vplsh

1 hour ago, turquoisewater said:

I got my response from Emed:  Thank you for contacting eMed. 
 
 
I understand you may have some concerns about the expiration date on your BinaxNOW COVID-19 Ag Card  HOME TEST kits.  
 
The BinaxNow COVID-19 test kits were originally made in a bulk in late 2020 thru early 2021 and was approved for testing by the FDA under the EUA (Emergency Use Authorization).  The test kits have an original expiration date of September 2021, October 2021, and November 2021.  Effective immediately, these expiration dates have since been extended for an additional 6 months by the FDA making the new expiration dates **March 2022, April 2022, and May 2022. 
 
**The new expiration date will be determined by the date you have on each test kit. Please take a look at second line of the white label to find the original expiration date. Once you locate the original expiration date, you can add an additional 6 months to that date. 
 
For example, if if your current expiration date is September 6, 2021, your new expiration date is now March 6, 2022.
 
Please note, if your purchase was made on or after December 1, 2021, you should have received test kits with an expiration date in October 2022 or November 2022.  These particular kits are not under the extension at this time since they were just recently manufactured.
 
When you are ready to test, please visit www.emed.com and click on "start testing".  Once your test kit expiration date falls within the afore mentioned dates, you will be able to test with no issues.
 
For more information regarding the extension date extension, you may visit www.fda.gov or click on the actual link to the FDA extension letter:  https://www.fda.gov/media/155326/download
 
 
Thank you for choosing eMed.
 
 
Best,
eMed Customer Support Team

This is such helpful information. Thank you for sharing it. We have two tests left that have current expiration dates of October 2021, so we can still use them until April, which will cover our next cruise in March!!

We decided to switch to the October 1 8 night cruise on Allure in a balcony. When our TA called on Sunday to make the changes, she was able to get them to hold 7626, a J3 cabin, for us until revenue opened on Monday morning. She was told that they had J3 cabins available but that they weren't open for booking due to limiting of capacity. When she called back yesterday morning, she was able to get 6640, a J3, booked for us. Apparently they didn't have a record of the hold put on 7626. That worked for us, but then yesterday evening she got a phone call from the agent she'd spoken to on Sunday, who had noticed that we were in a different cabin and made the change back to 7626 for us. 

Needless to say both our TA and we were both surprised and delighted to have this level of customer service from someone at Royal Caribbean. 

We were on this sailing in a JS as well. When we booked on board Independence in September, the Next Cruise agents were pushing this cruise, and junior suites in general. We spoke to several passengers who had done the same as we had. None of the alternatives presented work for us, as it was really the repositioning part of this cruise that appealed. However I did look at the possibility of moving to a JS on the earlier sailings and, as noted, none were available. I did think it was rather fishy as well, but...

Anyway, I'd love to know what the thought process was behind canceling this cruise. Will RC be sailing Allure to Galveston from Ft. Lauderdale without passengers? Why are they planning to get to Galveston earlier than planned. Just curious...

We've  been using Curative for several months, both before and after starting to cruise again. They have been excellent, and we have gotten our results quickly. That being said, we are finding it harder to get an appointment in the past two weeks, as the demand has risen. Looking for an appointment for our local site today, the earliest testing time is next Saturday afternoon. Makes it difficult if someone is experiencing symptoms or has been exposed, but would be fine for a cruise.

We were in Catalina last week on board Navigator. We rented a golf cart for two hours, which was a short walk from the pier, and rode around the island, following both the map they gave us and the signs posted along the way. We made a stop at the Botanical gardens and the Wrigley mansion, made a lot of picture stops along the way, and then returned the cart and walked to the casino. Unfortunately there were a lot of places that were closed- whether because of COVID or the fact that it was out of season we didn't know. 

We get on for the same cruise next Monday! Hoping for a low passenger count as well!!

My mother and sister booked a handicapped accessible ocean view on Adventure and when they got to the ship they were told they were moved to a regular ocean view room. They were told the reason was that they needed to create a quarantine area on deck 2, where their original room was. They had done this the week before apparently as well. No one called my sister or the travel agency to let them know beforehand, and there were no handicapped accessible rooms available on the ship at all. so they "upgraded" them to a Junior Suite. This, however, was not an upgrade as it was a standard JS, which has a tub in the bathroom which my mother could not get into. So, they gave her the keys to an empty inside cabin across the hall, which meant that my 85 year old mother had to carry her things across the hall and get into a regular cabin bathroom, which was also difficult. They had a tremendous fear that she would fall. And, they didn't find this out until the ship had sailed! Needless to say, the cruise was not a happy one for them.

Eventually, after speaking to anyone who would listen, they were given a FCC for their original cruise fare (it started out as 15%!!) Again, this was done without letting them know that they would not have an accessible cabin even though it was done before the cruise even boarded. 

The passenger is the wife of my husband's friend and we just heard from him that she is in the hospital and doing alright. She had chest pains on the ship and they stopped in Cozumel to let them off and take her to the hospital. She is awaiting a procedure, but is still very much alive.

We were also on this cruise and agree with just about all of your review Cruiselvr04.  Our check-in experience was very different, however. We made it through the first and second checkpoints and finally got to an agent when everything stalled. The agent told us we had to go to shore services, which was another line around the other side of the check in area. When we asked why, his response was "maybe you got upgraded". Not likely, but ok...

After waiting in another line for 20 minutes, we made it to the agent, who told us we owed $240. I knew we did not, and showed him our paid invoice. He asked if maybe we bought anything online. Again, I knew we had been charged for our UDP separately, and questioned if maybe the Royal Up bid had been accepted and we hadn't been told. No, our cabin was still the same. After 10 minutes of this, he told us to sign the form and go to Guest Services on board and they would take care of it. Surprised that they had no idea what to do, we signed and boarded the ship.

Now, getting on board is one of my favorite parts of sailing, but this time we were aggravated and didn't even get to enjoy the feeling. (Fortunately this was not our first cruise since COVID, so we had already had that feeling). We went to Guest Services where we waited in line again (apparently we weren't the only ones with issues) and the lovely Anne Li helped us. Or tried to... She had no idea and asked in the inner office and told us they would check into it and get back to us. They didn't, and the next day we had an additional $240 charge on our account. When we went back to Anne Li at Guest Services she very nicely told us that when they called shoreside in Miami it was already after 5PM and they had closed! They'll check and get back to us. Later that day I noticed the charges were no longer on my account and we had a copy of that account and the card of the Guest Services manager in our door, with no explanation and no apology for the inconvenience. Oh well, didn't cost us anything but we really had an issue with the way the whole boarding process was handled. Why send us to another agent, only to tell us to figure it out on board??

As for the service and food, both were excellent. We ate in Izumi on the first night and Giovanni's the other four and had great food and great service. We had lunch in Chops on both sea days and they were outstanding.

I was surprised how lax everyone was about masks and following protocols, compared to our cruise on Independence at the end of September. Perhaps it was that they added over 1000 passengers to this cruise following the first one the week before? Who knows? According to Tornado Tanya there were only 70 passengers under the age of 18, so we cannot blame the kids.

Entertainment was fantastic. The Adventure of the Seas orchestra was outstanding and the dancers were absolutely wonderful. We also enjoyed the ice show, which surprised us with how great the skaters were.

We went to Maya Chan in Costa Maya, which is our go to excursion there. Great people, food and drinks. Went to Nachi Cocum in Cozumel, which is also our usual there and it was wonderful as always.

Honestly, I don't think we will sail over a weekend again on one of these short cruises. Just felt that it wasn't for us. Luckily we are retired and can do weekday cruises. 

Next up for us is a four night on Navigator out of LA. It will be the fourth cruise for them and wondering what the protocols will be.

Cruisemapper has Adventure arriving in Galveston on November 8 at 8:45. We're on 11/12, so here's hoping we all get to go!

We were also able to use the UDP on Independence for Fish and Ships. We were given a $20 per person allowance, which was more than enough. In fact, we probably could have had enough using only one of our credits. We definitely would recommend it!

On 8/30/2021 at 2:33 PM, coupeb said:

If you're an ABBA fan, you absolutely want to visit their museum.  it's amazing.  We walked from our ship to the ferry dock in Gamla Stan, and then took the ferry to/from Djurgården where the museum is.   The museum is about a 2 minute walk from the ferry, if you walk slow.  Very easy to do.  

This is exactly what we did, however we started our day at the VASA museum, getting there before it opened. Then we went to the ABBA museum at the time we reserved on line. Definitely check out their website and see about buying tickets ahead of time. 

16 hours ago, cruiselvr04 said:

My travel agent says Royal isn’t saying the 12th is canceled yet so until something is official we wait.

I guess we will do the same.  We had something similar happen with our Liberty cruise earlier in October. First it disappeared from the website. For several weeks we checked with Royal and were told it was still going. Finally we were told it was canceled, after final payment. 

Guess we'll just wait and see!

Still can't figure out if our November 12 cruise is cancelled or is still possible. Guess we'll all just have to wait and see. We had been booked on the Liberty OTS cruise for Oct. 3 and that was canceled just about 4 weeks before, after final payment of course. We're now down to less than that, and it looks like the ship is still in France, so who knows?

1 hour ago, live2cruise2011 said:

Yes they did but we took advantage of the lift and shift and for the same money end up b2b on Los for 14 days.  So keep in mind everyone that your lift and shift can be any sailing regardless of days they cover the difference from what you paid to the new cruise 

They said the 11/12 cruise was cancelled? 

Anyone on the Nov. 8 cruise receive anything definite about cancellation? We are booked on the Nov. 12 cruise and are just wondering.

We were on the 8 day on Indy the end of September and had a great time. We loved the Ultimate Dining Package and ended up eating dinner in Giovanni's 6 of the 8 nights. If you make it there, tell Ahmet that Lisa and Steve say hi!!

13 hours ago, dwayneb236 said:

Not meaning to be argumentative but I have the same expiration date and when I looked up the lot number the new expiration is 1/5/22.

20 hours ago, ampurp85 said:

@vplsh No its not a year from manufacture date, Its 3 months from expiration date so your test  expire Jan 5th 2022

Thanks for the clarification. Guess I'll be using them sooner than I thought.

1 hour ago, vplsh said:

Had the same experience. Got the text this morning that they were out for delivery by FedEx by noon today. Fortunately my second call spurred them to ship. It's 11AM here and nothing yet, but I really don't need them now, as I was able to get a test at CVS this morning and received a negative result. 

That said, this really isn't an acceptable way to do business when time may be of the essence. I'd highly recommend people giving them a couple of weeks, just in case.

Ok, tests arrived, as promised, before noon. Expiration date is 10-5-2021 and manufacture date is 2-10-2021, which means the “real” expiration date is 2-10-2022. Glad I only got these 2. 

46 minutes ago, Lionesss said:

We initially ordered these through the link on RCI on the first day which I believe was September 8th.

 

Our invoice said we would get them on the weekend around the 11th ish.

 

We did not.

 

We called the help Number on Monday September 13th  and they said they had abundant supplies but were delayed on shipping.

 

We told them we needed them for our upcoming cruise.

 

They put a rush on them.

 

Today the Fedex truck just delivered.

 

Peace of mind.

 

 

Gotta be pro active I guess.

 

Take care

Had the same experience. Got the text this morning that they were out for delivery by FedEx by noon today. Fortunately my second call spurred them to ship. It's 11AM here and nothing yet, but I really don't need them now, as I was able to get a test at CVS this morning and received a negative result. 

That said, this really isn't an acceptable way to do business when time may be of the essence. I'd highly recommend people giving them a couple of weeks, just in case.

On 9/13/2021 at 5:41 PM, heimdall said:

Did they move your order status to shipped before they arrived?  I also ordered a 2-pack on the 8th… and they are reported as not yet shipped, today.   And I have a sailing on Sunday.  😕 About to cancel my order and order from eMed instead.

We ordered them on the 8th, received an email on the 10th that they would arrive on the 13th and they had not arrived by yesterday, the 15th. Called and was told they'd ship out and be here today. Not even shipped yet! We sail Sunday and ordered these as a backup. Hopefully they won't be needed!

32 minutes ago, wolfganghowell said:

Were you able to sit at the Pool Bar?  That's our major hangout on sea days.

I didn’t see anyone sitting there but there were stools. Remember with less than 400 people on board there were a lot of empty spots!

Getting off the ship was a breeze. We got self assist tags and needed to put them on our bags and exit when your group was called or later. We got off a little after 8 and we’re in the car and on our way in about 20 minutes including walking to the garage. No passport checks- you stopped at a facial recognition area and went on your way. Hope they keep that up!!

Glad to be able to share this trip with you all. It was fantastic and I can’t wait to be back on independence on September 19 for the 8 day cruise. 

We spent a lot of time today in the solarium. Even managed to stay through a pretty heavy rainstorm. The poor lifeguard had to stand there in a rain coat!!

2 minutes ago, lovelife said:

 

Thanks. Don't  want to hijack your great thread.

No problem!! Thanks for asking! Love to see what other people take pictures of!!

10 hours ago, dominicr said:

Any chance you could take a few photos of the liquor (whiskey) for sale in the ship store?  Kind of curious if they still have blantons for sale on board….it’s where I usually stock up for around msrp since a bottle in St. Louis is hard to find and if you do find it the liquor stores want 200+ dollars a bottle.  

Here you go…