Katiel53

If I can't sail in a balcony, I won't cruise, so 1 cruise in a balcony rather than 2 insides. To me, an inside cabin is like being in a walk in closet for a week. I did it for my first cruise, but will never do it again. I'd stay home before I would go in an inside.

I think the prices have risen far more than they should are based on a few reasons. I do believe the cruise line is trying to make up for their $18 snafu. They didn't void the purchases because it would have been a PR nightmare, but no doubt they are going to make up the money one way or another. Secondly, I think there are many cruisers who may or may not have cruised other lines where there was a 15 drink max per day and heard about the unlimited packages on RC, so they are booked and are darned sure going to get their monies worth. I have seen that posted so many times on another site that it's kind of like a given now. Thirdly, I think so many people have posted to watch for sales and if the price is lower than what you paid, cancel and rebook. The prices are lower than one line who gives free drinks but charges gratuities that amount to a much higher price than RC. Lastly, the cruise line has new ships on the line and needs to make the money to pay for them and the alcohol package is a great way to do so. At some point the cruisers will decide the price is too high, but until then, the price will go up. JMO.

I would be a happy camper if the casinos became non-smoking. Unfortunately, I have a son who smokes and he and his wife (non-smoker) were playing machines in the smoking area that were not available in the non-smoking area. They were doing well on those machines and asked me to join them. I did and I won some, but the smell was enough for me. I went into the casino one day when we were perhaps in Labadee or some place where the casino was open during the day but it wasn't a sea day. There were very few in there and I thought it would be a good time to go play the machines my son and daughter-in-law found lucky. I could not believe the number of cigarettes overflowing the ashtrays in there. Some people must have felt it necessary to go to the casino before leaving the ship and the smell was so bad, I had to leave the area. I do have to say that on Allure, and I think on Harmony, that when I first walked down the couple of stairs into the casino, the smell of smoke was horrendous. After walking a few steps to the left, I couldn't smell the smoke at all. I don't know if my sinuses were burned out from the initial smell or if the air circulation was really good and I didn't smell smoke. I thought the non-smoking side of the casino didn't smell, but some of the "good machines" weren't on that side. I wish the whole casino were non-smoking and if they can't/won't do that, have the same machines on both sides. I know there is a good chance that the casinos will become non-smoking and I do believe there are enough of us to keep it in business.

I have a lot of cotton clothes on a cruise. They get ironed or sent to the dry cleaner/laundry before the cruise. Either way, I hang my clothes by outfits and cover them with dry cleaner bags. They go in as the last items in my suitcase. I do the same with my husband's dress pants etc. They aren't wrinkled when we board the ship even when packed a few days before the cruise. Having the items on hangers makes for easy unpacking. If I have unworn clothes, which is usually the case, it makes for easy packing to take home and the clothes don't touch the dirty clothes in the suitcase on the way home. Easy peasy and I've done this for at least 10 years and it works every time.

I am not from the UK, but I have seen others question that they had the Deluxe drink package as it wasn't shown on the Cruise Planner. Many have contacted Royal Caribbean and have found out that it was on their records. It just didn't show there as it would if it were purchased. I wish we had that here in the US, but I do understand that we may pay less than you do, so I guess all is good. Enjoy!

I think a lot of a cruise is dependent upon how many cruises you have sailed and what is important to you. I say that because our last few cruises we have used the Ultimate/Unlimited dining plan. We enjoy the ambiance of the specialty restaurants as well as the better service we get in the specialty restaurants. I feel the food in the MDR sounds good, but lacks flavor other than salt. Our last several cruises as well as our future cruises booked are on Oasis class ships and there are quite a few specialty restaurants. We tend to go to Chops several times on a cruise as well as to Giovanni's on Allure and Jamie's on Harmony. When we went to Chops the first time, we loved the waiter we had so we requested him every time we dined there. The same with Jamie's or Giovanni's. I love breakfast in the MDR, but with using the UDP, we don't eat breakfast on sea days as we get to have lunch in a specialty restaurant and there is no way we could eat a big lunch and dinner. To us, because we have cruised many times, port excursions are not important any longer so the specialty restaurants are our excursions. I realize not everyone feels as we do and that's great as there are choices for everyone.

When you board and get the Cruise Compass, be sure to check the time shown on the Compass against the times shows on the app. We have found some last minute changes, for whatever reasons, were not updated on the app so times for events were changed. It was only for a couple of things, but if they are things that are important to you, it could make a huge difference.

You can try to change your show times in that there are some reservation spaces that can be booked onboard. If you arrive at the port early, my suggestion is to go to where the shows are being reserved and see if/what you can do. There are shows that take walk-ins if all the seats are not filled by those with reservations so that is something you may consider, but I wouldn't count on getting two or more seats together at all of them. With MTD you can walk up early and see if you can get an earlier time. You will have to wait to see when you can be seated, but there are many who don't make reservations and still get to dine in the MDR. If you'd rather, you can go to the dining room onboard right after you take care of the show reservations and see if you can make reservations for early dining or for a seat in the MTD restaurant earlier. Show reservations usually 90 days before the cruise so when you booked, it appears you were very limited in your choices which, I am sure you realize, is one disadvantage of booking close(r) to sailing. If a show is really important to you, and you can't change the day/time, you might consider eating in the WJ that night. Reports have been that the food is good and many even prefer to have dinner there. Good luck and enjoy the cruise.

We have enjoyed the specialty restaurants we have visited. We are steak fans and loved the steak in Chops and have dinner there a couple of nights per cruise. I love the truffle pasta at Jamies and totally enjoyed the salmon there as well. The burgers at lunch are huge and really good. Hibachi is a fun place and even though we have Hibachi restaurants near our home, none of them serve steak and lobster or steak and scallops or scallops and lobster. That's one of the reasons we go there for dinner. We only did 150 once and it was a fail but that's because the Lobster Thermidor was overcooked, dry and was one tiny lobster tail. The tail was the same size as that served in the dining room. I have seen that on other ships when the Thermidor was ordered, it wasn't dry and there were 2 tails. I did have a taste of the tenderloin for 2, even though it was ordered for one and was not sliced table side, it was quite good, so I will consider going there again on our next Harmony cruise. We have done Sabor for lunch and dinner. I would not consider it for dinner again as I don't think it's worth the price. One of our lunches took forever as the restaurant was very busy and when the food came out, it wasn't what I ordered for me, but I tasted it because I didn't want to have to wait longer for them to correct the order. I had ordered a steak quesadilla and got a chicken taco instead. Big difference! The taco was more like a pancake in that it was thick and the size of a pancake from IHOP. The chicken was stringy and in some broth and it wasn't something I enjoyed. I couldn't get anyone to go to Wonderland as the food is a bit out there and my family is more into regular food. When we go on Harmony again, we will get the UDP again but even without having breakfast and ordering burgers or a salad for lunch, and then having a dinner, there was too much food. We ended up skipping a couple of the lunches because the food was too heavy and we went to lunch at Noon, dinner at 7:30, we still weren't hungry at dinner.

My granddaughter has used the teen club on Allure and I am guessing it's pretty much the same on other Oasis class ships. The 12-14 year olds are in the same area as the 15-17 year olds, but are divided up in some cases by scheduled programs. There are ice skating sessions for each age group, basketball games, a prom and I think several other events. It is important to the kids to go to the club night 1 at 8PM so they get to meet the others. I think it is a distinct disadvantage to them if they don't go to that event. It may be different for you having two kids in there, but if not it is important.

As far as I have seen that is the ongoing policy because there are too many people purchasing the key to fit into Chops. It is not a large restaurant and there seems to be no way to seat everyone. The lines for it before moving the lunch to the dining room were long and too many posted comments about how they felt they weren't getting what they paid for. Another reason, and I have not seen this posted anywhere, there are people who have UDP and wanted to have embarkation day lunch in Chops and weren't able to do so as well as others paying for a lunch in Chops on embarkation. This now appears to accommodate everyone, albeit not those with the key having the meal IN Chops but they are giving Chops food for those in the dining room which is not open to anyone else.

Now that anyone/everyone can cruise, it is no longer the style of some of us. On most nights, having dinner in the dining room, shorts are fine as they are considered dress shorts, which to me is an oxymoron, along with a polo shirt. Now will you see people who feel the shorts with underwaear hanging out with a tee shirt saying whatever, sure. Is that going to ruin your dinner? For specialty restaurants, many are casual such as Jamies or Giovanni's. Chops is mixed in the here again, the dress shorts and polo shirts are fine. On formal night most people do get dressed up at least in pants for men with a dress shirt with or without a tie. Most women wear dresses or pants with a dressier top. I noticed in Jan on Allure when we went to 150 people were more dressed up that in other specialty restaurants. Most men had on dress shirts with long pants and many had on jackets. It was NOT a formal night, but maybe it's just a higher class restaurant. I don't care what people wear, although, I probably do make comments to my traveling companions, but if the cruise line allows you to look like you just came from the gym or you just woke up, what's it to me?

The prices on Oasis class ships are higher than other ships. I guess I have a hard time having people understand when reading the price, it says DISCOUNT IS ALREADY APPLIED or words to that effect. The cruise line uses the onboard price, as you could pay whatever the going rate is onboard and it's usually higher, so the discount applies to that. I know the price onboard can vary depending upon how well the sales are going. OP if the price were the 50% BOGO off the onboard price and RC didn't discount each person 25% which is what the discount amounts to if you take the time to figure it out, you would be paying the same for 2 people as it comes up on the pricing, but the 3rd person would pay the full rate because there is no 2nd person to discount. Think about it and you can see that even though the price is high, and may not be for you, it's not false advertising, bait and switch or whatever you choose to call it. I think it is fair to have the discount of 25% per person work as for those who purchase it for one can benefit as well as 3 people who would have the 3rd person pay more. Not everything about the cruise line is out to get you.

There are passengers, mostly first timers, that think they want to give their stewards something as an extra. There is a running joke for years about someone's giving his steward a key chain with a John Deere tractor on it and thinking the steward was really happy with it. I have to say the crew is very polite, and will act like they love whatever is given to them. Their quarters are very small, so where would they put all the things given to them? If your boss gave you magnet from your/his home town instead of a bonus, would you be happy? Common sense is not always common. Having said that, we give extra cash to whomever we feel deserves it. I did give our extra cash to our steward on one cruise and wrapped it in KitKat bars. I thought he could eat them, share them, or throw them away and it would't matter to me. He said he loved them and I thought, yeah, and I knew that's what he would say as he was a very kind person. Later that night, I saw the empty wrappers on his cart, so maybe he really did like them, lol? I believe most of the crew have their paychecks sent home to feed, care for their families. I also believe that the cash they receive allows them to buy some things they may want/need. It's not up to me to decide what they need, so, for us, cash is king.

I guess I am confused by the first part of the OP's comments. If the towels were returned, why were they charged $200? Believe me, I don't agree with chair hogs and I do understand the removal of items, but if the towels were picked up by the pool attendants, why would the passenger be billed? If I did leave things and go off and hog the chair, I might have questions for the cruise line as to why I am being billed if they removed the towels. Either I don't understand, which is possible as I don't use the pools, or something is wrong with this post. Please explain it to me. Thanks.