FireEMT978

14 minutes ago, Tree_skier said:

Music is fine but I draw the line with those clods who bring in their own bluetooth speakers thinking I want to listen to their rubbish music.  If there is music it should something Royal deems appropriate for the environment. 

Many ships do have music playing in the Solarium. But, on some older ships, the systems do not work anymore. Sure would be nice, if they did have "ANY" music playing. That would be enough to act as a "White noise" to blur out the peoples individual conversations, and those that do the "Speakerphone" game.

9 minutes ago, Charles4515 said:

Does RC still have libraries?  They seem to be eliminating libraries on cruise ships. I don't recall music in the Solarium. I recall a lot of people reading. We went there to relax and read. 

I would think that at 19.4k posts, that you would be well aware of the library/card room situation on Royal ships. As others stated, it is an "Adult area" for "Adults", not children. I like to interact with other adults. That, is why I go to public areas on the ship that are designed for adults, such as the casino and Solarium.

On 9/28/2023 at 9:19 AM, Billy Baltic said:

Agreed. If someone wants to talk so loudly that the whole place can hear them, there’s a more appropriate place for them than the solarium. Similarly if someone wants to use a phone hands free. 

In the older ships in particular, it’s a small space and one clown can ruin the area for everyone. 

Quick question. Many times while in the solarium, my daughter will tell me "Dad you're yelling" while we are in the pool talking with her and other people. What are all of your wonderful thoughts about that? As I am deaf/hard of hearing, and have to remove my hearing aids while in the pool.

On 9/27/2023 at 4:16 PM, BND said:

I was informed on here several years ago that the Solarium is not a quiet spot and that people are in there to have a good time, you know, even if it infringes on others.  The reason it's adult is so adults have ONE space they can be in without worrying about kids being around.  Whether it's language or whatever.  Kids have their own space that adults can't go into.

Spot on. There is a library, if people want to have a silent, peaceful area to read. I prefer music in the Solarium.

You should definitely be able to use them for that. You can go to the clubroyaleoffers.com site to check the availability of the particular sailings. And, yes you can combine them for a better cabin.

On 5/18/2023 at 10:48 PM, Azllama said:

Yep! Thats what we called our recent Eclipse cruise out of Sydney. B2b cruise and we lost weight! Food was subpar at best. Mast grill burger was grey before being cooked, and grey when cooked! No worries about it being red on the inside!  

Must have been the cruise to Hawaii. Couldn't believe the food situation.

2 hours ago, NutsAboutGolf said:

 

Generally the MDR as the majority on the boards have ate there.  We dine in Blu most of the time but often order off the MDR and understand the majority do not dine in Blu or Luminae (we have never been there)

 

I'll repeat what I've said about Carnival's food many times...Disclaimer, many will say "I don't cruise for chicken, BBQ or burgers" but this is Carnival's LUNCH, what "gourmet" lunch does the average X cruiser eat on X, the buffet (rhetorical)?  Carnival's free Guy's BBQ lunch beats anything I've had for lunch at X (I have not dined in Luminae or a specialty during lunch), Guy's free burgers literally destroy the mast grill, Shaq's free big chicken beats any chicken I've had on X, a big point of contention for many on X is their baked desserts looking good but them tasting incredible bland, not on Carnival, their baked desserts like their chocolate melting cake are fantastic.  On their newer ships, they made some specialty dining restaurants free apparently to reduce crowding, although they still charge on some older ships, their Asian/Mexican and Italian restaurants beat X's MDR

 

With X, I have seen ZERO food quality improvements, only cutbacks, from my first X cruise in 2019.  I don't cruise for the food and eat off the ship as much as possible as this gets better quality food, a sense of what the locals eat and can meet locals

Upon speaking to many friends that sail Carnival, I am very jealous of the choices of good quicks eats that they have. Celebrity's Edge Class ships are definitely "My speed". I have no interest in ever sailing on them, except maybe to try there food offerings. My only problem, is that the food quality on both Royal and Celebrity conitnues to slide downhill. It is the EXACT same food on both lines. The mystery meat burgers have gotten so bad, that I can barely stomach them. And, I can't sit for 2 to 2-1/2 hours in the main dining room, only to finally be served a meal that was not cooked properly.

9 minutes ago, Ex-Airbalancer said:

Wow, 7 times on RCL , you are a brave person , 

we were on the Voyager of the Seas Arctic TA last September, it was pretty bad, people got off in Iceland to fly home because they thought the ship was that bad , 

This was my 25th cruise in the past 6 years. So, I feel as if I have firsthand experience to base my expectations on.

5 hours ago, bigAWL said:

 

I'm curious if you have also cruised Royal Caribbean in the past year, if you have first-hand experience to compare the products as they currently are?  It seems to me the cruise industry in general is having trouble maintaining previous quality levels, and are cutting services across the board.

I have. This is my 9th cruise since the return. 7 of which were on Royal.

Well,

Just got off of the 5/9/23, 12-night Hawaii Eclipse sailing. I'm sure that this will upset the "Loyalists"! But, the food quality was horrible on the Eclipse! I was on the 8-Night Beyond "Holiday sailing" from 12/26/22-1/3/23. The entire cruise, including the food was all phenomenal! As for our Eclipse sailing, I can't say enough about just how much the majority of the guests onboard were very disappointed with the food quality all over the ship. The buffet was pretty much identical, with minimal changes daily. The scrambled eggs were like soup! The quality of the "Celebrity" product has suffered severely! We looked up to Celebrity to be a big "Step up" in food quality! We now feel that Celebrity is being cheapened up, to save money/make the investors a larger profit. We feel like the exact same food that is being served on Royal Caribbean ships, is now the exact same food being served on Celebrity. It's really sad. The ships are sailing at up to 110% revenue capacity. And, they are still cutting the quality of the product. Many of us sailed during the restart immediately after the "Pandemic" to prove our loyalty. Now, I feel as if I should even consider booking anymore future cruises. While we have been very happy with my "move" from Royal Caribbean, to Celebrity Cruise Line, the current experinces will shape our future decisions. We dressed up in our "Finest" to go to the MDR on this cruise, only to find out that the "Aged Prime Rib of Beef" was not being served, as shown on the menu! Talk about a huge amount of the MDR guests being extremely upset! After 25 cruises in the past 26 years, the deficiences/intentional cutbacks are showing badly!

2 hours ago, LobsterStalker said:

This is the absolutely intolerable one . Watched someone do this every day for a week in a prime spot... Very hard to keep mouth shut. If I could go back , I would 'tattle' 

If it weren't for my 24 year old daughter telling me not to confront them, I was going to go off on them. It has gotten so damn bad with the "Entitlement", and lack of respect for others.

My daughter is on a lot of immunosupressants and infusions. She is highly allergic to dogs and cats. As stated by others. Even by an animal previously being in the cabin, she will have bad reactions. There is an expectation, that we will not have to be in contact with these things while on our cruise. While we don't sail Viking, we have experienced these first hand on Royal.

On 3/28/2023 at 8:01 PM, Familygoboston said:

Yes, I know the “family” 🤣 RC, Celebrity, Azamara and we even have a cruise planned on Silver Seas! Keeping it in the family!!🤣🤣

No more Azamara. Only Celebrity, Royal Caribbean, and SilverSea now.

On 4/1/2023 at 6:04 PM, SOPOME said:

I wonder if this is because you need 2 unique sign on IDs to claim both of the free  benefits?   We usually travel with a phone and an IPad, so that should solve the issue I think..

This is exactly correct. I have free "Signature" internet. But, my GF and I each have 2 "Diamond +" days. She has to make a different login to use her free ones, and mine.

My daughter and I were on Oasis, March 5th-12th. It was soooooo bad. Besides the normal chair hogging, it was so out of hand with people "collecting" chairs. 2 people would grab 4 loungers and a table. Then, they would use the extra loungers to place their items on.

On 3/27/2023 at 11:00 AM, A&L_Ont said:

Photo below is at the beach pool. I also miss the tables on Oasis, they just have the umbrellas now. 

 

They did nothing. 

 

This was on Oasis before 8am the week of March 12th.  The sun is just rising in the background in the photo. The loungers were basically this empty at 9am, with a few people showing up. Still more than the 30 minutes time limit.  Nothing was marked, or moved by deck crew. People eventually showed up as it was a sea say. Even up on the suite sun deck every lounger was hoarded.

 

Yep. My daughter and I got off of the Oasis on March 12th. Every chair was completely hogged every day. Looked identical!

Best of luck to anybody trying to use wi-fi calling since the change to Starlink. 

I was on Harmony, Oasis, and Beyond since the installation, and was running on the "Premium" for all of them. Can't do Wi-fi calling. All calls immediately go to garbage, and when the other person can hear anything, they say that you sound like a robot. I use a Samsung S22 Ultra. MANY people complaining about this with Starlink on the ships. I never had a problem prior to the change. Now, wi-fi calling doesn't work. 

9 hours ago, BND said:

I think it's an easy way to test out smokeless casinos without making the full up one so until they see the results.  It's coming by the way as cigarette smokers are a smaller and smaller percentage of the population.  

Not an apples to apples comparison. No bar service, and a tiny horrible selection of machines is not a way to "Gauge" Non-smoker vs. Smoker revenue for the casino. It's ridiculous how many people walk around the Non-smoking section of the actual main casino smoking and vaping. 

I was on the Holiday Beyond sailing in Sunset Verandah # 9327. During 2 of the 3 last nights, I about lost it, due to the loud banging/creaking every 5 seconds. No matter how late, drunk, or tired I was, it was bad. This almost drove me to ANY other quiet spot! BUT, what a beautiful ship the Beyond is!

Curious, as to what your "Observation" is, as to the average age? I'm going to be 52 on NYE! On, the NYE sailing. I'm really stressing, needing some "Fun" times. Not ready for retirement! NEED adrenaline!

8 hours ago, RichYak said:

It also doesn't say what you want it to say, so IMO it provides no validity to your argument. What you want is the following, which says "Reserved" and "Full Sailing":

 

Well............I can clearly see where it says "Full sailing - 12 Days". My guess would be, that it would be a "Good argument".

On 10/14/2022 at 8:32 PM, iuki said:

My friend has dealt with eating disorders because of her weight issues and, despite losing weight, she still sees herself as overweight and is embarrassed to divulge her weight, even to her husband.  So, what a couple of you seem to think is so trivial is something very painful to her.  Now I’m sorry I asked.  She was right, people are judgmental of people with weight issues.  

Not judgemental AT ALL! When TSA is looking at biometrics, this can be very important!

On 10/15/2022 at 12:00 PM, gelli8112 said:

Well, it finally happened. Today, six days after stepping off the Allure the Seas, I checked my crown and anchor status and it's purple. I have finally reached diamond +. 

 

Now don't get me wrong, it feels pretty good. I'm loyal to royal and I'll take all the perks that I can get, but I was expecting a little more. 

 

Was I wrong to expect a diamond 💎 anchor to fall from the sky from the ghost of the Song of Norway. Am I the only person that thought I would receive a call from Jason Liberty, just to say what's up. 

 

Shucks at a minimum, I expected to be offered a cameo appearance on the Royal Caribbean blog. 

 

You know what I just realized, it's the weekend. I'm sure all those things will happen on Monday. 

 

Happy cruising. 

 

 

 

 

We were on the October 2-9th Harmony cruise? I just hit Diamond Plus on that one. Ironically, I received an email that was meant for my girlfriend yesterday, congratulating her on becoming Diamond!? Royal's IT at its finest! We now have 179 points actually showing in both of our accounts, as of yesterday. The points are correct. A little "off", congratulating us on "Diamond" status.

Yep! Our October 2-9th Harmony sailing was at 103% capacity.

Just got off of the Harmony this last Sunday October 9th. Mixed drinks are now $14.00. Upon speaking to the Solarium bartenders, I asked this same question. They said that all of the drinks they can make with the liquors in the Solarium bar, they are all within the $14.00 limit also.