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Looking for people that cruised this week!


Matt

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Did you sail on Symphony, Odyssey, or Oasis this past week and happy with Royal Caribbean’s approach to Covid protocols?

Please share your thoughts on how safe and effective the protocols were. Did you feel the ports are being unfair? 
 

Im looking for some quotes from folks who sailed recently to show that mainstream media coverage is not reflective of the overall experience. 
 

please include your ship and sail date. First name optional.

@Neesa @Jax

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35 minutes ago, Matt said:

Did you sail on Symphony, Odyssey, or Oasis this past week and happy with Royal Caribbean’s approach to Covid protocols?

Please share your thoughts on how safe and effective the protocols were. Did you feel the ports are being unfair? 
 

Im looking for some quotes from folks who sailed recently to show that mainstream media coverage is not reflective of the overall experience. 
 

please include your ship and sail date. First name optional.

@Neesa @Jax

Just finished a 7 day on Liberty OTS this morning.  I don't feel the new protocols could have been any better last month.  Maybe you didn't need to wear a mask in a few areas, but it really wasn't bad at all.  Once your in the dining room, mask off.  Once you have a drink at the bar, mask off.  We had a great time!  

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Yes! Please combat this bad press! Odyssey of the Seas 12/18/21  

Captain was always communicating, every day. Felt well cared for and safe. Security mingling through out in addition to staff gently reinforcing proper mask wearing to make sure that protocol was followed. 

Please see my reports on my Odyssey sailing and use what you need. I did feel safe, while I wasn't surprised our ports were canceled it was probably best. The island numbers were climbing and we would be blamed for the virus spread. This way Royal couldn't be the scapegoat once again.

Instead of concentrating on the 1.9 % positives how about the rest of us sailing healthy and happy being mindful of our behaviors. Celebrate and speak to that! Denise 🙂

oh, and thanks for doing this. All I thought when I read the reports was this isn't fair reporting.

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I just got off Oasis this morning. Sail date: Dec 19-26th. Feel free to use any of my comments from my live blog or other forums.

I feel Royal is doing a good job balancing protocols with guest experience.  If they become the Covid police the guest experience will suffer. Some onboard feel Royal should enforce protocols better,  while just as many if not more are content with the way they are being enforced. If you expect cruise lines to implement protocols similar to government mandates in your province, state or country now may not be the right time for you to cruise. It was refreshing to turn off Covid for a week and enjoy a much needed vacation. 
There are definitely some protocols that are not being enforced; the elevator limits being one of them. But if guests aren’t comfortable getting into an elevator with more than 6, they can wait for the next one. I was worried that the new mask protocols that changed a day or two prior to our sailing would impact our onboard experience, but they were mostly unnoticeable. As long as you had a beverage you were free to remove your mask while seated in a vaccinated venue. Many guests chose to wear their masks, while other removed them.  I feel Royal has done a good job of focusing on the guest experience rather than masks, and giving guests a certain degree of freedom in this area. I saw a general tightening of protocols as the week went on; genie’s and crew wearing N95 masks, increased sanitizing of high traffic touch points; particularly the casino, placement of physical distancing markers in lineups and staff redirecting guests in long line ups to alternate lines or venues. 
I felt completely safe and my onboard experience wasn’t impacted but I also had the benefit of a genie which I felt was invaluable during these times.  My genie was transparent about cases onboard and the number is relatively low when you factor out close contacts and guests being isolated with flu like symptoms that tested negative. 
Updated: In response to reporting (criticisms) of onboard testing on other ships, ours was completed on Day 7 at 8:15am and our PCR test results were emailed to us quickly. Return times ranged  from less than an hour to 4 hours. This process may have been expedited due to our genie but it exceeded expected timelines. 
Jacquie  

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39 minutes ago, Nate said:

I am on Symphony right now and they just cancelled San Juan.  So far this has fallen way short of expectations.  There are no aqua or large main theater shows because of a COVID outbreak with the performers.  The entertainment is extremely thinned out.  Not nearly the experience it should be.

This. It’s my first royal cruise. I was ok with the updated mask protocols. I’ve noticed Americans are more mask compliant than foreign guests. But to get on board and have no shows and little entertainment, especially for kids (mine is vaccinated). Plus losing a port “due to health & safety” is making this a sub par experience. And royal isn’t offering any accommodations to try and make up for it. It feels like they are tired and defeated. We have another royal cruise already planned next year but we are already talking about cruising on a different line. 
 

Should also mention that we are not really getting any Covid outbreak on the ship info from captain or crew. Maybe we are lucky there isn’t one? If there is, no one is saying anything. Just typical follow the rules reminders. 

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I think it’s kind of hard for cruisers to say that the ports are being unfair. The ports have a responsibility to their citizens, and while a lot of the islands are doing pretty good on vaccination, they still have less medical capacity overall if there is a huge spike in cases. Preliminary data about omicron is looking positive (in the sense that it appears to be less severe) but it’s still a little early to make the call that omicron is no big deal. 
 

My take: I think cruise lines are doing a good job overall, but I also don’t blame the ports for being cautious. 

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Bottom line right now is cruising is going be tough over the next several weeks with omicron skyrocketing the case numbers. The usual cruise experience likely will be disrupted in terms of entertainment etc as we haver already seen. Of course if increase cases are being seen among passengers it will inevitably spill over to the crew and entertainers. This is the unfortunate by product of focusing on case counts and testing especially in light of everyone aboard being vaccinated. 

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3 hours ago, Nate said:

I am on Symphony right now and they just cancelled San Juan.  So far this has fallen way short of expectations.  There are no aqua or large main theater shows because of a COVID outbreak with the performers.  The entertainment is extremely thinned out.  Not nearly the experience it should be.

Thanks for sharing, my family is sailing on Symphony January 15th.  My wife wants to a cancel the cruise due to the canceled entertainment but I want to go.  My fingers are crossed that the staff recovers and will be back in action for our vacation.  

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Sailed on Odyssey of the Seas, 18Dec2021.  Overall, I think the protocols were fine.  I had recently been on Anthem over Thanksgiving with the mask off in vaccinated areas, and this was the first all masking cruise.  It was not as bad as I assumed it would be.  Social distancing was pretty much impossible and areas such as 270 (for disco night) or Music Hall (at all times).  It was not a problem for me, but if there were people who are bothered by close proximity to others, this would have been an issue. 

On a particularly busy night (night 7) in music hall, we were standing next to tables marked 'unavailable for social distancing' on deck 4.  A bar waiter came over to us and asked us to move, because "pictures of non-social distancing were posted on social media as a 'look, Odyssey is having massive outbreak and they are not social distancing'".

Fact was that the captain was very forthcoming with information about covid and explained why the ports would not allow us to disembark.  I do not blame the ports for these decisions, and the captain and crew made the best of it for us.  No complaint overall.  Great cruise!  

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5 hours ago, pcvchristine said:

think it’s kind of hard for cruisers to say that the ports are being unfair. The ports have a responsibility to their citizens, and while a lot of the islands are doing pretty good on vaccination, they still have less medical capacity overall if there is a huge spike in cases. Preliminary data about omicron is looking positive (in the sense that it appears to be less severe) but it’s still a little early to make the call that omicron is no big deal. 

That makes total sense. So doesn’t that logically mean they should ban flights with tourists? The issue is tourists coming to their country and potentially overwhelming their healthcare system. 
 

Of course, we know that’s not going to happen. People on airplanes have no vaccine requirement, less stringent testing requirements (if at all), and no obligation to report positive cases. 
 

That’s why ports are being unfair.  They are targeting cruise ships only, as if Covid only exists there.

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Currently at MCO airport. I have yet to see any Covid protocols period except for masks. They jammed all of us into 1 car on the train to terminal B while the other 4 cars sat empty. Sanitizer stations are empty. No distancing markers. Bathrooms not clean.  If any of this was reported on cruises the response would likely be very different.  

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Went on liberty dec 19. I felt it was great. No complaints 

A couple observations though

1. Unlike other ships,  liberty did not have hand washing stations in the Windjammer. 

2. There were enough people on board that the elevators were very full. People wanted to limit the number to 5, but it was impossible to find an elevator with so few on it.

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My elderly mom and I got off Indy today at Port Canaveral. I felt that the protocols were well adhered to except for elevator crowding. There was no Grease production but other than that, the cruise met expectations. They did offer the skating show which we attended. It was more crowded than my cruises to Alaska in the Fall. I was hoping for fewer people but gleaned beforehand that would not be the case. I would have preferred more reduced capacity. It seemed pretty full.  Actually my main complaint was our onboard shopping. Compared to my cruises on other ships the shopng was disappointing. Overall I felt safe and liked the communications from the Captain. We stopped at Coco Cay and Nassau as planned. The crew seemed content and I was unaware of an Covid outbreaks if any occurred. I did notice was room service tray in our 9th deck corridor that had a red hazard covering. Not sure if that signified Covid or just general “don’t touch” that any tray might get these days. Does anyone else know about that?

F2615E55-8C8C-48FB-9171-853B31B10865.jpeg

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6 hours ago, Jax said:

Currently at MCO airport. I have yet to see any Covid protocols period except for masks. They jammed all of us into 1 car on the train to terminal B while the other 4 cars sat empty. Sanitizer stations are empty. No distancing markers. Bathrooms not clean.  If any of this was reported on cruises the response would likely be very different.  

Welcome to Florida! 🤣

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I’m on Symphony, as well, and figured they canceled Jan Juan because the infection rate in Puerto Rico is 2.17, the highest us the US and it’s territories.  We’re having a lot of fun, but the limits on access to the Windjammer and other food venues (not super sad, mind you.  How can you complain about not being able to eat more on a cruise ship?) the freestyle soda machines are down as often as they are up, and the real bummer is the entertainment being curtailed.  Rumor: the ship has closed the front half of deck six cabins, which leads me to. Eli we they are quarantining either passengers or crew there, but I haven’t heard anything about it yet.

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8 hours ago, Anderneal said:

Rumor: the ship has closed the front half of deck six cabins, which leads me to. Eli we they are quarantining either passengers or crew there, but I haven’t heard anything about it yet.

On the Anthem they have deck six forward closed…I saw it on the Oasis also…but it’s part of the protocols. They keep a section closed and sanitized to be available for quarantine purposes only. Also, whenever new crew members come aboard to start their contracts (which happens regularly) they quarantine them there as a precaution. That’s also part of the protocols.

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We have just returned from oasis of the seas (B2B) 12 Dec - 26 Dec.  Having sailed a B2B on Harmony in September from Barcelona (we live in Spain) we were very surprised at how much the protocols fell short from our experience on Harmony.  

Passenger social distancing non-existent.

Passengers not wearing masks correctly.  Many occasions passengers were seen walking passed crew members who ignored the fact.  There was limited enforcement. 

Tables in the dining room were close to each other.

Lift capacity rarely adhered to.

In conclusion COVID protocols were poor compared to our European cruise.

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8 hours ago, BrianB said:

On the Anthem they have deck six forward closed…I saw it on the Oasis also…but it’s part of the protocols. They keep a section closed and sanitized to be available for quarantine purposes only. Also, whenever new crew members come aboard to start their contracts (which happens regularly) they quarantine them there as a precaution. That’s also part of the protocols.

That’s what they want you to believe! 😉 that makes perfect sense.  I know we had some new crew come onboard at Coco Cay, and today deck 6 is open again today.

 

question for anyone that knows: at Coco Cay the Vision of the Seas docked, carrying only crew on board.  Today we have the Rhapsody of the Seas docked, but it obviously is not cruising with passengers.  Does Royal use these ships to transport staff around the Caribbean?  That seems incredibly inefficient to me, but I guess if it works for them…

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On 12/26/2021 at 5:00 PM, Jax said:

I just got off Oasis this morning. Sail date: Dec 19-26th. Feel free to use any of my comments from my live blog or other forums.

I feel Royal is doing a good job balancing protocols with guest experience.  If they become the Covid police the guest experience will suffer. Some onboard feel Royal should enforce protocols better,  while just as many if not more are content with the way they are being enforced. If you expect cruise lines to implement protocols similar to government mandates in your province, state or country now may not be the right time for you to cruise. It was refreshing to turn off Covid for a week and enjoy a much needed vacation. 
There are definitely some protocols that are not being enforced; the elevator limits being one of them. But if guests aren’t comfortable getting into an elevator with more than 6, they can wait for the next one. I was worried that the new mask protocols that changed a day or two prior to our sailing would impact our onboard experience, but they were mostly unnoticeable. As long as you had a beverage you were free to remove your mask while seated in a vaccinated venue. Many guests chose to wear their masks, while other removed them.  I feel Royal has done a good job of focusing on the guest experience rather than masks, and giving guests a certain degree of freedom in this area. I saw a general tightening of protocols as the week went on; genie’s and crew wearing N95 masks, increased sanitizing of high traffic touch points; particularly the casino, placement of physical distancing markers in lineups and staff redirecting guests in long line ups to alternate lines or venues. 
I felt completely safe and my onboard experience wasn’t impacted but I also had the benefit of a genie which I felt was invaluable during these times.  My genie was transparent about cases onboard and the number is relatively low when you factor out close contacts and guests being isolated with flu like symptoms that tested negative. 
Updated: In response to reporting (criticisms) of onboard testing on other ships, ours was completed on Day 7 at 8:15am and our PCR test results were emailed to us quickly. Return times ranged  from less than an hour to 4 hours. This process may have been expedited due to our genie but it exceeded expected timelines. 
Jacquie  

Having also been on this sailing, I echo everything Jax stated above, the new protocols didn't impact the experience at all.  Some shows were adjusted but that can happen anytime.  We had our genie replace on the next to the last day due to her being a close contact to a positive case.  The new genie stepped in and took great care of us without missing a beat.

Service was outstanding and I would go again next week if I didn't have to get back to work.

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