The cabin stewards cant get in there unless it was left unlocked.

Its crazy! looks like the last cars crossed like 30 seconds before the impact. Maybe 45 seconds.

I'm from Maryland and before I got into Cruising I always assumed the Chesapeake Bay bridge was MUCH taller than the Key bridge. I guess because its a suspension bridge with the accompanying huge spires it seems so much taller then the cantilever style of the Key Bridge.

Yeah, Norfolk or Bayonne would be my guess. And a whole bunch of charter busses.

It's a bit of a shame that in order to fully appreciate what cruising has become these days we have to spend so much time being an apologist for the things that have gotten worse of late. Not everyone cares about the same things. So it's all subjective. It's just frustrating when you know how it was not that long ago. But to be fair, many folks have always thought the food on Royal was terrible. Personally, I'm taking a break from cruising for a while. Maybe some separation will help me appreciate what we do still have.

As far as they are concerned, it's just a bar code to scan. They do not care where they scan it from. As a side note. If you know how to "clear storage" on the royal app periodically, it sometimes alleviates a lot of these problems. You'll have to re-input username/password, but it forces the app to refresh all its stale data.

Coulda, should, woulda... If your Wireless provider fails (Looking at you AT&T) you'll be very pleased with yourself for taking the time to print it out.

Symbolically, this represents nearly all the changes of the past year IMO. Add "and it costs more than ever" and you have summed up this past year on Royal.