rudeney

This just goes to show that you should generally not rely on "social media" for facts.

May they refunded because GI issues are a COVID symptom and that would have failed the questionnaire and thus qualified under CWC.

Regardless of whether it's because you are afraid of the virus, or you are afraid of dealing with how the cruise lines manage a positive test, you have every right to feel that way. Personally, I know there are risks to everything in life. For me, I weigh the risks against the benefits and find that my chances of becoming very sick or having to spend time in quarantine are very small, but the chances of having a great cruise vacation are nearly 100%, so I choose to cruise.

I have had issues receiving calls with wifi calling, and not necessarily on a ship, but even using fast, reliable land-based Internet services. Sometimes the phone just doesn't ring and the caller goes to voicemail. With the spotty and bursty Voom service, it might be worse. I would suggest that the caretaker be prepared to text, too. Since being in touch is critical, this also might be a good time to invest in a smart watch because sometimes it will be too noisy to hear a phone alert for calls or texts. Note that there is no reason to pay for a "data plan" on a smart watch unless there's a need to use it without the phone being nearby and connected via Bluetooth. Just buy a cheap watch that vibrates and lights up to get your attention when it's noisy.

Then you might just want to wait and purchase it onboard where you can get the beverage package of your choice, and your wife can have no package. You may have to pay "full price" for it, but it would likely be less expensive than paying for a package that your wife won't use. Sometimes they do discount it onboard, but it depends on how popular it has been selling before the cruise. They pretty much grossly overcharge for everything on the ship and the specialty restaurants are no exception. If I were going to pay US$60 per person for this restaurant on land, I'd probably go to Outback or Texas Roadhouse instead and have money left over to spend on a drink or two.

I know Enchantment is old, but the ocean is very hard on all the ships. I remember years ago we were on Freedom when it was still the largest in the fleet, and its balcony was very rusty. They painted it during our cruise, but it still looked like rust that had been painted over. I used to have a 30-foot sailboat on the coast and every...single...year the teak wood had to be refinished and the brass had to be polished every six months. Something was always rusty.

I was playing with this earlier today and the MDR "Menu" option was flaky. Exit the app and try again. Remember, this is RCI's IT department you are relying on! 🤣

So that's for one person? That's 2x what I paid. Then again, you have more dining options on Ovation than I have on Voyager.

When the precautions are more of a threat than the disease, it's probably time to stop taking such extreme precautions.

There are some other possibilities...it could be the device with the least bandwidth usage, or maybe the one with the most. Or the lowest MAC address (or highest). I think if I were coding that algorithm, I'd make it random, just to keep people on their toes. 😜

I assume you meant, "Hospitals are not 'overwhelmed?" A friend who is a nurse at our largest hospital in town said on Monday that they have only 3 COVID-19 patients, despite our test positivity rate over over 10%. It sure seems like it's time to stop treating this like a death sentence. Its probably time to stop testing and quarantining people on ships. We may end up with ships full of people coughing and sniffling and a few may even feel really bad, but it's nowhere near the same level of danger as it was two years ago, or even one year ago.

I can tell you that the published $245 UDP price was exactly $490 when I paid for it, so no gratuity was added.

My clients are attorneys, and despite the generalizations, most of them are very good people. But Lord do they know how to eat and drink! It's okay, though, because they pay us very well for our services, and few of them complain unless it's truly warranted. We've had 20+ year relationships with many of them. We do not mind thanking them for their business with a good meal. You're right about the bundled/inclusive pricing. Not having the DBP on previous cruises, we always made sure to bring our two bottles of wine, and also grab a few cocktails in the suit lounge before and after dinner. Now, I suspect we won't do that and will just drink whatever we want when we want.

I checked my shore excursions and two of them did drop in price, but by less than $10. It's not worth the risk of cancelling and rebooking as my cruise's excursions seem to be selling out quickly. I was able to save $60 on my Voom 2-device plan by rebooking it during the sale.

Definitely! Except when I travel for business and entertain clients on expense account. I don't even look at prices then. I have, however, learned to not let the server hand wine menus to everyone at the table - I get the wine list and make the choices.

I figure $20 is the minimum. On one cruise, we took my wife's mother and we were in a GS and she was in a JS. The concierge welcomed her with us into the lounge and basically treated her as if she were in our suite. I tipped $100 that time.

Good point - OK, I'm good with my decision on the UDP!

About the only time we go to a bar is when we travel. We rarely order drinks when we eat out, but it does happen on occasion. Around here, the typical "simple" cocktail will cost around $15, plus tip PLUS 10% sales tax, so it's about $20 all totalled - for ONE drink! 😮

Actually, I find RCI's onboard cocktail prices to be very competitive. I think current prices are about $11 for a "simple" cocktail like Scotch (JW Black or Chivas) and club soda. Around here, I can't get Dewars for under $12. Of course all restaurant and bar drink prices are crazy expensive.

It's drinks up to $12 or $13 (there are discrepancies in their published terms). I think most call brand cocktails and frozen drinks are in the $11 range. It's only when you order doubles or get into the aged specialty liquors where the price goes beyond the DBP limits. But you can get around the price limit on doubles if you order a cocktail plus a shot. That's two regular-priced drinks. I also hear that that frequenting the same bartenders and tipping extra can get you better service, like always just serving a double for the regular "price".

I think I remember being told that an extra login above the number allowed will bump someone out, but being an old IT guy, I always "do the right thing" and logout when done. 🙂

I wish! 🙂 We're driving 400 miles round-trip to the Nashville airport to get a better flight due to crappy schedules out of Birmingham. That's more than we usually drive in a week. Also, our daughters will still be house and pet sitting for us, so I doubt I'll see any utility savings (they may use MORE electricity!) But that's OK - it's a cruise vacation! Yeah, that's probably something like 12 per day. I suspect 3 will be my wife's so I guess I need to get my liver rested and ready for 9+ per day! 🤣 Seriously, I know we will also drink some juice and bottled water, and maybe a few soft drinks, too. I just decided to buy the DBP because it will make the trip easier, not necessarily less expensive. Really, the UDP is the one I have 2nd thoughts about. We normally only do Chops one night and Giovanni's another, and no lunch, so maybe we will just have to change that pattern on this cruise.

Yes, when you are done on your device, just log out and then another device can then login under the same account. We always get the 2-device plan, but we have two phones and a laptop, so at any given time, any two of them can be online.

Because we do only sail every few years, a cruise is a special vacation and we don't skimp and we book full suites. But I am a numbers person, so I always try to maximize the perceived value. This time, I just decided what the heck - I threw out the spreadsheets and spent the money. I hope it will make our cruise feel more relaxed, even if we don't "save money" on these packages. I suspect knowing that there is no "additional" cost for drinks, my wife will likely drink more than normal. I know about suite room service and have done that before, but we really like eating out. During the "lockdowns", we were going absolutely stir crazy not being able to eat out.

My wife and I are both work, but from home and we have no major health problems except old age. We usually eat out 2 - 3 times a week, and make at least one trip to the grocery store, Costco, Home Depot, etc. We only mask when required and we have both been vaccinated. During this whole pandemic, I am the only one who got sick. I had "original recipe" COVID-19 back in November 2020, before vaccines were available. It was a cold, and I did not get tested because I never had a fever. I lost my sense of taste and smell the week after that and an antibody test was positive. I caught it from the lady who cleans our house when she was here the day before Thanksgiving. We had a few family members coming over and she has no family in town, so we invited her to join us for Thanksgiving dinner. She called that Thursday morning and said she was having some GI issues and wouldn't make it. On Friday, she called and said she tested positive for COVID-19. She got it from the person whose house she cleaned on Tuesday. I had no symptoms until Saturday. Ironically, my wife did not get it. Or, at least she did not have any symptoms at all. And none of the family members who were with us on Thursday got it. I now have "long COVID" with a partial loss of sense of smell. Like I said, this is a strange disease!