Bronx12

25 minutes ago, JessyCruises said:

I am still negative! According to my rapid antigen test anyway…

 

 

Sunday evening will consist of Cheesecake Factory via DoorDash and NFL football.

 

Sadly my Pats got their butts walloped last night 😂

Yummy! Gotta like Cheesecake Factory 🙂

50 minutes ago, JessyCruises said:

 

It is ok.  We are chilling out at the Embassy Suites for a week or so.  We are trying to make the most of it and stay positive.  What sucks is that we had 2 cabins booked using our annual tiers comps on the 1/15 sailing and my sister, my son and his friend were supposed to be joining us.  I feel worse for them. At least we got a bit of a vacation.  Luckily we found out before they flew down.

Good to see that you are not defeated, and making the best of things 🙂  It would drive me crazy seeing those ships out my window knowing I was supposed to be on one. Were you able to get any information from Royal yet?

4 minutes ago, firefly333 said:

Really? Would be awesome but never heard of this. 

 

I do remember some room off the Mdr where we used to be able to have breakfast, but want at chops. They had specialty coffee in there and better service but same menu. No idea how many years ago that was. 

I am trying to get confirmation of this perk

2 hours ago, John&LaLa said:

Chops Breakfast. Nothing exciting

Diamond Plus can have breakfast at Chops daily, could you please confirm 🙂 

I hope things are going ok 🙂 

1 minute ago, JessyCruises said:

 

Ugh I am so sorry!!  We went through a panic mode before we left when Westjet messed with our flights too.  I hope it works out for you.  It really is a lovely ship

Thanks, I appreciate that, but, I think you have more important things to be thinking about than I do, you are in the middle of it. Did you get a PCR test today? So hoping you continue to be negative, thinking happy thoughts 🙂

5 minutes ago, NSnewcruiser said:

Feel your pain.Ours were cancelled yesterday for Feb 26th.Seems like direct flights from Halifax keep getting cancelled. Our Westjet ones back in Nov were cancelled as well.

Thanks, it sure will be nice when we can start living with the virus instead of existing with the virus 🙂

I got up this morning to an email from Air Transat cancelling our March 19 flights to Fort Lauderdale, and they were direct flights too 😞

So, we are on the fence if we should cancel Odyssey (March 20-26), or just go 🤷‍♂️

10 hours ago, JessyCruises said:

We are supposed to be going in May for an Alaskan B2B,  Ovation on 5/5 out of Vancouver and then Seattle 5/13.  Which one are you on?

We are on Serenade May 8-15

2 hours ago, Jasukkie said:

I love transatlantics but I wouldn't book one now. I know they are selling these itineraries but who knows if they will even sail. If you to proceed, I would suggest no one in your party have pre-existing conditions or a BMI>30. 

Could you clarify "or a BMI>30", I am confused as to the relevance between that statement and a transatlantic cruise 🙂

I am so sorry to hear about Paul testing positive, that just plain sucks! I hope you continue to test negative. I will say how impressed I am that RCCL is doing so much to assist you, thanks for posting your entire experience.

5 hours ago, Ozark_Kid said:

Even though I wasn't hungry,  I made it through Jamie's.   Thought I would let you know so there was no worries. 

So my second tough time happened this morning.   Usually I sleep later but I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep.  A result was this.....

 

I made it back to the room.  If I can't take a nap I will try to recover by the pool later.

 

WoW! Great shot! To me, that cloud on the right looks like a ship!

2 minutes ago, orville99 said:

In the casino it is one ticket for every 100 points you play, and at bingo it is based on how many cards you buy.

Thanks for the info 🙂

2 hours ago, John&LaLa said:

Guess there wasn't much interest in RoyalUp.

 

They are raffling 2 Crown Loft Suites this afternoon.

 

Just changed the raffle to tomorrow. That's stupid. Earlier the better

How are they raffling them off, do you have to buy a ticket, fill out a raffle ticket, or are all cabins entered in the raffle ? Thanks 😉

Me again, I also forgot to ask if you could post a picture of the Specialty restaurants. Thank you again 🙂

PS, glad to hear you are feeling better 😉

Hi Jessy,

I really appreciate your live posts and all of the information. I am going to be a pain and ask if you could get the onboard pricing for internet, and possibly post some pictures of the casino. My husband and I will be on Odyssey in March, are Diamond Plus, and enjoy the Casino also. Oh yeah, I noticed that you had Corona and water in your room, I am wondering if the beer was cold when you got to your room, my husband wanted me to ask for that as his Diamond Plus perk, but wondered if it was cold, technically, we cold hope the cooler, aka fridge, cools it enough to drink it. Thanks for your help 😉

12 minutes ago, JillK said:

Celebrity and Royal have also abandoned this as well. Frustrating as those of us who booked while the policy was in place didn't have to account for where to get this done or the expense. 

 

We are a family of 6 supposed to cruise over March Break with Royal (using FCC from our cancelled March 2020 cruise) and are now looking at having to shell out "starting at $210 USD" per person at the pier or trying to find a testing site that can do a rapid PCR test on our own. Sounds like a fun and stress-free way to end a trip. 

 

Pretty frustrating situation to be left in. 

 

Wondering though if Omicron might make these companies re-consider? 

I wouldn't count on it .  We also booked cruises when the policy was in effect, and we are Canadian, so not happy either ;(

Following 🙂

5 minutes ago, BennyBrun said:

Did you try to call 877-742-9521?  It’s not direct to Miami but they answer calls for CAS.  If you call the Miami VIP number it says they are closed for the holiday for the past week.

No, I did not have that number, I looked on the NCL website, because I thought there used to be 2 numbers but the numbers were the same as I had. Thank you very much, and you are right, it has been closed all week.

I had 2 Cruise Next Certificates that were expiring today, decided to book a cruise as far out as possible, so, December 2022. I called the Casino, they are closed for the holidays, I called my cruise planner at NCL, she is off for the holidays, I called the regular NCL line, spoke to an agent, she said that the casino is open, transferred me to them, I waited on the phone for 45 minutes, no answer, so I decided to call the regular line again, spoke to another agent, who was a complete a$$. He said you chose to wait until the last day, which I did, we are in the middle of a pandemic, and I needed to decide what I wanted to do, he said it was too complicated to deal with and hung up, I called back but they are closed now for the holidays, so I emailed my cruise planner. I can't book online because the certificates are completely gone from my account, but the last agent said he could clearly see them on his screen he didn't know why I couldn't see them 😞

Copied this from another post, I hope I am permitted to do that 🙂

Here is the link to the CDC website:

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/notices/covid-4/coronavirus-cruise-ship

Here are the relevant sections (bolding is from the CDC statement. not me ;-).

• If you travel on a cruise ship, make sure you are fully vaccinated before travel and get a COVID-19 vaccine booster dose if you are eligible.
• People who go on a cruise should get tested 1–3 days before their trip and 3–5 days after their trip, regardless of vaccination status or symptoms.
• Along with testing, passengers who are not fully vaccinated should self-quarantine for a full 5 days after cruise travel.  

Oh no! That is terrible, hopefully you can get it sorted out, Good luck and post how you make out, if you don't mind. 

Thanks for doing this, I love  your writing style! Following along 🙂 

1 hour ago, AftMan said:

Just off the Harmony yesterday.

 

Club Royale had a certificate in our cabin for a free Grand Suite + $1,000 casino play + an additional $1,000 in casino play if booked on board through NextCruise. As stated by a previous poster,  they are getting away from discounted/free casino certificates at the end of cruises and instead providing one at embarkation(based on previous play). Offerings went as far out as September but later sailings did not include some or all of the casino money.

 

WOW! That's an awesome deal! 

8 hours ago, xcell said:

 

It's been over 2 years since my last cruise.  Hi, I'm Jermaine, and I'm a cruiseaholic.

 

Our flight was with WestJet, from Toronto to Miami at 9:40 am. We live downtown Toronto and left at 6 am arrived and parked by 6:40. I booked a parking spot at terminal 3, preferred parking. If you book that, as you pull up to the lot (that's the left lane), swing over to the far right to use the preferred parking entrance. We had a hiccup, as a car in front was having a hard time getting in. Security told us to use the lane beside the preferred parking but once in, I noticed that the preferred parking spots was on another area which I couldn't get access to. Worried about how busy the airport was going to be, we just parked and left. HINT #1: take a picture of your parking spot for future reference.

 

The airport was busy. It's been a while since we traveled, so I was not sure where to go. You can go to any kiosk to do the check in/baggage tags but if you are traveling to the USA, walk all the way to the end on your right (as you enter the terminal) for the international luggage drop off. International travel area wasn't too busy but the baggage drop off line was long as they only had 3 drop off conveyors open (I think they had over 12 that they could have used). Thank god for Nexus, as it was a short line, no line actually, to go through security and customs. The Nexus line was on the right side and everything associated with Nexus made the process seamless. Weird thing was that no one asked to see the negative rapid antigen test we were so stressed about the night before. Was that what the attestation form you had to declare when doing the flight check in? My wife did that, so I didn't know what that was about.

 

We boarded on time but sat on the tarmac for 2.5 hours. I think the airport was understaffed or at least that's what they said was the cause for the delay (probably why only 3 baggage drop offs were open). My wife said the guy behind her coughed for the entire time and she was just thinking, "I hope i don't get covid." Other than that and the delay, the flight was ok. We landed and went to claim our bags. HINT #2: As you walk to the baggage claim area, there's screens to show which carousel to go to. It's right before you have to either turn left or right to get to the baggage carousels.

 

If you are booked at a hotel with a shuttle, head to door 23, then walk across the street. You could call the hotel to let them know you arrived but if it's midday, I think they just come every 30 mins. HINT #3: if you do call, ask them what color of van to look out for.  It doesn't matter where you stand (platform 21, 22, 23, etc..) because as the shuttles drive by, the drivers honk to see if you need a ride. If it's not your shuttle, you can politely  wave them off.  We just missed our shuttle as we approached the pick up area  but that's my fault because I didn't tell my family which hotel. HINT #4: 4 pairs of eyes are better than 1 - tell your family which hotel, mine saw the shuttle, the shuttle honked at them but because they didn't know, he left and we waited another 40 min.

 

We are staying at the Wyndham Garden International Airport. Check in was straight forward. All adults in the room are require to provide ID. There's a gasoline station beside the hotel where we bought water for our trip. A McDonald is on the other side but after reading some reviews that mentioned unsanitary conditions, I didn't want to risk food poisoning, so we ate at the hotel restaurant, The Pilot House. We had a burger, pizza, Cesar salad and chicken fingers.  The food was surprisingly good or we were famished after a long day of travel. If you have MSG sensitivity, there's a lot in the food, but that is my unscientific opinion as I tend to fall asleep quickly and get really thirsty with MSG. Thank god for the bottle water I bought at the Circle K gasoline station next door. It's a newly built hotel, so it's nice for a night before a cruise but if you are a light sleeper, you might want to book somewhere else. I can hear the roar of the airplanes and also the cars and trucks, whizzing by (remember,I live downtown Toronto, so just memories of home...too quiet and I can't sleep).

 

 

Next.... embarkation day...

Did Westjet tell you to apply for the flight delay claim, you can find it on their website. Our flight was delayed, this was in September, and we each received a $400 refund, it took about a month after we applied.