LeesSummitCruiser1

We are diamond on Royal.  On Cyber Monday we booked B@B Voyager of the Seas for October of 2024.  First leg Rome to Athens leaving 10/7/2024.  Second leg 10/14/2024 Athens to Barcelona.  We had the same cabins for both cruises. Then in July they sent a letter saying they were canceling and replacing the Athens to Barcelona leg with a Athens to Malaga leg same dates.  We had to choose if we wanted to change or keep this cruise by August 10th.  I got in touch with Royal on August 3rd and received a new cruise invoice with the proper ports and the same costs.  This morning by chance I was reading the pubic board on this cruise and saw that several people had the cruise canceled and refunded because they did not make a decision by August 10.  I checked my royal account and the Athens to Malaga leg was gone. No email from Royal saying it was canceled.  I called Royal and they had canceled my Athens to Malaga leg for nonresponse.  After being passed to a supervisor, I did get the cruise reinstated at the Cyber Monday price but now my cabin was gone.  I am not sure why they had to completely cancel the cruise and make everyone choose to rebook.  This is very poor customer service.  Royal had to know there would be issues with this cruise they way they were forcing everyone to rebook rather than just accept by default.

We will be staying at the Electra Palace 2 nights in May before our cruise on Enchantment of the Seas departs.  We booked it with our flights through AAvacations.

Thanks for the article, we will be stopping at Zakynthos in May off Enchantment.

On 11/21/2022 at 1:37 PM, island lady said:

 

Decided to avoid the extra weight.  For us, not worth packing the wine in checked bags.  I do have the wine shippers as well, but don't use them any longer.   Buying wine in the terminal in San Juan is not going to happen for me after last episode.  

 

Fast forward to current situation that has evolved for us :   We get six drinks per person per day, plus 3 bottles of comped wine, and two beers sent to our cabin each week...more than enough for us.  😉   

 

Needing any more than that...I will be checking to see where the local AA meeting is taking place when I get home.  😄  😄 

 

 

 

 

 

Our problem is we are wine snobs 🙂.  There are few wines on board we are willing to pay for. The ones we might purchase we get from the vineyards at significantly less cost.  I wish Royal was like Princess and just let you bring as many bottles on board as you want for a $25 corkage.  We are glad the diamond drinks are now a $13.00 credit rather than a limited menu of wines by the glass. That way we can at least get $13 off a higher end glass of wine.

On 11/20/2022 at 9:26 AM, island lady said:

Flying into San Juan presents a problem with bringing wine to the ship.   I won't check it in my luggage, and can't take it in carry on bags.  

 

 

I have used wine case shippers as luggage for years and never had an issue.  We usually travel in a group and 1 of us checks a case of wine for the group to put their bottles in.  We always fly to our departure ports.

On 11/14/2022 at 7:07 PM, Biker19 said:

Welcome to 2014 RCI advertising when fake sales started. 

2010 when they quit allowing combining loyalty discount, share holder credit, and sales.

On 10/16/2022 at 10:41 AM, LeeW said:

They do this routinely with minor kids in separate cabins but NOT adults.  Easiest way is to have one person in cabin in all group photos.   Onboard they will also add a second cabin for half price.

 

Lots of folks would like one package to include multiple cabins but not how it's sold.  While you can try giving photographers one cabin number the face recognition software often will override that.

The face recognition software will also have you getting pictures of other groups that you are "photo bombing".  

We had booked 5/22 for the stops and had a suite guarantee so while we would rather be on Brilliance we are ok with Enchantment since it is only 1 sea day.  This will be our first Greek Adriatic cruise.  We will be exhausted in the evening.  Plan on enjoying the local cuisine so MDR not so important. We have about 40 friends go on the cruise so it will almost be a charter.

51 minutes ago, Biker19 said:

If they are going to make substantial changes, they will probably try to make them ASAP - they want to avoid having to pay airline fee changes (most folks can't book flights more than 330 days out).

We are on May 22 sailing and booked our flights as soon as they were available.  Nice hotels to in Athens and Venice :(.  We have a group of about 30 friends booked already with another 10 or so trying to book that is how I discovered it was not available.  The following is pure speculation.  I wonder if Royal is concerned about fuel availability being an issue in Europe next summer.

You can no longer book Brilliance of the Seas out of Greece, Ravenna, or Barcelona in 2023 from May to September.  We have about 20 couples booked on her on May 19 out of Piraeus and have not heard a word from Royal.  I know they pulled the Serenade of the Seas out of Northern Europe because of the war in Ukraine.  Any knowledge, rumors, or pure speculation on Brilliance?  I am wondering if Royal is concerned about fuel next year in Europe. 

We have cruised multiple times the week of Thanksgiving.  Usually out of Puerto Rico.  We love it.  It's a way to not have to worry about family conflicts.  We would leave Friday before Thanksgiving and get back Sunday after Thanksgiving.  You do have to be ready to book flights and cruises the day they become available and hours matter on costs but it's worth the trouble.

On 6/7/2022 at 4:54 PM, Bruin Steve said:

Thought this interesting in that it's ben there forever.  The neighborhood is called "Hilton"!!

So I just checked and found this on Wikipedia:

 

"The Hilton Athens was a hotel in Athens, Greece. Opened in 1963, it closed for renovations in January 2022 and will reopen as Conrad Athens in 2024. It is on Vassilissis Sofias Avenue, within the Hilton Area, adjacent to the Kolonaki and Pangrati neighbourhoods."

 

So, yes, it's basically, still under the Hilton umbrella...but closed during the changeover.  BTW, the views--especially if you're on a high floor on the side of the hotel facing the Acropolis (like we were), fantastic...View from our room (disclaimer--zoom lens used):

Thanks for the update

On 6/28/2021 at 11:44 AM, Bruin Steve said:

Flying in to Athens in four weeks for Apex B2B cruises, staying pre-cruise 4 nights and post-cruise one night at the Hilton.  Need to figure out ground transportation.  I read somewhere that there are fixed taxi prices for Airport to Central Athens hotels, however I'm seeing some greatly varying quotes.  Also heard Uber works, but really only as a conduit to taxis...which, again, makes me uncomfortable as to possible rates.  Benefit to Uber might be going direct to credit card...but it also looks like I could pre-arrange taxis and charge to card as well.  But thinking it may make sense to have the rides pre-arranged.  I am a little concerned that they tend to ask for time of arrival...and, who knows, with possible flight delays, time to retrieve luggage and time to make it through customs, what time to ask for.  I don't want someone charging me, not waiting and leaving...or charging me a large amount of money for "waiting time"...

 

Any suggestions?  Is a taxi the way to go?  Should I pre-arrange one or wait and take my chances?  Or is there a better way to get from the airport to the Hilton?  And how about the Hilton to the ship in Pireus?  Basically, the same for the return at end of B2B cruises.  Thanks.

I was looking for a Hilton Property in Athens for next May and none showed up.  Is the Hilton in Athens switching brands soon?

In 2009 it was by 9 am.  We made an 11:30 flight to the us out of BCN.

On 7/28/2020 at 4:33 PM, Liverpoolfan181 said:

We put down a deposit on Anthem of the Seas sailing next September 23 2021 for 9 nights in Northern Europe.  
 

Through other social media forums, We learned that this sailing has apparently become a charter sailing for a themed concert. This charter is also expected to be a 3 night heading to completely different ports. 
 

At what point does one learn that they will be bumped from this sailing? Why is RCL double booking same ship with different itinerary? 
 

the charter is selling rooms but so is RCL. Our TA says that as long as RCL puts the rooms in inventory to sell, she can sell them and they can’t see anything on the charter. 
 

Of course for a good laugh, called RCL direct and they claim the “charter” is only 3 nights of the 9 and won’t interfere with regular sailing guests, but again how does this make sense with 2 different itineraries?? They keep stating our sailing will happen. #facepalm

 

Also if the charter sails 3 nights, what happens to the remaining 6 nights of the original cruise? RCL not offering any 6 night cruise pre-sale and I can’t imagine they just don’t pick up passengers for 6 nights. 
 

the cruise before us became a charter as well but full week which made sense.
 

trying to plan a bday trip for my mother and ideally this is the preferred sailing, but how long do you hold out to see what happens?

 

We’ve luckily never had to deal with a charter bump in all our cruising years.... has anyone experienced this before? 

A couple of years ago we booked on board on Monday a cruise the following year on Adventure (spring break time frame). The next cruise agent even talked with Miami to get the room we wanted.  By Thursday when our friends tried to book the ship was locked.  First it was a ex-football star vanity cruise then it became a Gay cruise with an overnight in St Barts 21 and over and special entertainment.  We had kids so this cruise was out.  We found out way before Royal told us. I even talked to the Gay cruise charter company who was very helpful in getting us off that cruise and onto another Royal cruise out of PR with no cost and similar room before Royal contacted us about the charter.

On 6/30/2020 at 7:13 PM, pcur said:

Per Dr. Fauci of the CDC on 6/28:

With government support, three coronavirus vaccines are expected to be studied in large-scale clinical trials in the next three months.

I expect by next March it will be available, 9 months from now.

 

Studied nothing proven.  Will take a year to prove it provides immunity short term.  Will take 3 to 5 years to prove it provides longer term immunity.  MRNA vaccines have to be transported in liquid nitrogen. Even if they work they will be difficult and expensive to administer.  WE have no other proven corona virus vaccines.  I hope one works but all we will know this year is a vaccine is safe to administer and generates an antibody titer.  Also what if after a few weeks and a few million doses Gillian Bare syndrome shows up in a few individuals.  Will that shut down the vaccine like it did the 1976 national flu vaccine?

We always book our dives through shore providers.  After our first couple of cruises we stopped even looking at shore trips through royal.  We use Dressel divers where available (Cozumel).  Coconut Tree Divers in Roatan. Belize Diving service in Belize City.

On 3/22/2020 at 9:15 AM, bouhunter said:

They are saying there will likely be waves of the virus over the next 12-18 months until a vaccine is available.  If that comes to be, one has to wonder how they could consider putting thousands of people together on ships under those circumstances.

This is what the annual flu is and we have come to live with it.  This virus has a single strand of RNA so it wont be as variable as the flu so once a vaccine is developed and if immunity lasts more than a couple of months, it may disappear.  Then we will be back to millions catching the flu every year because of its variability and the vaccine being a best guess at what gets out of the far east 18 months ahead of production and thousands of mostly older adults succumbing to complications of flu.  

On 3/18/2020 at 8:18 AM, Yorkvillain said:

We have arrived in Florida! The Sunshine State! I LOVE all the palm trees. It’s exactly how I always pictured paradise.

 

Courtney and I both woke up with this weird flu bug today - some upper respiratory issues and feeling a little short of breath. In fact, most people on our flight had it too. Oh well, I’m sure it’s nothing. It’s vacation time after all! We’re in Florida!

 

Some photographs of our airplane and flight down. I read today’s entire New York Times from front to back and then took a nice nap on the way down.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Love these TWA pictures.  I worked for them in the late 80s Early 90s at the Kansas City Maintenance base.  Helped rebuild the Connie and I have been inside the wing of that 747-100

10 minutes ago, The Grumpus said:

Probably more like Cubic Zirconia.

tanzanite

We have sailed times during March Madness. They do have one or two games on at a time.  It was a little frustrating in that on the Jewel with a sports bar with 18 screens they only had 2 games playing.  They also don't have a lot of choice as to what games they show, what ever ESPN is carrying is whats on.

On 1/8/2020 at 7:45 PM, Host Clarea said:

I''d look for a cruise on an Oasis or Quantum class ship for the most activities for the chldren.

Since Freedom and Adventure have nothing for kids to do ;-).

My 15 year old diamond daughter thinks it is amazing.  She was 5 months old her first cruise and has been cruising ever since.

317 Freedom out of Puerto Rico for Thanksgiving

First 2 cruises were on Majesty.  Sounds like it is time to return.  The rooms are tiny, but She and her sisters are the original megaships.