karmacats

Hiya. Here you go ADPMOM. I've got surf and stream on Allure of the Seas.

 

I've got surf and stream too and got 4.13 mbps download and 1.74 upload. Sorry no screenshot. Tempermental phone. : )

jamie's was open for lunch on quantum and anthem, but you could not make advance reservations.

giovanni's is open for lunch on oasis and allure. on our last allure cruise (i think 2013) we could make advance lunch reservations, but royal no longer allows it. you just have to show up.

jamie's was not crowded for lunch on either quantum or anthem, but was booked solid for dinner.

giovanni's on allure was a nightmare on our embarkation day, but i heard that was because they held the B2B cruisers lunch there, and there were a ton of B2Bers. others have reported it's pretty empty at lunch usually. we leave this sunday for allure and plan to do giovanni's lunch on embarkation day again, so i can report back. we usually eat a light lunch so doubt we'll do specialty restaurants for other lunches; we only do it for embarkation day because i hate schlepping my bags around a buffet. :)

We just did this math ourselves, and ended up on Grandeur.

We knew we wanted to go in June 2017. Grandeur was $1100 cheaper than Anthem for the same time frame (I can't remember if it was the exact same week, or a week or two later, but the dates were close). We got a JS; the price difference might be less in another category type. In addition, we live an hour from the Baltimore port, so can go the morning of the cruise; to leave from NJ, we'd probably spend about $200-250 in gas, tolls, and hotel for the night before, which brings the difference to more like $1300.

We've been on Anthem before, and enjoyed ourselves. However, to be honest, if we hadn't been on her before, I'd be worried about making myself frantic trying to see everything, plus bermuda, on a 5-night. If you're the type of person who wants to see and do everything on the ship, I would not do a 5-nighter on anthem. If you're the type who will not be bothered if you miss a show/restaurant/activity that sounded cool, then that wouldn't be a problem for you. it would drive me nuts, though. :p

On the flip side, i've seen some reviews saying grandeur is kind of....sedate. i probably wouldn't like that for a longer cruise, but on a 5-night, you've really only got 4 days, and one of them will be in bermuda, so i figured with only 3 days on the ship, that gives me just enough relaxation time, plus i'm sure there will be enough activities to keep us busy for 3 days (atrium aerial show, etc). For us, there's also the matter of trying a new ship (grandeur) vs one we've been on already (anthem), and having snagged an awesome corner aft JS on grandeur which i'm excited to try.

The biggest downside to grandeur, and it was enough to make us consider anthem despite the price difference, is the shorter time in bermuda. on anthem you have a day and a half. on grandeur you only get two half-days. on most cruises i don't even get off the ship, but bermuda is beautiful and there is tons to do there so we definitely will get off in port. in the end, we decided that an extra half day in bermuda was not worth $1300 and the extra hassle of getting to NJ. however, if you've never been to bermuda before, i might consider anthem more seriously.

i'm not sure if that was any help, but since we just weighed the pros and cons ourselves, thought i'd at least put it out there. :D

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who answered my question about the corner aft. I thought it was a little pricey per night for a JS and we were contemplating maybe cancelling, but after all the glowing reviews, I am feeling good about it again. We also got a $190 price drop during this current sale, which helped. ;)

Walt, sorry for sort-of-hijacking your thread. I'm glad you found a JS you'll be happy with. I hope you enjoy Anthem, too - she's a beautiful ship!

The aft Jr. Suites on Decks 7 and 8 have extended balconies. The corner afts on 7 ( don't know about 8) have huge wrap around balconies and walk in closets. There is no noise from the lounge below.

I'm very glad to hear this. We're in the corner aft on 7, I think above the diamond lounge, next June (2017). I tried to do research before choosing a room, but there is surprisingly little out there. It will be our first corner aft and first time on grandeur, so I was kind of booking blind when I reserved it. I had initially booked on 8 but changed to 7 because I am a late sleeper and was concerned about noise from deck 9.

Short version: the title says it all.

Long version: I checked in today for an upcoming cruise in a GS and was only given the option to print luggage tags, not order them as you can typically do for suites. So I called C&A, thinking maybe I was too close to the cruise but maybe they could get me some tags (I usually do online check-in way in advance, but this time I'm only 12 days out).

The C&A rep read to me from a notice that they received today saying that as of April 29, they would no longer be sending tags for suites, and we would have to print them out. We had a good laugh about how the policy started 5 days ago but C&A was just informed today, but it seems like that's that.

For anyone who's pinnacle, she also said no tags for pinnacles anymore; I just turned diamond so didn't even know that was a perk.

I know it's just a small thing, but I am not crafty and I absolutely hate putting the tags together - I try to laminate them with packing tape and it never goes well. :p DH jokes I want to upgrade to suites just to get out of assembling the darn tags. We ordered tag holders for when we cruise in non-suite rooms, so I guess I will try those. Still, I am kind of annoyed.

Anyway, a heads up so you don't spend 20 minutes like me, searching all over my online cruise documents for the "order luggage tags" button.

Saved $190 in a JS on one of the Grandeur 5-night bermuda sailings next June (June 10, 2017).

We booked on opening day, so were really happy to see a price drop in our favor. It will be our first time in a corner aft, so we're already pretty psyched, even though the itinerary is not that great (less than 24 hours in bermuda). More time to spend on our balcony! :D

We managed to book our Harmony cruises in early June 2015 when the prices were crazy low, so we'll never see drops on those. I figure it all evens out, as we way overpaid for our last couple of cruises. But we went on them anyway, and had a darn good time. :p

My husband and I got comfortable in front of the TV last night to watch it. Then we learned that our cable subscription doesn't include the Science Channel. (We have RCN in Washington, DC.) We were so disappointed.

if you have friends with fios, maybe someone will record it for you? we're dc-area (fairfax va) with fios, and were able to get it.

there was a special on quantum or anthem that was only shown in canada sometime last year. we never got to see it. so frustrating. :(

What flavors frappucino on allure are included in drink packages

no starbucks drinks are included in the packages.

you can get frappuccino-like blended drinks from the cafe promenade. on my last few cruises they were made with seattle's best coffee, which is owned by starbucks but tastes different.

they usually only have a couple of flavors listed - like coffee, caramel, and usually a coconut one - but they have different syrups behind the bar and can use any of those upon request. i find seattle's best coffee a little strong for me, so i would get mine with caramel and chocolate syrup, which sweetened it up. they probably don't have all of the ingredients to copy some of the frappuccino flavors, like i'd imagine they don't have chips to make a chocolate chip frappuccino-like drink, but if you're ok with the various syrup flavors, you can likely get what you want.

Oh so cant you use Coastal kitchen, is it worth it then for just the space ?

i'm pretty sure that starting in may, junior suites (of all types - JS, SJS, FJS, etc) can have dinner in coastal kitchen. it's part of the new suite perks.

i really like the aft balconies, but the JS balconies are big too, even those on the side, at least on the newer ships (i've only been on freedom class and newer). i'd probably take the upgrade from balcony to JS for a few hundred bucks, and definitely for $150.

I read you can text messages for the two guys to "write".

 

I wonder if it works when it snows. ;)

yikes. i had not heard that! that's pretty funny, actually.

Just because there's meaning to them, doesn't make them any less weird.

oh, i agree, they are definitely strange.

what's with royal's big-freaky-head motif? quantum (i think it was quantum, though it might be anthem) had a big freaky head near cafe 270, and one of the other ships has one in the solarium (i can't remember which ship, but it's probably either oasis or quantum class, given my cruise history). i tend to like a lot of the art royal has on their ships, but the heads give me nightmares.

i actually kind of like some of the other cerny sculptures. there's more to many of them than you can tell just by looking at a pic on a website. for example, if you peek inside the hole in the "ladder" one, there's a film of two politicians feeding each other slop, which kind of puts the whole exterior sculpture in a different context. it just makes me think of this election season and crack up. similarly, i read that the peeing guys are apparently spelling out lines from czech literature - i know nothing about czech literature and i don't really "get" this sculpture, but it's more than just a couple of guys peeing.

i'm going to be in charlotte for a friend's wedding in a couple of weeks - maybe i'll track down the head. a few months before we were on quantum we happened to be in denver and took a special jaunt to get a pic of the big blue bear downtown, which was by the same artist who did the big red bear on quantum. it was kind of cool to get a sneak peek. though i liked the bear way better than the freaky heads...

I had this on a five night sailing on Liberty and I liked it but not sure if it's too expensive for a seven night. I used it to get special coffee but since this ship has Starbucks I can see getting a few there. Can you get it midweek if you want and just pay for remaining days?

if you're ok with the coffee drinks at the cafe promenade (which are usually seattles best, not starbucks), i would get the package on allure. allure has the freestyle machines, which are an extra bonus. i've found that having the freestyle machines usually makes the difference as to whether i come out ahead on the package or not, as i don't drink a lot of regular soda but like the funky flavors in the machines. You do get the special cup.

the package does not work at the starbucks stand-alone kiosks on allure. if you want starbucks coffee, as opposed to the seattles best served at the cafe promenade, it might not be worth it to get the package. you'd either be paying for a package and then paying extra for starbucks, or you'd be drinking the seattles best because its in the package and wishing it was starbucks. :p

I have not been on the Anthem yet, but we are booked for a trip in the summer. We have classic dynamic dining and are in a grand suite. Does anyone know if we can order room service from the complimentary restaurants to dine in our room? If so, is Coastal Kitchen included?

 

Thanks for the help.

yes, and yes. :)

dinner menus for all five (4 main complimentary restaurants, plus coastal kitchen) should be in the folder in your room. you can also order lunch from coastal kitchen and the open complimentary restaurant (i can't remember which one it is - maybe american icon?). i don't eat breakfast so can't comment on that.

just fyi, the coastal kitchen menu, including the lunch menu, changes every four days - we tried to order the croque monseiurs to our room for lunch on day 5 and they weren't available because they had already switched menus.

i do have a JS/coastal kitchen question, too. we'll be in a JS on allure in mid-may, so the new perks should be in effect and we should be able to go to CK for dinner. however, i called C&A and they will not allow me to book a CK dinner. they said i have to do it onboard. does anyone know if this is correct, and/or has anyone in a JS been able to pre-book CK? if you had to book onboard, was there any trouble getting a table for four? i really want my mom, who we're traveling with, to get a chance to try it.

this is our first time in a JS on a ship with CK, so i wasn't sure what to expect.

Thanks!

I've bought the royal replenish drink package and was wondering how much bottle water comes with it. Do I need to purchase a pack of water to go with it.

you can pick up bottled water at almost any bar. there is no limit, except that you can only get one bottle at a time. there were days i picked up 3 or 4 per day, and no one cared - i'd just swing by a bar when i passed one and ask for a bottled water. the bottles are standard drinking water size bottles - a little taller and thinner than a soda can. sorry, i can't remember the ounces. :) unless you think you will need to guzzle a gallon at a time, you shouldn't need to purchase additional water.

I have searched and have not found the answer. What is the current price for say a frozen non-alcoholic drinks like a virgin Pina Colada or similar? How much is a regular one

$5.00 - $5.50 (varied by bar for some reason) on liberty last august. similar on anthem last month - i think $5.50 - but i had the replenish package on anthem so i didn't really pay attention, i just had friends with no package who ordered a virgin drink occasionally and i think they paid in the $5-6 range.

when the pp said a "regular" one was $10, i think maybe they mean with the alcohol? :confused: i'm pretty sure those were $12 on anthem.

I was going to purchase the Royal Replenishment for myself on our 10 day sailing in April. I was surprised that it costs $22.42 per day! I expected it would be less. Does the price ever go down? Will it cost more on-board? I probably should just do this in advance b/c I know that those lattes will add up....:cool:

it costs the same onboard or as a pre-purchase. the price recently went up a little bit, but it had been $22 for quite a while before that, so not a huge hike. i think it started at $19 back when first introduced.

not really any benefit to pre-purchasing vs buying onboard, though if you pre-purchase you lock in the price in case it goes up again. however, if you buy onboard, you will get your soda cup right when you purchase it; if you pre-purchased, your cup will be waiting in your room so you can't use the freestyle machines (if you ship has them) until you can get into the staterooms. that's pretty much the only difference i can think of. if you decide to buy onboard, there are tons of places to do it, including a huge table you can't miss in front of the windjammer buffet on most ships.

fwiw, i am not a huge drinker and i pretty much break even, and maybe get a little ahead on trips that have a lot of sea days or on ships that have a freestyle machine. i like the flexibility of it, though - i don't spend much onboard, so sometimes i hesitate to buy a drink when i really want it if i don't have the package, so the package frees me up a bit to get what i want without stressing about it. the bottled water is also handy to take on shore excursions etc.

And with Royal hiking up the prices on food, buying a Kate Spade purse may be a bargain after-all! [emoji12]

and it might taste better!!! (i kid, i kid... :p i just couldn't resist, after all the comments on here about the food).

Thanks Karma! I hope they bring the cupcake decorating class back to Anthem.

My kids will love it!

i hope so, too. i've done it three times (twice on liberty and once on allure), though i'm no kid :D. i was on an earlier anthem cruise where entertainment was kind of sparse; it sounds like they are adding new activities all the time, so maybe you'll be in luck. for some reason the cupcake class on quantum was held in sorrentos, which i thought was weird, though it looked like they trucked supplies over from la patisserie. it may be worth it to ask around at either place once you're onboard.

For that matter there's no Cupcake Cupboard on Allure anymore. The Kate Spade store took over the space occupied by Cupcake Cupboard on both Oasis and Allure and the cupcakes are now part of Cups and Scoops (formerly the Ice Cream Shoppe) on the Boardwalk.

i was going to say that makes me sad, but in addition to loving cupcakes, i also love kate spade purses, so i guess i'll live. my allure cruise in a couple of months may just have gotten a lot more expensive.... :p

Is there a cupcake cupboard onboard Anthem of the seas?

This was my daughters favorite place on Allure.

She and my wife signed up for a cupcake decorating class and they both had a blast.

Is there a similar class on Anthem as well?

no cupcake cupboard, but la patisserie has similar cupcakes (for a similar charge) and also other pastries. it also has a nice seating area.

they did a cupcake decorating class on quantum, but i didn't see it on the compass on anthem.

Thanks Robin. I'm seriously thinking about purchasing the Royal Replinish for myself and dd. The coffee' date=' tea, and bottled water alone makes it worth it for me. Plus dd likes the frozen drinks which can become costly as well. Do you know if the Promenade has iced coffee and iced lattes?[/quote']

 

sorry, i only drink my coffee in frappuccino-like drinks (i like it mostly milk and sugar with a little bit of coffee :D ), so i've never tried to order iced coffee or iced lattes. they do make lattes, and have regular seattle's best coffee, and have a big freezer full of ice, so i'm 99% sure it would not be a problem, but i don't know for certain.

 

as bob said, if you're unsure about the package, you can always check with the cafe and then purchase the package onboard. it's hard to miss the tables hawking the package - there's generally one set up in front of the windjammer buffet at least, plus you can normally buy it at the bars if you can't find a table.

on quantum the card room was kind of behind boleros, but it looks like on anthem they used that space to make boleros bigger. in any case, there is no dedicated card room.

games etc that are usually in the card room can be found in the library, which is in the upstairs part of 270. i don't know that there's really a good place to play them there, though.

fwiw, we played cards and games every other night or so in michael's pub - there is a large table near the front entrance that was the perfect size. it was a dead zone in there so they seemed happy to have the business, as most people ordered drinks. as someone else mentioned, people were playing cards and mah jongg at a couple of tables in the wide hallway area before 270, but there were only two tables there so they were always full.

Do you know where specialty coffees and teas are available on the Oasis?

In the main dining room, and at the cafe promenade. the cafe promenade makes similar drinks to starbucks - espressos, frappuccinos, lattes, etc. last time i was on oasis or allure (a while ago) they used seattle's best coffee and had tazo teas. chai and hot chocolate were also included.

there is a stand-alone starbucks on oasis and allure that does not take the package, so starbucks from that kiosk will not be included.

Are you kidding? what a joke.

 

RCCL Cruises are massively more expensive in the EU than other lines. The food is consistantly worse than other lines too. Anthem Food was the worst i have eaten on a cruise by far. 5 white steaks which looked like pork sent back in a row! Cold bland curry and breakfast which was worse than a £3 cafe.

 

They are cutting costs on food. Prices this year on Indi are 50% more expensive than 2 years ago. staff are happy to serve you crap and when you send it back its suddenly better most of the time. Its like you have to eat crap first to get the meal you should have had. One Menu on Allure was so bad not one person on the table would eat any of it and we ended off with a secret curry from a menu that was for indian customers which was 100x better than the crap "beef tenderloin" they tried to pass off to us earlier.

when I read a post like this I always think of one thing........bull----,

don't believe a word of this post, period....:rolleyes::rolleyes:

i know nothing about UK prices, but i can vouch for the gross pork-like steaks. on our dec 12 cruise (out of NJ) our servers told us that the various steaks on the menus had been replaced with "loin." we figured that would be tenderloin. boy, were we wrong. the first night in american icon when that sucker came out, our whole table had a (joking) argument about whether it was pork or beef. even friend eating it couldn't tell - she thought it was beef, but her husband tasted it and said pork. finally we asked the server and she said it was in fact beef.

the same poor meat replaced the filet in the grande. i ate about two bites. and i am by no means a food snob. it tasted grainy - i can't think of another way to describe it. it took two lava cakes to get the taste out of my mouth. :p

there was some ok food, but plenty of other food problems, too. also at american icon i ordered the cookie sundae, and the cookie was so hard i couldn't even break it with a spoon or fork. i just ate the ice cream off the top, and then picked up the cookie, but it was so hard i was worried i'd break a tooth (and i'm relatively young and have all my teeth :D ). my baked potato at chops was also hard as a rock and my steak was basically a block of salt. and on and on.

i really hope things are improving. we had fantastic service throughout the whole ship while previous cruises had many complaints, so it seems like they got that straightened out. when we went on quantum last year there were tons of complaints about the food before our jan 3 cruise, and our cruise seemed to be the one on which it turned around, and everything was great. it does sound like they are working on the food quality and preparation issues on anthem; i just kind of wish we had waited a few extra months to sail, because much of the food was definitely sub-par.

I had a discussion with the cruise director (Abe) about WWRY today. He claims that the passenger ratings for it are very high (even from the US sailings)

it's been a few weeks since i did my survey, but i seem to recall being frustrated when asked to rank WWRY because there was just one spot to fill in what you thought of it - there was no differentiation between music, performers, tech, story, etc. so in my case, where i thought the band was a 10, the performers between maybe 7-9 depending on the character, and the book/story a 2, i rated it somewhere around a 7 or 8 because that's what it averaged out to. i also didn't want the performers to be penalized by a bad rating when on the whole they did very well; there's nothing they can do about the bad storyline. so, i can see where people who didn't exactly enjoy the play might still give it decent marks, while never planning on seeing the horrific thing again. :p

fwiw, i did explain in the "do you have anything else to add" freeform text at the end of the survey that i gave it its higher rating because of the cast and band, and that the play itself was terrible. however, i'm guessing all they will see is "rating of 8 - that's pretty good!" maybe i just should have put "n/a" as the rating, but i wasn't really thinking about it at the time.

my whole group of 5 really enjoyed spectra's a lot - it was weird, but not in an offputting way, and i thought they did a really good job merging the tech and performers. my group was split on the gift, but both DH and i really liked it, and i can't understand why people have trouble following the storyline, as they spell it out at the beginning. it's also not a traditional play, but not as strange as spectra's. both of those are short, too, so if you don't like them, it's not as painful as WWRY.

then again, i also liked cats (on broadway - not seen it on oasis). so my opinion may not be in line with many on here. ;)