Royal Caribbean has released a new video with Quantum of the Seas' captain, discussing how the bridge crew navigates a ship across the Atlantic Ocean for her maiden voyage.
When Royal Caribbean announced the concept of a virtual balcony on Quantum of the Seas, it was a big deal because it offered passengers in an inside cabin a view without the cost of a balcony or even oceanview stateroom.
Today we have a new video by Royal Caribbean that has a behind the scenes view on this unique feature found on the world's smartest ship.
Speaking of virtual balconies, don't miss our exclusive interview with the team that built the virtual balcony!
These days, Royal Caribbean is rolling out brand new restaurant and dining concepts by the handful. But not all restaurants Royal Caribbean opens stay open forever.
We thought it might be fun to look back at the restaurants Royal Caribbean has said goodbye to as well as the ones that are nearly extinct (endangered?).
Seafood Shack was a brand new restaurant when Oasis of the Seas first debuted. As the name implies, it served up seafood in an open-air restaurant in the Boardwalk neighborhood.
Originally, the Seafood Shack charged guests a cover charge but later Royal Caribbean changed it to be a la carte pricing.
The axe came swiftly for Seafood Shack just a few weeks ago when Oasis of the Seas underwent its 5-year drydock refurbishment and it was replaced by Sabor Modern Mexican.
The Seafood Shack failed to connect with cruisers and the changes in pricing seemed to be indicative of efforts to get more passengers eating there but it never became a fan favorite.
At one point, Portofino was Royal Caribbean's signature Italian specialty restaurant. Along with Chops Grille, Portofino was being rolled out across Royal Caribbean's fleet.
When the Oasis-class of cruise ships debuted, they noticably were missing Portofino and had introduced a new Italian restaurant, Giovanni's Table. Would there be room for two kinds of Italian restaurants in Royal Caribbean's fleet?
Turns out the answer was no, as the fleet-wide refurbishment replaced existing Portofino restaurants with Giovanni's Table.
Portofino still exists on a few ships, but Royal Caribbean has quietly confirmed they are on their way out in favor of Giovanni's Table. We will never know the exact reason for the swapping of Italian restaurants, but it's likely a part of a shift in the onboard dining strategy Royal Caribbean instituted.
If you've ever cruised on a Radiance-class ship, you've probably dined a few times at the Seaview Cafe.
Part sit down, part quick service, the Seaview Cafe offers freshly made sandwiches, soups and snacks with a view of the ocean. It was quite popular among Royal Caribbean fans as being a "hidden" secret.
Like Portofino, Royal Caribbean decided to remove Seaview Cafe in favor of adding new specialty restaurants. Only one Seaview Cafe remains on Jewel of the Seas, which will also be removed once Jewel of the Seas receives her refurbishment.
Seaview Cafe was an interesting restaurant experience and unique to the Radiance-class. Replacing it with specialty restaurants made sense from a business perspective, but fans lament its loss for the simple yet incredibly tasty fresh food.
Asian food has always been a popular cuisine and Royal Caribbean looked to capitalize on its popularity with a special section in the Windjammer just for that, called Jade.
Jade offered sushi, a variety of Chinese, Thai and Indian dishes along with a few Asian soups. I personally enjoyed the make your own miso soup bar.
Jade was never the best Asian food you'd ever have, but it was complimentary and the main dishes changed each evening. The sushi wasn't great but at the time, it was the only choice we had.
When the Oasis-class of ships introduced the Izumi specialty restaurant, the Jade sections started to be removed in favor of Izumi. Izumi offered much better quality sushi and Japanese food, albeit at a price.
Much like Portofino, only a few ships have Jade these days and they too will be replaced eventually.
The Cupcake Cupboard was a small shop on the Oasis-class promenade that aimed to capitalize on the rising popularity of cupcakes as a stand-alone product.
In addition to offering cupcakes to eat, there were decorating classes for kids and adults.
Even after debuting on the Oasis-class, the Cupcake Cupboard made its way to other Royal Caribbean ships during the fleet-wide upgrades. As ships were upgraded, the Cupcake Cupboard started to go from a small shop to an offering at Cafe Promenade.
When Oasis of the Seas received her refurbishment, Cupcake Cupboard was evicted in favor of a Kate Spade store.
I believe revenue from Cupcake Cupboard was not great enough to warrant the prime real estate it occupied but on Navigator of the Seas, you could find slimmed down Cupcake Cupboard offerings from Cafe Promenade, which allowed Royal Caribbean to offer the tasty treats without all the space.
This one is up for debate how endangered the Main Dining Room is because as of the time of this post, the Main Dining Room has only been removed from Quantum and Oasis-class ships but Royal Caribbean waiting to see how its replacement does.
Dynamic Dining is the new dining concept initially introduced on the Quantum-class of cruise ships that eliminates a main dining room and replaces it with smaller restaurants. The idea is to give guests a greater variety of choice for dinner and without the formality of the main dining room.
Perhaps the main dining room will soon meet a similar fate as other restaurants in this list or perhaps the Dynamic Dining concept will not advance any further. Time will tell.
Of the restaurants listed here, which do you miss the most? Is there a restaurant here you'd love to have one more meal in? Share your thoughts in this post's comments!
Our newest podcast episode is out to help give you a quick "audio escape" to a Royal Caribbean cruise!
Episode 66 is available for downloading, where Matt previews his upcoming 2-night cruise on the brand new Quantum of the Seas.
Matt will be boarding Royal Caribbean's newest ship next week for a glimpse at what this ship has to offer. Matt previews what he has planned for the cruise, what he's excited about and previews what content will be coming to the blog as a result of this cruise.
Here’s the podcast page for Episode 66. And don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast via RSS, Stitcher or on iTunes!
Take a listen and as always, let us know what you think! Please rate and review the podcast on iTunes and leave your comments below!
It's only a pre-inaugural cruise and the ship still has that "new ship smell", but a few technology hiccups troubled the first day Royal Caribbean opened up the ship to the public according to a report by The Telegraph.
The main issues were the super fast internet provided by O3b wasn't working yet because the satellite network does not cover the UK but should be online once the ship reaches the New York area.
Without the fast internet, the Royal iQ smartphone app did not work either.
In addition, the luggage RFID tracking system that is supposed to let you track where you luggage is was also "patchy". The Telegraph claims the few bags that were selected to be part of the RFID trial seemed to take longer to get to their proper staterooms.
Probably the biggest snafu occured at the Bionic Bar with the robotic bartenders. Here's the exact report by the Telegraph:
"The robotic arms failed to stand glasses upright on a number of occasions. Cocktails are meant to be mixed in one minute but as waiting times rose to 20 minutes the IT team pulled the plug – literally – and went back to the drawing board."
For those looking forward to Anthem of the Seas, Royal Caribbean vice president Dominic Paul promises that by the time she arrives, Britain will have an O3b satellite so the IQ app should work and smartphone check-in and bag-tagging issues will be resolved.
The cruise business in Australia is booming but Royal Caribbean's research shows that customers down under are most concerned about price and don't really care who they sail with. This is has lead Royal Caribbean to invest more in brand marketing to separate itself from the competition.
Royal Caribbean Commercial Director Sean Treacy told Mumbrella the research showed people did not look at brand at all.
"What was really surprising, and frankly a little damaging to our egos, was that people who are new to cruising can’t tell one cruise brand from another,” he said. “They are merely comparing one big white ship with another and they find it difficult to tell the difference between the likes of us, Princess Cruises and most surprising, P&O."
Royal Caribbean took the research as a "wake up call" to how they were marketing in the Australia market and as a result will be ramping up its brand marketing to increase awareness.
Part of that initiative is increasing its advertising reach beyond print and search and to start local television ads. The new campaign is called, "It's Royal Caribbean Time".
Royal Caribbean will also increase its social media presence and will run a competition on Facebook offering 50 places on a one-night cruise in December.
Onboard Royal Caribbean's Quantum of the Seas, engineers and shipbuilders came together to create the first skydiving at sea experience.
This video offers an inside look at the one-of-a-kind installation of Ripcord by iFly onboard Quantum of the Seas.
A few guests aboard Royal Caribbean's Explorer of the Seas are reporting a giant 40 foot wave struck Explorer of the Seas causing damage to the ship's lifeboats.
Photo copyright Cruise Critic Message Board Forums / Merion_Mom
A Cruise Critic message board member, Merion_Mom, reported that two life boats were torn from their position along side the ship and struck the Promenade deck.
Additionally, some sea water penetrated damaged doors on deck 4 and there were some elevator outages for a short period of time. No injuries were reported and the ship is able to continue on its normal course.
Photo copyright Cruise Critic Message Board Forums / Merion_Mom
The ship's captain indicated that despite the lifeboat damage, there are still enough space on the deployable life boats and rafts for all guests.
Royal Caribbean has finalizes the price that it will repurchase 3.5 million shares of stock that are held by Awilhelmsen AS (Awilhelmsen). Awilhelmsen is a privately owned investment company that was one of three founders of Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. in 1968.
The repurchase price per share will be $67.45, which is equal to the price paid by a financial institution to Awilhelmsen in connection with its sale of 3.5 million shares conducted yesterday November 3, 2014 pursuant to Rule 144 of the Securities Act. The repurchase is expected to close on November 6, 2014.
The last reported sale price of Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd (RCL) common stock on November 3, 2014 was $68.40 per share.
Before Quantum of the Seas left Southampton, England yesterday, John Wakefield was able to snap these great shots of Royal Caribbean's newest ship docked nearby.
Here are a few of John's photos that he shared with us, that I think are just great looking.
