12/14/17 9 day on anthem: your opinion?

[luckyinpa]

just a general inquiry as to anything I should be aware of for this date .I never sailed RCI before but I assume all cruises are always full and that doesn't bug me. I know in general from NYC you want to avoid jersey week in November but I did sail NCL mid December last year and had no issues with charter groups or any other ancillary things. my guess is this ending December 22 means that's why it's so cheap.

 

the price is a steal (cheaper than Bermuda or other bahamas sailings) and with everyones help on here i'm ready to pull the trigger before the 100 OBC and balcony sales go away (one is done tomorrow is my understanding)

 

i'm very excited about anthem because if its indoor winter features like solarium and two70. on the breakaway I had some bad winter days 2 months ago and wish I had a ship like anthem in my sights back then.

 

Nassau is not my fav stop but we missed kennedy space center in December because the ship was late. so i'm looking forward to that .

 

any pros/cons would be appreciated. im likely going to book on deck 12 perhaps superior balcony. tips on that would be nice too. thanks

[schmeed]

I've not been on Anthem, but I say book it! You can't go wrong with Royal. :)

 

Oh, Nassau is pretty much a dump. Atlantis is neat to see and they have a cool aquarium tour.

 

Enjoy!

[tennislvr8]

We did the Anthem last december, about the same time you are going. It was great. We enjoyed cruising around that time so much that we scheduled another one this December. Leaving out of new york for us was an added bonus as we live in PA and was less than a 2 hour drive. Two 70 was out favorite place on the ship. We spent just about everyday in there reading and relaxing (our main reason for the cruise).

 

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[hallasm]

I have Sailed Quantum Class ships four time - love the ships. Just go ahead and book.

Here is a link to Anthem Review including links to and a 12 Night Southern Caribbean Quantum in January and 9 night Anthem Canada and New England - both from Bayonne, NJ.

Superior balcony deck 8 or higher is fine - reviews does include superior balcony videos deck 8 and 11.

 

[YOUTUBE]qz-WeIq9lo8[/YOUTUBE]

[luckyinpa]

thanks will watch vids and read review. is deck 8 to avoid the lifeboats below. I don't need to look straight down and see water as long as they aren't in the way from sitting on the balcony and looking out.

[luckyinpa]

We did the Anthem last december, about the same time you are going. It was great. We enjoyed cruising around that time so much that we scheduled another one this December. Leaving out of new york for us was an added bonus as we live in PA and was less than a 2 hour drive. Two 70 was out favorite place on the ship. We spent just about everyday in there reading and relaxing (our main reason for the cruise).

 

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it seems like anthem has so many more public places to sit than breakaway. i am gonna love this. especially if there's bad weather. . i guess i'm silly trying to figure out upper or lower deck to stay in but hate to make the wrong choice :)

 

i guess one way to look at it is id be more likely to use steps going down 3 or more decks vs even up 2 lol. so maybe leaning toward lower now.

 

combined with the RCI not listing all rooms available this will drive me nuts but the decision will be made soon

 

if you change rooms its a cancel and rebook at current prices isnt it (more than 90 days out). i love the balcony sale going on now

[hallasm]

thanks will watch vids and read review. is deck 8 to avoid the lifeboats below. I don't need to look straight down and see water as long as they aren't in the way from sitting on the balcony and looking out.

Deck 6 is the only deck with obstructed view by the life boats - Deck 7 will be OK for you.

I haven't stayed at deck 7 - here is a deck 8 video with balcony view at the end.

 

[YOUTUBE]ll7WQbncPVw[/YOUTUBE]

[luckyinpa]

I was driving everyone including myself nuts so I finally booked . deck 9 angled rear facing superior balcony. its near the aft elevators but hopefully not too many crazy drunks will be noisy :)

 

I figured with 270 and the buffet and other restaurants mostly mid/aft, the only reason for me to be forward was solarium and indoor pool. plus I hate that RCI site doesn't list all the rooms available. I went to 3 other sites including a warehouse club and saw many more rooms available. but I didn't want to bother with calling up RCI and asking if they were available. I assume you can do this though

[AdrenalineRush]

I was driving everyone including myself nuts so I finally booked . deck 9 angled rear facing superior balcony. its near the aft elevators but hopefully not too many crazy drunks will be noisy :)

 

I figured with 270 and the buffet and other restaurants mostly mid/aft, the only reason for me to be forward was solarium and indoor pool. plus I hate that RCI site doesn't list all the rooms available. I went to 3 other sites including a warehouse club and saw many more rooms available. but I didn't want to bother with calling up RCI and asking if they were available. I assume you can do this though

In the future if you want to see more available cabins do a search of the royal caribbean uk site. Not sure if it lists all available cabins within a category, but it comes pretty close. Then you could just call Royal and book the cabin you want

 

This is an example of how many cabins they show available for a random Anthem cruise Obstructed Balcony

 

[luckyinpa]

that above post looks like its in the same format as other USA travel agents. I notice in my browsing that so many use the same format which is good, and bad. id love to know the reason reason to only show a few cabins in any category when there's no way a TA bought all the cabins remaining on the deck. also noticed many they were trying to sell were literally the 1st or last cabins on the ship. id think those would be less favorable and only remain towards sailing date. not 9 months out.

 

306 days for me to lose weight and research the ship. hope I can get it done :) hopefully I got myself a nice bday present.

[hootowlrn]

I love the Anthem. Will be sailing on her in 2 weeks for the second time. Absolutely two70 is my favorite place on the ship whether it is for watching a show, eating, or just hanging out. The cruise before the Christmas cruise is always nice because of the decorations ect plus usually few kids on that cruise.

 

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[luckyinpa]

I forgot about decorating . NCL did a pretty good job on that and so cant wait to see what RCI does. anyone have any idea if, per the ad, the true balcony price really is about 1199 for this trip? reason I ask is that's about 2700 out the door , which is what the NCL 7 nite Bermuda was in September. im going on this trip because of the sale. but it seems like anthem may be a lot more expensive.

 

maybe it will be worth it, I wont know for 9 months

[hootowlrn]

I forgot about decorating . NCL did a pretty good job on that and so cant wait to see what RCI does. anyone have any idea if, per the ad, the true balcony price really is about 1199 for this trip? reason I ask is that's about 2700 out the door , which is what the NCL 7 nite Bermuda was in September. im going on this trip because of the sale. but it seems like anthem may be a lot more expensive.

 

maybe it will be worth it, I wont know for 9 months

I haven't looked up prices for that specific cruise but I'd think that is pretty close. We have sailed that week on several different ships and that seems to be one of the more reasonable weeks there are to sail. We are on a 12 night on the Grandeur at the same time and it was $1900 for an inside large room with tax and port fees included.

 

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[robtulipe]

The Dec. 14th cruise is not a 9 days cruise. It's a 8 days or technically an 8 nights one as dis-embarkation day doesn't counted as a cruise day. We've done three 12 nights Anthem cruises and that itinerary is a much better one than the 8 nights one that goes to Florida and the Bahamas. It's an actual Caribbean cruise.

We've gotten very good prices for a balcony cabin on all three of our 12 night Anthem cruises, two done in January and one in March, by waiting and booking an X Gty just after the final payment date. Our cost would have been well below $100 per person per day even without our Diamond + balcony discount. With that discount, saved us another $23 per day, our cruises were a real steal and we got $200 OBC from RCI by doing these as onboard bookings. Also got OBC from our TA. We ended up on deck 12 once and deck 10 twice. :D