scotlady

Hi!

37 days and counting!

I'm curious whether you can pick up tickets for more than one cabin if you are sailing with a group, or whether someone from each cabin has to do it?

I was thinking maybe they would allow it if you had the persons SetSail Pass? (is that what they call it? new to RCI)

Any recent experience with Navigator? Is there much of a line if we go to pick up tickets during the time early slot on embarkation day?

Just curious what is best - I don't want to cut into my celebration time too much on embarkation day!

LetsGetWet -

Fortunately, there are two of us that are dealing with the details! That way we can commiserate with each other :p

But I think we have it all sorted out now. Turns out we are at two 72" oval tables right by each other - those should be comfortable for 8-9 people.

And hopefully, no more late additions to the group - I think we're running out of additional friends & family anyways!

Hi,

We have a group of 17 that will be heading to Nachi Cocom August 1st.

Does anyone have a vendor they would recommend for pre-arranged transportation? Or should we just take our chances at the taxi stand?

We don't mind waiting a little while, but want the whole group to be able to get to Nachi at about the same time, since we are all under one reservation.

mlmc - your name is Marge? Cool - mine too :p

Lovescruising - yes, they have a few right in the center on deck 3. In the picture below you can see them clearly.

So things changed again - we got two tables of eight close together by talking directly to the dining room concierge (if that's the right title) on Navigator. THEN - found out one more person was going.

So now we have two tables of eight, but they are putting nine people at one of the tables. I'm guessing that will be ok - not too crowded? We could try to protest and ask for a 10 person table, but I don't know how they would take that at this point . . .

Has anyone had an extra person "squeezed in" at a table?

Hi.

It appears that currently RCI goes to either Rendezvous Caye or Water Caye for their excursions. There is a lot of information on the boards regarding Rendezvous Caye, but very little concerning Water Caye. I'm trying to decide whether to do their snorkeling excursion to Rendezvous or their Snorkel/beach excursion to Water Caye.

So, has anyone gone on a recent excursion to Water Caye? And I'm trying to figure out if the Water Caye that gets mentioned under RCI, NCL and Carnival posts are all the same caye. Wouldn't that make for one really crowded little island? :eek:

Hey, thanks for the quick answers.

No, it is not a group booking, just individual booking through the same TA, who then requested to have the reservations linked for dining.

I'm sure our TA will be happy to request the dinner linking, but I don't know about the other. It was through a generic warehouse store travel site, so who knows. I guess worst case we try on the ship.

The only thing I am debating is if, before the cruise, we should go back to the dining people on Navigator who were nice enough to reserve us that 14 person table and ask them to give us two eights (or an eight and a six, if they can't link the other couple).

I would think that if they have us at a table for 14, it would be harder to make two eight person tables appear after all the passengers have already been assigned their seating.

So -

We have a group of family/friends on the July 27th NOS cruise.

Thanks to advice from Clarea (Bob?), we emailed RCCL dining directly, and just today they confirmed a nice 14 person table for us!

I was surprised and pleased that they confirmed it this far out.

Now the glitch - an additional couple just booked the cruise. AND - they booked it through a different TA. :(

I was wondering whether anyone knows if linking reservations made through different TA's is a problem? Has anyone done this? Obviously, they aren't going to be pleased if we can't get them seated with us.

I know we can always talk to the maitre d' when we board the ship, but prefer not to wait like that with a large group.

25th Anniversary - 10 day cruise of French Polynesia on the Paul Gauguin (it was owned by Regent at the time). Upwards of the 10K mark and worth every penny. I never imagined there could be so many colors of blue in the water. I would say it spoiled me for cruising elsewhere, but it hasn't - even Carnival is still fun :p

I would fully agree with the post about the serenity area on the Magic. I have been on the Carnival Ecstasy and really enjoyed the serenity area at the back of the ship. However - on the Magic it is very windy up there, making it close to unusable some days. Also, no hot tubs close by. It just generally feels like an afterthought - as in - "hmm, what can we do with this out of the way, unused area . . ."

I haven't been on Navigator - going at the end of July, but we are choosing it over going the Magic again. The biggest reason is that we were REALLY fed up with the so-called "entertainment" by the end of our cruise. At least half the time, Carnival used the passengers themselves as the entertainment - talent shows, contests, dance lessons, etc. There were only a couple of good shows.

Another big reason - no live music by the pools. Just DJs playing mostly hip/hop etc. In general, not much live music on Magic, and when we went a year and a half ago, the piano bar guy was absolutely terrible.

On the other hand, as everyone has said, the cabins are very nice. And the Red Frog pub is great :D

Hey, cool idea!

I think I'll do that for the birthday girl in our group!

Its a shame, really. I love Labadee but can't stand Chris. I'd rather not be so close to one of his ships of horrors while I'm enjoying a very fabulous vacation.

Cruisnseas: I won't weigh in on politics, but I will recommend a book: Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus, by Orson Scott Card. It is an "alternate history" book - I think you would appreciate it.

That was fun!

A little mini-vacation in the middle of the day :D

So, can I ask - how was the sand at Parrot Tree? We were considering this resort, but we want to make sure we are at a beach that has soft enough sand that we can walk into the water without shoes.

Okay, thanks, TRULY, to everyone for their responses!

Between my research with the resorts and the info you all have given me on the layout and shade situations at the resorts, I think we have enough info to make an informed decision.

At this point, I'm leaning towards Infinity Bay. I already have an email from them saying that they will reserve 14 loungers and 2-3 umbrellas for us, and it looks like a really nice place. And since it looks like we could move some of the loungers under the trees if we get there fairly early, I think we'll be set.

But - I have to run the choices by the 50th birthday girl (the reason for the trip :) and see what she thinks.

Thanks again - I'll let you know what we decide and I'll do a review of wherever we end up after we get back.

Thanks, guest. Sorry - I know I'm not being very clear. Mostly because we haven't settled on anything yet. Please realize that I am asking the questions on behalf of a group of people, and they have different priorities. So - sorry for the confusion. Basically, some shade is a must. We have 3 70 plus year olds in the group and having them in the sun for 4-6 hours isn't a great idea. And we would like to keep our group together if possible - that's what is turning out to be hard - finding chairs and shade for 14 people!

Beyond that, we would like to visit West Bay, but if we really need shade, I'm guessing we'll be closer to "guaranteeing" it if we go to someplace like Turquoise Bay. Or else we make sure we get up early :). I also have tried contacting Argentinian Grill, but no response.

Texan - of course, I do know it's a poor country. More to the point, I know every country does things differently. That doesn't mean backwards. Just different business models. But the logic doesn't hold up - if they are willing to reserve chairs ( which several resorts have already agreed to do), there's no reason they shouldn't reserve umbrellas. It just seems they don't have as many umbrellas available as they do chairs. So thanks for confirming for me what I was thinking - that there is enough shade on the beach that people just put their chairs in the shade instead of renting umbrellas.

Guest - we are considering Turquoise Bay as an alternative if we can't find a place we like on West Bay Beach. And I had seen in another thread that Overthe hill had planned to go there on a recent cruise.

I wasn't considering Tabyana because I have heard it's the busiest place on the beach.

So - is there a lot of shade at most of the resorts? Are umbrellas not really necessary? I've been told by the group to look for someplace that will rent us umbrellas, but there doesn't seem to be anyplace like that on WB beach.

Okay, after looking around, I am having a great deal of trouble finding any place on West Bay that will guarantee us umbrellas as well as loungers. Infinity Bay said it might be able to guarantee us 2-3 umbrellas.

This is a lot different than I am used to - most beaches, if they have loungers available they also have umbrellas. Why so few umbrellas on West Bay? Is there so much shade from the trees that they aren't needed?

Also - OvertheHill - we are still considering Turquoise Bay instead. Did you end up going there?

Hi,

I can't find anything on their website and very little on these board that is current. Do they do prebooked day passes? We want to find a place that will guarantee us chairs & umbrellas since we have a group of 14. I know Carnival does an excursion to Mayan Princess, but we are coming in on RCL.

So what cut of steaks are the included steaks? Are they choice or prime?

And does anyone have a picture of the Navigator Chops Grille now that there are no tablecloths? Curious what it looks like.

Thanks, Guest.

That is all good info. Looks like bars will not be a problem. Now all we need is a place to park ourselves when we're not crawling :p

Crewsweeper -

Thanks for the recommendations!

Yes, we will be arranging transpo ahead of time since we are a large group.

And we always have at least one sober person in the group to watch the time :D

Overthehill -

I have actually already emailed Argentinian Grill based on seeing your recommendation on an earlier post. I hope they reply. I am a little worried about finding a place that will take us in advance, and I don't want to leave it to chance on finding 14 chairs together!

Other than Mayan Princess and Bananarama, I haven't really seen any place that advertises a prebooked tour/spot on the beach. I was trying to avoid those two because I know they are the most crowded, but we'll see. If they are the only places we can book in advance we will do that.

Thanks very much, Texas Cruzer.

Nice concise answer :p

So sounds like West Bay is what we want to do. I will keep looking at particular places. I need to find one that will rent us chairs/umbrellas for 14 people in advance.

Hi,

We would like to be able to do a sort of beach pub crawl between bars, maybe 4 -5 bars. Thinking of picking a spot to rent beach chairs, then doing some walking/drinking from there.

Would West Bay beach be good for this (maybe starting at Bananarama?)

Or would West End Village/Half Moon be better? We would like the bars we visit to be actually on the beach.

Also, comparing West Bay to West End - what I am gathering is they both have nice beaches, but that the beach at West Bay is more of the white powdery sand? Is that correct?

Also, any recommendation for bars/resorts that would have nice padded beach loungers and good umbrellas? We have found occasionally that we will rent chairs/umbrellas from a place, and find out that the chairs are worn out and/or the umbrellas small or broken, so just looking for recommendations of places that are good, or ones to avoid.

We have a group of 14, so I am thinking of trying to contact a place in advance to reserve chairs/umbrellas. I know sometimes bars or resorts will do that if you have a large group.

Lastly, has anyone ever put together a comprehensive list of which resorts/bars/restaurants rent chairs & umbrellas or do all-inclusives for the day?

Hi,

Looking for anyone who has been on Navigator recently and has taken the ship's shore excursion to Rendezvous Caye. I believe it is BE31. So far, it is the only snorkeling excursion showing for our July 27th sailing.

I am wondering if it still picks up right at the ship, first of all.

Second, if any more advanced snorkelers are out there, I'm wondering how the snorkeling was. I have heard they break you into groups - if they have the advanced snorkelers go to a different area that would be great! No offense, but I am very tired of getting kicked in the face by the fins of oblivious kids.:o

Regarding snorkeling by boat from Nachi - not sure I would really recommend it. They stopped in an area that had many boats there - all dumping plenty of fuel into the water. I got a mouthful of diesel-filled water at one point. Yuck. On the plus side, there were a variety of fish and finally saw a sea turtle, which for some reason I had never seen in ten years of snorkeling.

Hi.

We are frequent snorkellers (is that a word?)

Trying to find anyone who has taken this excursion on RCI recently.

First of all, does it still leave directly from the ship?

Secondly, would LOVE to hear from anyone who went out in the advanced group as to how the snorkeling was and how long you got to snorkel. Was there any live coral, and was there a wide variety of marine life?

Thanks!