chiguypaul

3 hours ago, LB_NJ said:

We have a cruise booked in April and have some specialty dining reservations we booked over black Friday.  Given the current situation with MDR menus I am thinking that we might want to move the days we have specialty dining to the days we really don't like the MDR menu.

 

Assuming availability, once we get on-board will we be able to move the date without having to cancel and rebook?

Yes provided that there's availability. So you're taking that risk.

On 1/6/2023 at 8:30 PM, sm3ds said:

I changed my cruise to another date. They added 100.00 dollars pp to the cruise fare. I didn't have to pay any additional deposit. If I change it again do they add 200.00 to the cruise fare?

Good question. Should be listed in the terms section of your new reservation. Would think that the $100 charge pp would apply each time you change, but check the section called "DEPOSIT AND FINAL PAYMENT SCHEDULE" in your new reservation and it should tell you there.

It is NOT an escape room. My 17 and 20 year olds were very disappointed by this offering and felt it was oversold in the description for what it was. Just go in to this with proper expectations. The staff told my kids the room was not fully ready so they had put out puzzles in the mean time.

Just now, Norwich Cruiser said:

Agree.

 

Effectors 2 ????????? 
 

A complete waste of time and money? IMO

Agree as well. Stupid plot.  I appreciate the tech but the show was boring.  Singers and performers come second to the overall high end tech production. 

3 hours ago, Ret MP said:

Since the Solarium is fully enclosed, much of it enclosed with glass or plastic or whatever, does the A/C keep up with the heat or does it get real hot in there during the Caribbean sunny days?

I am on the ship now for the New Year’s sailing. My wife and I found the solarium extremely unpleasant during the week. Extremely humid. Nothing was done to adjust the temperature down. Others complained as well. Was very disappointed. We normally look forward to spending a lot of our trip in the solarium, and it was unbearable to us. 😞 that was us. I’m sure others will give you different opinions.

2 hours ago, zestyzorra said:

Were you able to get the Hamachi restaurant? That's the one I'm hoping for most, and I don't board until 11:30am.  Like you, I've been stressing about it.  But my sailing is 1/21. Thanks!

Never tried. Wasn’t interested in hibachi. 

Just a follow up to my experience after originally posting the message for this thread. We checked in as early as possible and had zero issues getting everything we wanted. I was beyond stressed about the stories here on CC and not getting the times I wanted.  Some of you had to cancel your UDP because you couldn’t get the times you wanted. Now all this being said, I worked myself up pretty good until I knew I had all my reservations in place.  I was ready for that though.  On busy holiday sailings you just have to go in to UDP with a tremendous amount of flexibility and know that there’s a sense of rolling the dice on getting the locations and times you want.  If that sounds unappealing then go with something like a three night package and know you have the times you want ahead of time.  We had 13 UDP reservations between early brunch, sea day lunches and dinners. It was a lot to schedule and we had to double check multiple times because sometimes the staff would make some mistakes when booking.  Thanks for everyone’s thoughts and comments on this topic and I hope it’s a helpful thread for others thinking about UDP. 

Just a follow-up for everyone. Our check-in time was 1130. We were able to check in at 10:45 without any issue and get on the ship within 15 minutes. This is was for a December 31 sailing. 

I wanted to provide some closure on this thread that I started. We ended up driving. Our flight was originally scheduled for December 29. We decided to leave on December 28th and make it a 2 1/2 day trip with a stop in Atlanta for some tourist stuff.  Our originally planned flight didn’t experience any delays. But I have zero regrets about driving and it alleviated a tremendous amount of stress by doing so.  We are flying back.  Thanks everyone for their comments. 

On 12/26/2022 at 3:33 PM, VTSKIandCRUISEGUY said:

Can you use Diamond drink vouchers for Johnny Rockets shakes?

Have tried on multiple ships - never successful.

2 hours ago, davekathy said:

You will board the ship at the same time as the rest of your group. Diamond doesn't get you on the ship any quicker. Unless you are in a suite. 

That was not true during our Thanksgiving Freedom cruise. Diamond members boarded before everyone "below" that.

Just now, cooncat_mom said:

Southwest in New England is a mess still, add in  staffing problems, planes not in position and the WiFi is

 still iffy.  IF you drive, please schedule walking breaks in (those if you with lityle ones shouldn't be in trouble 😆) - I've had long distance drivers admitted to the hospital I work at with DVTs. One week we had 3 of them admitted.  For others, AmTrak can be an alternative....

Great advice on the breaks for all. We decided to add an extra day of travel to break out the legs and make them a little shorter. Sometimes we pull over just to stretch for 5 minutes when we have long trips. 🙂

1 hour ago, alexgtp said:

Same boat as you. 12 PPL , 2 seniors and 1 infant

 

Leaving Chicago for FLL for Harmony 31st cruise. Our SW Flight is Friday, But we already have 2 cars booked and leaving on Thursday so we have 2 days to get into FLL and make our hotel reservation for Friday PM.  We are Stopping midway in Georgia for an overnight stay.

We rented 1 way down, hoping the Southwest situation gets resolved by the time we need to fly home.

I don't trust SW to get their act together this week, looks like their main issue is getting staff moved to correct locations due to outdated computer system they use.

So it is a staffing issue and the fact that Southwest uses a point to point system as opposed to a HUB style system, add to their dilemma's. So they pretty much have staff trapped all over the USA without any direction on where they are to be, or an effecient system to get them where they need to be. Very disappointing as I am a frequent SWA customer.

I think you're making the right call. It's not worth missing the cruise. The flights from MDW or MCO seem to be moving today, but all you need is your flight to be canceled and that's game over. We already had AA scheduled back. Was just a fluke with how we scheduled this time. Normally we're SW RT. When you get tired of that drive - think about not having the stress of if your flight will go or not!

15 minutes ago, DirtyDawg said:

Just one final question. Won't cruising at this time of the year interfere with you watching Da Bears playoff run? 😇

Yea...right. 🙂 That season ended a few weeks ago.

12 minutes ago, DirtyDawg said:

@chiguypaul, It' sounds like you have things covered. Have a great cruise. 

Thanks. Appreciate everybody’s comments.

2 hours ago, Jimbo said:

Is this thread Royal Caribbean related or is this a weather related/ flight /travel issue thread?

I couldn’t find another part of cruise critic, forms to post this in. Recommendations?

2 hours ago, matj2000 said:

You might not be able to do that.

 

If you no-show for the first flight, the entire flight may be cancelled.

 

You should check with S/W first.

I understand what you’re talking about.
We are on Southwest going down and American going back. But even if that were  not the case, we would split our reservations up with Southwest to avoid the situation you were describing. 

2 minutes ago, long4acruise said:

Since you already have a two-day buffer between your SW planned flight and the date of the cruise, I'd tend to stick with the flight, and perhaps have a tentative plan to depart even a day earlier if offered the possibility . Not sure I'd want to drive that distance but that may depend on upcoming weather forecasts.

Whatever you decide, put safety first and have a wonderful relaxing cruise! The Wonder is a beautiful ship.

The plan is to leave on the flight and if for some reason there’s a cancellation we are ready to drive.  

2 hours ago, IHateSnow! said:

We just got off the Wonder with a party of 7.  We had the UDP. Here’s what we found:

 

1: we had plenty of a la crate credit for all of us for both playmakers and Izumi - we never paid extra anywhere.  
 

2: we had an impossible time getting reservations.  3 out of 6 days we were able to. Only 1 day was at a preferred (chops) restaurant and that was day 6 at 8:00 pm

 

3: making reservations in app was impossible.  We were on the ship at 11:30.  There were literally none available. Any day. 
 

4: a kind individual at mason jar helped me get Giovanni’s and Mason Jar.  The reservation desk at check in told me we were all set, and we were not.  
 

5: at all 3 experiences the restaurants were maybe 30% full.  Leading me to believe it’s a staffing issue.  Also, for a ship of 7k, the venues are exceptionally small. 
 

6: we were also told on 2 nights there were no my time dining reservations available. 
 

 

This is fueling my concerns about our New Year’s Eve cruise on the wonder with our UDP. I am very concerned about not having a place to eat and my family furious with me because we re stuck at the windjammer. Our check in is at 1130 and we plan to arrive earlier just to get any chance to get ahead of any other people. I have not seen checkin times earlier than 1130 from others I talked with for this sailing on the wonder. 

3 minutes ago, LindaD22 said:

How about changing your flights to fly in a day or two early, just in case? Way easier than driving all that way 

Flight is already two days before the cruise. 

$500 from Chicago to Port Canaveral with National. That includes two day rental with loss damage waiver. Hertz was $580 for the same coverage with a drop off at the Orlando airport.  

10 minutes ago, DirtyDawg said:

I agree, you should be fine but just in case does your car have winter tires? Does the oil need changing? You might need to do some prep on your car his week just in case. 

All good things to consider. Car was recently inspected with oil change. So all good there. One option is to rent a car. Going down and then take our regular flights going back.

1 minute ago, IHateSnow! said:

Some of our party was on about 10:45 this past week. 

Do you know what check in time they had?

I live in Chicago. I leave for the wonder on December 29. My cruise is on December 31. I am flying on Southwest. Given what a mess Southwest Airlines is right now, I have a lot of concerns about the probability of my flight getting out. I know it’s a couple days away but I’m worried about it. So I’m thinking about driving with my family from Chicago to Port Canaveral. We have four people that could drive so it wouldn’t be horrible but definitely not ideal. Obviously I need to wait a day or two to see what the airline landscape looks like. Was also thinking about renting a car instead of using our own but I know I can trust my own car.  Just wanted to reach out to my cruise critic folks to see what their thoughts are on this. I might be overthinking it. Thanks.

8 minutes ago, firefly333 said:

I just read that cozumel closed at 3 pm today because of high winds. If ships are docked, stay docked.  No more allowed to dock. I think closed tomorrow too.

This will be interesting to monitor in terms of what itineraries end up changing from events like this.