rudeney

Voyager should be the template for what NOT to do when amping. The only upgrade was adding the water slides. Everything else was a downgrade - smaller spa, smaller fitness center, delete saunas. delete Johnny Rockets.

You can choose a time online, too, but it's easier in the app because that step comes before all the others, then you can stop and come back later to add the rest of the required info. My wife's check in was just another "card" within the app. I did mine, then scrolled down to hers.

I'm with you on this, except there is one possible explanation for disclosing removed gratuities to attendants during the cruise. And I am surprised that it has not been mentioned yet, as it seems to always get thrown out in all the best tipping threads. Specifically, I am talking about the rumor that cash tips have to be pooled when received from guests who removed gratuities. If that is true, then the crew has to know if gratuities have been removed or not so they know to keep cash tips or to hand them over. Now, I'm not saying that is a fact, but it's been tossed into tipping threads here for years, so there it is! 😉

Why do I suddenly have the urge to watch Blazing Saddles?

If you ship is sailing from an east cost (Eastern time) port, then yes, start checking at 12:00am Eastern time.

When it comes to Italian food, I have my own recipes that are praised worldwide. Well, maybe statewide. OK, I promise - my friends and family like my cooking. Anyhow, I am very critical of what I get in restaurants. Alfredo sauce is so easy to make with its three basic ingredients: cream, butter and parm. Add anything else besides some fresh garlic or other seasoning and you've ruined it. I also prefer whole wheat pasta, and for some reason, I have a hard time finding whole wheat fettucine so I do sometimes use whole wheat linguini. But then I adjust the Alfredo with extra parm to so it doesn't get all watery. If I know this, then a "chef" should. There's just no excuse for bad Alfredo! Years ago, we took a galley tour and one of the things that I remembered was how almost everything was prepared fresh from scratch. They did use some canned and frozen ingredients when necessary and appropriate, but they were not using "prepared" dishes. If that has changed, it's truly sad. I mean, if I want "boiler bag" meals, I can got to the local Applebee's for much less than what a cruise costs.

I had this same dish at the same restaurant in 2019 and it was $29. My how times have changed!

I probably would not know good sushi from mediocre. We do have one local restaurant with a very entertaining chef. I think theirs is better, but It may just be the presentation. I eat it rarely, though, because my wife does not like it. I used to go out for lunch, but I've been WFH for about 6 years now, so unless a friend wants to meet up, it's not happening. I am looking forward to Izumi on the cruise since we have the UDP this time. I will make my wife go with me and she can order something else. And if she doesn't like it, no worries - we can get something else and not worry about wasting money on it.

I understand that section of the Canada website states no testing, but the section I linked specific to cruise ships says testing IS required. When the section you quoted states "...or water" it is referring to private vessels or ferries - not cruise ships. I know it seems ambiguous and contradictory, but for now, if you arrive in Canada via cruise ship, you must be tested before boarding the ship.

Yes, for cruise ship passengers, Canada requires a test: https://travel.gc.ca/travel-covid/travel-restrictions/cruise#pre-embarkation-test

That time is just a placeholder and not an actual reservation. You still need to make specific reservations once you board (or with the concierge ahead of time if you are in a full suite).

See? I was right! 🤣

Just FYI, most all fish is frozen. It's put on ice on the boat as soon as it's caught. The exception would be things like lobster, crabs, shrimp, oysters, etc. that are kept alive in water. Depending on how far that catch is going to travel, it may be frozen once unloaded on shore.

Online check-in will open soon after at 12:00am (midnight) 45 days prior to sailing. It is the current time of the "departure port" - not the "ship's current time". Most people find it's open at 12:01am, but sometimes it takes longer. I checked in for my next cruise last week and it didn't open until just after about 12:15am. If you want a choice of a specific boarding time, especially the earliest time, you will want to check in as soon as possible. You may not have to do it at midnight, but as soon as you can in the morning is best. Using the Royal App on your phone, you can just choose the time and then do the rest later. Since I was in Central time, and I always stay up until after 11:00pm anyhow, I went ahead and completed everything for us (my wife and me). It took less than 10 minutes. I happened to look at my account from my computer today and notices a few things that I fixed. When I uploaded our photos on the app, it did not let me resize our photos and they looked strange, so I re-uploaded them and the website has the ability to zoom in and out to center the face. It had not saved my check-box selections for permission to use these photos for boarding and onboard photography, so I fixed that. Also, it had our emergency contact numbers listed both as our primary contacts and emergency contacts, so I correct that, too.

I am not a "paper person". I try to keep as little paper as possible and have all of my documents stored electronically, synchronized across several computers and OneDrive. Of course I do keep paper copies of things that are required, like care titles, birth certificates, notarized documents, etc. but they are also scanned and saved. I can get to all of my stuff from anywhere in the world. Having said that, I always carry printed copies of travel documents "just in case". I'd hate to miss a cruise or a flight because I dropped my phone and broke it right before boarding. I just print the SetSail pass, though.

So here's a thought...according to what we think we know, crew members are guaranteed a monthly wage of $1100, and out of the $14.50 per person per day gratuity, a stateroom attendant is allocated $3.55. In order for that to equal $1100 in a month, an attendant would need to provide service for about 10 guests (not staterooms, but guests) per day. Given an average of double-occupancy, I'd think an attendant would provide service to more than 5 staterooms, and thus be earning more than $1100/month just in gratuities that passengers pay. This means that RCCL likely pays nothing in wages unless a lot of passengers remove gratuities (but I really doubt that happens in large numbers). If this is the case, I'm OK with all that. Some might argue that RCCL is making passengers pay the crew's salaries, but as I said previously, we are anyhow, either as tips or higher cruise fares.

I think "because...COVID" is just an excuse and the real reason RCCL doesn't allow this is because they might lose some onboard spend revenue and have to do extra paperwork. They will put passengers off in foreign ports for breaking rules or needing medical care, so it's not a "safety" issue. Having said that, why not just take a 7-night closed-loop cruise out of Boston? They run those pretty much every week in the fall.

I like crab cakes, but not as much as just crab itself. We were at the beach last week (northern Florida Gulf Coast) and went to one of our favorite seafood places. I had the Bairdi crab, which was 1.5lbs for $75. Best money I spent all week!

I know for a fact it will happen either this week or another week.

It saves RCCL nothing. They still have to guarantee the contract minimum wages for the crew, which is rumored to be $1100/mo. If they didn't meet that with added gratuities, then they would raise cruise fares to cover it. Customers are always going to bear the cost of paying the crew (and fuel, and food, and maintenance and taxes...)

Not counting things like CAS vouchers, bartenders are getting an automatic 18% gratuity on every drink served to a "cash" customer and splitting the 18% gratuities added on drink packages. On top of that, there are always some people who tip extra. The only way they would be making less money is if there are fewer drinks being served. I know that up until this summer, ships were sailing at reduced capacity, but there was also reduced staff and always reports of bartenders being busy and passengers having to wait on drinks. Except for maybe a few very empty cruises right after the restart, I just don't see how a bartender could be earning less. In fact, with skyrocketing prices for beverage packages, I'd think they'd be making more than ever. In terms of corporate taxable income, it makes no difference if RCCL adds on gratuities and passes them through to the crew or if they increase prices and just pay the crew more because labor costs are fully deductible. However, there are some taxes and costs that would be affected for land-based businesses (so I am not sure if this applies to cruise ships). Those include things like unemployment insurance, worker's compensation insurance, and the employer's portion of Social Security contributions. There are also some other state and local fees and taxes that can be avoided by paying employees with pass-through tips as opposed to wage, but again, I don't know if those apply to cruise ships with foreign citizen employees.

I guess we have been very lucky as we've never had issues with smokers. I know a few times I've gotten a whiff of smoke on a balcony, but it was just a quick thing and I could never tell where it was coming from so I just ignored it. One time, there was a guy walking around the pool deck with a lit cigarette. He was going back and forth between where his family was seated and the smoking area.

What??? No art auction schedules? Say it ain't so! 🤣

Mean is average (all sample values summed and then divided by the number of samples). Median is the point where there are the same number of items in the sample that are both above and below the value. In the case of median income, it means there are the same number of households making above $67,521 as there are below $67,521.

According to the 2020 US Census, median US household income was $67,521. The average (mean) US household income was $97,026. https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/cps/tables/hinc-01/2021/hinc01_1.xlsx