GSRDPM

I’m on the Allure for Christmas this year and was able to sign up for the meet n mingle before my cruise was paid in full.

Thanks. That's what I thought.

Are you sure you are using your individual reservation number and not the group reservation number?

Yep, Same reservation number I use to sign into the cruise planner.

Sorry in advance if this post is a bit of a rant...

I recently booked the December 29, 2018 cruise on Anthem of the Seas and was trying to register for the M&M. When I go to the registration site (which is hosted on Royal Caribbean's site) and enter and submit my information, I get a response that says, "Only purchased reservations can register for Meet & Mingle party."

I first called my travel agent to explain my problem and although rep did not really understand what an M&M was, she did contact Royal Caribbean for help while she placed me on hold. She was told that Meet and Mingles were a cruise critic function and they had nothing to do with the registration process. To the agent's credit, she did try to input my information on the page and naturally got the same result. In the end we both decided that I should try to call RCI customer service myself as I had already been active on the cruise planner, so I obviously have an valid booking.

I called Royal Caribbean and the customer service rep did not know what an M&M was. I patiently tried to explain my problem and she seemed to be typing some information and then proceeded to guide me to the cruise critic site, guided me to the boards and started to explain how to make a post! At this point I politely (really) suggested that she let me lead her to the M&M registration page by clicking the link on the CC site which brings you to https://secure.royalcaribbean.com/ccRegister.do I had her enter the information so she could see the error message. She then said she needed to speak to a specialist and after being placed on hold, she returned to tell me that the specialist said that the registration for M&Ms is a cruise critic responsibility, needs to be done through cruise critic and Royal Caribbean has nothing to do with it. At this point I asked to speak to a supervisor.

I was placed on hold just under 30 minutes into the call. At 52 minutes, the on-hold advertising stopped and the call was disconnected....

I called back and as soon as the customer service rep picked up the call, I apologized for asking to speak to a supervisor right away (I asked her if she knew what a meet and mingle was first and she admitted she did not know...-BTW, I know that cruise critic members make a very small % of cruisers, so it is understandable that reps would not know what M&Ms were...) She put me on hold and about 10 minutes later, another person picked up the call. I explained what had happened so far and she also did not know what an M&M was. I took her to the registration page on Royal Caribbean's site and she started to read the verbage on the page as to what an M&M was an that it was obviously cruise critic's reponsibility. I tried to express how even if it were solely cruise critic's responsibility, I was hoping that Royal Caribbean should be able to assist as the the registration functionality was apparently hosted on it's site. She said that was not the case and that the problem was cruise cruise critic's and not theirs.

I had her input the information on the registration form so she could see the message and she then said that the problem is probably due to my cruise not yet being paid. In the past, I was able to register for M&Ms prior to final payment. Has that changed? Even so, I HAD already paid in full over a week ago! I explained that. She said she could not see my payment information so I needed to check with my travel agent. It told her that I had paid in full, had a receipt from the agency and even received a credit card statement today showing the payment. She repeated to check with the travel agent. I sighed and asked if, hypothetically, she COULD see that I was paid in full, would that change anything in her ability to assist me. In the end she repeated that I needed to speak to the agent and if it turns out the cruise is fully paid for, it is cruise critics problem. She also added that my call was forwarded because I was supposedly having a problem with booking shows! Sigh.....

Got back on the phone, spoke to the travel agency and was told that I am fully paid for the cruise and that Royal Caribbean should know this. The only reason, the rep may not have been able to see this was that I am listed in a "group" and the reps I have spoken with may not have had access to that information. Also, my booking has prepaid gratuities so that may be affecting how the payment would be viewed. Not sure all that matters.....

OK...Rant over....Anyone have any insight/answers?

Was on Anthem for the 9/6/18 sailing. Upon boarding I was directed to Bolero's for the WOW band. Took all of 2 minutes.

I was was on the September 6th sailing of Anthem. I book the cruise within about 6 weeks of the sailing and was able to book two very inconvenient times for the iFly (for the middle of our Halifax stop) . There were only four spots available at the time. After further consideration, a couple of weeks later I decided to cancel my reservations. Prior to my cancelling, I went into the cruise planner and noted that there was no availability. After canceling, I went back into the cruise planner and my previously reserved spots were again available for reserving, so it would appear that there are a certain amount of slots available for booking prior to the cruise starting.

Northstar and the Puzzle Break activities were also not available for booking prior to the cruise by the time I booked it. ON embarkation day, upon entering the ship, I went to one of the iPads by Guest services and immediately was able to sign up for the Puzzle Break activity, though there were not a lot of spots left. North Star and iFly had many slots available for booking on multiple days. In the end, I was able to go on iFly on, I believe, day 4 and was told that I could return on day 6th in person and book a second reservation. (the planner will only allow one reservation per trip, but if there were open spots still available as of day 6 on our 9 night cruise, they would let you go again. I did my second flight on day 7. Upon embarkation we booked North Star for day 5 but were able to walk on during embarkation day while still at the pier. North star is very popular. You can get in a kind of "stand by" line in case there are no shows.

Bumper cars, circus/trapeze school and flowrider sessions (other than the private lesson or reserved options) are get-in-line affairs.

We are booked aboard her for another cruise during New Years! - North star and iFly are already "filled" for online reservations.

Anyone have any ideas of bottles can be glass - ie: starbucks bottled frappuccinos?

I live about an hour and half north of the port and on two of three cruises out of Galveston our return was delayed substantially by fog. The first returned New Years eve and we did not dock until about 8PM. The second was in March and we did not dock until 2PM.

The website does not like Google Chrome for that part. IE or Safari should work fine.

another question i had was how often does Royal caribbean have their great sales? I got this trip as part of their "Bogo" sale... are there similar sales throughout the whole year? my girlfriend is so excited for this trip that she actually wants me to start planning a trip for her birthday which is in october... so she wants to do the cruise at the end of february 2016 for my birthday that we booked and then october of 2016 go on another cruise for hers... :D

There are benefits to booking your next cruise while on board such as reduced deposits and on board credit. I believe you have to be a Crown and Anchor member so I am not sure if you can get the benefit if you are still ON your FIRST cruise.

The downside of waiting until you cruise to do this is with your first sailing so far in advance, and the way that the pricing as been lately, waiting to book until so much nearer to you sailing date may backfire and end up canceling any benefits from any OBC you might get by booking on board.

We were there 5 years ago and I thought it was very nice. I was considering going back for our cruise in three weeks, but we have decided to deep sea fish instead. You can see some pictures in our trip report below:

http://www.boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1170841

It looks like we are going to go with some deep sea fishing for a half day (4 hours) and have narrowed it down to either Chubasco or Born Free. Apparently Blue Hole does not go the "deep sea" route and we want to take a chance at some bigger fish. I hope it works out, otherwise will be a pretty expensive boat ride....

Neither my wife or I are fond of cold water for swimming, be it in pools or surf. Relaxing on a beach is nice, but we will be at Coco Cay (hopefully) the next day.

Water temps in the bahamas is listed here:

http://www.water-temperature.com/bahamas

Anyone....Bueller....

My family of four (Myself, DW, DS 19, DD 16) will be on the Majesty of the Seas leaving Miami on March 16th. While this is our 10th cruise, it will be our first 4 day and the first where we will be entirely in the more cooler waters around Florida.

Since we are in Nassau from 8AM through midnight, I was wondering about options for while we are in port. On one other trip we walked over to the BCH and spent the day there. While we enjoyed the property, we would like a little more activity this time around. So far I am considering a rather wide range of options.

The Melia day pass seems nice for the pools and the nice beach. (Is there any option to rent a Hobie Cat or another small sailboat in that area?)

A Trip to Blue Lagoon Island for a beach day with perhaps smaller crowds and the opportunity to view the dolphins. Am I correct that this would likely be a quieter, more peaceful location during spring break than Cable Beach and the Melia?

Barefoot Sailing Cruises 6 hour snorkeling island cruise seems nice though I am concerned about the air and water temperatures during the sail into the ocean and snorkeling in the waters at that time of year. Most of our prior snorkeling trips have been further south such as the Virgin Islands or Cozumel. Will it be uncomfortably cool?

A fishing trip such as with Blue Hole Watersports as it would be something different for our family and might be fun without having to get into the cooler water. I am also interested if anyone has any other recommendations for a fishing trip operator.

I know it seems like we are all over the place. I figure our beach day would be at Coco Cay (if there is no problem tendering...) and our final port of Key West, we could do some land based touring around town, etc...

Any thoughts or recommendations?

Enjoying yet another fantastic review Victoria. Clemson was my son's second choice for college. (He is currently a freshman studying ME at University of Tulsa - He wanted a smaller school.) I really loved Clemson when we visited and if I was choosing for myself, it would have been MY first choice. Incredible friendliness and school spirit! I still have a high school sophomore daughter so there is still hope....

I am in awe of your photography skills. I finally got a DSLR (Canon T5i) last year and the information from your reviews helped me to begin to explore the camera's capabilities during our recent Thanksgiving cruise on Liberty. I still have a VERY long way to go...

We were on the same cruise with you and were blown away by the quality of the main production shows. This was our 9th cruise (four different lines).We loved our wait staff in the main dining room (We were a table of 12 on a family reunion) but found the breakfast service in the main dining room slow and indifferent for the first time. We still have the main dning room highest marks on our post cruise survey because we did not want our comments on the breakfast service to be taken against our dinner service. It is unfortunate that you can't separate comments between the two.

Starfish Island was a lot of fun!! It was just a small little island, maybe a 15 minute boat ride from our ship? There were a LOT of starfish in the grasses around one area of the island, near a playground and a dock you could walk out to see more fish and starfish. There were kayaks to rent - we did and paddled around mangrove trees with cool looking birds in them. The beach itself was beautiful! I was very thankful, though, that our kids had their water shoes on as there was probably a 4-5 foot section of shells to walk through before getting to the sandy bottom of the ocean. We didn't have our water shoes so we walked slowly out with just minor pain ;) but I'd wear them next time. :) My kids absolutely LOVED collecting all the shells, and we brought back enough for each of their classmates. They did include lunch (it was rice & beans, chicken, & potato salad) and I think they had a bar (with an Elvis impersonator for part of our stay, ha!). Restrooms were fine, and there was a small gift shop.

 

I hope that helps :)

So the excursion leaves from the cruise ship if I understand correctly. How long would you say you were on the island?

Get to the Flowrider first thing in the morning and the lines are minimal. We stayed on board during our stop in Jamaica and for the first twenty minutes, my son, daughter and I were the only ones there!

thanks

 

My final payment was 3 weeks ago....now there is a $600 obc being offered.....it hurts!!! :(

But look at the price being charged with that OBC and compare to the price you paid. Many of the high OBC offers are paired with ridiculously high fares.

We did it with CCL but it appears to be the same excursion and it is run by the same people...I think the whole thing took about four hours including the ride over. As long as the grandparents can sit on a beach mat on the ground if there are no seats available they should be fine. There are some benches and picnic tables in the shade but they get taken quickly. As I need shade we simply asked until we found a group that let us join them, although several people still had to sit on the mats. They were fine with people not snorkeling and the guides were very good with timid people and kids in the water.

So it seems that the total time there would run about 2-2.5 hours. Thanks for the insight!

There is no pool. There is a beach, there is volley ball in the sand. There is minimal shade and not a lot of chairs. They will give you beach mats to sit on. The groups, especially beginner and intermediate were pretty large...there were more than 200 people on the excursion when we were there. 223. I think. They do want you to snorkel in groups but afterward people went back in on their own for a bit. The guides do keep a watchful eye. The currents were pretty strong when we were there but the sea was not rough.

 

There was a snack shack...burgers, hot dogs, snacks...like bags of chips. Bottled water soda and beer I think. We did not eat there. They also sold a few trinket type souvenirs....

 

I did the beginner snorkel...hubby did the advanced. He wanted to do a lot more photography while in the water but they were on him to keep up with the group. It was interesting. We saw a good bit but not as much as you might think...more coral than fish...some snails, conch everywhere..

 

If there are any specific questions I can try to answer them....it was great to just leave right from the ship and go there rather than tender in and then boat back out again....

We are in a group of 12 with ages from 10 to the low 80s. We would like to go on this excursion but there is an age limit given the physical activity associated with the snorkeling. The grandparents are not interested in snorkeling but just want to spend the day out, enjoy a beach area and watch their grandkids. While I know you cant speak for policy matters (We have been told by RCL Reservations that we should ask at the excursion desk on board if they will allow the grandparents on the excursion), does it seem reasonable that if they were allowed to go, they could simply step off the boat/tender and camp out on the beach for the entire time at the site while others in our party participate in the snorkeling. If so, about how much time is actually spent at Rendezvous Caye?

Thanks for this and any other insight!

jdotexas,

I was wondering if you took the excursion to Water Caye in Belize and if so, what did you think about it? We are a family of 12 (small children to age 80+) that will be on a cruise on the Liberty of the Seas during Thanksgiving week. We were hoping on an easy excursion that would give the kids something fun to do and still permit the grandparents the opportunity to relax and watch their grandkids while avoiding the tender ride to Belize City.

Thanks from me too. I realize you were on Carnival, but I would like to be on the island longer, given the expense and the boat ride. I don't think the RCI one is much different, though.

 

My DH and I are the oldest in our group at 68 and 69 and we will definitely be snorkeling as we have snorkeled a lot and luckily are very able yet. Five of the seven kids are great swimmers and do snorkel around our lake--not the same as the ocean, I know. The other two can swim but not as well.

 

As it gets closer to the cruise I think I will just put out to the group the different options and let them decide; snorkel trip, tubing/zipline, ruins, etc., and maybe have a couple of groups going different directions. I wish Belize had an easy area to just go to a beach, since a couple of the adults would rather just relax on a beach with a lovely drink; the rest of us are more active.

Somehow had missed previously that the maximum age for participation in this excursion is 80. Two in our party are actually over that age. They have no intention of snorkeling but would like to take the excursion just to be able to watch their grandchildren and enjoy some beach time. They have no intention of snorkeling. I have called Royal Caribbean and have asked if they would be able to pay for an participate in the excursion if they did not snorkel. The person on the phone recommended that this question be asked on board at the excursion desk. I was wondering if anyone had any prior experience with this.

Another option would be to take the "Tropical Island Getaway" to Water Caye, but the limited reviews on that excursion do not sound very promising....

Well we've done this through Carnival, so I'll answer what I can. There were palapas for shade and we did not have a hard time finding one. We also used one chair and the mats. We snorkeled for close to an hour they divided us into groups according to skill level. When we finished we had an hour (or maybe a little longer on the island). We snorkeled from shore. We were in the advanced group which snorkeled about 3/4 around the island. the intermediate group went around 1/2 of the island. and the beginners did a smaller portion of reef close to the beach. (this is where all of the groups ended). If you wished, you could stay and snorkel some more or just enjoy the beach. Our tour left around 10:30 and returned around 2:30 and we left and returned directly from the ship.

Thanks so much for the response. A couple of questions if you don't mind...

About how long was the tender right from the ship to the island?

A few of our group are in their 70's and early 80's. Well they won't be snorkeling, they would like to come along potentially enjoy time with their grandchildren. They would probably spend time relaxing on the beach. I remember one time when we were in Belize several years ago, the transferring from the ship to the tender was somewhat complicated and involves traveling down a ramp , onto a pilot boat, and over another Bridge like ramp onto the tender. Do you recall if the transfer to the tender seemed simple or potentially difficult for someone that might have limited balance or mobility?

Anyone....anyone....Bueller....?

I have been searching through the threads here and have read some conflicting information.

My extended family (10 years old through mid 70s) will be on the Liberty of the Seas in November 2014 and our first of two ports will be in Belize. We are considering this excursion to avoid having to tender into Belize City first. Some of the grandparents will probably not want to snorkel and would rather just relax on the beach. I think only our ship as well as a the Crystal Serenity are the only ships scheduled to be in port that day.

A few questions:

1. How difficult is it to find an area with shade.

2. I understand that they give you some straw mats to place on the sand, but I have seen pictures of some chairs. How difficult are they to come by?

3. How long are you on the island?

4. Most importantly, I have read of two scenarios with regards to orders of activities. Once in which the snorkelers leave the boat before the boat reaches the island and another where the boat docks at the island and snorkelers leave from the island. Which is the order of events based on recent experience.

5. What time are you typically back at the ship?

Thanks!