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1 hour ago, jimbo5544 said:

Getting people back to staff a ship in my estimation is certainly going to be easier then getting them home.  The reason is they are not coming from a ship.   

True , but how many people have moved on. After the fiasco of being stuck on a ship and the fear of COVID-19 how many will want to return? I don't think they will have a problem with staffing, but I think a lot of the people will be new and it will take a cruise or two before they get into a grove. 

On 7/18/2020 at 6:46 PM, Jamman54 said:

That's great! Just hope it isn't as hard to get them back when the time comes. 😎

 This has also crossed my mind. Lets say they do start back in October. It going to be impossible to get everyone back. Most of the crew probably couldn't just sit around for a couple of months. I bet most have moved on and found employment in other places.  This isn't going to be like other times when they launch a new ship. At least then they can pull experience from other ships. I don't see how they are going to be able to start back up without hiring a lot a new people  Your going to have a lot very green employees across the fleet and it will take them time to get back to the level of efficiently they had prior to the shutdown.   

10 hours ago, drsel said:

At this rate, if they keep on selling more ships, their capacity will be severely reduced and cruise fares will go up substantially after this virus pandemic is over.
I am looking forward to the virus becoming extinct but not inflated Cruise fares.

Not really, lets assume both the Fantasy and Inspiration  sold for scarp and I think they probably are. The Fantasy holds  2,675 (max)/2052(double) and the Inspiration holds 2,610(max)/2,056(double) . Together that is 6285(max)/4108 (Double) When the Mardi Gras  comes online it will have a total Capacity 6500(max)/5282(double) passengers. That is a increase of 215 passengers than the max occupancy and 1,174 passengers at a double occupancy.

Since two Mardi Gras ships are in the works, I would require more than 4 fantasy ships to result a net loss in passengers.

Yes I know the Mardi Gras is not service yet, but I think it quite possible it will be finished before any of the ships are allowed to sail. 

A side note, has anyone notice the official name of the Mardi Gras is just that and NOT Carnival Mardi Gras???

Add this one to the rumor pile(or not), my co-worker’s Brother’s Friend’s Sister has family that lives in Curacao and her uncle’s brother in-laws neighbor’s nephew helped unload the Fantasy. According to him only older equipment unloaded to make way from newer(used) equipment from other Carnival Corp ship’s schedules to be scraped at that location. Reliable???

1 hour ago, HaveWeMetYet said:

There is not much Chapter 11 can do for the cruise lines. Maybe get out of some lease agreements at the ports and a few service provider contracts but not much else.

Not, true. All of the newer ships are actually financed in addition as other have pointed out they have accumulated a lot of other debt. Chapter 11 bankruptcy allows them to renegotiate with creditors and in some cases pause payments until they emerge from bankruptcy.  Why would a creditor what to do this? Well the other option is Chapter 7, where all the assets are essentially auctioned off. Since nobody is buying cruise ships right now, the creditors would take a huge loss if Carnival went under. With that in mind its in the best interest of the creditor to renegotiate under Chapter 11.    

On 7/13/2020 at 1:03 AM, PlanoDebbie said:

 I sold all of my Carnival stock last week and took a huge loss on it.  The reason I sold is because CCL credit rating has been reduced to Junk, which is the absolute lowest you can have.

I think this was a smart move. A while back Carnival got a huge inflow of cash from Saudi Arabia. However that was before the shutdown was expanded to end of September. With the credit rating so low now any further assistance is unlikely. Some have said they think Carnival has enough cash on hand to make it to the end of the year, I'm not so sure. If the shutdown is extended much further, I expect Carnival to seriously look at bankruptcy protection. That's not to say they are going to go under. They will just use the bankruptcy laws to lessen the bleeding and hopefully emerge from it in much better shape. Right now, I think there is about a 40% chance of that happening and that chance increases the more cancellations they have. If you hold stock when bankruptcy  happens, there is an extremely high probably that the stock will be canceled making it worthless. 

4 hours ago, ninjacat123 said:

Which private island?  I know he owns Necker and Mosquito Island.  Just curious...

It was Necker Island. 

https://people.com/travel/richard-branson-tries-to-mortgage-private-necker-island-to-save-airlines-amid-coronavirus-collapse/

49 minutes ago, GSfromCT said:

What about Virgin buying a few to expand their foot-print?  A cruise line starting up with two new cruise ships, isn't really a cruise line.

They don't have the money to buy anything right now. All of Virgin's brands are hunting he has already has to mortgage his private island just to keep his brands afloat.  If this goes on much longer, I virgin cruises to go under.

24 minutes ago, Garth2 said:

There are no "secret decks". 

Not ture!! There is deck 13, but it's very hard to find😂

6 minutes ago, Joe817 said:

No kidding! I once read somewhere(not substantiated) that Mountain Dew contains more caffeine than any other soda. 

Back in the day this was true. Back then, the only other soda that contained more caffeine was Jolt. However now with with all the energy drinks out there this no longer the case. If you don't count the energy drinks, it's still up there and it still has more caffeine that most coffees. 

As others have mentioned Dr Pepper(my drink of choice)  is distributed by both Coke and Pepsi and is the official soda pop of Texas. I hope this doesn't affect its availability on cruises out of galveston or New Orleans. 

16 hours ago, PhillyFan33579 said:

Which Carnival ship has a heated pool?

The Spirit Class ships have Heated pools.

Here is just a few pictures I took from our balcony 

We just got off the Carnival Legend a few weeks ago. It is the second time we have done that cruise. I don't how anyone can say its not fun. It is different, you are almost always in site of land and there is a naturalist on board who constantly come over the PA with updates about whale sightings, area history, and other stuff. Instead of the warm sunny sea days you the temperatures will range from the mid 40's to the low 60. Expect rain, it rained nearly everyday for us.  The scenery is absolutely amazing, In Tracy Arm you literally have 2000' mountains on ether side of the ship, waterfall everywhere you look and beautifully  blue icebergs as you approach the glacier.  Tons of entertainment on-board.   We were doing Game of Thrones trivia when we got interrupted by a group of whales that decided to show off next to the ship. You can't go wrong with Alaska!! 

10 hours ago, CruisingViper said:

count me as a native Texan that can't stand Dr Pepper.

Publicly stating this seriously risks  the revocation of your "Native Texan" status 😛

From what I have been told, all cruises out of Galveston and New Orleans have Dr Pepper.   

I was on the Carnival Breeze  for 14 days when they repossitioned from Galveston to Port Canaveral. I was worried that Dr. Pepper would be replaced by Mr Pib mid-cruise when they resupplied, but had it throughout the entire cruise 

Its no secret and the cruise lines will tell you that these three things are their biggest money makers. I believe its been said these three account for over 50% of the revenue. There are people who enjoy one or more of these, but that doesn't mean its any less of a ripoff

1. Casino

2. Alcohol 

3. Bingo 

Also its thanks to these "ripoffs" that I can cruise for really cheap. As we don't participate is any of them 🙂

My understanding is that the essential departments will need work as normal. There are alot of people who come aboard during a normal dry dock. With this being a floating drydock, its not like they can put the workers in a hotel while its a sea so alot of the same functions will probably occur(minus the entertainment) just on a smaller scale. 

2 hours ago, Earthworm Jim said:

 

I'm not so sure about that. I had a cruise booked far in advance of sailing some years ago (2007?) and the ship was chartered so I lost my booking. and we had the option to get our money back. (Well, that was pre-Early Saver days and we were no where near final payment date, so of course we could have gotten our money back I guess. But they offered our money back as an option.)

 

They also offered to switch us to another cruise of our choice, which we did, no complaints. The new cruise was slightly more expensive but they honored the original rate. I'm not sure how far I could have pushed that if the new cruise was substantially more. I didn't try.

I guess that would be an exception, but I guess the point is carnival is probably making more from the charter than a normal cruise. That brings me to the 16'th rule of Acquisition:  A deal is a deal ... until a better one comes along.

If one or more of the ships are sold there are two likely options.

1. One of the terms of the sale will probably be that it will sale will not "close" until the completion of scheduled cruises"

2. If the sale does "close" prior to the completion of scheduled cruises, the ship will be leased back to carnival for the completion of the scheduled cruises. It gets the ship off the books and has some tax advantages.  

As for canceling already book cruises...this will never happen unless there is something like maniacal failure or weather that prevents the ship from sailing. Remember the 1'st rule of acquisition: Once you have their money, you never give it back!!! 

I did the 14 day re-positioning cruise on the Breeze and it was by far the most fun out of all the cruises I've been on. A couple of things I noticed different from a normal cruise(I know some of these were mentioned before).

1. Demand and Platinum Cruisers will outnumber Blue, Red and Gold Cruisers(possibility even all three combined) 

2. More competitions that a normal( paper airplane, and egg drop were some I did).

3. Fewer kids on board especially true if cruise is during the school year. I think we has less that 20 people number the age in 18.

4. Fly aboard entertainment like a juggler, mentalist, Professional singers, etc      

5.  Academy of fun. I attended the Food and Celestial Navigation(my favorite ) seminars.

6. Pirate theme party.  

7. Midnight Buffet

8. Quest....was...um.. more interesting than a normal cruise(thats all I'm saying)

9. They did have a problem keep some items stocked, bananas is one example.

10. I was wrong by thinking that after 14 days I'd be ready to get off, if anything I was more attached and the ship, crew, and other passengers. It felt wrong getting off at the end of the cruise. 

There is much more but that is want just comes to mind. 

On our last 7 day Alaskan cruise they changed times 4 times. Twice going up and twice coming back. The only other cruise were we had to change time was on a 14 day repositioning cruise. The time change was mid-cruise and it was the local time at the new home port. 

If this is true, I think I will like it. Looks promising ...if this is what Carnival will be using. 

LOLISTRAWS look and feel like regular plastic straws, according to their IndieGoGo page. However they go “from straw to soil in 60 days or less” rather than sitting in a landfill for what is essentially forever. You don’t need to worry about the straw disintegrating in your drink, either. LOLISTRAWS will last for 24 hours in your beverage and have a shelf life of up to two years. 

https://youtu.be/4HV91fkAIbg

I would like to see how edible they really are. I'll be happy if they don't change the taste or fall apart before you have finished using them. Those are by two biggest complaints about paper straws and I'm glad Carnival didn't go that route.  Besides everyone knows paper straws are made from recycled toilet paper right?? 

On my last cruise(14 day repo on the Breeze), I just happened to have breakfast with the guy with the most sea days of all of carnivals passengers(something like 1600 at that time). In essence he told me is was cheaper to cruise that live in a retirement community.  I've always wanted to do a B2B, B2B2B or even a B2B2B2B2B2... well you get the picture. With all times I've gone on a cruise a realized I forgotten something, would it be possible to have an item delivered to you ship at the end/start of your next leg?  

5 hours ago, Bookbug53 said:

Do you know which Carnival US ports have the capability for LNG? I thought I read somewhere that Canaveral was Carnival's only port that could not only refuel but was large enough to accept these mega ships. 

The Port of Galveston has actually been making a lot investments in LNG and I remember a while back reading that  Rodger E. Rees(Port Director/CEO for Galveston) was quoted saying goal was to make Galveston the largest export port of LNG in the country(after all in Texas we have lots of the stuff with the Permian Basin). When he came from Port Canaveral he also mentioned increasing revenue from additional cruise traffic by attracting larger ships like Oasis. I'm not sure if anyone has really out these two together, but I think it primes Galveston for one of the new LNG ships.   

The cruise industry has proven to be a cash cow for the Galveston Port Authority. Its the fastest growing port and they are getting ready to build its third cruise terminal.  Right now its the 4th busiest port in the US, but there is a lot a talk about it dethroning Port Everglades currently in the #3 spot. 

I have been our of Galveston 4 1/2 times. Seattle 1 time, Charleston 2 times  and Port Canaveral 1/2 of a time.

Q: How did I go out of a port 1/2 time. A: It was a 14 day requisitioning cruise(The best cruise by far) on the Carnival Breeze form Galveston to Port Canaveral. I really can't rate Port Canaveral become I have only seen it from the debarking prospective, but I will say I didn't like long trip from the Terminal to Orlando airport though. 

Galveston is probably my choice because we live in DFW and the rates are good.