Starry Eyes

Personally I think it is wrong for both cruiselines and airlines. The airlines knowingly overbook, much more so than the cruiselines. The do ask for volunteers and they do offer compensation. Sometimes nobody volunteers and someone gets bumped involuntarily. Depending on the airline and the route, there might not be an available flight soon enough for the passenger’s needs. A flight the next day, for example, may well cause them to miss their cruise or a special event. Recently, like the airlines. The current disappointing report aside, Royal has also asked for volunteers and offered compensation…except Royal made the offer in advance, not in the terminal like the airline…that is much better than the airlines.

I agree, but go after the big offenders first. Both airlines and hotels are notorious for substantially overbooking with the expectation that there will be no shows, allowing them to collect double revenue. They ruin trips, too. The number of incidents where cruise lines overbook seems pretty low compared to others in the hospitality industry.

Of course we do not know the whole story; one rarely does. One does suspect that most cruisers and the general public reading about this event on social media would be more understanding if the root cause was a last minute maintenance issue (or some similar unavoidable last minute problem). Note, however, letter posted on Reddit does not indicate such as issue. The OP on that thread stated they had no prior notice and had they were unassigned gty’s (13 couples). You and I know gty’s are ordinarily assigned at least 2-3 days before the cruise. Unassigned gty’s suggests Royal had at least 2-3 days notice…perhaps more.

I don’t understand why Royal Caribbean wasn’t proactive by asking for volunteers in advance of this cruise. Here on CC we saw copies of emails Royal sent for other overbooked cruises this year. That price protection offer might have induced 13 or more people to volunteer to reschedule to another week while others might have volunteered for the refund plus 25% FCC if they’ve had a recent financial setback. Those offers are only so-so for volunteers. I think the offers are really poor for non-volunteers bounced the day of sailing without notice.

Royal Caribbean has noticed when the lounges are most likely to be overcrowded. We know that due to concerns about Crown lounge crowding on some cruises D’s are excluded from the Crown lounge during cocktail hours. The obvious parallel action would be to exclude (non-suite) Pin’s from the suite lounge during cocktail hours. Suite guests would then more easily find seats during their free cocktail hour. The Pin’s in the SL at that time would be suite guests who then would not be scapegoated if it did get crowded.

Unless the adult son is also interested in accumulating points. He would get single points under your booking system vs double under the status quo.

I think you have been given good advice above. Nevertheless I will add that on some sailing on that class ship, the obstructed balconies (or guarantee balcony bookings that may be assigned obstructed balcony categories) can be much less expensive. While not optimal, people in obstructed balconies still have a private space with sea air and a view when standing (the degree of obstruction varies). If perchance budget becomes an issue for you or others reading this thread, with the correct attitude an enjoyable cruise can be had in an obstructed balcony on deck 6. Deck 6 would be a convenient deck.

One need not pay for a cruise or go to a bar if you’re into that. Just read CruiseCritic; somebody will post a moan soon enough🤣

True. Also if the spouses currently have the same number of points, they are both better off in the long run if the double points go to the person who is more likely to take cruises without the spouse (solo or with a friend/relative) in the future. Sometimes that needs to be planned when the booking/upgrade is made.

Though DH and I tend to be early birds, I know late night food matters to other people. If we all kept the same schedules and enjoyed the same things, the ships would feel more crowded. I recall how unhappy fellow cruisers were as midnight buffets became less lavish than disappeared. Even on the same line, some cruises feel different than others. For example, several years ago we did a back to back cruise, so same ship, same departure port, same month. The first cruise was a five night sailing to Bermuda. There were lots of young couples and families with young kids plus some seniors. It was very active with long lines for pizza and a very busy buffet, even at dinner. Boisterous crowd. There were only a few b2b guests. The second cruise was nine night Canada and New England. There were lots of seniors, far fewer young people, very few kids, and far more high loyalty members. More card games, no more long lines for pizza, the MDR was busier at mealtimes. Sedate crowd. We enjoyed both cruises, but the contrast was quite noticeable.

Ah, so none of your other 37 cruises were transatlantic or other ocean crossings. We have done 96 cruises on a variety of cruise lines, including multiple transatlantics. They draw a different crowd and have a different pace. Passengers on a TA behave differently than passengers on a 7 or 10 day cruise. Obviously the TA worked out for us but it does not suit everyone. Try to think about the TA demographic and TA crowd behavior separately from your feeling about Royal Caribbean. That will help you decide if long transoceanic cruises on any line suit you at this point in your life. There are other points that are specific to Royal Caribbean and your cruising style/preferences. For example, free late night food seems important to you (that is not important to me at all, showing personal preferences really matter here). If Royal’s offerings (typically pizza, sandwiches, cookies as I recall) do not appeal, another cruiseline might suit you better for most or all of your cruises. That’s why there are multiple cruise lines. Many of us have taken a cruise that was good yet did not quite fit. We go back to the line(s) that feel right.

Our congratulations email for a winning bid came yesterday. Today with received new cruise docs with the new luggage tag on the last page. So watch your email. Your new docs should come soon. Your new cruise docs should then also be available in your cruise planner.

I’d guess it went through in a wearable pet carrier https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B5KWBB5K/ref=sspa_mw_detail_2?ie=UTF8&psc=1&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9waG9uZV9kZXRhaWw That might be where it was hidden some of the times the cabin was serviced, too.

While there are some reliably “high kid” times, I don’t think there are any reliably “low kid time period” cruises on Oasis class ships. There can be a surprising number if kids of many sailings. Just because kids are in school in your hometown does not mean all kids are in school. Not only are there many pre-school child, there now many home schoolers. There are also plenty of parents who will pull kids out of school for a trip. Then there are schools with alternate calendars, both domestic and abroad. For example, my schools only got one day off for President’s day in February while in other parts of the country, there is a week break. I have also boarded ships to find a large number of families vacationing from Brazil, for example.

I guess that’s another reason I don’t want to sail Icon (at least while she is new). If other people want to pay that much for a rope course, I hope they have a blast…and I hope RCI pays down more debt.

Access to Solarium Bistro those weeks costs only $70 ppd. Royal will be happy to take your money.😉🤣🤣 Joking aside, I do understand your pain. I’ve lost access to multiple venues when I discovered I was on a ship with a partial charter. The cruiselines do not warn other passengers and it can impact their cruises. Allowing a group to have certain venues for all or large portions of a cruise is not just Yeshiva week/Bistro/Royal thing unfortunately

I have found a coffee station set up early somewhere on those ships. Some ships have more than one spot (for example, they might have a coffee station on an upper deck outside the WJ and one on a lower deck, maybe near near the MDR entrance). The guests who do not have lounge access on those ships generally are not really OOL.

I suspect you’d get also varying reports if you asked about spring break cruises with loads of kids. Some people would report the their cruise was ruined by poorly behaved kids while other people would say they had a decent cruise with lots of kids being kids. Not only are there different kids and different parents on the various cruises, the different observers with different personalities keep different schedules and hang out in different parts of the ship so they see different things and are impacted differently. My sailing was a few years ago. Ii is quite possible that the behavior has gotten worse.

Ok, here’s a different report. Several years ago we had never heard of Yeshiva week and happened to book a cruise with them (oasis class out of FL). They were families with kids. They behaved like kids on a cruise…those kids might have behaved a bit better than average. I have been on cruises with worse behaved kids during summer and spring break.

I agree with the others that a suite gty nearly always results in a JS assignment; anything else is rare. Don’t get your hopes up for a free upgrade. If I were booked in a suite gty, I’d bid on the upgrades as if I expected a JS. I would keep an eye out for my assignment and cancel the bid if by some chance I was assigned a full suite. Watching for the assignment would include doing the “barcode trick” on set sail pass within 45 days of cruise.

US Virgin Islands also raised port fees(“Capital Cost Recovery Charge”) for Royal Caribbean cruisers to fund port infrastructure improvements.

I have not used this benefit, but I can imagine a couple uses. If the wine one desires is only offered by the bottle, not by the glass, it would make sense to use a voucher for a discount to get the wine one really wants. Or if one wanted to treat your whole table to wine, one could buy a bottle (or two) with the voucher discount.

Thanks for providing the flyer. The participants will be paying $70 per person per day for their Kosher buffet meals. $35 for kids 6-12. That will really add to the price of a family cruise.

The MTD desk does ask for cabin number and does know which guests have MTD vs traditional dining.

It varies. An 83 year old family member loves the big ships, though getting from one end to the other is taking a bit longer than it did 10-15 years ago. I laughed when the OP said Odyssey was “too big (long) for ‘guests’ over 25.”