Petroplex

I have also posted drink menus here. If you haven't been on board and want to know what the spaces look like, you can see that video here. However, here are some of my quick thoughts on the bars on board:

• Embarkation Day in Galveston kind of stinks for drink choice until about dinner time. I have the particular menu with the rest of them, but gosh I would like more choices at first.
• I wish Bacardi Limon wasn't the default for mojitos. You can obviously get it with a different rum, but it took me a couple of tries to figure out why my drink tasted weird.
• The rums on board are an absolute steal. Flor de Cana 18 year old for $11-- well under the drink package limit? Yes, please!
• I am not a beer guy. I enjoyed everything they brewed on board except the stout. Who knew?
• The wine choices were surprisingly good, although I could not determine a system by which they decided which wines to offer by the glass and which were only by the bottle.
• There were excellent tequilas, most of which were covered by the package.
• I am a bourbon guy rather than a Scotch guy. I cannot comment on the scotches other than to say my Scotch-drinking buddy seemed happy. As for bourbon, Woodford Reserve was probably the high end. Happily, it was included in the drink package.

I am working on more thoughts, but they are coming slowly as my household recovers from the COVID post-cruise. I have mostly cruised Royal Caribbean before, and there are things I like much better about that experience, but frankly I preferred the bars on Carnival. They had better choices, and I hope the bar menus are helpful to you.

Hey, folks. I had another trip scheduled two days after this trip ended, so I am just now getting around to posting menus and pictures and such. Two observations:

First, there were 9 people in our party. All were fully vaccinated, and everyone who was old enough was boosted. We have three confirmed COVID cases this week along with two more people mildly ill with similar symptoms. Everyone is fine, everyone is recovering, and symptoms did not appear until after the cruise was over. In my particular case, I am double boosted, asymptomatic, and still testing negative 6 days later. Please be careful and make whatever choices you feel are best for the particular needs of you and your family. Please also don't turn this into a thread about what COVID policy should be. I am making an observational data point so you can make your own choices as best suits your particular situation.

Second, our itinerary was:

• Embarkation
• Fun Day at Sea (first formal night-- Lobster night)
• Fun Day at Sea
• Roatan
• Belize (second formal night-- No lobster)
• Cozumel
• Fun Day at Sea

If you want to see the menus from each night, I have posted them here. We found something we liked every night, although we noticed a lot of repetition and the service seemed hurried due to lack of staff. I will post bar menus and specialty restaurant menus as I get a chance over the next couple of days.

We just got back, and I will write more over the next few days. However, I want to talk about debarkation while it is fresh. We were in a suite, and they told us to be in the theatre by 8 for priority self-assist. We got there early and actually left at 7:41. We have passports and went in a line using Carnival's facial recognition technology. Two machines were working well, although our machine didn't recognize any of the for of us. That involved spending roughly 5 second each with an immigration officer who was standing right there, and we were officially back in the U.S. at 7:59. The longest part was paying my Texas liquor tax. We were actually rolling in our re-packed car at 8:19, although there was a long delay while we figured out where to put souvenirs. Overall, this was as well organized as I have seen.

13 hours ago, kwbrad said:

If you have time, would you find out what the imax movies are for July, and if the thrill theater is running or still shut down.

Have a great time!  

 

Minions, a treasure movie, a James Bond movie, and something about icebergs. I will look again later. Those are also the dive in movies.

15 hours ago, JillinCalgary said:

Sounds great!  I do have a quick question... is there 3 card poker in the Casino? Please and thank you!

There is. One table @ $10.

So it is Sunday, I think. I know it is the first full day on the boat, and I know I am incompletely sober. I intended to conpose this as random observations about the cruise, so I will start with observations on drinks:

1) I am normally a Royal Caribbean cruiser. I have been impressed by how many spaces here I enjoy drinking. Red Frog Brewery is, in particular, amazing. Flor de Cana 18 covered by the drink package? Yes, please. However, for the love of bacon, please wait using lemon rum as your default rum for mojitos.

2) The rules in the casino suck very much bad. Slots are mostly dollar slots requiring more than one unit. There is one 3:2 blackjack table, and it has using an auto shuffler.

3) The Family Harbor section is surprisingly quiet given there number of kids.

4) Lines actually aren't bad, unless you worship at the Altar of Guy's Burgers. It is a great burger, but the line there is 25 people deep whereas 3 people want pizza.

5) Pay the $5 to message other people on your party on the app.

6) JiJi Asian kitchen was nice, but I preferred eating in the MDR. Yes, I ate two duvet last night. Yes, that was a mistake.

7) I am dumber than whichever politician you happen to oppose. However, don't walk barefoot on the top deck to get to the water slide. My wife is a black belt in taekwondo, and I would rather let her watch me kiss the Swedish bikini team, which is a completely feasible scenario, than do that again. It would hurt less.

😎 The spa is amazing. I haven't had a treatment, but I did but the pass to use the facility.

9) Guest services takes a while.

More later. Lemme know if you have questions.

So the ship has a lot more beautiful spaces than I imagined. We are still in port, though, so they are on a restricted menu of Texas alcohols. For example, Red Frog pub cannot sell their own beer.

The only real disappointment was my room. Every video I could find of a family harbor suite showed a bed dropping from the ceiling. That doesn't exist in my room, which means my two larger teenagers will have to share a bed. While I acknowledge there was certainly some legalese which covered this, it is weird that rooms in the same category wouldn't have the same amenities. I was also frustrated that the desk agent with whom I spoke wouldn't let me finish sentences before cutting me off. That is exceptionally poor customer service. Even if you can't do anything, make a point of listening to understand the issue rather than listening to respond.

So we got here too early. We arrived at the pier at 9:41 for a 10 a.m. appointment. We went in immediately and were done by 10:04. Observations:

1. Masks are suggested but not required. Mayhe 5-10% wearing them.

2. They have shorter lines for suite and diamond/Platinum guests but are not directing people to those lines. So far, it doesn't much matter.

3. No designated waiting area for suite guests.

4. The last few people were still leaving immigration when we walked up. We are now in a large waiting area, and you can tell it will be a while.

5. We had green checks on VeriFLY, and nobody asked to see paper documents after that.

Howdy, folks. I am boarding the Vista later today and thought I would try to do my best job of posting a more or less live review of the trip. My immediate party is 4, including two teenagers, and we are staying in a Family Harbor Suite. We are also travelling with another party of 5 that we know from church, and they are in a interior stateroom and a window stateroom, also in the Family Harbor section.

I always get to Galveston a couple of days in advance, because I love Galveston. It is part of the trip for me. We stayed at the Tremont House, which is an easy walk to the cruise pier. That is complicated a little by the fact that we still need to park the care somewhere. We secured parking at Galveston Park n Cruise, which we have used before. We loved eating at Katie's Seafood House on arrival, and we have tried some old haunts, as well.

We have our respective drink packages, and we all have green checkmarks in VeriFly. I can see on the cruise webcam that our ship has arrived on time. I will try, although not promise, to let you know about masks, lines, and anything else I can think of during check in. Our appointment is at 10, because me. More soon, I hope, but right now I need coffee.

How did they find out they had COVID? Did they start displaying symptoms, or was there some kind of random testing?

Flor de Cana 18 year old is covered under the drink package. Just drink a shot of that neat or with maybe 1 ice cube!

Howdy, folks. I am sailing on the Vista July 2 with my family. The American Table menus for dinner in the MDR look fine, but I would like to make specialty      reservations several nights. However, I really like the 2 American Feast menus, and I don't want to book a specialty meal on one of those nights. Is there any way to determine which nights will have the special MDR menus? Thanks! 

51 minutes ago, clochette said:

I am really surprised that they would just reduce the fare, do you have a travel agent?

 

I do not have a travel agent. Apparently, there was a subsequent promo for 60% off the second passenger. They just applied it without me asking for it, keeping the same base fare for the first, third, and fourth passengers.

When my cruise was cancelled last Summer, it took months. A lift and shift sounds great, save that I am in a 2 bedroom grand suite. There aren't a whole lot of those on any ship, which means the inventory into which I can shift isn't going to be huge. 

Yeah, this was a combination of a straight up price reduction (after deposit and before final payment) with wanting my money for a trip which is unlikely to sail.

7 hours ago, RCCLNYMETS41 said:

Did they actually reduce the cost of your cruise, or they are just asking you to pay less than full at this point in time?

They straight reduced the cost of my cruise.

8 hours ago, crbonfiber said:

Interest free loan for a few months on $3,900? How much will that be? 42 cents? lol

Fair. My original statement was poorly put. I shall rephrase- I do not think the cruise is going. I see no particular reason to be the one to finance their next round of refunds when I could do almost anything else with the money they would keep until they got around to returning it. 

My family is scheduled to sail on the Explorer in July, and our final payment date is soon. I owed them about $5300, and I was not inclined to make final payment- I don't think the ship sails, and that means I would be giving them an interest-free loan for several months. I would love to use that money for some other vacation this Summer. However, I also have a non-refundable deposit I can't get back (except as a FCC) unless I make the whole payment and they eventually cancel.

This morning I got the email requesting final payment. I was hoping RCCL would do something like Carnival did and extend final payment dates. That would let me have longer to see how things develop. They didn't do that, but they *did* apply a promo which wasn't originally available. Without me asking, my fare due decreased from $5300 to $3900. Sooooo...... good on them for proactively applying the discount, and that makes this sailing really attractive. Sadly, I still don't want to give them a $3900 interest free loan.

Here were the suite perks when we sailed on the Liberty in 2017 and in 2019. No idea how it will change when cruises eventually resume, but we loved the suite lounge in particular.

26 minutes ago, irishgal432 said:

I am still flabbergasted by this decision.  

As am I. I can't read this as anything other than a desperate ploy to hold on to cash.

7 hours ago, Ourusualbeach said:

Correct.  All her Galveston Itineraries from November 2021 through April 2022 are cancelled and replaced by Liberty.

 

Expect to be notified in the next couple weeks.  You may get an offer to sail Allure price protected from her new port in Florida.

I was on the first Allure sailing out of Galveston for 4 nights in November 2021. They automatically switched me to a sailing of the Liberty, which on the surface was great-- I got a 7 night cruise instead of a 4 night cruise. I was also offered a 100% credit if that sailing did not work for me. I was not offered a 125% credit and, interestingly, no refund. That is a real challenge since I can't sail for 7 nights just then. I obviously don't object to them cancelling the cruise, but failing to offer to just give me my money back is not acceptable.

EDITED-- I have attached a copy of the letter they sent me, with personal references removed.

Allure cancellation letter.docx

I would love to have Carnival announce one way or another what is happening to the Radiance for next year. I am booked July 2021 in a cabin which doesn't exist yet. We are traveling with another family which has 2 existing cabins. I can respect either business decision, but I want to know what it is so I can plan.

On 4/24/2020 at 7:14 AM, Petroplex said:

I canceled Cruise Planner purchases Sunday, April 5 (19 days ago). I did not cancel the cruise. I have not received a refund, and I haven't bothered calling Royal. The cruise is scheduled in July, and I received email cancellations for each purchase. 

 

What is interesting to me is that pre-COVID, I cancelled cruise planner purchases all the time. I would do it if, say, a price dropped. I always got my money back in 1-3 days. 

I got my refund yesterday or today, which made it 20-21 days from the time I canceled my cruise planner purchases. 

I canceled Cruise Planner purchases Sunday, April 5 (19 days ago). I did not cancel the cruise. I have not received a refund, and I haven't bothered calling Royal. The cruise is scheduled in July, and I received email cancellations for each purchase. 

What is interesting to me is that pre-COVID, I cancelled cruise planner purchases all the time. I would do it if, say, a price dropped. I always got my money back in 1-3 days. 

I note with interest that Royal is still selling cruises out of U.S. waters in May. I just did a search for cruises out of Galveston, and everything scheduled after May 11 is still there. I'm obviously not booking that, but as of about 2 minutes ago RCCL is clearly not understanding this as an order to quit selling cruises out of U.S. waters for 100 days.

I expressly make no finding about whether this is right, wrong, or indifferent. I simply provide a data point about what the cruise line is (not) doing in response to the order.

So to the original point of when cruising will be allowed to resume, I offer the projections available at https://covid19.healthdata.org/united-states-of-america. While that link will take you to U.S. data, you can easily toggle it for any individual U.S. state or for most European countries. There are, of course, a number of limits to using this data:

• It doesn't even begin to address cruises from Australia, China, or anyplace else which isn't the U.S. or Europe.
• I cannot speak intelligently to how long the caseload needs to be down before it is safe to ease restrictions.
• Critically, the data does not speak to many of the places we would cruise to. For those of us in the U.S., that means we cannot reliably predict what is going on in the Caribbean and Mexico, and we cannot predict how those governments will react.

With those rather large caveats, it looks to me like many places will be experiencing significantly better public health by the start of the Summer. I hope that correlates with it being safe to cruise by then.

7 minutes ago, firefly333 said:

If you wait and its cancelled you get a 100% refund, no fcc. Personally I'd gamble your cruise will get cancelled for july, but I can see why you wouldnt want to pay it off.

 

But yes, sounds right.

So I should have included that detail. I gave them full payment months ago, so they already have my money. If this isn't happening, I would rather have it back sooner rather than later.