MEFIowa

And from O's perspective over the long run, it is an intended cost-cutting measure trying to disguise itself otherwise, but then the "best" cost-cutting measures are the ones people don't tend to realize reduce the company's costs. Not sure why people struggle to understand how O (and NCL) took on mountains of debt that has to be repaid. And they've suffered from wholesale price inflation, too. So they are trying to reduce their costs and increase their operating profits. To literally stay afloat in the long run.

First, there is no age demographic for smoothies, though I do enjoy starting the day on an O ship with the Sun Salutation smoothie. Old and young alike can enjoy them, and everyone in between. Second, we've got 22 more nights on Sirena starting Aug 28, 2024. Can't wait! So you seem quite confused about reality.

I ate at the new pizza station on Riviera 11/2024. There isn't anything truly different or unique about Vista's station vis-a-vis Riviera's, so stop the Vista Cheerleading. The pizza was fine, decent, nothing to write home about. A LOT better than the junk pizza they served in the TC at lunch. But that isn't saying much. In my home town I could easily find a dozen pizza places where the pizza is better. (For example, a couple of Chicago deep-dish style places immediately come to mind.)

By George, I think you've got it. They've substituted eating an inexpensive item rather than an expensive item. The cost of the food itself to O. And it all adds up over time.

And you'll get to "enjoy" the looks of the wait staff as they obviously want you gone and them getting out of there. You'll notice it. But then there are those who enjoy the misery of others.

Think dough. Bread. The use of bread, dough, to replace eating more expensive food. So, of course, O would love to have you fill up on bread, dough, as often as they can. Weird how people extol bread and rolls, which means they aren't eating something that is a lot more expensive (like meat or seafood).

Think how LITTLE it costs to make 10,000 pizzas for couples that essentially replace all or most of a meal they'd have in the TC or GDR. As opposed to the cost of the food in the TC or GDR. My local Pizza Hut can make a nice 5-ingredient pan pizza and make a profit selling it for $15. The worker is on contract, so no added cost for the staff. He's got to work somewhere.

Getting cold and wet at 0730 getting my breakfast Sun Salutation smoothie because the station was moved out forward to make room for a pizza oven is NOT "completely subjective". That's an objective issue. And objectively, IF we're spending say $350-500 per couple per day, having a glorified "Pizza Hut" is an objective disappointment about food. When so much more could've been "added". Weird how an obvious COST CUTTING MEASURE is being made out to be some amazing improvement in food. Right, basic American pizza. That Americans have eaten a thousand times already. Not unlike the Vista cheerleaders who want us to believe that dropping Jaques for Ember was an "improvement", as if adding a glorified Applebee's or Ruby Tuesday was an improvement.

And that is controlled by O. Not passengers. So, for example, when Southern Gary and I are on the same cruise on Riviera in the Med last Nov and he (apparently) can get ALL the specialty reservations he wants from his Suite, just asking any day, and I can't get any at a decent time, what is "possible" for him isn't "possible" for me. Weirder still is being "forced" to take a 9 pm reservation 45 days out and then on the day of being told earlier in the day it has been changed to 8:30 and you see you and just 2 other couples show up at 8:30. There was no real "9 pm" slot. They just dumped you into it hoping you wouldn't take it or knowing they'd force you out of it anyway.

The primary issue is what is AVAILABLE for G-B cabins on the first minute they can make their reservations 45 days out. As couples. In advance, supposedly AFTER the A and higher cabins had their first crack at what is available. And IF G-B cabin passengers are being DENIED tables for 2 45 days out when O knows they exist but are saving them, esp. desired earlier time tables for 2, for others later. Weird how so many seem to be able to just walk up on nearly any day during a cruise and snag a table for 2 when the G-B cabin passengers were told 45 days out, "NONE are available. NOT a one. NOT on any day you're cruising."

I'm clearly discussing TABLES for 2. We have no desire to eat with another couple. And no amount of "flexibility" can make 6:30 or 7:30 specialty reservations magically appear at the 45-day window if O says "None are available". My wife tries to make them at 1201 AM on the 1st day we can.

And we quickly learned that IF we didn't want to be one of a couple couples left at the end of the evening, when it was obvious that the staff wanted to be gone, too, we'd tell our server right up front: NO bread and NO desert. We'd order our meal, all of it, and just have them bring it out as quickly as possible. I do believe it highly possible that O knows that many G-B cabin passengers don't eat in the specialty restaurants for all their possible minimums due to the timing issue. We've got F and C1 for our upcoming B2B on Sirena in the Baltic starting late Aug. I don't think we'll take any specialty reservation if all they offer is at 8:30 pm or later.

You can really learn a lot about the issue IF you do a B2B in different cabin levels which we did off Riviera 10/30-11/19, 2023 in the Med. Trieste to Athens then Athens to Barcelona. Ship had about 1230 passenger on both legs. With a very heavy Asian contingent on both legs, too. Learned there really was no "late dining" on either cruise. Very few passengers showed up to eat at or after 8:30 PM in the specialty restaurants. They were emptying out by 9 pm and pretty much empty by 9:30 PM. O actually changed our 9 pm reservation to an 8:30 one and I saw why. NO one showed up at 9 pm and only 3 couples showed up at 8:30 For our A3, no problem getting the early 6:30 or 7:30 reservation. For our B3, no such luck. Was all 8 pm or later. BUT we only wanted table for 2. Something is OFF IF people can get table for 2s at say 6:30 pm added on the day of, when people in G-B cabins can't get those slots 45 days out!

Guess that depends on where you live and the kind of pizza places near you. Having eaten it on Riviera 11/2023, there was NOTHING extra-ordinary about it. Decent. Nothing to write home about. Better than they're thoroughly mediocre lunch pizza, but that isn't saying all that much. When a couple is paying $350-500 per day for their cabin (G-B), I'm not immediately getting how adding mere pizza, something so many eat so often, is being viewed so favorably.

It's more an "Emperor Has No Clothes" situation.... I had the pizza on Riviera 11/2023. It was decent. Nothing to write home about. NO shortage of great local pizza places where I live and we eat pizza so many Friday nights during a year. Hardly any culinary accomplishment by O here. Hard to argue that adding pizza is any improvement when people are paying say $350-500 per night per cabin (G-B). Just another cost-cutting measure fobbed off by O as something new & exciting. And it moved the ice cream/yogurt operation forward into an exposed location that is crab during inclement weather! Stand in line there getting a smoothie at say 0730 when wind and rain are hitting you.

We're on a Baltic cruise then, too. We're doing ours as a B2B. On Sirena. 12 nights London to Stockholm (8/29-9/9). Then 10 nights Stockholm to Copenhagen (9/9-19). AS just for PRICES, do keep in mind that these were opened for sale around April/May 2022. We did the 2nd half as "cruise only" back when it first came out, and then upgraded from a G to a "big" C1 in October 2022. So we're $1000 under the current listed O price for this cabin and cruise (which is all waitlisted). We then added the new 1st half during the "Simply More" sale in the summer of 2023, when SM was introduced. Today our price is $900 under the current listed O price for our F cabin (very little of this cruise is waitlisted today).

Just so glad it was a beautiful 77 deg F and sunny in Izmir/Ephesus on November 7, 2023. Perfect weather. Smaller crowds. We did a private car from Riviera to Ephesus, including the "Marian" house on the hill tourist trap. Amazing walking around the ruins of Ephesus including some famous ones not too far away (e.g., the Temple of Artemis).

Riviera had the pizza oven when we spent 20 nights on her Oct-Nov '23. And yes, Sirena is also amazing. We've got 22 more nights on her this Aug-Sep '24 after 10 nights on her 11/2022. So I do agree: ALL O ships are "amazing".

Though with all the Vista cheerleading (soon to be replaced by Allura cheerleading), guess this means that Marina and Riviera, for example, are NOT "amazing ships". But I can't tell WHAT makes Vista so "amazing" vis-a-vis Riviera, for example. Maybe it is "amazing" that people wanted a glorified Applebee's/Ruby Tuesdays? Or who knew that room noise could be so..."amazing"? Yet, having spent time on Riviera pre- (10 nights) and post-refit (20 nights), we preferred much of her as she was in 2021 as opposed to the Scandinavian minimalism we found in 2023.

Given the waste of bread and how it is used to fill people up with essentially worthless carbs, what you write sounds wonderful. Wife and I tell the server when we order at any specialty restaurant (on both Riviera and Sirena), "No bread please."

Hard pass for me on the sushi. Not something I enjoy. I hope to enjoy the once-per-cruise Indian dinner. Will be interesting to see if Sirena will have either come 8/28/24.

I enjoy physically reading a good daily newspaper. So at home that's the Wall Street Journal for me. Don't get my serious news from the Internet and don't waste my precious vacation time on the Internet. I love scanning a physical newspaper to quickly see and read the exact stories I'm interested in. And I enjoy sampling the Canadian and UK papers. Too bad they didn't have the Times (of London). Thinking last Nov it was Daily Mail and Telegraph. And have done A4 and A3 concierge only on RIVIERA. The BIG therapy pool there makes that quite wonderful on a day filled with excursions. Love to use it around 5-6 pm. Trust me, after walking 10,000 steps to the St. John's Fortress in Kotor, that big therapy pool was worth its weight in water that evening. And on any evening my wife wanted to take her sweet time doing her make up and getting dressed without being bugged. (Never have sailed on Marina)

IF you enjoy NEWSPAPERS, as I do, then READING the various American, Canadian and UK newspapers in the Concierge Lounge is appreciated. As for the food and beverages there, they are what they are and you either use and enjoy them. Or not. Have also pulled out some port tourist books in this lounge, too. And once the Concierge helped look something up specific to a particular brand of Mexican wine I had purchased. So make of it what you want. If at all.

First, study a map and you'll quickly see that Paris is NOT in or near the "Mediterranean". You might as well discuss Berlin, Geneva, London, and Vienna. Second, in light of climate-related issues, the "historical weather charts" really mean study the past 5 or so years. What 1989 or 1999 or 2009 were like is rather immaterial in 2024.

So you mean a real win-win-win-win... Lower prices, no children, great weather, enjoying excursions and ports. As opposed to traveling over Christmas & New Year or June-July-August.