uktog

Yes,

Absolutely - and worse still some do it and then do not turn up at all rather than late cancel or turn up 2 hours after their reserved time and then proceed to order items from other restaurants. I do not know how the maitre d did not take a swing at the lady!

So what happened to the chairs the deputising HD was telling us all about in December and long convoluted stories about Chinese containers. Very disappointing as the balcony chairs are awful. I did not make negative comment about them in my survey because I believed the Shanghai Container yarn and cut them some slack

The computers in In Touch are absolutely awful, several run on Windows 7 and they do not support many of the features of current websites. They are very slow to log on and log off - in the past I have used them just to print boarding passes but it has been so painful. There is absolutely no benefit in using them and I consider there are many disadvantages!

We had it on Quest earlier in the year, it was lovely

If you always arrive at 6, you have a very high % chance of being seated in the same area even night, it is later on it is more difficult because tables turn over at different rates

Thats good to hear - we stayed there in 2013 and were very happy and as we might be back next year, it is good to hear that this hotel could still be a good option

If you use a cane/rollator there can be weather conditions - not necessarily wind, more usually tidal swell, where the Safety Officer can decide you should not attempt to enter the tender and you will be asked not to go ashore. I think tgg has the number of steps right - they are quite steep metal steps, the tread is higher than normal stairs

Never a subject I have had conversation with fellow passengers about during a cruise. Must have been very different cruise if tipping amounts were discussed by many. I too consider the crew fund the fairest way to share extra tips over and above what I have already paid for in my fair and provided of course the overall cruise experience merits this extra. An individual would have to go over what the norm for their job to be tipped even a lowly $10. Rarely (but sometimes) does that happen.

I have seen these too, not even in envelopes, which I consider a breech of data privacy so the process did need some changes. Hopefully it is teething problems and will resolve itself. I have never relied on the ship to provide sea sickness medication. And I certainly would not if I have more complex contra indications for medication. We bring our own, much easier.

Darren on Journey played a different set in October which was a welcome change. My only issue with it was it had less slow numbers which are often all some folks can manage but otherwise it was really good. It was also longer (we were disappointed on Quest that it was a shorter set, the whole evening was over quicker and there was no real after event whereas on Journey some of the staff joined the action in the Living Room). I agree the White Night music needs a refresh as do some of the CDs shows that haven’t changed for years.

If you do book excursions, go to the shore excursion desk on deck 5 on boarding and make sure they note that you are to have the front seat. You will find when you board each bus, the seat will be held for you - usually the sign says "reserved for cabin XXXX" or alternatively there is just a reserved for disabled guests. Every trip I have been on that has been the way and I have never seen able bodied guests not respect the reservations

Agree it’s nothing to do with tip it’s first come first served. And as you walk through the dining room with your escort if you see another table you’d prefer you can just ask to go there - for example if you’d then be adjacent to an acquaintance

Nice idea to drop from 12 to 8 wines but he’s not thought that one through. Unless I’m mistaken they operate with 10/11 4 white (Riesling Chardonnay Pinot and Sauvignon Blanc), 4 red (pinotage, cab sauv, merlot and a Zinfandel or equivalent, 1 sometimes 2 rose and one sparkling. If they drop the types down some guests will be unhappy and understandably so. Im not sure what cutting the selection achieves if as is implied they might pay more for a bottle. Given the rate of consumption they should be able to manage wastage so reducing choice only (adversely) impacts the guests. . (One way they can save a little to contribute to better wind is that at dessert time instead of automatically opening a fresh bottle before approaching a guest to offer a top up check first they want one. If open wine is not kept overnight I’m sure they could save a little each night and guests wouldn’t notice).

I think unfortunately once you got through on the call (yes i agree the wait time is unacceptable) you got a very badly trained agent. Writing to Royal Caribbean would achieve nothing because Azamara is no longer part of the RC group although they are still sharing some processing facilities. Any correspondence you make should have been directed to Azamara. I have been on many excursions where folding wheelchairs have been accommodated no problem. Motorised chairs are different because of their weight to be lifted into a coach. There is unfortunately no facilities for motorised chairs on excursions - typically overseas buses are not adapted for them. Where are you travelling to? Those who have been there before will be able to guide you on what they have seen happening. And on board, the crew do everything they can and more to help guests in wheelchairs, especially at the gangways which can, due to their slopes be very tricky and potentially a little dangerous

This is going to be a struggle is it me or has going off at a tangent become the norm

Bang on! 8051 also suffers from time to time with carts rolling to and from a galley

Go to room unpack hand luggage and set up the safe, go and make any reservations we need, have a quick drink, hopefully the luggage has arrived so unpack, attend anything I am invited to then have a relaxing shower, get dressed up and go for a drink and really enjoy our first nights dinner (always sit down, relax and be served)

Unfortunately boarding still is not happening before 1400 due to the enhanced cleaning and inspections that happen. In addition, Border Force (or equivalent) are not coming on duty until later these days in most countries, I think due to staffing. You will find if you arrive early you will be sitting around for a while. You might like to recheck with your travel agent if the timings are correct and if they are what will happen between arriving at port and boarding

We were in a Deck 6 V3

Now there is another difference, ours did not light up - I think there are a variety of different ones in use maybe they had to source some for safes that were well short of an acceptable standard during dry dock and lots of different types are now around on Pursuit - but we now know the suites have bigger ones with possible charging facilities

And that explains it - I have a 12.9 iPad pro, it had to be on the angle and as I say we hit issues when it touched the back of the safe mechanism and would not allow the safe to open. It happened twice, it was only on the second time that security came up that we solved the cause of the jams. The security guy said these safes were temperamental and that they also had many more calls to deal with wrong codes going in because of their position. I have to agree you really are having to crouch down a bit to see the pad and hit the right buttons

So we have now established thats not the fit out of the non suite rooms on Onward. For the majority of the guests its a smaller safe and as I recall an awkward semi crouching position to have to enter the code.

That solves the riddle, they may be bigger in the suites but for the rest of us they are much smaller - see post 1859 - because of its cover type my iPad would not go flat in an Onward safe but does on a Quest safe. Certainly no power source and the space it went in it would have been tight I think to get the one in the picture squeezed in Just shows answering questions we have to talk about both the ship and the type of premises we are "lodging" in

Strange, which room was that in? We went almost immediately between the two and certain items could not fit in Onward that did on Quest width wise