Rogueperson

You sound like a friend of mine @death_star. He's been trying to game the system to get to Diamond and he finally made it last March (I think). I did the same thing. I took 2 cheap 9 night cruises to garner 36 points to jump to Diamond. And then in the first year after the restart after covid, I took 4 cruises that got me 80 points with a combination of the double point promo and solo cruising, to jump from Diamond to Diamond plus, with my first Diamond plus cruise coming in the fall.

This is exactly why we jumped on it. Our first TA, but not the longest cruise we've been on. We were hesitant to book a new cruise line (to us) for such a long cruise, but that price could not be beat. I'm hoping that they will extend the loyalty match, as we're Diamond Plus on Royal, but even they didn't, they're giving us a $600.00 bar tab already!!!

I have found Chef's table is more often bundled into a package onboard more than being discounted by itself. Like I see Chef's table and chops for like 110/person. Not much of a discount, but discounted from what was on the cruise planner. Also, I rarely if ever see Chef's table's price change much on the planner, its almost always around 90 bucks/person total. *edit* Price went up on my Jewel cruise to $84.99/person, which puts it at 200.40 for 2 with tip.

Just last night, I was hammer out my next trip up to Bayonne and pricing it out. The most expensive option surprisingly, was driving up day of and parking, because parking by itself at the port would be $420.00 for my 14 night this fall.

Be glad Royal doesn't sail out of New York City. That's $45.00/night. Bayonne recently raised theirs to $30.00/night.

Life long resident. Born in 20901, moved from there to Gaithersburg for a couple years, went to UMD, came back, bought a house in 20906 which is still considered Silver Spring, though Rockville and Olney are actually closer than downtown Silver Spring for me.

Not a cruise ship story, but around 2005 or 2006 was working downtown, DC near the White House. Occasionally, we would get notices that there could be overflights of military aircraft due to exercises out of Andrews. There was one such notice and when walking from the Metro to my office, I heard this really loud roar and I looked up to see a B-2 at around 2000 feet just flying by. That sucker is HUGE.

I'm glad i found this thread. I'm looking to book the transatlantic for next year, probably in the next two days or so once my TA gets pricing for next year on Scarlet Lady. It will be my first one on Virgin, but the price is amazing! I was a little hesitant to do such a long cruise on my inaugural Virgin cruise, but the price made it worth it. I'm new to this board, but I don't see many live threads. I will more than likely do one while i'm onboard so that should be interesting. Thanks for the preview.

Covid screwed a lot of things up. Here in Maryland, we used to have tons of places open after 9 on weeknights. Now, we're relegated to Fridays and Silver Diner that opens after 10. Weekends are a "little" better but not much. Kind of sucks because our options are limited after 9 and we tend to eat late 😞

Love the pictures of Cartagena, but I bet its really hot. I was there in December of 2015 and it was 90 degrees with 90% humidity.

Isn't that what baked alaska is? ice cream surrounded by cake and meringue? Admittedly, my only experience of this is on a cruise, and that's what i always thought it was.

That's harsh. Love the imagery here.

I'm missing something here about the upgrade. You can't get any kind of price match or such after final payment, but there's nothing saying you can't upgrade. When you upgrade, you pay the difference between what you paid and the current price. If the upgraded room is less, wouldn't they just let you upgrade? Its rare, but I remember a situation when I cruised on Anthem in 2016. The price plummeted after final payment and I discovered a balcony room was only $80.00 more than what i had originally paid for my interior. I upgraded paying the $80.00 but it included a $150.00 OBC, so in essence, I got an upgrade for $70.00 net gain.

My wife is sensitive to light when sleeping so she absolutely looks forward to an interior room when we cruise. She says its the best sleep she ever gets. I've never gone in a Suite, but I've done balconies before. Its interior or balconies for us. To get a Balcony, it has to be a good deal or its not worth it to us. Also, when i book rooms, I never book guarantees, always specifically pick a location, which is usually sandwiched between two passengers decks if possible, if not, the deck above us should be a passenger deck. When you royal up, you are essentially paying for a guarantee in that category. The one time we got the royal up, we somewhat regretted it, even though we saved over 2K for the upgrade (RC wanted 4K for balcony on Enchantment for 12 nights, we royal upped for 2K paid). The balcony was okay, but we were in the very front and it was VERY rocky. This was the first cruise out of 22 that I've ever gotten seasick, it was that bad up there. Balconies on Vision class cost significantly higher than interiors due to the lower number of them. We've gotten a promenade interior, which we vowed never to do again. We've gotten a Virtual balcony interior, which is paying extra for a big screen TV showing the outside. We found it annoying and just turned it off. Bottom answer. Its up to you. As you've seen, some people can't even think of doing a cruise in a interior and there are others like me who live for them.

I would not do any excursion in Cozumel that requires the ferry to Playa del Carmen independently. Too many variables that could make you miss the ferry. The ferry itself is 45 minutes each way and apparently the schedule is not always reliable. I also suspect that the cruise lines (not just Royal) may charter entire ferries for their excursions because every time I've done an excursion, we come back and hop right onto the ferry with no pause, but i see people hanging at the terminal looking like their waiting. That too may screw up their schedule. As for the Excursion itself, I thought Tulum was great. Its about an hour or so from Playa Del Carmen, so your travel time is almost 2 hours each way including the ferry transit. Sometimes, the cruise lines will also offer excursions to Coba, which is about 30 minutes farther, but in my opinion, a far superior experience, but only go on this excursion if you have at least 12 hours in port. Its about a mile or so hike from the parking lot to the central temple and last I heard, it is probably the only temple that still allows you to climb to the top.

Some destinations don't have the reduced deposit either. I remember back in 2019, my friend booked a Bermuda cruise but for some reason, at that time, Bermuda cruises did not have the reduced deposit and still had the standard 250/person deposit.

This question really depends on what cruise means to you. If you need the latest and coolest gadgets. Lots of options, then Enchantment will be a letdown. With only 1 specialty restaurant, Enchantment is indicative of what I would like to call traditional cruise experience. However, if you're like me, who find all the latest and coolest stuff is nothing but a novelty which wears out fast in my opinion, then Enchantment is the better option as service on smaller ships is usually (but not always) better. Also, smaller ships tend to cost less than the big mega ships.

On my B2B last October on Adventure, we had the same lunch as the Key holders. It was in the MDR, not in the specialty restaurant, but it was the Chops "special" lunch.

I'm just coming in late for your live thread. I see you're flew in from DCA, which makes you a local to me. Saturday night was insane. Not sure when you flew out, but at about 8 or 9pm, it really got bad for us north of DC in Silver Spring. The high wind warnings were up till 1am. I've did a live thread on Grandeur back in 2018 when she sailed out of Baltimore and have sailed on her a total of 4 times. Its weird thinking that you had to fly to board Grandeur. I'll be following along.

On all the Royal Ships, if not all cruise ships I've been on there's usually on deck 4, 5, or 6, a outside deck you can walk around (or at least walk outside). Along the wall of this deck, are lines of deck chairs mostly unused. Its on Deck 5 on Brilliance, but I've gone out there to read plenty of times. Depending your heading, and the time of day, you can choose one side or the other for shade/sun depending on your preference. It is rarely crowded unlike the pool deck.

Oh, you should be aware that some cruises do not qualify for the reduced non-refundable deposit, at least the last time it affected me. A friend of mine back in 2019 booked a cruise to Bermuda and the deposit was not reduced and was the standard 250/person for non-refundable. One of the reasons I did not book it with my friend. But i ended up going anyways.

I recently did a b2b, and I found out that you cannot check in using the app while connected to the ship wifi. It just won't let you even if the cruise is still open for check online check in. However, it doesn't matter as everything is done for you and they easily port all the info to your new sailing. Also, they *may* tell you that you do not need to do your muster, but I would just in case. I was told that I didn't have to, but the muster station on the 2nd leg said that information is incorrect and that I needed to check in (which i did).

It almost feels like a movie theater where the theater makes the bulk of its profits from concessions. Its why you see popcorn at 10 bucks a pop for a small bag. You can buy an 8 pound thing of Orville Redenbacher's for 13 bucks. I use 1/2 a cup of that for a big bowel of popcorn. It lasts me like over a year. As we've seen with these posts. Alcohol is almost a necessity for many. Royal is trying to squeeze as much money as possible from that. You either pay the high price per drink, or pay the high price of the package.

No one mentioned something that should be mentioned. E-mustering!!! No more lining up at your muster station for 30+ minutes in the Florida heat and possibly sun depending on the which side you're on. You watch a quick video on your phone and then listen to the horn on the phone, hit okay, check in at the muster station at your leisure and you're done. Just make sure to check in at your muster station before all aboard time.

Depends on the ship. I'm guessing you have an 11 night cruise? I had it for a 5 night, and the food started getting a little repetitive for me. We had two sea days on that 5 night. So I had a total of 3 lunches and 5 dinners, including Chef's Table. We were on Adventure of the Seas that had 3 specialty restaurants plus Johnny Rockets (I don't really like Johnny Rockets, so i don't really count it). After eating at Izumi's once, Chops 4 times and Giovanni's twice. I was done. If I had to go longer with just those three, I dunno. I was on a b2b and to be honest, I actually enjoyed the MDR for the remaining 9 nights of my 2nd leg of that trip and did not care or want to eat in another specialty restaurant for the remainder of the trip. The fallout for me, was I did not even want to look at a steak until maybe day 3 or day 4. On my 5 nights, Izumi's and Giovanni's did not open for lunch as often as I liked or was closed due to special events like sushi rolling class and taste of Royal. Keep in mind, that there is NOTHING wrong with the food. It was amazing. But you start realizing how limiting the menu is when you start eating at the Specialty restaurants multiple times. But there a couple things I discovered. If you have a dietary restriction, your choices are even more limited. My wife is gluten free and she felt the limited menu limited her even more. The MDR was actually better at accommodating her Allergies and diet. Johnny Rockets has chili cheese fries which I got with the UDP. But what I discovered was that if you do NOT have the UDP, and just get Chili Cheese fries, you pay only 7.99, not the full 14.99. But in my opinion, its about as good as 7-11 Nachos. Chops' burger at lunch is AMAZING. I'm a bit of a burger snob, but this one may kick Princess off as Best Burger at Sea. And to answer your question, Teppanyaki is decent, if you've never done it before on Royal, its somewhat worth it. I think the Sushi/Saki Lunch is a better value for the upcharge. For sanity, i think your best bet is 2 days per specialty restaurant onboard the ship. That's assuming you like all the specialty restaurants onboard. I'm a little meh with Izumi's. So if your ship has 4 specialty restaurants you like, anything longer than 8 nights maybe too much, in my opinion. The issue is if you decide NOT to eat at a specialty restaurant, you lose value on the UDP.