Eleris

I saw a bunch of people (couples) walking dressed all in white last night so maybe it was last night 5/31 on this trip. They looked very nice but I have no idea if it was something they were attending or just doing it for fun.

Sorry to hear that your experience wasn't much better. If the virus is still on board, I am not aware of it because they are cleaning and keeping items in lockdown so that seems to be helping. Tonight was an eye opener for us when we went to Qsine for dinner. We have never done the new Petit Chef menu and were big fans of the old Qsine menu so we figured we would give it a try since the food in the main dining room has been less than acceptable. The service I have already covered in my original post so I will leave that alone. For anyone sailing to Charleston on the next trip pay attention to what I am about to say, we were charged sales tax on our dinner tab in Qsine for Charleston SC. I had the restaurant manager explain this to me and while we are in port any items you purchase on board the ship, we were told would be billable with a sales tax for Charleston's pocket. If you have a drink on a drink package that does not apply. If you have a drink and pay for it that will be taxed. Our dinner in Qsine was hit with sales tax and that is a first for me. I think I am more annoyed that we did this as a last-minute reservation when coming back to the ship and the Qsine people were trying to convince passengers to give it a try and they did not mention this additional charge. I am not one of those people that appreciates deception whether intended or not. I was informed that this is not the case in Newport are Martha's Vineyard with the restaurants or other purchases and this is just a SC thing. If you pre-paid for dinner packages I think you will be fine, but you may want to check before you dine.

Just finished our 2nd meal in the main dining room. The waiter opened with "thank you for coming back". I am not sure if I should read into that because half of me thinks he is glad to see us and the other half feels as if chastising us did the trick. The service was better and there was a more pleasant tone in general which confirms the attitude from last night was deliberate. I am not sure what we will do about tomorrow or the rest of the trip so maybe for now we will just sleep on it. Life is too short to be unhappy. Sadly, the people next to us are so much fun and we end up laughing the whole time.

I agree we do not need an attitude on vacation, but it is a first for me after 24 years of cruising I just was waiting for the punchline because I assumed it was a joke at first. Since his service/attitude had not improved and I asked my DH what he thought his response was we don't need to go again. Before we take it to a higher level, I think we might try again tonight to see if his attitude improves. I know you don't get a second chance to make a first impression, but I am willing to try to let this go since there is a lot of time left on the cruise. There are many available tables in the dining room at this scheduled seating so I am sure we could get another table easily. I know our recent Royal cruise many dinners did not show up the first few nights and the staff was more than welcoming when they did so this really just surprised me that he would be affronted by us not attending a few nights.

We are presently on the ship and after a slightly delayed boarding due to a major cleaning all seems to be going well. We are still in sanitation mode and are unable to do typical dining things for ourselves but all in all this is a minor inconvenience compared to contacting noro. I do have a question because I am a bit off balance by what happened last night. Some background to know, friends of ours surprised us and showed up on this sailing to our delight. We had dinner with them in Tuscan Thursday night (first night of the cruise) which was fantastic but wear your stretchy pants because it is a lot of food. Friday we were at sea, and they wanted to just head to the buffet for dinner since they are not fans of the long hour and half dining experience. Saturday was a Bermuda day and although the weather was up and down after running all day again, we joined them at the buffet. Sunday, we found our table in the main dining room, and we were seated. This is the 8:30 assigned seating. We arrived at our table for two which is a row of 4 tables for a total 8 people in the row. The next thing that happened has shocked me because never in 24 years of cruising has anyone been so rude. The waiter approached us and said "nice of you to finally show up". He did not welcome us, he did not introduce himself, and he continued this cold shoulder throughout the dinner. When dinner was served, he placed the other 6 meals on the tables in the row we are part of, and the assistant waiter brought mine and my husbands out. He never asked if we needed anything else or how our food was. Before you ask, we were not late for dinner, we just had not gone to the main dining room because we had done other things which last time I checked this is still my right to do especially with the dining packages. We are going to go back again tonight and give the waiter another chance because everyone has a bad day sometimes this was just very unexpected. Not sure what I will do if this is a repeat performance. The rest of the staff has been fantastic and fun to speak with.

I was told the garage is being used by Summit and Adventure and Oasis is given the out door area. My recent trip on Summit in May we were able to park in the garage. I am leaving this week on Adventure and will know whether or not what I was told is true. Fingers crossed.

Agree, you never know and it is obviously a risk we all are willing to take or we would not go. My point is that having your face down on a table that was recently occupied is something to consider. We did not attend any populated venues and stayed as far away from crowds as possible. Since we were in a suite we spent time in the Retreat which was empty without the need to social distance. The Luminae restaurant was never crowded and the staff skipped tables to keep guests apart as much as possible. The cruise line is doing everything possible to clean but there are places we can avoid.

We also had a large sum of OBC to use and would have probably given most of it to the spa... but that was no longer an option. Can't prove this is where he caught it but the timing was too perfect. I guess the good news is now that we have had COVID, we can go to the spa on our next cruise. 🤪

Yes that is the one we used.

First let me say DH and I love the Spa. We are both hunched over computers all day so deep tissue massage or hot stones are heaven sent. I am not assigning blame to anyone or anything but I just read an article confirming our suspicions over the Spa treatments and COVID 19. On our recent trip my DH had a massage on Tuesday and was sick by Thursday. Of course this led to me feeling out of sorts by Friday. We stayed in and chilled because although we weren't sure if it was COVID either way we were feeling congested and tired. Used some OTC items and got some rest seemed to help. Confirmed COVID 19 when we were home a few days later. The reason I am bringing this up at all is I just caught an article where a young women tested positive on Princess (we were on Summit) and detailed her experience of being quarantined to a hotel and all the chaos that went with it but the thing that caught my eye was she mentioned she had a spa treatment 2 days before presenting with symptoms. Again this is not proof of anything but it is something to consider. In my case the only time DH and I were not in the same place at the same time was when he had his massage and perhaps it really is not the safest place to be for any length of time. I know the crew is doing everything they can to clean the ships and they are amazing and appreciated for all they do but this is one time I would have to say we really wish he skipped the massage.