pinotlover

Absolutely not. Well kind of. The ship actually ported in Cadiz, so we paid O $99/ea to get us from Cadiz. Then we were on our own until we meet the bus to go back. All the touring there was on our own or by a local tour company.

We were there in early November from the Sirena. Enjoyed the day. Didn’t find the main pedestrian street to be as described above. Also enjoyed the tour up the Rock with all the great views. Had a great lunch in town. Found it funny seeing the good monkeys versus the bad monkeys!

At many fine restaurants , a 20% gratuity surcharge is now automatically added to groups of eight (8) or more. Some tip in addition to that, but the 20% cannot be lowered by the patrons. I have seen restaurant owners or managers follow patrons that don’t tip onto the street to ask why they gave no tip. If a problem occurred they apologize and vow to resolve it. If the patron says “they don’t believe in tipping and to pay your own staff”; the patron is often told to never return. Find a new restaurant to be cheap at. Then that patron goes on a banned list. Known of some quite wealthy families banned from most of the better restaurants in town. Not as uncommon as you might expect

One has to wonder if Oceania’s prior President to Howard didn’t see the handwriting on the wall and opted to bail out on his terms instead of FDR’s. He was popular and appeared to do a good job, but the storm clouds of nepotism can be seen from afar. It was/is apparent that FDR has no intention of retiring any time soon.

Tipping in the US is serious business. I work with restaurants where it’s a big deal. Some restaurants require pooled tips where not only the wait staff shares in the tips but the kitchen staff may also. Some waitstaff refuse to work at those restaurants. They want what their hard work brings in and refuses to subsidize those that don’t push and sale As they do.Others only want to work at tip sharing shops. Makes hiring interesting and complicated. 🥴

Using a professional TA as opposed to DIY calling 1-800-clerk at Oceania eliminates a lot of frustrations. Easy -Pezzy to just text your TA as opposed to the 1-800 route. DIY is a choice.

If they’re paying inside sales, and then having to double pay for those folks that then roll over to a TA, don’t be surprised to see inside sales cut. Bring in an outside Agency to work the inside sales. Once you booked with them, you’re bound to that Agency. O/NCL only pays once. That Agency decides what, if any rebates they give.

I do feel it’s a personal decision, who I tip and how much. No one else’s business. To jonthomas’s comments, I will pass along an interesting story. Several years ago we asked a highly acclaimed, recently retired, butler what we could do to most help the crew. His comments were: 1. Pick up after yourself. Don’t leave computers on the bed with open software. Clean off bathroom sink, and don’t leave piles of clothes or merchandise piled on the floor or . furniture . (Obviously YWYW doesn’t include living like a pig which some do at home.) 2. When they come to clean your cabin, leave. If you can’t leave right then ask them to come back in X minutes and be gone. Even if they say it’s OK to stay, you’re in their way, and they’d prefer you to be gone. 3. While they enjoy you inquiring about them, about 30-45 seconds is adequate. Longer than that you’re slowing them down and they have lots of work to do, especially on a full ship. They actually hide from some of the lonely hearts that try to corner them and talk incessantly. Be careful about asking very personal questions. 4. If they preform admirably, tip them personally. It’s appreciated. A couple things in his list stood out.First, tipping was listed last. There are a number of things we can, and should, do to make their jobs easier that matters a lot to them on a daily basis. Some as important as the “ tip”.

I thought all the crying and wringing of hands was over the Blue Bags, or absence thereof! 😂. Didn’t think about the take home dust collectors! 🤔

I wonder how much hit the miraculous IT department took!! 🥴 Until the bottom lines improve, I doubt much on the expense side will be added. Probably includes a delayed refit of a certain O ship. Revenues, not expenses are going to be the name of the game for at least the short to mid term. $1.4Bn of debt speaks loudly.

A complicated question. One of our bartenders on the Sirena last month has a contract for the Vista. The contract starts early to mid April, I forgot the exact date. She said they’ll be getting everything set up for the Inaugural cruise including a trial cruise before the first official cruise. There would be passengers on the trial runs, but she didn’t know identities.

Old Howard certainly didn’t last long in the job!! My guess is he has a contract where they had to pay him regardless, so now he’s a “ Special Adviser “ for the remainder of the term of the contract.

So many unrelated and interrelated issues here. Does jacking up gratuities, that only affects those with 10 or fewer cruises, or without OCAPP, really make a lot of sense? What percentage of Oceania’s cruisers are paying gratuities? If more revenue is required, it seems that cruise cost increases would be more efficient that increased gratuities. NCL still forces pool tips. From conversations with staff last month, employees of the former PCH lines are still allowed to keep individually given to them in cash. Only the ship wide applied gratuities are pooled . All ship board personnel are assigned a rank and pay grade based upon certain criteria. Everyone of that rank/ pay grade make an identical salary across the ship. Some positions have the ability to make additional pay via tips depending upon position and performance. The base pay of any position is based on contract pay , not gratuity levels charged. Your cabin steward gets the same pay, based on pay grade, whether the ship is full or 50% so. Any additional income comes from the envelope you leave them. Gratuities collected by Oceania are dispersed as Oceania sees fit and not necessarily in a personal level.

Another marketing gimmick to entice cruisers to your brand. Yawn. How many hundreds of boats, with new marketing gimmicks, rafted together across a river, do we need?

Let’s not get apples and oranges confused. If one is booked for a cruise, there is a penalty schedule for that cruise. If one is only waitlisted with a paid deposit, they are not booked and no penalty applies. They get their full deposit back if they never clear waitlist.

So a ship’s officer is constantly announcing to not go to your cabins until your desk is released But you talked to a random stewardess, which obviously out ranks the officers, and they said it was OK!!! Any realization of how silly that sounds? Just admit it, you believe you’re special and have zero interest in listening to the instructions of senior staff.

Actually surprised someone hasn’t already asked about a keg. 😜 Something along the lines of: ” I’m a beer drinker, can I bring my mini keg to the PG and they tap it for me? What will the charge be? Will they store it for me and bring it to the Terrace later for me?” But what about????

$25 corkage whether a magnum, jerobaum, methuselah, etc. A bottle is a bottle.

One must laugh at the imaginary titles they produce! 😂. Soon we’ll be having “ President of Navigational Operations “ Parties instead of Captain’s Party. 🤪

From discussing the entrees with the chefs, for most preparations there are very few alternatives made by the chef. Miami gives them the cookbooks and they have to follow them. If Miami wants certain entrees bland, they are made bland. If Miami wants it otherwise, then that’s how it’s made. Biggest difference is, as we all are aware, some chefs are better than others even when using the same cookbook. To compare Julia Childs, that studied French cooking for years with a young chef just handed a cookbook of recipes, of which he isn’t familiar, is silly.

Unless you have a group deal corkage fee is $25/btl.

I got one last cruise. Not only was the meat wrong, but it had some ground cabbage on it with the texture and taste of coleslaw. Nothing even similar to sauerkraut. Another chef’s expression of a traditional entree that was lacking. Plenty to eat, just don’t waste your time with that dish.

I was once a Segmenter. Never again. However, nothing in this instance has anything to add to the decision. Segmenters need to realize they are exactly that. There will be functions for which they are not invited and only for those on the ATW. I don’t see the problem.

Oceania cruisers pay no attention to their assigned boarding time, why should you expect they don’t ignore the constant announcements to not go to cabins/decks that haven’t been cleared? 🤔 As a previous cruiser told me “ if Oceania didn’t want me in my cabin, they wouldn’t give me a cabin key that works!” 🥺

I have a true food porn question: For those that have been on cruises post the Covid restart, have any of the ships you’ve been on had the special big Sunday Brunch in the GDR ? I will also ask about the extravaganza Tea they once occasionally had. Not the normal tea, but the over the top Tea with 50-60 items. We had a Sunday sea day and I enquired with the hostess that acted as if she’d never even heard of the Sunday brunch.