Atlantix2000

I know that. I was pointing out that Odyssey wasn't the only ship missing in the original post.

Anthem, Enchantment, Vision, and maybe more are also missing in your original shot. I'd say reopen the browser, clear cookies, or wait a few minutes!

Just came across this article on Beyond today. It says Gwyneth's partnership with Celebrity was announced in Jan 2020 but then delayed by the pandemic. So maybe this isn't really news. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-9523373/Gwyneth-Paltrow-new-Advisor-Celebrity-cruise-ship-launching-2022.html

OMG, how did you know? You must be psychic!

Actually, you CAN book the kids in the their own room as long as you meet certain rules. (Adjacent, or across the hall, or maybe 1 door down). But there are pros and cons. If you are booking 2 rooms of the same category, officially booking 1 adult, 1 child in each room is a way around the rule that if one adult in a room orders an alcohol drink package, then all adults in a room must order an alcohol drink package. It also lets you effectively book the children in a room further away from you assuming you trust them. However, if you are booking a suite and a non-suite room, remember that the suite benefits go to whoever is officially in the room. Booking 1 adult, 1 child in each room probably doesn't make sense in that situation because the second adult would sleep in the suite but get no other suite benefits.

When booking a cruise, you have to choose between My Time Dining (make reservations or arrive when you want but might have to wait) and Traditional Dining (where the early seating is ~6PM and the late seating ~8PM) for the main dining room. It sounds like you selected Traditional Dining. After booking, you can purchase the Unlimited Dining Package (UDP) through the Cruise Planner. All reservations for dining through the UDP are done on board. Usually, purchasing the UDP means you won't be using the main dining room at all because you'll be going to specialty restaurants for every meal. However, you can still choose to go to the main dining room if you want and if you do, you've chosen to go at 6PM. There's nothing wrong with what you have done, but there is a table reserved for you in the main dining room (possibly with other people at that table). If you know you won't step foot in the main dining room, some people recommend choosing My Time Dining so you don't have an assigned table.

I wonder if Royal was waiting until the charter had sold a certain percentage before they canceled people that weren't part of the charter? I don't know enough about ship charters but it seems reasonable to have contract terms about minimum cabins sold to guarantee the charter.

Think of it like any restaurant on land. You can show up and be added to the current wait list (which could be short or long depending on the time and size of your party) or you can make a reservation so they know when to expect you.

Great news Joe. Best wishes for a speedy and complete recovery!

Today the CDC said that all the extra surface sanitizing precautions (which some call "hygiene theater") are not necessary since most transmission is through the air. Yet somehow don't most of their requirements for the cruise line industry fall into that category? https://news.yahoo.com/end-the-hygiene-theater-cdc-says-173440864.html

I think it was @twangster who gave a more detailed analysis in an older thread which I'll try to sum up in a couple sentences. The extra points given out by this program is less than the number of points that were NOT given out due to the year long shutdown. So the number of people advancing is really no different. It's easy to assume the number of D, D+, & P C&A members is always increasing and yes there will be more of them after the double promotion. However, there are also always people who have taken their last cruise due to age, illness, or death. So it's a balancing act and Royal may not have to change the tiers to keep the same distribution.

It's been long enough since my last cruise, so please remind me...do you HAVE to check-in online? If no, then this doesn't strike me as a policy change because you can still show up at the port with your birth certificate. Making electronic check-in a convenience only available to those with passports would be a way to encourage more people to use passports but isn't exactly a policy change.

See screenshot below - The text comes from the tab at the top, not the text of the article. Whether it was written by the author or the webmaster of the Miami Herald is impossible to tell. But when you post a link, that's what gets used.

I think an even more interesting theoretical question would be whether it is possible for someone who has NEVER cruised to receive and pass on Diamond status. Let's say my wife and I cruise and attain Diamond status. We sign our child up for C&A but never actually bring him on a cruise. But he has Diamond status right? Fast forward a few decades. My son gets married, has a kid, and signs them up for C&A. They become Diamond right? Now that kid (my grandchild) grows up and at age 30 takes their very first cruise with Diamond status. Does this matter? As Matt points out above, sure I've created several Diamond family members but if they never cruise, they aren't taking away space or anything from the regular cruisers. I've put too much thought into this. When is my next cruise???

As I've said previously, I think the disappearing bottoms of the O and S looks like a mistake.

JS already have access to CK for dinner as long as there is availability so you should be able to make dinner reservations for 6 but it may not be possible every night of the cruise. Someone else will have to answer regarding room service from CK.

Took me awhile to understand the comments about the flash and hex thing. I guess I browse differently than most. I right click on the blue dots next to each thread I'm interested in reading and choose "open in a new tab" which opens all those threads to their first unread post. By the time I start clicking through the tabs, they are all loaded.

There have been news articles about the risks of ID theft from posting images of your COVID vaccination cards. While your photo doesn't show your name, you may still want to remove it. Besides the ID threat, people have also created cards that show they've received their first vaccine with a real lot number which "proves" they are eligible for a second shot. They do this twice to receive both shots when they aren't actually eligible to receive them yet.

Thankfully, it's about 5 weeks too late for a Covid-20 to be discovered, unless one of the variants the like the South African mutation gets tagged as a separate disease!

I take it using the same browser to look at two different cruises causes website issues? Can you use incognito mode for one to get around that?

In my experience, a ditch witch ALWAYS cuts something. I replaced a deck with a paver patio some years ago. My landscaper had to reroute my sump pump drain because it discharged under then old deck. When he buried the new drain around the patio, he cut my neighbor's cable. The following spring when he came back to do our sprinkler system, he cut the same neighbor's cable again. A few years later, my sump pump was creating a flood at the side of my house. While fishing the drain, I found found tree roots had completely blocked it. The roots got in because, you guessed it, while installing the sprinklers, he cut right through the drain he had previously installed!

I don't know whether my answer will help or hurt your anxiety. I don't think it's unusual for shore excursions to be unavailable a year out in normal times. As Matt said, with the pandemic, it will be even harder to negotiate with vendors. Some of the local tour companies have probably already gone out of business, others may do so in the coming months, and new ones will be created once there is demand again. It is also not unusual for excursion offerings to change. Even under normal conditions, if you book something a year out, it might get canceled a few months later, and you'll have to pick again. I've even seen entirely different excursions pop up and canceled my original plan because the new one sounded better. As for the ship itself, yes there's always a possibility Royal could reassign the ship to another region. The ship could also get chartered by a private group. That risk goes down as a sailing gets closer and as the percentage of cabins sold goes up but it happens and it is messy. I generally don't book vacations more than a few months in advance to avoid a lot of the risks but that doesn't work for everyone. It also has it's downsides. Suites and cabins with better locations are generally sold earlier and at better rates but right now that's a compromise I'm willing to make.

I think part of the confusion (at least for me) is Royal uses Winter 2023 to refer to the beginning of the 2023 calendar year but when I think of Winter, I think of the end of the calendar year. I get that Jan-Feb tend to be the coldest months, but I definitely can't understand calling April Winter. That's clearly Spring damn it!

By Royal dropping you off at the next port and saying "No refund, getting home is your problem now."

Sounds like how I approach certain meetings while working from home. Of course boss, I'd be happen to attend and ignore your 8th meeting this week while I get actual work done!