seabeew

Hideaway Beach club is “limited” to 2,000 guests. If you buy your tickets in advance, you’ll get in whenever you arrive. You probably will have a hard time getting a chair, and you’ll probably not going to be able to get a chair near the pool. I’m speaking from experience. 
 

There is an outside lobby area, where many people eventually dropped off their stuff. 
 

Honestly, I I don’t think you’ll be able to get in unless you buy a ticket in advance.

I don’t know if you’ve been to CocoCay before or not, but the Oasis Lagoon pool is awesome. It’s supposed to be the biggest pool in the Bahamas, I believe. It’s free to use, offers a zero entry section, and has a swim up bar. Chairs and umbrellas are also free and permanently anchored in the ground. It used to be a big party area prior the opening of the hideaway.

 I think it will still be crowded at the Oasis pool, though. You can get chairs on the beach and walk a small distance to the Oasis pool. 

We were on Celebrity in Roatan last summer. We docked there, but the Enchantment passengers had to tender. All the other berths were filled so I don’t know if that was a one off. If you look at your cruise invoice, it lists whether you will dock or tender At each port. Royal has a special needs department that can probably provide the best information for you if haven’t already contacted them. 
 

When looking at excursions on line , many times a description of mobility needs will be provided.

Thanks to all for providing information about the cabins. It’s all very helpful. I’m afraid I’ve made a mess with my replies. I don’t post on cruise critic very often.

1 hour ago, Lena11033 said:

Here this was standing back a litle in the room but you get the idea - this was 6136

 

Thanks for providing the photo! I can certainly live that to save what I consider a lot of money.

The obstructed cabins on deck 6 are $4900 each. The unobstructed cabins are approximately $8000 each. 

My husband and I need some advice concerning deck 6 partially obstructed cabins on the Celebrity Beyond. We are looking to book two cabins for a family cruise over Christmas and New Years in 2024. It has a great itinerary with a partial Panama Canal transit and visits to Colombia and the ABC islands.

We are considering booking two cabins on deck 6. I found information from a travel agency that has a group rate that is half the cost of an unobstructed deck 7 cabin. We’re looking at paying approximately $8000 vs $16,000. 
 

If anyone has sailed in an obstructed deck 6 cabin, I would love your feedback.

Just a couple thoughts.

Independence-The kids splash pad on Independence is very similar to the ones on the Oasis class. They could be the same size. They won’t be missing out.( I have not been on Wonder, though. However if the Independence doesn’t go to Coco Cay, I’d have to think about it. Your family would be missing the Oasis lagoon pool with zero entry , a free kids water park, and the pirate ship.The chairs, umbrellas, bathrooms, and buffet would probably be more impressive to adults. 
 

Thoughts on Wonder. You and your wife could purchase the Key. This would give you priority boarding, lunch in a designated dining room offering a modified Chops steakhouse menu, reserved show seating, two internet packages, and some other perks. There is no charge for the kids due to their ages.

1 hour ago, ARandomTraveler said:

Playmakers is like a Chili's restaurant with more tvs for watching sports and some video games. Not sure why it says 21+ but it's definitely family friendly, and I've eaten there with my daughter before she turned 21.

In the early days of the return to cruising, many venues, including Playmakers, only allowed entry to those 21 and over. I believe the current 21 and over verbiage is a carry over from those times that should be deleted from the Royal Caribbean website. 

One potential problem with the Adventure is that it doesn’t have a baby nursery for children under three years olds. Most of Royal’s other ships do offer the baby nursery option. It may or may not be important to you, but it does offer a little flexibility for parents. 

It applies to 12 or 13 year olds and up.

The selection and quality provided in Royal’s Cafe Promenade does not come  close to Celebrity’s offerings. 

I think part of what’s going on with Celebrity and the downgraded food options can be attributed to having a new CEO in place. Richard Fain, longtime CEO and Chairman of the Royal Caribbean Group, retired about a year ago. He was replaced by Jason Liberty, the former Finance Director. 
 

I have questions about the key for those who have sailed with an under six year old.  I read the description of the program which states a minimum age of six. Does that mean we can’t buy it because we will have a four year old in our party? If we can book it, will our four year old be allowed to participate in priority boarding and seating, etc. along with our family. Obviously not going to do it if he can’t participate! I know wouldn’t get an internet package . 

21 hours ago, margsipie said:

Hi all,

 

We are trying to plan a cruise with my husband, mom, and my 12 month old son.  My son is not vaccinated (we are).  I reviewed Celebrity's website and spent 40 minutes on the phone with them today.  Even they are not 100% clear on their own policy, so I'm curious if anyone has first hand experience.  It seems that unvaccinated children can only leave the ship on Celebrity shore excursions.  What seems to be unclear is the policy for the family traveling with the child.  

 

If you have been on Celebrity recently with an unvaccinated child, were you able to leave the ship (leaving your child behind with another family member) and explore on your own?  Or were you also required to only go on a Celebrity shore excursion?  Thank you!

We were on the Apex in March. We met a young couple with an under two year old. When they tried to get off the ship without a shore excursion , they were stopped by security . The parents had done their research found out that families with children under two could get off the ship without an excursion. Security scanned the child’s card and off they went.

Pre-pandemic, the Royal Tots and Babies Nursery (6 to under 36 months)was offered with no breaks for meals. An hourly fee was required for this program at all times. I imagine the service still works the same way. Our grandson has aged out of the program so I can’t tell you for sure.

In the past we did take pre-filled bottles for him when dropping him off. 

I think most covid cases, at least on Celebrity, were identified due to contact tracing. 

1 hour ago, bgoff60 said:

Harmony OTS stopped there last Saturday - all day.  Got there at 8:30.  Left at 5 pm.  ONe other RCI Boat there as well.  Good times!

Independence was the other ship.

18 minutes ago, mek said:

That is certainly interesting information, but it seems crazy to me to require people with unvaxxed children to purchase a ship tour to get off the ship if there really isn't any control.

 

And that irritates me greatly. It’s not just that I might want to do something else, but they are not protecting our grandson when the tour operator drops us off in the Costa Maya maze.

The tours available for unvaccinated children are in actuality not bubble tours. I was just on three tours last week and and they are just ship curated tours.

I know what the popular opinion around here is that are like the bubble tours in Europe. First, the available tours listed on the cruise planner have no verbiage about not going out of a bubble, the tickets have no information about not breaking away from the group, and there is no admonition from the tour guides about the parameters. 
 

Second the tours are open to all passengers, and in fact most tour participants are adults. 
 

Third, upon return from all tours, the bus just dumps everyone out. There are no Royal Caribbean staff members there to herd everyone back on the ship.

Booking a ship’s tour just allows you to get off the ship with an unvaccinated child. From the moment you get off the ship to your return, there is no oversight. Maybe the tour operators submit a list of people going on the tour to the cruise line.

We knew how bubble tours are supposed to be operated mainly by reading the information about bubble tours in Europe. For the protection of our grandson, we adhered to those practices.

What infuriated us was that our tour in Costa Maya picked us up from a back staging area and dropped us off at the back entrance to the Costa Maya maze. It was hot and humid and thousands of cruise ship passengers were wandering around without masks. There was no way to social distance, we were packed in so tight in the narrow passage ways. The quality of the awful, too. 
 

The shore excursion desk was closed when we got back and we were too exhausted to pursue our complaints.

To the OP, I would still go on your cruise. The ships are great and the tours we went on in Cozumel and Roatan were good for children. Playa Mia in Cozumel had a very nice water park for kids along with a sandy beach and Tabyanna Beach on Roatan had a great beach and very calm water. I would skip Costa Maya. 
 

You could try Adventure Ocean to see if your son would like it. 
 

I’m not providing this information to encourage anyone to skip out on any tours. I just wanted people to know that at least for the western Caribbean Royal does not market or manage tours for children as true bubble tours. 

Thanks for clarifying, RCCL. Our grandson is three, and we won’t be taking him to Adventure Ocean under the circumstances you describe. I think he would think he was in time out and being punished.
 

We were on the Odyssey with him in September and that was not the scenario. Of course there was never more than one other child with him at a time. 

RCCL Fan, 

From your very helpful post above, you indicated you couldn’t go to any restaurants with unvaccinated children in your group. This concerns me greatly because we are going on the Oasis next week with our grandson who is too young to be vaccinated. We also have specialty dining. Our plan was for him was to go to adventure ocean instead of dinner. Adventure Ocean won’t work for us under the scenario you described.

From my recent research, when protocols are listed on the website or recently compasses, almost all speciality restaurants are listed as for everyone . I was even on the Allure in October by myself and the compass listed most restaurants as available to everyone.

is this not the case anymore?

And before anyone says you know what you we’re getting into, here’s the thing. The website protocols don’t tell you that tested kids have to sit alone in a circle in Adventure Ocean or that passengers on back to backs can gobble up all the time slots by virtue of not having to register for the program again. 

On Royal Caribbean a delay between uploading the card and having it approved is the norm lately. I would not be concerned about it. 

5 minutes ago, h20skibum said:

On Oasis, MTD is vaccinated only, and is on deck 3.  Deck 3 also has main dining for vaccinated, as does deck 5.

 

Deck 4 dining has the (E)veryone designation.

 

And on Odyssey, they were also being strict with the vaccinated venues and areas where masks were required.

Children under two do not need to wear masks.

45 minutes ago, CruiseMelissa said:

During that three months, were 12+ treated as vaccinated adults if they were fully vaxxed or not until August when it was a requirement?  You may hold the key to my original question if you have that info 🙃

I just wrote a long response that vanished. Short answer: a poster called RCCL Fan wrote a long review describing his family’s experience sailing out of Nassau in June.

His 12 year old daughter was fully vaccinated by the time the ship sailed. She was not required receive the antigen test required for unvaccinated kids  during check in at the British Colonial hotel. However someone put a green kid’s club band on her even though she was too old for the kids club. The band was apparently the signal of an unvaccinated child. 
 

Upon entering the ship the family had to argue with four or five different people that their child was vaccinated and didn’t need the band and didn’t need to wear a mask. The representatives all agreed she was vaccinated but thought she needed to wear the mask. The parents finally prevailed. Basically the staff couldn’t justify why she should be could considered be unvaccinated . 

4 hours ago, abpplh said:

Parents are considered unvaxxed if unvaxxed children are with them

Parents are vaccinated whether or not they have unvaccinated children on board with them. However, their unvaccinated children cannot enter vaccinated only areas. And by extension their parents cannot enter these area when their children are in their care.

Vaccinated parents can enter vaccinated areas when their children are not with them, i.e. at the kids club or being supervised by other family members.