leaveitallbehind

I no longer have a local travel agent. I have been searching and making my own reservations with the help of various cruise lines. What sites have you found that offer the best prices? Can you count on the cruise line to provide the best price? :confused: I am ready to look for our next cruise and any help from you would be appreciated.:confused::confused:

Sorry, specific TA's can not be mentioned here. But regarding price, most mass market cruise lines pricing will be the same whether you book directly with them or through a TA. They do not discount their prices through a TA. Ship, itinerary, length of cruise, time of year, stateroom category, etc., are the drivers regarding differences in prices.

What a TA often will do is offer an on board credit, or prepaid gratuities, or free specialty restaurant dinners, or some other form of perk that will not be cruise line sponsored and will come directly from their commission to entice you to book through them. They also may secure blocks of rooms that by volume offer a minor discount that may be passed on to you as well. These perks may be shown as a "discounted" price, but the base stateroom rates are the same.

What you need to check for with different TA's is whether or not they also charge any separate fees (separate from the cruise lines) for reserving, modifying, or cancelling a booking made through them. If they do, move on to another as the cruise lines compensate the TA's for their bookings with you and you should not pay anything additional for their service.

As others have pointed out, it isn't a matter of which ship as both are large and stabilized. It is purely a function of the seas at the time as any ship will feel the motion if the sea conditions are rough. The better recommendation would be to get a mid-ship, lower level stateroom location to minimize the possible motion.

Congratulations! Next up, D+!

I don't have a cruise compass for Grandeur / Bahamas, but the attached link is to the RCI webpage describing Grandeur, which provides a lot of information regarding the ship:

http://www.royalcaribbean.com/findacruise/ships/class/ship/home.do?shipClassCode=VI&shipCode=GR&br=R

As you are new to RCI you may not be aware that you can also bring two 750 ml bottles of wine (wine only) per stateroom on board at embarkation as well. However if you take them to the MDR you may be assessed a $25 corkage fee. They are nice to have in your stateroom and you can bring glasses of wine from your stateroom with you anywhere - including the MDR - on the ship.

Most ships are allowing water to be brought on board. But the ship's water is very good and we've never felt the need to bring bottled water with us. Personal choice.

We've not done it on Voyager, but have done it on other shops. The tour will take you through the galley in the MDR, food storage areas, waste incineration plant, engine control room, down the "I-95" corridor, backstage at the ice rink and main theater, through certain crew areas, and ending up with a bridge tour. It will last about 3-1/2 hours and will be guided in each area by different crew and staff members. You cannot wear open toed shoes, so be prepared for that, and it requires walking and climbing crew stairs. We've enjoyed the one's we've been on and felt it was a worthwhile tour.

On Freedom, what's the difference between

Conoisseur Club

Concierge Club

Diamond Club

Connoisseur Club is the cigar lounge on deck 5 open to all.

Concierge Lounge is the private lounge on deck 10 for Grand Suite and higher suite guests, and Diamond Plus and Pinnacle Crown & Anchor loyalty members.

Diamond Club is the private lounge on deck 14 for Diamond, Diamond Plus, and Pinnacle Crown & Anchor loyalty members.

Being from Canada I would not get a tax receipt for the donation, but the experience alone is worth the price of admission. The fact that the money goes to a great cause makes it that much better.

While there is a US benefit in the tax write off, that would not be my motivation either. The cause is the reason.

It was on the Majesty I saw the horn go at auction. It wasn't cheap. I seem to remember the donation going over $1,000. Of course, it including a full bridge sailaway.

The full bridge sailaway would be awesome!

Not an auction, but several ships we've been on sponsoed a "Walk of Wishes" for Make a Wish whereby a $10 donation (and you can certainly donate more) provides a T-shirt to be worn during a multi-lap walk around the jogging track. This usually includes the Captain and other officers.

...and the breakdown by leading cruise lines is:

Carnival (which includes Carnival, Princess, AIDA, HAL, P & O, Ibero, Cunard, & Seabourn) - 48.4%

RCI (which includes Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Pullmantur, CDF, & Azamara) - 23.3%

The remaining 28.3% is spread between 35 other lines combined.

(Source for all information: Cruise Market Watch)

I saw that Princess and NCL introduced The Royal and The Breakaway this year, adding a total of over 8,000 additional passengers each week. Both lines are adding sister ships this year, adding another 8,000 additional passengers per week.

 

That totals almost an additional 1 million passengers per year.

 

Is the cruise market unlimited?

In 2013, the global cruise revenue was a reported $36.2 billion (4.5% increase over 2012) with 20.9 million passengers (3.3% increase over 2012).

Unlimited? Hard to say. Growing? Apparently.

and please check the invitation. Ours was on a different day at a different time then it said on the "confirmed" list.

That has happened when a late conflict for the same venue arose. Correct to check the on-board invitation as that would be accurate.

All RCI ships provide hair dryers. It will likely be located in a top drawer at the vanity. They are the type where you must hold the button down continuously to keep it on.

Items ordered from Gifts & Gear are typically delivered to your stateroom along with a note. Some items may be elsewhere, such as wine specified for main dining room delivery or onboard credit that merely goes onto your shipboard account. Regardless, there should be a note in your cabin.

 

However, I'll note that on one cruise a year and a half ago, I was given a gift of onboard credit. There was no note in the cabin, and I assumed it came from someone else, so it wasn't until after we returned home that I found out that it was a gift from my friends.

That happened to us as well on a recent cruise where we happened to check our SeaPass account midway through only to see an unexpected OBC balance that turned out to a gift from a relative. We had no notification of this in advance from RCI and only learned of it by confirming the unexpected positive balance shown with guest services. (Thought at first it was an error on RCI's part to our favor with our charges. ;))

So unless the gift is something you can see or feel, it does pay to check with guest services to confirm a possible OBC.

On day 1 we should receive our meet & mingle invitation as well as our welcome back party invitation since this will be our second RCCL cruise, right? These will tell us where to show up & when.

Day one you will receive your M & M information in your stateroom if - as is typically the case - your M & M is scheduled for day 2. And yes, you can access the confirmed schedule information a week or two ahead of time as indicated by others.

Your welcome back party is a C & A sponsored event for which you will receive the invitation typically two or three days in advance, again in your stateroom.

It is fine to take a glass of wine to the MDR, but bringing your bottle from the stateroom could subject you to a $25 corkage fee. So the best way to avoid that would be to leave the bottles in your stateroom and take a glass with you - anywhere on the ship.

Of course you are correct, got my Nellie's and Barefoot's mixed up.:o

 

Thanks for catching that, hate to give the wrong info Zoey.

 

Zoey, substitute Barefoot where I said Nellie's in my previous post.

...not a problem - you've caught me more than once! ;)

The suite beach is called Nellie's. If you got a cabana on Nellie's beach, then you could have a total of 6 people in that cabana, and those people would have access to Nellie's beach. Otherwise, only full suite guests have access to Nellie's beach.

Bob - I think you mean Barefoot Beach at Labadee as the suite beach. Nellies is the general beach just past Barefoot. (Both have cabanas).

RCI Sovereign of the Seas - 1992

Then my information was perhaps only partly-correct, rather than incorrect.

But then you're addressing someone who can only dream about suites ;)

 

Re: room-service & buffet, no argument - but the OP was asking whether an in-cabin kettle was provided.

 

JB :)

As the OP didn't specify stateroom category - or ship, or itinerary for that matter - I was only trying to suggest that it could be available. You're statement was also rather broad based which was why I highlighted the specifics I was indicating as incorrect. No offense was intended. :)

Labadee actually has two straw market areas; one that is enclosed in a building with "regulated" vendors where the prices are more fixed, and therefore you are less hassled by the vendors; and a second outside venue behind and up the path from the building where there is no set pricing, therefore everything is up for negotiation. This is the also the area where you will be approached by the more aggressive vendors wanting to do business with you and where you likely will get the lowest prices.

We typically shop very little on Labadee but were with a couple on one cruise who priced a couple of things they were interested in at the indoor area then found similar items with the outside vendors to negotiate against that price.

I want to dock at the dowtown piers as DH is disabled and cannot walk too far. He will be able to get to the Trolley stop and we can get on and off as we choose.

 

If at the Pan Am pier then we need a taxi to get into town.

 

Before we were married I had been to SJ several times and loved it. Just roam around the streets of old town. The architecture is beautiful.

 

If you have never been to the forts they are worth a visit. El Morro is really amazing.

Agree with your thoughts on the location with the downtown pier - which is the pier at Old San Juan. You will not have any concerns as you will not dock at Pan Am - as a port of call, you will dock at Old San Juan.

And some cruise lines, like RCI (& Celebrity & Princess?), provide in-cabin facilities but only on cruises out of the UK - cos they know that an Englishman likes his cuppa.:).

But RCI don't supply the coffee in-cabin. So bring your own jar of Nescaff - or steal sachets from the drinks stations.

JB :)

I can say from direct experience that this information is incorrect. Junior suites and higher on RCI supply both the brewer as well as the coffer and tea on US based itineraries. I believe this is also the case on UK based itineraries. It is also available through room service and self service in the Windjammer and other venues on board.