emeraldcity

There are a large number of shore excursions to choose from so you have to choose carefully. I sorted through the options with my key objective in mind. I wanted to see waterfalls and geothermal activity. There are so few places in the world that have mineral springs and bubbling mud and streams of steam escaping from the ground. I've been to Yellowstone and I knew this wasn't going to be on that scale, but I knew it would be amazing in it's own right and I wanted to experience those sights. So I selected the Jewels of the North excursion. And yes, one can also choose to book something with a private company, but my appetite for that sort of thing has suffered considerably in the past couple of years. If you book it with Royal Caribbean and there's a cancellation, they handle the refunds effortlessly.

So we set off from the ship and circled around to the other side of the fjord, offering us some pretty decent photos of the ship docked in Akureryi. We headed inland to our first stop -- Goddfoss Waterfall. It's an amazing thing that nature situated the waterfall right by the main road, so you can actually see it from the bus, but they stopped anyway and let us out to venture closer for pictures. There were a number of angles for those who wanted to get closer, but I was happy to experience the incredible force of the water from the easiest vantage point. I'll try to post a video, since a simple screen grab of a waterfall doesn't do it justice. You have to hear the rushing water and feel the force of the current as it rushes over the brink.

Our next stop was at a lake that was nice, but not worth the experience of having to deal with the midges that are attracted to that water. I had read the warnings that a face net was a good idea as the midges were bothersome. But I reasoned that it was so late in the season, that they should be done spawning and bothering people. Besides, I had so many other things to pack, did I really want to buy something else on Amazon.com? Yeah, the net would have been a plus here. But even if I had the face net, I think I would have voted to give this stop a pass.

Our next stop was on the other side of the lake. They took us to a restaurant for a snack, which was a sandwich and something to drink. This restaurant boast floor-to-ceiling windows that offered a view of the lake ... without the midges. So again, they could have skipped the midges experience and just brought us here. Unless of course, the intent is to insure we get the full experience of what life is like for those who live near a lake in Iceland.

Our next stop was the geothermal area ... and that calls for another video. I saw the pictures beforehand when choosing my shore excursion in the comfort of my house, but those pictures didn't have the impact of standing on the edge of the thin crust of ground that covered the hot steam rising from deep in the earth. I do apologize that I can't also deliver the scents that go along with the video. To get the full effect you need to crack open a dozen rotten eggs and scatter them across your desk before you run the video.

In order to get to Akureyri, Iceland, we had to cross the Arctic Circle. This is, of course, an occasion that needs to be marked with a certain amount of tomfoolery. Hence, there is the Blue Nose Ceremony. King Neptune shows up to officiate at the rites of passage ... and a hapless junior officer is chosen as the sacrificial lamb for all of us. His gleeful fellow officers seize him and toss him into the pool and then all who choose can crowd forward to have blue paint swabbed on their nose. I do not do blue paint ... I simply photograph people who do blue paint.

You will note that King Neptune is appropriately dressed for the weather and his lovely young assistant is not. I hope she got paid more than he did.

6 minutes ago, skyhawk352 said:

Do you happen to know what time the ‘walk-off’ time slot was? Was it 6:45am? Trying to time a flight home. Thanks!

I'm not certain, but friends of mine walked off and made it to the airport in enough time to change their Delta flight to one that left before 11:00. That exceeds my comfort zone, but they pulled it off.

One final photo ... as we sailed away from Norway and into the North Sea, I caught this one.

This isn't so much a review, as it is an introspective look back at one of the most unique itineraries I've ever taken. Your mileage may vary.

I joined a group of cruise friends (we initially met on the Brilliance Spring TA in 2016). Most of us hadn't seen each other in three years and as amazing as this trip was, the best part was being reunited with my friends after such a long time. We arrived in Copenhagen three days early from our respective corners of the world and managed to get in a number of major attractions before boarding day.

We did the hop-on/hop-off bus one day and visited Rosenborg Castle at one of the stops. I had missed out on doing that my previous visit and it was on my hit list. It didn't exactly deliver the "wow" I was expecting ... I think because it's decorated in such dark colors. But I suppose it was all the rage in it's day. I was surprised at how close they let you get to the crown jewels. I actually slapped my phone right up against the glass for a photo and nobody rushed up and bundled me off to a police van.

We took one of the canal boat tours and had lunch at one of the open air eateries in Nyhavn. Since the boat tour provides for views of the famous Little Mermaid from the back, we also managed to check her out by land from the front (this is a Hop-on/Hop-off stop). We also visited Tivoli Gardens. It was nice, but I'm not sure it was worth the hype.

As you can see, we didn't stray much from the beaten path (except maybe that evening we headed down a series of side streets to find that Thai Restaurant on Google Maps).

And, of course we visited the iconic spot all Copenhagen Royal Caribbean cruisers visit ... the Pharmacia for our covid tests.

Tests and Passports in hand, we boarded the Voyager of the Seas on September 4th and set sail for Kristiansand, Norway. This wasn't my first time in this port and I had done the "wander the town" thing last time. If this is the sort of thing others like, I can recommend Ravnedalen Park, which is within walking distance of the port. This time I wanted to see something more of Norway, so I joined Doreen and we set off on a RCI Excursion to Setesdal Mineral Park. An hour's drive through some stunning scenery brought us to a deserted parking lot. I was certain they had closed for the season from the looks of it. But the guide led us around back and they were expecting us ... all 26 of us. We had the place to ourselves. What an incredible find! An old feldspar mine has been converted into a museum of crystalline minerals from all over the world. They used mine cars as display cases in some places. Old mining machinery was still scattered about with display cases placed between them. The delicate nature of some of the crystals blew me away. How did they transport them without breaking the fibers? There were 5 different rooms in the mine to explore and I could have spent more time, but one doesn't want to be the last person on the bus. Ours was an afternoon tour and we returned to the ship just before sail-away. They were apparently counting us as we got off the bus "Yeah. That's all 26 of them. Now we just have to wait for the two from the airport."

Just back from my Greek Isles cruise. We were late getting due Santorini due to a diversion for a medical emergency. We arrived at 10:30 a.m. and were one of 4 ships in port ... but the Odyssey was by far the biggest ship. People had to queue up for tender tickets to leave the ship and we opted to stay on board that morning, have a nice lunch and then head ashore at 2:00 p.m. We knew we had plenty of time because the captain had announced the ship would delay departure until 10:00 p.m.

It took about an hour and a half for all the people with tender tickets to get off. By noon, no one needed a ticket.

My plan of duplicating my experience on how to get to Oia fell apart as soon as we hit the dock ... the water taxi to Oia ceases operation at noon. So we took the cable car up and figured we'd explore Fira. Of course, it didn't take long to realize that Fira wasn't going to deliver the visual experience of Oia ... but there is a solution to every problem. We got deeper into the town and spotted a big sign that said taxi. Even better, as we got closer to the sign, we discovered a lot full of buses right behind it. We asked at the lot and were told to go to bus 18. You buy your ticket as you are boarding the bus and it set us back a mere 1.6 Euro each. 30 minutes later we were in Oia. The bus runs every 30 minutes. When we finished exploring Oia, we headed back to where the bus dropped us off and there were two buses waiting to load passengers for the trip back to Fia.

Score! 6.4 Euros total for two rides in a very comfortable huge coach. They simply don't pay that driver enough to negotiate those roads every day.

PS. While we waited about 15 minutes for the cable car ride down, we found out that those who opted for a taxi to Oia paid 35 Euros. And while we enjoyed dinner that night on the ship at 8:00 we realized the cable car ceases operating before dark ... we could make out little pinpoints of light slowly zigzagging down the cliff as passengers made their way back down, undoubtedly using the flashlights of the phones.

8 hours ago, TVNews said:

Last time we were in Santorini we took the ferry to Oia from the tender port below Fira. I think it was about 25-30 EUR and that included a shuttle bus from Oia back to Fira where we caught the cable car down. As Mapleleaves notes, the ferry will not depart until it is reasonably full (even though they will tell you it’s leaving “in a few minutes” so you need patience or good timing.

That was my experience as well. We plan on doing the same thing this time. Sounds like we can expect a line to the cable car, but it's all part of the adventure. 

I had absolutely no luck booking any private tours that could accommodate the ship's port schedule (2 p.m. arrival with a departure the following day at 5:00 p.m.). I ended up booking a ship tour on day one and the hop-on/hop-off bus the next day.

The ho/ho bus was a colossal waste of money. They were supposed to be operating every 15-20 minutes and clearly the drivers never got that memo. We waited 30 minutes at the port before the bus showed up. It took us as far as the church (stop #9), where we got off with the grand plan to walk back to bus stop #7, doing a bit of shopping ... then catch the bus to do the rest of the circuit. We reached stop #7 shortly before 3:00. And we waited. Then waited some more. By 3:30 it was clear doing the rest of the circuit was going to be cutting things too close, so we called a taxi. When the taxi picked us up at 3:40, there was still no sign of the bus.

Introduce some new itineraries ... definitely in the Med, but elsewhere as well. Other cruiselines offer something other than Ketchikan, Juneau, Skagway in Alaska. Why should I cruise RC again in Alaska if I don't get to see a new port? And then there's South America ... I don't have the funds to undertake the World Odyssey, but I'd be interested in something other than the ABC islands and Cartegena.

I've got the same issue for an upcoming cruise out of Rome. We finally decided what we want to do in Naples and the only thing that doesn't block us with that message is the Hop/on-Hop/Off bus in Naples

4 hours ago, grouchomarx said:

Just curious, are they actively enforcing this or is it just lip service?  I saw on a Celebrity thread that it was greyed out and they were unable to click on it for booking because they were over the age limit.  Is Royal the same?

They absolutely enforce it. I wanted to do a "go fast" drive yourself boat excursion in Cozumel and I couldn't book it on the web site, so I waited till I got on board and tried the shore excursion desk the night before. As soon as she input my name she told me that I exceeded the max age.

One month later on the Anthem I got to do the Rhino Riders in St. Maarten ... same "go fast" boat experience ... drive it yourself ... no age limit. Both excursions were ship excursions.

That indicates to me the issue lies with the third party providers, not Royal.

I have typically gotten a lot of information about port stops on the ports-of-call section of this forum, but I can't find anything for Iceland and Greenland. Are they just not there, or maybe the ports are buried under an unexpected category. They aren't in Canada/New England and they aren't in Europe.

1 hour ago, ILOVESHIPS said:

What ship is stopping in  Colon in Panama.  Serenade and Radiance  do not  stop in  Oct.  2022

Vision ... November of this year

47 minutes ago, neverbeenhere said:

Unless Colon has changed very recently, it is a very wild and woolly area. Not for the tourist crowd, unless you look and speak like a local. 

I agree with this assessment wholeheartedly. Stick with a ship's excursion here and suffer the big bus experience (which I also am not a fan of).

Special trivia note: the emeraldcity avatar is actually a photo of a condo in Panama City

Finally found it. Thank you all for your patience with me.

Oh. OK. Thanks.

But is there a way to see my set sail pass in the subsequent cruise?

I would like to access my check-in information for a cruise in late September. I did my checkin on my computer, but you can't upload photos of your vaccine card there, so I want to do it in the app. However, I have a cruise that takes place prior to that and when I open the app, all I get is info about the upcoming cruise and I can't figure out how to find an option to see information for a subsequent cruise. I'm sure it's a simple thing, but it's eluding me.

So many favorites already listed. I agree wholeheartedly about the Austrian Striezel bread in the morning ... although it's not the same on all ships. Sadly, I think they overbaked it a bit on the Allure and sliced it too thin so it was drier. But that's the only ship that disappointed.

And I'm all about the mashed potatoes and gravy ... it's in my DNA. Numerous times I'd head to the WJ thinking I was going to get something else ... and then I walked by the mashed potatoes and it called to me.

And the inclusion of real ice cream (instead of just that soft serve stuff on the pool deck) is a huge draw. My last couple of cruises I'd head up there just before closing time for my version of a night cap.

So glad to see they are adding a crepe station. It was the one thing NCL had over Royal's buffet for so long. 

Thank you. I was a bit disappointed in the first go-round, but I see the thread was revived and my actual question has been addressed. So it's possible that Royal is giving them compensation in some way, but it's really unknown. And a dollar a drink for an easy pour, but $2 for a frozen concoction would be more appropriate.

I've been giving the server a dollar for the drinks that are loaded on my card, but is that enough? 

Mainly, I'm confused about whether servers receive any compensation for those D and D+ drinks. If they don't and it's a $10 drink, then my dollar is only a 10% tip and I need to up my game.

And I'm sure this topic has been covered, but I tried several searches, and apparently my searching skills are deficient.

3 minutes ago, twangster said:

 

I suspect it's because a significant portion of overall revenue comes from onboard spending.  They are enticing two guests to book so they have one more wallet or purse on board to spend money.  The lower cruise fare, they hope, will be offset by the spend on board. 

 

Two guests also pay two daily service charges so that also helps with overall crew compensation.   Solo guests pay one daily service fee.  

OK. That makes sense. In my case, I tend to tip the cabin steward extra because I don't want him/her to feel like they got shafted by having only one person in the cabin.

23 minutes ago, molly361 said:

Sometimes when you put in 2 passengers it is pricing a guarantee cabin and then for some reason if you put in 1 person you can not book a guarantee.

OK. You're right. It was a guarantee for the couple but not the solo. That's a strange policy. I wonder what's the reason behind it.

In any event, I clearly want to book as a solo because I've just hit the magic 340+ points, so I should be able to qualify for the solo supplement reduction. Not sure how I go about getting that discount. Do you have to book with a phone rep?

I've been watching pricing on January cruises for Anthem. And the situation hasn't changed in months. When I run a mock booking for a given cabin with 2 people in it, the final price is nearly $200 less than if I back up and run the numbers again for one guest. I'm getting $2551 for a solo and $2375 for a couple in a balcony. I was prepared to pay for double occupancy plus one charge for taxes and port fees ... but that's not what's coming back.

Whoa! Given the big upcharge I had to pay for that accessible cabin when I was still wheelchair-bound a few weeks before my May cruise, I can't see people plunking down that kind of cash unless they are getting a suite with suite perks. Granted, the only one available was the "spacious" oceanview, but I've paid far less for a junior suite and at least got double points with it.

Thanks for the info ... I was told last night that price adjustments are no longer made (as of May). So it's back to the method of calling back to get someone who will give me the answer I want.