TheRobinsons

On 6/9/2023 at 2:10 PM, Jolly Ogre said:

This would be formal. 

Fair point.  

On 3/5/2023 at 2:42 AM, GeorgiaDawgs said:

Anyone have any idea, how many teens can we expect on this cruise.  I have 14 and 17 year old daughters and hoping they can make friends with kids their age. 

My daughter is 15. She’s not great at engaging with other teenagers. The joys of being an only child I guess! 

14 hours ago, Jolly Ogre said:

I don't get to formal but I do wear something like this to dress it up a bit.

That is totally FORMAL to me

Hey, so I noticed that two of the nights are noted as Formal - put on your black tie and cocktail dresses.  Is this compulsory, as I do not wear dresses at all, not casual, not cocktail, I just about wore a wedding dress.

Would a pair of chino shorts and a button up shirt be ok?

Thank you all so much this is all really helpful

How much spending money does one actually need on a one week cruise (Greek Isles).

Drinks and Foods are already all paid for.

General Ball Park?

THEY CHANGED THE ITINERARY AGAIN.....

Departing at 19:00 instead of 17:00 (coulda saved myself some money and flew in on the Sunday if we had known this sooner)

No longer going to Mykonos and its Athens now, and CROATIA IS 8:00-17:00 instead of 07:00 - 16:00

We are just gonna get the train and stay in Ravenna on the Saturday night in a wee hotel, train is only one hour and no changes which is great

How many of you are there? I will be using trainline to look for tickets, they've never let me down

Our original cruise has been cancelled so now we will go on this one:

WILL BE FLYING INTO BOLOGNA, which makes much more sense and is only one hour / one train from Ravenna

Venice (Ravenna), Italy
Departs At 
17:00

Split, Croatia
From 
07:00 - 16:00

Cruising
Day At Sea 

Mykonos, Greece
TENDERED 
07:00 - 20:00

Santorini, Greece
TENDERED 
07:00 - 19:00

Olympia (Katakolon), Greece
From 
09:30 - 20:00

Cruising
Day At Sea 

Venice (Ravenna), Italy
Arrives 
06:00

On 12/14/2022 at 11:14 PM, WhoCruiser said:

The original  literary Robinsons hundreds of years ago did in fact ship out on the sea,  but then of course they didn't have Dr Smith to contend with...

Our Dr Smith is currently Royal Caribbean as a company lol.... 

On 12/14/2022 at 1:14 PM, smokeybandit said:

And here I thought The Robinsons always went on space trips

Wish I was going on a space trip at this point lol.

So they haven't fully protected the price, we are unable to get my time dining now and are stuck with 6pm, this just feels like a disaster of a first experience with Royal Caribbean.

They have cancelled off all our special black friday deals we got on our drinks, so thats gonna cost more now, and to be honest, as the supposed best cruiseline in the world, this is a bad experience for me so far.

Explorer on 9th July from Ravenna has been cancelled, so now we have choices to make, the dates were perfect for us.  We cannot go any later than this as I have work commitments that I simply cannot get out of    The itinerary was what we were looking forward to the most.

Options they offered:

Option 1: Re-book one of the following 2023 7-Night itineraries onboard Explorer of the Seas sailing to:

• Split, Croatia | Mykonos, Greece | Santorini, Greece | and Olympia (Katakolon), Greece on July 2^{nd  (NOT REALLY THE ITINERARY WE WANTED BUT SIMILAR)}
• Split, Croatia | Mykonos, Greece | Santorini, Greece | and Dubrovnik, Croatia on July 16^{th   (I CANNOT MOVE TO THIS DUE TO WORK COMMITMENTS)}
• Kotor, Montenegro | Corfu, Greece | Athens (Piraeus), Greece | Mykonos, Greece | and Argostoli, Greece on July 23^{rd   (THIS ONE IS THE SAME ITINERARY AS WHAT WERE MEANT TO HAVE, BUT I CANNOT MOVE TO THIS DUE TO WORK COMMITMENTS)}

Option 2: Re-book any other Royal Caribbean International sailing  - This will prob cost more money than we can kind of afford to change to

Option 3: If you can’t find a new itinerary that works for you and choose to cancel, we’ll be sad to see you go.  - We dont get to do the holiday we wanted.

I am just sad that this has happened, will probably go for option one as its the only dates that really suit.

Someone comfort me  lol

This one is cancelled.   Royal Carribean have cancelled the ship.

They have this 11:15 on the AIR2SEA for London and the same time to JFK also (these are from Venice) 

To Dublin they have a 12:15 - so if my flight is at 12:50 from a closer airport, that should be ok too?

We are travelling by train from Rome to Ravenna €90 total for us, and then from Ravenna to Bologna Airport as its only €40 total for the three of us, I dont think we could get better than that, I will check the air to sea as you say for the earliest flight

Ok cool, thank you so much, we cant get air2sea as they don't do from Belfast, so booking our own little trip to Rome on the way there (travelling to Ravenna the day before the cruise) and Bologna is the closest for on the way home

Oh so you can actually choose? I am not sure how it works etc, first timers

At the end of the cruise, how quick are you usually off the ship?

It says the ship arrives to Ravenna at 06:00

I am trying to plan our flight back home, my question is, can we make a flight at 12:50, its one hour or so travel from Ravenna to Bologna 

On 9/27/2022 at 6:57 PM, Xaa said:

I hate that your level of stress is high TheRobinsons, but you've got some time to figure it out.  I'm not sure it's fair to blame cruising for not being as simple as it appeared, I'm certain you knew that you would have to get to port to embark on your cruise.

 

This particular cruise appears to have some arrival challenges.  I know you'll get them worked out and have a great cruise.

It wasnt by any means to blame cruising, this is our first time, and I think, because it says Venice, you think ahh yeah that would probably be 20/30 minutes to port, but its 2 hours. So I just kinda was thinking from that perspective.  The other 'simples' i talk about, are the upsells of foods and drinks etc, it took a while to figure out for us that you dont HAVE to do this, you can Pay as You go  etc.

On 9/27/2022 at 11:21 PM, FManke said:

The airport in Bologna is about an hour away and RC offers shuttle service to and from as it does to and from Venice.  We're flying into Venice and out of Bologna and airfare was about the same from either place. We decided to fly out of Bologna to cut the return trip to the airport by 2/3.

 

Happy Cruising!

Oh this is a good idea, do you know is there much difference with Milan, Ryan Air offer direct flights to Milan, Venice or Bologna are definite connecting flights for us.

Also, I couldnt find any infomation anywhere regarding transfers to/from airports, maybe that will come in time?

On 9/27/2022 at 11:00 PM, Pattycruise said:

Book your airfare as early as possible.  We did ours with the cruise line and were able to adjust it up until final payment….be sure they still allow that if you are looking for that.  
. 

They dont seem to do airfare from Belfast I will check Dublin.

I am totally in a flap about this, we don't even go until July 2023, these costs for transfers by any of the ways mentioned are astronomical.  Ravenna appears to be the most out of the way port I have ever seen, with no airports nearby at all.  It is so unfortunate that cruising is not as simple as it first appears.  Is not as cost effective as it first appears and its making me totally anxiety ridden at the thoughts.   EEEEEPPPPP

Any recommendations for the following locations?

1. KOTOR, MONTENEGRO 
2. CORFU, GREECE 
3. ATHENS (PIRAEUS), GREECE 
4. MYKONOS, GREECE 
5. ARGOSTOLI, GREECE

We have never been to any of these places, should we self explore, shore excursion, stay on the boat etc?

Yeah we are Ravenna > Kotor > Corfu > Athens > Mykonos > Argostoli > Ravenna

On 8/6/2022 at 2:52 PM, berkeleykel said:

Then if you want to tip extra you can bring cash tips on the final night of dining for the waiter and assistant waiter who you’ll have gotten the chance to get to know throughout the cruise.  You can get envelopes from guest services for the tips or your steward may leave some in your cabin. 
 

 

Does cash have to be in dollars?

On 8/6/2022 at 3:09 PM, wordell1 said:

On the subject of shore excursions, you can either book a Royal Caribbean excursion, a 3rd party excursion, or none at all.  Each port is different in terms of how to evaluate what is best for you.

Royal excursions are often more expensive and crowded but have the advantage of a guaranteed return to the ship on time - they will wait if something happens.

3rd party excursions are often cheaper and better but do not have the guarantee above

Often, you can just get off and find your own fun.  Some ports are in a city/town or close to a beach - if not you could just take a taxi.

I would recommend spending time at the shore excursion section of this website to get ideas.

Awesome, thank you so much.

I think we will book a 'RC Excusrion' for Athens, as it is further away than the port, but i think everywhere else stops in a little town, or near to one.