jbjunior

royal up and booking guarantee level staterooms are both part of the exact same program that shuffles people into cabins and makes royal more money and, after the drink package and the key might be the most asked about and misunderstood part of a Royal cruise. it's Royal asking you for more money, if you want to fork it over it's up to you. it's not an upgrade. it's a fee collection as part of their sorting process.

i would agree that cabanas are wildly overpriced, but there are a lot of people who make a lot of money, it's your vacation to splurge on so hey, do what you want to do. the island has so many fun spots, different bars and places to eat, i don't know that i would want to commit to staying in just one spot but it is different with a group if you want to stay together and you can always go back again! enjoy

for the people who haven't seen any changes at all in their routines or lives, that's great. truly happy for you and you're very fortunate. however, that does not track at all with any of the widely available data and is not my experience traveling across North America by plane and on the highways for my job in the food biz and traveling for pleasure the past few years, including cruises before and after the pandemic. things have changed, they just have. i also don't ever expect food or beverage on vacation to be the same quality or the same price as my corner bar. i expect better and also more expensive food, but i will also say cruises are still a really great deal compared to a land based vacation on an island resort in the kind of place you can cruise to. we looked at grand cayman for a getaway this january and pricing a resort on the beach vs a 4 night cruise, it wasn't even close and that's before figuring much more expensive flights and paying for all the food and drinks at the land based resort. just not even close.

we are doing this same thing yet this January on freedom 4 day out of miami with a casino royale offer. we're also getting close to diamond so i wanted the double points and also wanted to stay in a new room (the junior suites on deck 11 were just added in 2020 and are brand new). we had a free interior or OV offer and paid $1k total for my wife and i to upgrade, the room was listed online for $1,900 so I feel pretty good about it, also booked through our travel agent for $50 each in additional onboard credit.

1- smoking is just one small area of one side of the pool deck as on other Royal ships, so no it's not an entire side of the upper deck. smoking is also allowed in the casino. 2- deck 10 balcony is great, just a couple easy steps down to central park on deck 8 and just a few decks up to pool deck. you're mid ship which is good for not walking the whole length of the ship, can go to either elevator bank easily, google the room there will be lots of very similar cabin images and video tours etc, it's a solid spot. i'm assuming the whole group is not all in that room, if you are next to each other you should be able to open your balconies up to each other as a way of connecting the rooms if you'd like, your stateroom attendant can usually get that done on day one. if you aren't next to each other plenty of room to have a travel agent work on that for you. symphony is great, our extended family group has been on her twice plenty for those ages to do, enjoy. google and youtube are your friends, as well as the royal site itself. the anticipation is half the fun

we grabbed cocoa beach club for $89/pp on black friday sale for a 4 night sailing. no way in heck would i pay over $150, the snack shack burgers and other options are just too good and south beach is still very new and usually not crowded. plenty of good options

we looked at joining some friends who were flying to grand cayman for a work conference and staying for a long weekend after, $6-$800 PER NIGHT hotel rooms with no food or drink included and still would need other ground transportation on top of that. cruising is still an incredible value to go to some special places and i would echo the many who are saying that the whole world is not the same, it's not some special Royal glitch. as others have mentioned, i'm back to traveling pretty regularly for work in the food business and the world is just very, very different. all my favorite hotels/bars/restaurants....none of them have the same experience, most or understaffed or lower staffed, most customer interaction is done on my phone in an app, the food quality and room cleanliness (can we get real cups and glasses back yet?) they're almost all worse in some way other than one or two absolute top tier high end joints that very few people can afford to go to regularly. lastly, the lobster thing is so silly to complain about and the egg comparison is a good one. royal was very generous with the nearly unlimited practice in the past, that kind of gluttony is representative of the overfishing and other problems for the lobster industry in North America, that is completely outside of Royal's (and every other vendor I work with) control. google what's going on with the crab season in Alaska, not as impactful to our everyday lives as the current egg issue is but you see what i mean, it goes on and on. a 24 pk of coke or pepsi used to have a truckload buy for $5.50 or $5.90 cost, retail two for 9 or $5.99 on big holidays, best price this year was $7.90 for a 24 pk. it's just affecting everything and until we all get used to the app experience and get more self driving trucks and automated warehouses etc this is just how it's going to be with the supply chain. good people retiring and leaving the workforce faster than they can be replaced and it takes more of a lesser experienced person to replace them.