The Fun Researcher

I agree. Your pictures suck. 😉

I know you know this, and not being snarky or anything but charging for a second or third entrée is way different than simply saying some cruise lines are charging to eat in the main dining room

Varies by ship and waitstaff. On Anthem in March they tended to do one at a time. Quantum in July was all at once…. Like this: (This was “Taste of Asia” with a lot more apps than normal. Too many good apps to turn down)🙂

The dedicated Sorrento’s location yes, but didn’t they start offering the same pizza in places like the Cafe Promenade on Voyager class well before? We’ve never been on a class smaller than Voyager so I don’t know if pizza is offered on Radiance or Vision classes?

The pizza quality is the same as before but I have noticed a significant downturn in the quality of the little sandwiches in the Café Promenade. Used to love the turkey, roast beef, salmon options. All good tasting proteins. The last two cruises (Anthem in March, Quantum in July), the best you are going to get is tuna salad. Lots of vegetable fillings as sandwiches. Mind you, it was a good tuna salad sandwich, but it pales in comparison to offerings prior to 2023. This is a big change to me, as I like the sandwiches more than the pizza to be honest. Hopefully it's temporary.

We sailed allure last summer and it was one of our top cruises to date. Have a great time!!!

We started sailing in 2012. If if I gave the 2012-2022 MDR a 10, I would say now is a 7/10, so about 30% worse.

JR definitely needs to be turned into something else. IMO it’s the most out of place venue (our outdated rather) on the ships. Royal needs more included food venues on their ships, not less (especially evening)

LOVED O-Sheehans. It was amazing to have a complimentary full service restaurant 24 hours! Absolutely awesome. However there were many negatives to NCL... Ship layout (especially pool deck) for one. Terrible. Still enjoyed our cruise. Don't want to derail this thread though...

True, forgot to mention that there are always some dessert options in Cafe Promenade as well. I didn't think of that because I'm not a dessert kind of guy, especially later in the evening. Nothing really in the bars anymore as complimentary snacks. Some of the pubs offer a menu but it's not complimentary. Still, can you imagine just finger sandwiches and some desserts? Ludicrous.

A single shot of Captain is currently $10.99+ gratuity on Freedom. I don't think they charge extra for the mix of coke and captains. Dan

Thinking about the this… Once the buffet closes (which isn’t very late) many Royal ships ONLY have the complementary pizza and finger sandwiches to offer went out and about around the ship. Can you imagine having the only complementary offering being finger sandwiches in Cafe Promenade? The whole idea of this is ludicrous when you really think about what it would be like.

Unless it's differing cruise by cruise, or by region, it seems that Royal may have made the change sometime in spring. My March cruise on the Anthem did not have the extras (at least not that I can remember). I'm 100% certain that they weren't there on the Quantum in July this year. Hopefully it's temporary... we'll see I guess

I was really disappointed to not have the extra antipasto items in Sorrento’s on both our March Anthem cruise out of Jersey or the July Quantum out of Seattle

Personal preference but I agree. I do have roughly a slice of Sorrento’s each day and it’s ok.

Thank you for the clarification. Haven’t sailed Princess yet. I remember Tony mentioning it on his La Vida Loca YouTube channel. Didn’t realize they had two separate locations 👍🏼

Speaking of Bob “Paycheck “? 😂. I agree and it’s now hurting them with park attendance significantly down. Pretty soon you break the camels back. We love Disney World as well and have cut back with them due to the price hikes and new charges (Genie+ and $ILL)

That’s what I thought to myself when I heard of Princess charging for pizza. Must be dang good pizza if they feel they can charge for it. I just don’t see this happening on Royal for grab and eat items like pizza, especially considering it’s not top quality. It’s fine but that’s about it. It’s almost akin to charging for the buffet, not that I’m suggesting that but it just seems odd that they would even ask about charging for pizza on Royal

Pretty sure Princess just started charging for their pizza location onboard, so Royal is probably feeling out charging as well. In my opinion Royal’s pizza is nowhere good enough to start charging for. I’ll eat it if I’m hungry and there aren’t other good options available but I don’t crave it or anything that’s for sure.

C&A level hardly gets you anything until Diamond. Diamond is a big jump.

It’s around the same timeframe as you mentioned. I can’t remember when it starts. It might be the actual Friday after Thanksgiving but I think I got it a couple days after that still.

Like minds. We like both Coco cay and Labadee but if I had the choice, I would choose Labadee 2 to 1 over Coco cay. Coco cay feels more like an amusement park on an island.

$7.99 plus grats Got that price this past Black Friday.

Just posted this photo in another thread, but Columbus Cove is our favorite spot. Beautiful beach looking out at the ship as the backdrop. Close to food and restrooms too.

Columbus Cove is our favorite spot. We don't find it loud at all. Pretty chill really. I circled that in red on the top-left of photo. There will be more people but we've never found it loud or obnoxious. The other option is the area I circled in red towards the bottom. Not many people plop down there. The only downside is the sound of the zipliners going by (line drawn in red), and it can be a bit windy due to it's exposure.