notscb

I think it's a fair comparison in some ways with the attention to detail and upkeep Disney prides itself on with its ships. Disney is also a much, much more personal experience compared to what Icon will be offering, and as @WheresWalter pointed out, the Disney fare includes soft drinks. I think the point, ultimately, is that Royal is pricing out their own customer base with the Icon right now, and likely will be for some time.

Welcome to CC! There is a celebrity forum which might be a helpful resource to you as you plan. Most cruise lines start boarding around 11am. The best generally accepted advice around here is to arrive a day early so you don't have to worry about any delays and potentially missing the ship if you fly in day of. Google flights is your friend for planning this 🙂 The dining room has a Maître d' who will be available to you on the first night of dining as well as during the afternoon of embarkation day to take your request. Note that this is only a request and not a guarantee on all ships, but most will do what they can to make you happy. That's totally up to you. Some lines have great black friday excursion deals right now, others do not. Most have similar prices for shore excursions and some lines add excursions as the date of sailing approaches (i.e. there will be more excursions available at 2 months out v. 6 months or 1 year out). Book when you're content with what you're paying for it and when you find an excursion you're happy about. Again, I'd highly suggest the celebrity forums as an invaluable place for info. Happy planning!

Maybe? I mean, cruise lines like to do their upmost to market and sell folks the "perfect" vacation with every attention to detail in a specific time frame. It's their own marketing that ultimately leaves people even more upset when something goes wrong, a port is missed or delays happen.

There's a cruise youtuber who I follow who just posted a video with a similar sentiment. RCL is definitely sending a message based on how they unveil their new ship designs, and I think a lot of folks are wondering if RCL is going to be their main brand line for much longer. For me- as an often solo traveler- I'd never step foot on ICON of the seas with how they've designed it for kids and families. They've really downplayed the adult spaces and activities in their marketing. I'd really like to see RCL do something along the size of Carnival's Mardi Gras or go back to a vision class size ship for smaller, unique ports and cruises. I know their Caribbean and Bahama cruises are making them the most money, but I'd like some differentiation in their new product offerings.

I know it's annoying when a stop is missed, but I would have absolutely loved to watch this unfold in real time.

For sure. I'm wondering if you'll see him around the next few days or not. I'm hoping they actually kicked this guy off.

Of course, and when folks are under pressure or stress they tend to not have the most rational approach to what is happening in real time. It's also possible that the announcement wasn't broadcast as widely as the ships officers or cruise director thought it was (which happens all of the time, IME). I appreciate you confirming some of what's happening, though. It's really helpful in getting a fuller picture for those of us not onboard.

IME, these boards have been a bit hostile lately and folks don't assume best intentions or support new conversation as they have in the past. Sorry that you became the subject of some of it.

it's interesting how multiple folks on the same ship are coming to this thread with different information, which I think speaks more to the situation being that communication has been poor overall from RCL to those onboard and to those who are now having to wait a day extra for their cruise to depart. What's true to you clearly isn't true to the other poster, and I'm wondering how that's happening.

Sure, I would agree with you. My intention in responding to that specific commenter was to figure out what exactly they were trying to say. If OP witnessed a fight break out and the next day saw the very folks involved still on the ship, they are right to share their experience with Carnival's "Rowdy Behavior Policy" in these forums. There's no reason for folks to belittle OP when the entire basis of this space is cruise specific discussions.

For me, it showed up in my "To-Do" for my upcoming cruise as well as in the "Booking and Order Details" page next to the pre-pay gratuities button.

Wouldn't you say someone who was a direct witness to this fight as being involved? Isn't a fight a safety issue to all passengers onboard? Where do you draw the line?

I'm all for giving more directly to the local businesses for sure. I think with this being the first time to some of these ports, I was hoping to do more with Carnival just because I'm not too familiar with the lay of the land or the providers themselves. I'm still considering just cancelling my excursion through Carnival and going direct.

Thats such a good tip and I'm going to have to do that in the future. Thank you for your kind words, I posted this to figure out where I went wrong and definitely wasn't expecting some of the harsh replies I was getting.

I was just reading another thread on another forum about someone who wasn't able to cancel and rebook an excursion nor could the customer service department. It seems like this issue you're experiencing is really widespread. if I were you I'd find the company contact for RCL guest services (it's out there, i on a certain elliott site, but I'm not sure if I can link it on here) and email them with a brief description (i mean brief- use very few words and bullet points if needed) of the problem and the fact that they haven't been able to solve this for you via normal channels. Include what you reasonably would like them to do to resolve it as well.

The Atlantis example was just an example for discussion purposes. I also answered this question above- but basically that I enjoy the protection of doing it with the cruise line if possible just in case something goes wrong and it's late getting back.

I'm not saying transportation is free or anything, but I think within reason a 5 minute bus or cab ride included doesn't change 95% of the experience which is happening at Atlantis itself. Again, I think this is "within reason" as a reasonable person wouldn't say a 2 hour bus ride there and back as some of the Belize excursions have are the same experience.

Carnival rejected my initial request to reconsider based on the facts I already mentioned. Their response: "These are reviewed by the product manager per port of call, and we can offer no further review." So essentially they are saying if they reject it the first time, they consider it case closed. They did mention this: "You MAY submit a new request from a different website for review, but this one is tagged for denial for all requests."

Sure, and I wonder what it would look like if cruise lines addressed this issue by allowing for a holding area onboard for luggage or if they allowed outside of stateroom drop off (i.e. hallway drop off the same way that they do on the last night of the cruise for debarkation luggage pickup). They could still incentivize folks to drop their luggage at the port, but they might also create efficiencies in how much luggage they have to be responsible for from the port.

Maybe. if transportation is truly not included in the third party offer and is the main difference here, one might think that they would wait for the carnival excursion transportation to get back, not transportation we would take.

One main reason, really: If we do it through carnival and there's a delay of some sort (even if the chance of that occurring is low), they'll wait for us. Honestly, I'm not holding my breath that they'll honor the guarantee based on the minor difference, but it'd be nice to have some extra OBC for other things. Not to say that I'm not considering cancelling it.*

Honestly, that's a pro-tip. Maybe I can contact them to ask about their transportation for folks coming in on cruises and see if they include it.

Yeah, the corporate nature of it all. I'm sure Carnival works hard, too, to make sure they are well aware of (and probably contract for) what excursion providers can and cannot offer via third party- otherwise they wouldn't offer this price protection in the first place.

From a consumer perspective, I'd ague that product is much more similar than different when the actual activity being sold is the same. You don't buy an excursion for the bus ride there, you buy the excursion for what you do when you're there. Of course, I can understand where this would be "within reason," but in the Nassau/Atlantis example, a 5 minute ride over there doesn't significantly change the experience being sold IMHO.

That could be the reason for their denial, then. The third part mentions "snacks" but doesn't go into detail what that means or what's provided. I still don't know if $66 total for a 10-15 minute bus ride for 2 people justifies declining the protection when the activity itself and the provider appears to be the same.