bajathree

Sounds to me like they are setting themselves up for a Labor Day sale. Raise prices now to bring back to normal and call it a sale.

Berns while an excellent restaurant doesn't exactly fall under the not to pricey category. Another suggestion if you are considering the "original" Columbia restaurant in Ybor would be their sister restaurant just a block away called Casa Santo Stefano.....excellent...better than even the "original" Columbia IMHO https://casasantostefano.com They are also well priced......make a reservation as they are always packed.

Second that recommendation. Columbia cafe is located at the Tampa History Center...right close to the port.

Maybe more helpful if you list the hotels that you see available.

I was just recently on a 3 night Utopia sailing and could tell you that if there were themed nights you would never have known it.

Don't try to figure it out...it's been this way for a long time....inventory comes and goes. Have a cruise booked and for months all JS's were sold out solid and all of a sudden one day 10+ came available....who knows exactly how the cruise lines handle inventory. And yes...it's the cruise lines inventory...they can throw out some behind the scenes special/offer that you may not be privy to.

Channel district is a safe residential area.

No specific experience with that cabin or Icon class in particular but I have learned from experience to try to avoid cabins under the pool deck.

We ate at Fishlips....food was very good.

Honestly I am usually not that impressed by Coastal Kitchen....HOWEVER the CK on Utopia was excellent...service, food and ambiance👍

I don't know about MGM but the comps coming out of Hard Rock are for their top tier players known as X Card members. X Cards are an invite only tier to people who are playing something like at least $100K/year in their casinos. I actually look at it a bit differently...they invite a lot of casino comps to be able to keep prices high on revenue cabins....supply and demand...lots casino comps means less supply. In most cases I think they figure they are going to make what they would normally sell a comp cabin for back on what casino comps spend abroad...if not much more than they would sell that cabin for. I would also have to believe that casino comps are mostly frequent cruisers for the most part.

Utopia 3 and 4 night sailings are currently priced very close to other Oasis class 7 night sailings....so I don't think thats in play right now.

Actually ....honestly it wasn't smoky at all.

Honestly I am not a table player so I didn't pay a lot of attention to tables....but I believe they were pretty packed always also. They also had tables in a section behind the bar....guess higher limits as it was often roped off....that had more limited hours it seems. I know people were playing the tables as I saw a guy cashing out $35K of chips😱 Good news......drinks were easy to get in the casino bar😀

I wouldn't call the 3 night sailing I was on a booze cruise crowd. However there were a couple incidents I saw that I don't know if were alcohol related or not. Walking down the hall on deck 3 I saw they had someone confined in their cabin with security sitting in front of the cabin. Also I didn't see but my wife told me that she witnessed in the casino actually some guy grab his girlfriend by the hair and throw her to the ground.

Don't count on that....I have casino comp offers for Utopia well into the beginning of 2025. Also Hard Rock is promoting free Royal give-away sailings and their top tier members are being offered Utopia comps specifically it seems....at least for now. 3 and 4 night sailings are huge casino comps. The sailing I was just on even had a Hard Rock casino host onboard from the Tampa casino.

I have seen them swapping out machines on some of the other ships. Yes...I assume they are brought in on embarkation day but it takes time to set them up, On Odyssey they had a block of machines blocked the entire week that they were switching out to newer updated machines...Dragon Links actually ....a huge favorite of slot players. That's why found so odd on Utopia that they had so few aboard when on others ships they have swapped out and added casino favorites. Just an FYI...Hard Rock Orlando isn't a casino...it's just a hotel. Hard Rock Tampa and Hollywood are their 2 bigs casinos in FL.

That is correct.

I recently came off Utopia of the Seas. Beautiful ship with some nice improvements from Wonder and I have to say....easily the BEST food quality overall I have experienced on Royal post covid....a BIG thumbs up to that. However there is a big problem with the casino. With the collaboration between Hard Rock and Royal it is clear why they wanted to put out a new mega ship sailing short weekend sailings. Our sailing was loaded not only with Royal casino comps but Hard Rock casino comps. Many B2B comps as well as Hard Rock slot tournament groups. Upon boarding and talking with some casino passengers from the prior sailing to ours I was warned good luck trying to find a slot machine you like as there are so many casino people aboard. Well we learned this the first night.....people were reserving their seats in the casino at their favorite slot machine 1 hour prior to casino opening...not only one seat but the entire row of slots. Selection of slots is also very odd...the favorites of most casino slot players they have very few of. I can't under stand this as you would think they would have had help from Hard Rock in slot type selection of what people like. The most popular slots like Dragon Link you can't get near...people are on them for hours and hours cause there are so few...and I mean few. Lightning Link another favorite of casino players I think they had 3 of. Then there are dozens of other slots that stay pretty much empty until someone so desperate to want to play something cause they can't get one their favorite machine, give up and play just to play something. This casino was so crazy packed to the point that it was absolute annoying to walk around in and crowds didn't thin out till after 1-2 am at earliest. There weren't even breaks in this casino like on most other ships around dinner times. Mix a short weekend sailing with tons of casino comps from Royal and Hard Rock with poor selection of slots and you find yourself in less than a fun atmosphere. It's clear they didnt think this out as they needed to double the size of the casino and have had much better input of the slots people are looking to play. Living in Tampa I can tell you that the Hard Rock here figures it out real fast. The slots that sit idle they get rid of and the slots that people like they have doubled and tripled the mounts of. We loved the ship and had a great time overall....but our evening casino time was met with frustration and shoulder to shoulder crowds....not the most favorite casino experience.

Agree 100%!!! It used to be my absolute first thing I would run to get when I first got on board any Royal cruise. Post covid the Kummelweck has become inedible. It is exactly how you describe...one bite and the meat is so tough it pulls right out of the bun. I watched other people on my last number of sailings trying to eat it and the same....they give up on it after the first coupe bites. I have sadly given up on it and don't even bother anymore.

Don't forget the D+ BOGO dinners....on these short sailings that can help fill Chops and Giovani's.

Post covid I have found that there seem to be as many kids on the big ships during school time as school vacations.....doesn't seem to matter anymore. We were on Odyssey first week last dec and the ship was packed with kids....some were even on for B2B....they seem to be pulling kids out of school.

Shocking....lol

No....the frat party is in the Attic starting at 1am till...????

I seen videos of the casino. I also live near and frequent Hard Rock casino here in Tampa. Seems like they have a lot of the latest most popular land based slots...saw this change over the past year or so on pretty much all the big ships.