Pratique

I think that would affect the next cruise either starting a day later than scheduled or being cancelled altogether. If the port continues to require tugs through the channel, that could also restrict the volume of traffic, making arrival/departure logistics more complex.

The open sea can be fickle. The North Atlantic is notorious, but crossings further south may be better. The ships will navigate away from hurricanes, but strong ones can send swells out for hundreds of miles. My perspective is that it is better to be on a massive modern cruise ship with stabilizers than one of those rickety wooden boats that plied the seas a couple hundred years ago. Everyone has their tolerance level - some things that used to cause motion sickness for me no longer do, while others that didn't before may do so now - and if it happens then I am better at managing it now than I used to be. My wife finds that lying down with head and feet pointing toward the sides of the ship helps a lot. These cruises are really great for folks who like to be at sea and my humble opinion is that if you are one of those, then you should give it a go.

Caveat is that this temporary channel is only for essential vessels (whatever that means) and will only be open until Monday or Tuesday. The Baltimore Sun reports the channel will then remain closed until May 10. "The Captain of the Port (COTP) plans to establish the Fort McHenry Limited Access Channel for commercially essential vessels on Thursday, April 25th until 6 a.m. Monday, April 29th or Tuesday, April 30th if weather adversely impacts vessel transits." https://homeport.uscg.mil/Lists/Content/DispForm.aspx?ID=89633&Source=/Lists/Content/DispForm.aspx?ID=89633

Sounds about right for four people. True but I think we need to view these comments as people's relative experiences from cruise to cruise. Some say it has gotten worse and some say it has improved over time. The benchmark is usually the earliest one we can reliably (fondly?) remember. My wife keeps complaining about the wider salad selection in the Windjammer, which is most definitely displacing something less healthy (and probably more tasty). 🙂 We don't cruise for the salads lol.

I was booking some things for Freedom and I also got error messages that something in the cart was not available, but while I was scratching my head the order went through (email confirmation popped up) and my credit card was charged.

Another reason is that foreign-built ships generally cannot be flagged in the U.S. (even if they wanted to) due to the protectionist laws intended to support domestic ship construction. These laws seem to further incentivize foreign-flagging as long as they still permit those ships to call in the U.S. as they do now. Walk around the harbors in South Florida and count how many mega yachts are registered in the Marshall Islands.

Looks like a beautiful, relaxing day at sea - a "perfect day" as they say! Curious why the captain is taking a more northerly track than Odyssey and Scarlet Lady. He has more time to kill than they do, maybe he wants to swing by Bermuda to wave hello. lol

I was part of the team that built the Indy stunt show way back in the early 2000s (lots of late nights on that project). There have always been plants in the audience (the performers rotate through). The flame effects were my favorite part of the show creatively, but adding more heat to the Florida summertime weather was not my idea of fun. 😀

No worries, the ship emissions will offset that. 🙂 More seriously, you've had more luck with bags than we have had!

Looks like you are having a great time at MK today. I used to work at WDW (12 years) so I've had my fill of it and my free passes are long gone. My favorite things to do at MK are anything with air conditioning. Dark and cool is even better (Mansion, Pirates, Space Mountain). Have fun whatever you do today!

I will just mention that 3848 opens into the corridor near the escalator that is used for gangway access, so there will be noise there on port days. If you can move (even if it is deeper into Deck 3) it might be quieter.

Ha I used to do that too until my wife figured out she could use her vouchers for bottled juice. Now she's using up all her vouchers and asking me if I have any unused ones.

I used to do the zip tie trick with packing tape, but now we have the reusable tag holders. One recent cruise I didn't have the holders and one of the tags fell off, so the bag was very late arriving to our cabin. Of course it was my wife's bag that was late, so she was not happy about my cheapness with the zip tie thing.

Has anyone ever told the app that they are unwell when answering the health questions? Serious question - what actually happens?

These new ship builds are pretty big investments. How many years until they break even on those? When the MBAs took over Disney Parks 25+ years ago they did the math and decided not to build a fifth gate at WDW even though attendance was high. Most attractions are designed with a 20-year lifespan but obviously many of them are much older than that. At this point I presume the parks have paid for themselves many times over and they are just a cash cow now.

How many of the new cruisers were sailing because of pent up demand from the pandemic? Will these numbers eventually sink back to pre-pandemic levels? In other words, was there a temporary surge of new cruisers who liked it and will come back versus the one-and-done crowd. I mean, Royal is still building more mega ships that will probably sail full but how close are they to reaching maximum capacity to fill these ships.

Most empirical studies of loyalty programs show that the effect of loyalty status on perceived brand value is higher for high-engagement customers (frequent return customers) than for low-engagement customers (infrequent return customers). And studies have also shown that brand loyalty often exists even without a corresponding loyalty program because it is based more on things like product quality and customer satisfaction than rewards (although everyone enjoys being treated "special" such as "early" boarding of airplanes). If higher fares are causing people to cruise less frequently (because they have less spending power - paychecks not keeping up with inflation), then it is not clear that having a higher status will have much effect on repeat business because these customers are financially constrained. Presumably there is value to the company in offering these loyalty programs, but it is likely tailored toward ensuring maximum revenue rather than specifically targeting levels of new guests versus repeat guests. In other words, the mix or new and repeat should always be such that revenue is maximized. So higher fares do not necessarily translate into a need to welcome more guests into higher loyalty tiers but rather a need to increase the number of new, infrequent customers (who may have to forego another vacation in order to afford a cruise). I will happily take the free drinks and other perks but it is not as big a factor in whether I decide to cruise with Royal (or do something else) as bottom line costs. I may be willing to spend a little more if it comes with substantive loyalty perks, but not much more.

I am also checking in and New Hampshire is not on the list either (app or website). I left it blank.

My problem with FLL is that the best and least expensive flights always tend to be in the morning, and then there is a black hole in the schedules until mid-afternoon. While I don't like having to rush to the airport, 10:00am is doable and better than sitting around the airport for hours. If there was a noon flight, that would be ideal for me, but there never seems to be one.

This seemed inevitable to me. There were going to be too many instances where everyone wanted an AM service and the attendant needs to have them spread ~50/50 across the shift. We've also noticed the same thing regarding the decreased quality of the free food. I would even say that if I had nothing to compare it to, I would still be disappointed.

They have already said the new bridge will be built to current standards, so replicating the original truss probably won't cut it. Also, truss bridges are heavier and more expensive than cable stayed bridges, which is the most likely way they will go with it.

Largely it is doable. My biggest problem is my employer’s VPN is super slow from large distances (such as cross-country). But video conferences are possible. (I even had a Teams call from an American Airlines flight recently.) Hiccups happen when sailing through weather or after dinner when everyone on the ship is FaceTiming at the same time.

I was not referring to safety, I was referring to expanded capacity for taller ships. I agree that new bridge designs should incorporate defensive fortifications as well. Although incidents like this are very rare, we just witnessed one of the most expensive ones in history, so it makes sense to fortify the new structures.

The discussion's diversion to the other bridges seems like putting the cart before the horse. They can future-proof the new Key Bridge by making it higher. They can also go back to the drawing board on the other bridges in light of these unexpected circumstances.

The Army Corps of Engineers said that these are "ambitious timelines" with weather delays and the complexity of extracting the wreckage, which sinking into the mud. We need Yoda to come and do that force thing he did on Luke's X-Wing. No doubt they are trying to set expectations for everyone who wants the port reopened yesterday.