Queenie&Dude

I posted a detailed topic on my recent arrangements with Royal. https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2882434-burial-at-sea-complete-details-and-info-learned-from-service-on-972022-aboard-voyager-of-the-seas/

Attached here are the photos I spoke of in the details. For some reason it wouldn't let me add it to the original post.

Hi all - I want to share with you the way to arrange a burial at sea with Royal. I just did this for my husband, and the process was very smooth, and the guest services manager helped me when I boarded to set the date, time. etc. I strongly recommend if you want to arrange a burial at sea to allow at least 1 month before the sailing to start the process. This is a long post because I am being very detailed at every step. I didn't know going into the planning what to expect and I'm glad I planned for everything ahead of time. I hope this helps if you're planning a burial at sea and will help you feel more at ease. Here is what you will need: 1- Death Certificate (a copy is ok) 2-Certification of cremation - this should be with the ashes/urn you have, or you can request it from the funeral home. Mine emailed it to me upon asking. 3-Biodegradeable urn - I purchased mine on Amazon from Perfect Memorials. It even allows for personalization, in the photo you can see how nicely this turned out. -----here is a link to what I purchased: https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B082DLR7SP/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 4-Certification that your urn is biodegradable (this can be a receipt from the purchase as long as it shows "biodegradable urn" in the details. Onboard they really didn't care about a 'certification' just something stating what you purchased is correct. Here is what you need to do prior to cruise: -Send an email to Royal Caribbean's desk for handling these requests, there are two email addresses - gfotravelservices@rccl.com and emergencytravelteam@rccl.com. I sent emails to both, and got responses from the emergency travel team. In the email you need to include: -Ship Name, Sailing Date, Your Booking/Confirmation #, Your name and Decedent's name -Attach copies of: - death certificate, -the certificate of cremation and - the proof of biodegradable urn (I used my amazon receipt since I didn't have the actual urn when I sent the email and that was fine) Once Royal Caribbean received my request it took about 1 week to get a response. After that initial email I had a personal contact to work with, ask questions, etc. It is up to the captain of the ship if they will allow for a burial at sea. I asked the hotel manager onboard if there would be a reason why the captain would refuse, he couldn't think of anything, but again it is at the captain's discretion. After you receive the response and confirmation that you can go ahead with the process, the next step happens on the day of boarding. On the day of boarding your ship: 1-Go to guest services with a print out of everything, the email, the death cert, the cremation cert, the proof of biodegradable urn and anything else you want included (I wrote up a 3-5 minute eulogy that I requested an officer to read). FYI-I requested the captain, which can happen, ours happened to be sick with covid in his cabin so it didn't work for me, but the hotel manager stepped in and did a very nice job. 2-Be prepared with several options for sea days for your service. It can only be done at sea as it needs to be a certain distance from any shore (basically international waters). I had a 14 day cruise so I picked a date early on in case there were weather issues we could reschedule. Luckily that day had perfect weather. 3-If you want any music played bring a speaker for your phone or tablet as it is very noisy and my phone volume wasn't quite loud enough, but everyone got close and could hear it okay. 4-If you want flowers, they need to be plastic/silk. At the current time no live flowers are being sold on ships, this may change back to that option in the future, but if you want to area to have flowers, you should bring them. 5-If you are creating a 'long' service (more than 10-15 minutes) you need to make sure guest services understands and plans for this. More on day of service below. On the day of the service: 1- I went to guest services about 2 hours ahead of time to double check everything was still on. This would be very important if weather is questionable. 2-Make sure everyone that is attending (we had 8 people) all arrive at the pre-arranged meeting place on time. You do not want to waste an officer's time. 3-Your entire party will be escorted to a low deck (ours was 4 on Voyager) as you will be tossing the entire urn, closed, not ashes, over the rail. 4-Royal Caribbean provided 2 security guards to stand about 20 yards away from the service area on both sides to prevent anyone wandering in during the service. This was a very thoughtful and well executed plan on their part. 5-Make sure you designate someone to either take pictures or video of the service if you want. I was not in any shape to take photos for my husband's service. That's what friends and family are for. 6-When you toss the urn overboard mine floated away very quickly with the wake of the ship. I didn't see it sink, but according to the seller it takes about 4-5 minutes. The urn I chose worked perfectly for the tossing. 7-When the service is over you can go back inside and toast, or have a celebration, the officer will excuse him/herself at the end of the service. After the service: - Royal Caribbean will provide you will a certificate stating the longitude/latitude of the burial at sea. Mine was given to me in a very nice photo folder and I will be placing an 8x10 of our group in the folder as well for display in my home. (see photo) I stopped by guest services about 2 days later and it was waiting for me. TIP - I wrote a letter to the hotel manager thanking him for the time and effort, no tip was accepted, but he was very thankful I thought of this. All of the preparation and completion of the event was handled with respect and I was very impressed with how everything was done. Royal Caribbean took time to make sure that everyone involved understood the process and I was very happy with how everything turned out. If you are considering a burial at sea, Royal Caribbean will take good care of you. Feel free to ask any questions that you may have that I haven't answered here, I'll try to answer anything I can to help you during what is a difficult time for anyone in this situation. Queenie/Doreen deVillalvilla

Anyone know how long it takes for the group to respond? I sent an email to the above address a week ago. Also called Royal and the said the email was emergencytravelteam@rcck.com and sent it there as well with all the details, death cert, etc and haven't heard back. Also, the telephone number doesn't work if you press 1 it wants a five digit extension number or it hangs up. Thanks in advance. I lost my husband in March and would really like to do this for closure.

Be aware, when booking this cabin it is an accessible cabin but the door does NOT have auto open/close features. Makes it difficult from a chair or scooter to easily get in or out of the cabin.

Be aware this accessible cabin does NOT have an auto open/close door. Makes it very difficult from a chair or scooter to get in and out easily.