RoyalGreg

I just want to put out a little positivity and write about a great experience that I had with a shoreside C&A rep. Feel free to share your own positive experience 

I emailed C&A because our status wasn't showing on our Set Sail Pass for an upcoming cruise. I knew the response time wouldn't be immediate, and I have no qualms with the 4 business day turnaround. Thankfully they were able to fix the issue right away, and our status is showing properly.

Not only were they able to fix my problem, but they also identified another problem. It seems that my birth year was incorrect for this booking, and so they alerted me to this issue and advised me to contact my TA. Identifying this error now, instead of at the port, likely save me a lot of time.

They also correctly pointed out that my wife has 2 C&A numbers assigned (one was auto-generated when she signed up for C&A before her first cruise, and the second # was assigned to her after her first cruise).  The rep was able to identify the correct C&A number that actually has her point total, and use that one for our upcoming cruise.

Of course I thanked the C&A rep directly, and offered to fill out a survey, and suggested that they can pass my thanks on to their manager.

22 minutes ago, TheMaxRebo said:

 

Maybe just as we are family of 5 but I checked Treasure for same week we are going on Icon, just a year out (so 2024 for Icon vs 2025 for Treasure) and my all in for a family infinite balcony on Icon was under $8k. For the Treasure the starting point indicates was $11,154 (and that is before on sale)

Maybe Disney discounts kids/passengers 3-5 less than other lines?

You certainly don't have to do the work, but I'm curious to know the pricing of your (similar) Icon sailing in 2025 for 5 in an infinite balcony. I'll bet your sailing in 2024 is nearing a sell out, so the current pricing of your cruise is probably crazy.

@TheMaxRebo Seeing your new edits now. Thanks for the info. The conclusion is that current pricing is CRAAAAAAZY! Enjoy your sailing on the Icon in 2024, looks like you got a steal!

Just for fun, I took the same Feb 1, 2026 date that I captured earlier. Here's the pricing for 4 in an infinite balcony (I was unable to choose 5 pax):

1 hour ago, TheMaxRebo said:

Well, to make me feel better about the Icon pricing I took a look at the Disney Treasure .... yowsas

Actually...... Icon appears to be worse:

Disney pricing is for 2 guests including taxes and fees:

Royal pricing is based on double occupancy, and then you have to add taxes and fees. That interior becomes $4,782.30 for 2 adults:

Going out to 2026 (Disney hasn't scheduled that far) the same Icon sailing (leaving Jan 31) is $4,471.60 for 2 in the basic inside.

The inaugural Treasure sailing is exorbitantly priced. I figured comparing non-holiday sail dates would be the most fair method.

17 hours ago, Irvy said:

It still shows 75 dollars 

 @Irvy The DBP can be priced differently for each ship and each sail date. So for your sailing it may be $75, but for my sailing it came down to $70 with this current sale.

If you keep watching, hopefully yours will drop too.

Thank you all for reassuring us. We've been going back and forth on getting the dbp for our cruise. The pricing has been fluctuating between $80 (20% off) and $75 (bogo), and it finally came down to $70 (30% off with the Labor Day sale). We decided to pull the trigger, and will still have a potential black friday sale to watch out for as well.

We just got worried after seeing all the cocktail prices hiked up only on the Anthem. Thank you all for reassuring us that the cocktails will be included (and the pricing will likely match the rest of the fleet when she returns to Cape Liberty).

32 minutes ago, Mike6453 said:

if you have the deluxe drink package i would not worry about it. The only time i have paid above was for glasses of wine. Anthem is also homeporting in the UK which could have different rules. I do feel they raise per drink allowance recently 

I think they raised the package from $13 to $14 recently. Hopefully the pricing is UK specific (I'll be boarding in New Jersey).

27 minutes ago, OCSC Mike said:

It's a UK thing. All the drinks you see at $15 will be covered by the DBP. No need to worry.

Normally I wouldn't give it a second thought, but with all the recent changes in the cruise industry, RC Group most definitely included, I feel like it's getting tougher and tougher to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Just noticed that all of the cocktails are listed at $15 on the Anthem currently. I'm not onboard, but have a cruise scheduled in a few months. 

Can anyone confirm whether they're actually charging $15 now? Will these be included in the drink package? Will they charge the $1+tax overage?

It's clear that the drink package is intended to include all the standard cocktails, but this pricing seems to be above the limit.

I took a look at the pricing on the Odyssey (also quantum class, and also sailing in Europe), but all the cocktails are priced at the expected $14.

Here are screen shots from the app: Schooner bar, Pool bar, and Boleros.

My wife is in the Facebook group, and we've signed up for the slot pull... Didn't realize there were two planned (I'll ask her about it).

Unfortunately, when cruising with a kid, we've learned that it's hard to make many plans in advance, and we've found that we've missed meetups that we had intended to attend. But one of the reasons we fell in love with cruising was meeting new people and making new friends. 

1 hour ago, letscruise said:

What brewery(ies) do you plan to visit?  I would love to hit at least one...I read on the FB group for our cruise there is a brewery close to the port area, but the poster didn't remember the name, so I may try to find that one on the way back from our excursion.  

Congratulations on reaching your 10 year anniversary!  What a great (and unplanned!) way to spend your special day!!  

Thanks for the well wishes! Cruising has a special place in our hearts, because I actually proposed on a cruise a little more than 11 years ago. Then life happened, and then life paused for a while, and finally we took our first cruise since then (this time with our son) just this past fall. 

Garrison Brewery is right in the harbor walk area, and Alexander Keith (originally from the 1800s, I think) is just a bit further away.

There are a few other good options up around the citadel: Propeller and 2 Crows.

Turns out this will be an anniversary cruise for my wife and I. We actually have another, longer "anniversary" cruise that we booked more than a year ago for later this summer. We've been planning that one for a while. However when we found out schools were getting out earlier than expected (no snow days), we booked this one for ourselves and our 7 year old son. Funny thing is that Friday night (the second sea day) will be the actual date of our 10th anniversary. We reserved chef's table for that night, and DS will definitely be in the kid's club.

Between the included wine at chef's table, the 2 bottles that we'll bring onboard, and doing some beer tasting at one (or more) of the breweries in Halifax, we figure we'll be ok just paying per drink.

In Halifax we plan to rent a car to drive out to Peggy's Cove or Lunenburg. Possibly we'll also travel over to the East side and visit Fisherman's Cove. We'll drop the car off before hitting the breweries.

Just to update, our room assignment is now official. The room was assigned on 5/20 or 5/21. I can also confirm that the room assigned is the same room that showed up using the barcode reader on the SetSail pass.

Hope you all are doing well.

I believe that people have reported purchasing $1000 worth of On Board Credit (before the cruise) will trigger the bonus. Since the OBC is refundable, you can simply get the $ returned at the end of the cruise.

14 hours ago, sleepy425 said:

When bidding opened up I did low bids for the one and two bedroom  grand suites.  We can't normally try Royal Up because I have 4 kids and book two rooms.  I figured since I'm only bringing two kids this time, I may as well take a gamble and see what happens.  Anyone else put a bid in?

We're just interior guarantee, so the best room we were given to bid on was a standard balcony (no suites).

We did put in bids on the spacious interior and spacious ocean views (basically at the minimum).

25 minutes ago, letscruise said:

I just tried again, and I'm still getting the - GTY.  I'm booked for GTY balcony, so maybe there is still enough movement with RoyalUp that some rooms are still in flux.  Oh well, I should know within the next 42 days!   Good luck on the Grand Suite bids!!  Let us know if you are successful.  

Our SetSail pass still just says "GTY," however, the bar code scanner translated the barcode on the setsail pass to a string of numbers. Supposedly the last 4 digits will be the room number.

Certainly it will show up on your account sooner or later as well. Patience is a virtue :⁠-⁠)

35 minutes ago, letscruise said:

I Googled the trick and mine still says -GTY, but I'll continue checking.  Did yours come up with a number yet?  

There's a lot of info in the RC blog. I think you can either add the setsail pass to an Apple Wallet (if you're an iphone user), or you can scan the barcode of the setsail pass with a QR code reader app.

We scanned our setsail with a QR reader, and the last four digits of the bar code does correspond to an internal room on the Liberty (we did book an internal guarantee). So assuming that will be our room, we didn't get an upgrade, but at least I think we're in a decent location on deck 9 near the forward elevators.

Good luck!

On 5/4/2023 at 8:09 PM, letscruise said:

Hi fellow cruisers!  We're getting closer and closer!  Are you ready?  We did a guarantee room, so still waiting for our cabin assignment.  Check-in is this weekend.....exciting!  

Did you check in? Have you tried the bar code trick with your setsail pass to see your (probable) room assignment? How'd you do?

My family of 3 just hopped on this itinerary! We'll be in an interior guarantee, oh boy! It will be the first time in an interior room for us. We figured the 4 day sailing would would be a good chance for us to see if we can survive in an interior.

We're pretty excited to be heading up to Halifax. This will be our first Canadian cruise.

55 minutes ago, SweetPea said:

C'mon who else is going to buy this for the apology OBC when it's canceled?

I'm in for another $50 OBC

As long as we're refunded, I'll be satisfied. If we get some amount of OBC ($50 or otherwise), then it's even better.

For now, I'm just ecstatic that I hopped on this ride!

It shows up for my Anthem cruise in February 2024. This is despite the fine print stating that it's applicable for sailings March 14 2023 - Dec 31 2023.

I think I'll still get it. I figure the worst that happens is it will be cancelled, or if they change the benefits there will be plenty of time for me to cancel.

2 hours ago, Ampurp85 said:

Thats why I post YMMV (your mileage may vary) I don't have children, but I eat in specialty restaurants often. I have seen it both ways: some staff will enforce the children only ordering off the children's menu when you pay the $10 surcharge, some will not. I believe if you get the child's price 3N/Unlimited they can order whatever. But again that is based on some instances. 

Thank you very much. I certainly appreciate your insight.

We're totally ok with a YMMV situation. We'll be able to make the best of it no matter which menu he orders from. Not to mention, with all the changes going on in the cruise industry, who knows what we can expect nearly a year from now.

First I want to apologize for slow responses... Since I'm new, my posts have to be approved by a moderator. I understand since it seems like there's been a lot of new trolls on the boards recently.

1 hour ago, DoomSlayer said:

I know they can choose in the Main Dining Room to eat off the kids or adult menu, but it I think they are limited to the kids menu in the specialty restaurants.  I am only going off what it says in the cruise planner under "important details".  Last time I did that with one of my kids, they wanted to eat off the kids menu, so we never asked about getting an adult entree.

That's also what I'm seeing on their website :⁠-⁠(

However I believe I've read reports from cruisers who said their kids were given the option to order from the adult menu (for the kid's price), but maybe I just dreamed it. Haha. We'll still be happy to share with our little guy if it comes to that.

21 minutes ago, DoomSlayer said:

How old are the children?  I believe children under 6 are free and the kids price is for kids 6-11.

Our child will be 8 at the time of sailing, and is a pretty adventurous eater (for his age). We'd love to be able to get him an actual steak at chops, and share some good Italian food at Jamie's. We'll be happy to pay the child's rate, but I'm not sure if that will limit him to a children's menu? From what I've read, it seems like children are often given an option to order off the adult or children's menu?

36 minutes ago, Ampurp85 said:

You could always prepurchase a 3N or Unlimited plan for children. But you can also wait until you board and pay the child's price for the restaurants you will attend. YMMV but they might be limited to the children's menu.

I guess I'm still a little confused, because of the answer given in the official FAQ (copied below, hopefully). To me, it seemed like you had to add the child on the ship?

Is there a way to keep the option open for our child to order off the adult menu? Does anyone have experience with the best way to go about that (without having to pay the adult price)?

Hello,

I'm new to Royal, but we have 2 cruises booked for 2024. The specialty dining options just opened up for our cruise next February, and I actually see the option to pay for our child (3 night = 32.95).

From my understanding (I've been lurking in the forums for a while now), previously you couldn't prepay for a child? Is this true? Is this a new "feature?"

My other question is that while we would like to bring him with us to Chops and Jamie's, we weren't planning on taking him with us to Wonderland. Therefore, if we prepay, it seems like we'll be wasting one of his meals (~$11).  Do you think it will be better for us to buy the package only for the adults, and then pay for him at the restaurant? Is there a chance that they'll be charging more for a child's meal on the ship now that you can prepurchase them in the planner?

I've tried to attach a screenshot, hopefully it worked.

Thanks from a new Royal Cruiser.