jticarruthers

It is offered now on 3 day cruises. No word on whether you have to buy a minimum of 3 days now on longer cruises though :)

Never caught the scones before, is that an "Independence" thing due to the UK background of the ship or do all the ships do it and I was just clueless ?

Soda package is pretty cheap $5-6 a day depending on age I think? So if they are soda drinkers that might be worth it. If they have the freestyle machines on your cruise you can also get flavored Dasani water instead of soda so it doesn't have to be an unhealthy drink choice :) The package for about $20 a day I believe adds the frozen "virgin" cocktails to the package as an additional option if they would be into that.

Also on a 3 night cruise in August and playing around with the package. It will depend for me on whether I can buy it on morning of day two or not :) Embarkation day I rarely drink significantly since we are usually exploring the ship, unpacking, etc. So paying $55 for limited drinking on day one doesn't work for me, plus it gives us a chance to use the BOGO coupons first night. Day 2 is Nassau and we probably wont leave the ship, Day 3 is CocoCay and package counts so day 2 and day 3 will probably be worth it, if I have to buy day 1, I will give it a miss :)

I like to do heavy research on the ship and the destinations ahead of time and get some ideas in my head of what I want to do. But let it go, relax and enjoy myself once I am onboard. For example, we were on Allure recently. Pre-booked tickets for all the shows, booked Rita's Cantina for sailaway, had some ideas for the excursions in the different ports. Once we got on board and were busy relaxing though we skipped a couple of the shows because we didn't feel like "rushing" to get ready, just stayed on the boat in Falmouth and chilled, etc. I feel like this way I know what my options are so I don't get the "man I wish someone had told me there was a zipline on this boat" feeling, but at the same time can focus on relaxing once on the cruise.

I am sure they have their reasons and it makes good business sense. I don't like the "bait and switch" feeling right now though ... Quantum will be year-round out of NJ , except for the season it spends in China ... Anthem will be split between Southampton and Ft Lauderdale , except it wont because we are sending it to NJ to cover the previous change ... Definitely glad I gave up on waiting for Anthem sailings to drop and went ahead and booked a different cruise when I was on Allure last month. Guess it hasn't really changed anything for me, except I now know I wont be trying Quantum class until at least the Winter 2016/Spring 2017 season :)

Michelle, definitely agree that the 3/4 and 4/5 night cruises are great intro cruises, need to keep them in the mix for that reason (taking one this summer to introduce some friends to cruising as a matter of fact). Just seems like the only option after those is 7 nt west / 7 nt east with the same stops everytime, would be nice to have some other alternatives out of florida (Oasis/Allure/Freedom basically do exactly the same thing week after week).

Definitely like the idea of some Southern Caribbean itineraries out of Florida. I think Vision is slated to do some out of Tampa in Fall 2015, unfortunately it took RCI so long to roll out their schedule that I have already booked a group vacation for my traditional Thanksgiving slot so I wont be able to take advantage. It would be nice to do something other than the standard 3-4 night Nassau / 4-5 night Cozumel / 7 night eastern / 7 night western runs out of florida ...

They usually do a pretty good job of televising major sporting events while on board. March Madness (NCAA Basketball) was televised on Allure 2 weeks ago and NFL games have always been televised on Thanksgiving. Don't know for sure though.

Yes its funny how the written fine print often trumps the verbal "but I was told" when the rubber hits the road.

I pretty consistently wear nice shorts and a polo to the MDR, have never had anything close to a problem. Formal nights - Slacks and a nice shirt Chops Grille, etc. - Slacks and a nice shirt. I know the policy is more dressy but have never had a problem with it and it is much more convenient and comfortable for me on vacation.

We have started booking as far in advance as possible and then watching the sales and repricing if needed. Just booked on board Allure last week for Freedom next Thanksgiving, picking up the OBC along with the minimal deposit for example. We had wanted to book Anthem for one of its first US itineraries but after a month of waiting it still wasn't available and with the new NextCruise policies locking in Freedom and getting the discount makes more sense. Plus I have a feeling Anthem is going to be very pricey and after being disappointed by the premium for Allure not interested in paying premium pricing again.

We have done a couple of Disney cruises (3 night only due to cost) and close to ten on RCI. On balance we believe the experience on Disney to be slightly better, although clearly we don't have a problem with the RCI experience at all. However, on balance the value for the money favors RCI dramatically. As we usually describe it "On Disney everything is perfect, on Royal its all good to great but you can afford a longer vacation".

$1 ? Move along people, nothing to see here .... :) Not aimed at the poster just the angst over $1 when you have paid $1000's

If you open the attachment at the top of this thread there is a second page to the attachment that is easy to miss if you don't scroll all the way to the end (it looks like it is just a 1 pager) .... on the second page it reveals the Open booking credit is now : $25 for a 5-7 day cruise, $50 for an 8-10 day cruise, $75 for an 11-14 day and $100 for a 15+ day cruise. No distinction for type of cabin, purely driven by length of cruise.

Its close on the $ value side so we are going to try it out since we got a healthy OBC through the travel agent .. I suspect we will conclude its not worth it but you never know.

Future cruise OBC is now much higher if you book a specific cruise as opposed to an open booking.

Thought I saw language in the fine print to the effect of "when changing the future date on a confirmed cruise we reserve the right to revert the OBC to that of an open booking", basically to say that if you deliberately book a date just to qualify for the higher OBC and then change it to the cruise you really wanted you would lose the higher benefit.

We will be trying a package on our upcoming cruise, I don't think we will really get the money out of it but ... one of the good things I have heard is that it gives you less angst about trying some things that you ordinarily would not try. For example the $12 cocktail that you aren't sure you would like is no big deal if its "free".

Just an update, received official confirmation from RCI last night that this is the case. They indicated you can buy it on any day of the cruise as long as their are at least 4 days left and that it is pro-rated.

True, but Anthem US itineraries go on sale next week (According to the Anthem press release from early Feb talking about the European itineraries going on sale), its tough to buy it next week if it isn't released until the week after ...

That was my expectation too but there is a reference in the press release for the European itineraries to doing "5 night Bahamas, 6 night and 8 night Caribbean". The 6 night/8 night is the Independence pattern and has been "confirmed" with port reservations out of St Maarten starting in early December of 2015. The 2nd half of November which covers Thanksgiving (my annual cruise) is very murky though and I am not sure about the 5 night Bahamas itinerary as something I would be interested in.

Anyone seen anything official on the Anthem US itineraries yet ? I keep seeing March 12th as the date for C&A members to be able to book them, would be nice to know what they are with a little advance warning ... sees like the Europe itineraries went public about 2 weeks before booking opened ...

Thanks both of you, makes sense to keep it quiet but I was hoping that was the case. James

I thought I read somewhere that you can buy the package online ahead of time or onboard in the first TWO days .... My question would be if you buy it on the 2nd day do you still pay full price or get one day off the price ? On Allure in a couple of weeks and already have the Ritas Cantina (includes 3 drinks) package booked for sailaway .. not sure how many more drinks we are going to churn through that night so if we could buy the next day and save $55 that would work out :) Just curious if anyone has any thoughts/experience