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We are first time MSC cruisers sailing in March (Lirica, Mediterranean). I booked Bella a week ago, and just received a new confirmation including cabin number. This seems awfully early!

There was an old thread about this maybe around 2019 but I can't find it now. As @Host Jazzbeau mentioned, Storylines has been working on this for a while. They did appear to do some odd things like use photos of a ship they hadn't bought, and use photos of actual land-based stores to represent their shipboard grocery market, etc. But I've been keeping an eye on them and they seem to be trucking along, albeit the launch is now said to be 2025. (Previously was, I think, 2020 and then 2023, though of course the pandemic affects that a lot.) Hopefully the Croatian government will give the authorization to proceed.

5 minutes ago, SeaHunt said:

Here's a link to the roll call for that sailing - maybe try and see if they have more info?

 

 

Thanks for finding that, I've asked there! I wonder if RCI does waitlists...

While searching around the web, I found a 4/25/21 sailing (Singapore to Tokyo) on Ovation of the Seas, but it doesn't come up at all on the RCI site. I found it on multiple aggregator/agency sites, so I believe the sailing existed at some point, but I would prefer to look it up on RCI. Is it perhaps a charter? Maybe sold out? Is there a way to be waitlisted for a particular itinerary in case somebody cancels their reservation?

Hmmm...still mixed answers on this it seems - it sounds like it may in fact be inadvisable for an asthmatic. I really appreciate the responses!

I saw on a thread here that the Sunshine has ventilation issues or something, and the smoke in the casino can be smelled elsewhere on the ship. How big an issue is this? I'm thinking of booking my first Carnival sailing for my 40th birthday (Jan 2021) but my partner has asthma and we cannot be around smoke. We have dealt with it on other ships where you basically have to race through the casino to avoid the smoke, but I am worried that more of the ship will be off limits on Sunshine, perhaps because of the ventilation. Any feedback would be welcome - I can always pick a different ship!

Thanks for this thread - I am looking at doing my 40th birthday on Sunshine out of Charleston in Jan 2021. Would be my 12th cruise but have never sailed Carnival before. This is a great thread, very encouraging, thank you!

Just wanted to say, wizard-of-roz, I love that this thread is still going after 10 years! I don't think I've checked in here since 2007 myself but I love that you're still providing answers!

I'm looking at the shore excursions on the NCL site for Harvest Caye, and seeing a bunch that seem to go to Belize proper. The Mayan ruins at Nim Li Punit, Garifuna Cultural Museum, etc. The list also includes cabanas, the ropes course, etc. It's the Belize excursions that interest me, though, and yet I didn't think excursions like that happen on a private island - I've been to Labadee but that's it.

Does anyone know if these excursions are usually offered? Our schedule says we'll be at Harvest Caye from 8am to 7pm, so there's plenty of time...I just didn't think they were possible!

Since the last menu changed 4 ish years ago there has not been Indian dishes on the menu every night or Indian dishes at all.

I decided to ask about this on the trip we just returned from (Grandeur). I asked our server what happened to the old Indian menu, and she was unclear, but she called the headwaiter over. Oh my goodness did he go above and beyond. We were brought fantastic Indian food every night - mostly vegetable curries, also dal. There was roti, papadam, and excellent raita every night. My spouse and I ended up asking for just one tray of curry to share between us, because there was way too much food! I have no idea if anyone else in the dining room asked for this, but we had Indian food every night and it was amazing.

So even though it's no longer on the menu regularly, it is absolutely still available - it is a bit of a strange request for them now, but they had no problem doing it.

Royal Caribbean is great for vegans and vegetarians. There's Indian food always available - every dinner in main dining has Indian food on the menu, and you can ask for it at other times too. If that night's offering has paneer or something, you can ask for something you enjoyed at a previous meal, you'll get it.

There's also plenty of salad, fruit, and other options. Lots of portobello stuff. You'll have a great time!

Haven't read through this entire thread since I'm on the ship but I have to agree with the op that the options for vegetarians are poor. Ask for veg burgers and I get the answer they don't have them. Ask if something has meat in it since the card doesn't have any of the symbols on it and the people in the windjammer either don't know or answer me like I'm crazy for asking. The windjammer had Mexican night last night. Had beef, chicken, and fish for tacos but no beans. Have had some days where all the sauce for the pasta had meat, i.e. chicken, beef, and shellfish. Salads such as potato, macaroni, or Greek, have shellfish in them.

 

in the mdr some of the soups look like they could be vegetarian but don't have the v. When asked on both cruises about the same soup one waiter said it was vegetarian (didn't have a v on the menu) and one waiter said it was made with beef stock so not vegetarian.

 

I've sailed this ship 25 times out of Baltimore and Enchantment 20 and many times could be called a cheerleader but the food is getting worse (and the service sometimes as well).

 

Fruit is good but for 20 days (I'm on a b2b of 2 ten days cruises), nothing but fruit gets boring.

Yes, that's it exactly! Especially what happens when you ask in the Windjammer. There's one officer up there who is downright rude if you ask him anything! Other folks up there were kinder, at least, and tried to fix it. For that guy, his approach was very rough, "why are you bothering me" kind of thing.

It's just a matter of staff education. Obviously they care enough about vegetarians to develop a labeling system, why can't they apply it accurately? That's really all I want...clarity in labeling.

....you know what happens when you "assume"?.....I only ask for I don't understand the attitude on some who live a certain life style and expect everyone to be able to fulfill their whim....I don't think I should or would be catered in a vegan/ vegetarian establishment...but that's me....I just would like to understand how others think......rude is jumping to a conclusion which tells more about those who do jump......;)

I too had been thinking you were just being facetious, but if you really don't understand, I am happy to answer the question.

It's about options. Let's say I am vegetarian for religious reasons. That means I cannot eat meat, right? So if I am in a place that serves both meat and vegetarian items, I will choose the vegetarian items, because that's what my religion allows me to eat.

But if you go to a vegetarian restaurant, as a meat-eater, it is not part of your religion that you must eat meat. You have the option to have a vegetarian meal if you want. You don't need to be served meat, because it is not a requirement for you, only an option that you can use (or not).

So for me, in this scenario, I do not have an option, I cannot eat meat. But you do have an option, and you can go without the meat for this meal.

Does that help?

Except they do label the appetizers that are ONLY fruit as V. It's just confusing if there are Vs on some things, but not others -- even if you think it's a given. Why would I assume that the strawberry soup appetizer is vegetarian when it isn't listed with a V, even though the 'mixed fruit salad' appetizer DOES have a V? That's the argument here. It's inconsistent in a weird way. Why label one random dessert with a V but not others? It's definitely the exception to the rule for desserts to not be vegetarian other than gelatin, and I highly doubt that all the desserts are NOT vegetarian except the random 1 or 2 labeled with a V throughout the cruise (and on my last cruise, I was told exactly which ones have gelatin, and the rest WERE vegetarian, even not labeled as such...).

 

What we are saying, I think, is that there should be a better system. Label everything or only label things that can be made vegetarian (and denote it as such), but don't do some weird in between.

Yes, that's exactly what I am saying, thank you! The fruit soups are an excellent example. I believe the pineapple-lychee soup was labeled as vegetarian, but a berry soup wasn't. It's unclear - does the berry soup contain chicken stock somehow? I think soups are probably the biggest culprits for mislabeling. Other foods it's pretty obvious. I agree oatmeal is overkill! But if labeling everything is the only way to get some standards...

As for those arguing a vegetarian shouldn't be in Chops at all - we had the all-restaurants package. We found out later we'd have been allowed to switch Chops and do another one twice, but it was our first and we didn't know.

Just a question.... Why would a vegetarian go to a steak house type dining and expect a large vegan menu? I would never expect to go to a vegan dining joint and expect a T-bone steak on the menu and if not get exercised over the fact.....it just baffles my senses .....:confused:

I don't expect "a large vegan menu" (and I am not vegan), but a single item, such as pasta (which they ended up serving me), would be nice. Just something they have as an automatic answer for the question "do you have anything for a vegetarian?" Their answer to the question was "ummm" instead of "sure, how about some pasta." They managed it okay with no notice, and I applaud them for that.

But it would be nice if they could have one item listed on the menu, or at least have it as a ready answer, without having to have the manager and the chef come to the table. They were all very sweet, but it would be nice if it didn't seem like the first time they had been asked the question.

As for why I went, it's because the other three members of my party were not vegetarian, and they wanted to go. I can't imagine that's the first time something like that has happened, so why were they thrown by the request?

The "Vegetarian Chicken Chunks" are actually vegetarian, made with seitan, I believe. They were also not very appetizing, in this vegetarian's opinion.

Ah now that you mention it, they probably were seitan. I had been thinking wheat gluten. It was my favorite meal on board besides Izumi, but everybody has different tastes!

Thanks everyone for your support. One other thing I noted was that they were completely unprepared for me in Chops, but I didn't warn them in advance at all, so that's partly on me. It would be nice if they had some standby offering for vegetarians, rather than needing notice, but I guess they figure most vegetarians wouldn't walk in, even with their families.

The wheat stalk indicates gluten free

The milk carton indicates lactose free

The V indicates vegetarian

And a triangular "thing" indicates a vitality dish.

 

Perhaps the staff need more training in why some of these labels are critical AND necessary.

 

My DD, who has celiacs, will be on the Grandeur in two weeks. I sincerely hope that they are better at labeling gluten free.

You are spot on with the marks. The little triangle is Vitality. "V" is vegetarian.

And in your DD's case it is critical to her health that they get the marks right. I won't die if I have meat, I have simply chosen not to eat it. But for people with medical conditions, it is quite serious, and I think they just don't take the marks seriously enough.

Interesting side note: I went onto RCCL's website to find their menus so I could check the above symbols. One of the items for a main course is a Sweet and Sour Premium Vegetarian Chicken Chunks with Jasmine Rice. It is marked with a V. In what universe is Chicken a vegetarian dish?

Actually, that's the dish I was saying they ran out of! It is vegetarian - made with fake meat, created with soy. I loved it. And so did everyone else, apparently! In the Windjammer, it was not marked with a "V" - it just said Sweet and Sour Chicken Chunks (soy meat). I couldn't believe the bad labeling in that case. Maybe that's why people loved it so much...they didn't realize what soy meat was! In the MDR (where I had to go to actually get any) it was labeled with the "V" properly. But Windjammer clearly doesn't care about proper labeling...

Edit: Found the menu symbols in an image here: http://i40.tinypic.com/2jfwy81.jpg

Left to right: gluten free, lactose free, vegetarian, vitality

Just got off the Grandeur a couple of days ago. I have been a vegetarian since 1993 and this was not my first cruise...but I have never had so many problems with the food. Rant ahead!

The Windjammer seemed to slap a vegetarian label on just about anything.

• My wife (not a vegetarian) saw Vegetable Fajitas with a "V" on them, and she tried them...they had fish.
  
• I saw something labeled "Indian Dal Gosh" with a "V" on it, so I went to take some...it had giant pieces of meat. I asked one of the senior Windjammer crew about it - a guy from India himself - and he said "oh, Gosh means it has meat." How am I supposed to know that, especially if it has a "V" on it?
  
• Chicken corn soup had a "V" on it. I picked up the label, found somebody, and said "chicken soup isn't vegetarian." He said "no, it sure isn't" and went to fix it.
  

Both MDR and Windjammer also failed to label items that were unclear as to whether they were vegetarian. Jalapeno potato soup, Brie and spinach phyllo puffs, Corn chowder...all of these can be vegetarian, but aren't necessarily. So my wife tried them, and said they all certainly seem to be vegetarian...but they weren't labeled, so how could we be sure? The number of items labeled as vegetarian is certainly smaller than the number of items that are actually vegetarian...and, as mentioned above, sometimes "V" items have meat anyway. They really should just label everything that is definitely vegetarian...even silly things like pancakes.

There were four pig heads in the Windjammer one lunch. Yes, I know you're serving pork next to them. No, I do not want to see that. Some folks were taking pictures, but I imagine vegetarians (like myself) did not appreciate it, and kids might not have either.

If they know the main vegetarian course is one of the most popular items anytime it is served, they need to make more. Non-veggie people have a tendency to eat vegetarian food if it's good. That's fine. But running out of the main vegetarian course? Not okay. I was told "oh that is popular with everyone, every time we have it" - so...why wouldn't you make more?! (This was in Windjammer, fortunately I was able to go downstairs and get some in the MDR by claiming we missed our seating.)

So, this is kind of a whiny post. Feel free to call me on it, I know I'm whining. (Yes, I put all this in the survey.) But I wanted other vegetarians to be able to find this info later. If you are vegetarian and you sail on Grandeur, you will not starve, but you are not particularly cared about. Examine all items with "V" symbols carefully.

End whine...happy sails, folks.

They will probably provide a full ADA kit like this. The door knocker, in particular, will be more like this. Hope that helps!

I'm curious, what was the problem with the captions? Were you not able to turn them on, or they were garbled, or what? Just wondering, hard of hearing myself.

I thought there was a coffee station somewhere near the Windjammer that was open 24 hours...I may be remembering wrong...

Can someone tell me what is the white area just above cabin # 2108? Is it a steward closet or something? I am trying to assess the potential noise level.

 

http://www.royalcaribbean.com/findacruise/ships/ship/decks/deck/home.do?shipCode=EN&shipProfile=1371

 

Thanks!

Because that's right at the elevators, I believe it's just a blank wall, but don't quote me on that. However, you will find the elevators to provide noise - more so than a steward closet. I've never found those to be noisy, but the elevators can be. *ding* every so often.

I saw the kids a LOT more than I have on other ships. That is, I am normally used to the kids being so busy that they aren't even seen, they are kept occupied with activities and such. But on Enchantment, there were kids everywhere...that's all the info I have on that.

I admit to thinking the same thing about Bill W on my first cruise! I am so glad the cruise lines offer the meetings, because it can be really hard to be around the bars, etc on the ship if you are a non-drinker.

Another term popping up now is "Rainbow Gathering" - this is the same as Friends of Dorothy, it refers to a hosted event for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender (GLBT) people.

Can adults use that bungee trampoline? What's the max weight?