We're scheduled for the Panama Canal cruise in March of 2024.
There are several red flags for me:
1. They scheduled their first sailing way too soon after they expected to receive final certification. Given the magnitude of that project, they should have expected something to go wrong. It did, and they weren't prepared. Somebody skipped Management 101.
2. This is not their first delay, although it's the first one where passengers were booked. Only a year ago, they expected to be sailing in May.
3. The response from their corporate office to all of you who've booked canceled cruises is atrocious. Branding and differentiating are what cruise line management is all about. They should have been all over you guys to make sure that you're beyond pleased with their response. They've certainly differentiated the brand, and not in a good way
One thing that I'll be very interested to hear about is the dining experience. For us, it's a great idea to get rid of the main dining room. The inference is that passengers will be dining in specialty restaurants every night. Super idea. However, I wonder if those specialty restaurants have the capacity to do that once their cruises reach full capacity or close to it. If they don't, the default restaurant will be Emporium Marketplace. That venue looks okay, but it appears to be a glorified buffet. Regardless, it's even a step below a main dining room. It's definitly not a fine dining venue. So, the good news might be that you don't have to deal with a main dining room, which most of us are not crazy about, and the bad news might be that you can't get into the specialty restaurants every night and have to eat in the Emporium. If that's the case, I would have preferred that they keep a main dining room. This is one thing that I'll be quite interested in hearing about from people who are finally able to take a cruise on Explora.
I wish everybody who has a booking on the near-term cruises the very best, and I hope that the company will come through and provide you with a great experience. The concepts behind this brand are excellent. I hope they are able to execute much better than they have so far.