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Re: pax count. Friends currently onboard guesstimate 250+/- pax. Additional pax are scheduled to leave the ship in Cape Town. Their guess is about 200-225 +/- after Cape Town. Rob

Not booked with the current itinerary. Will evaluate once a revised itinerary post-Rio is confirmed and becomes available for bookings. Rob

And this is where the oft-repeated "choice is good" comes in. We find every alternative routing opportunity after Rio more appealing than the currently scheduled itinerary. We have no interest in the circle-South America cruise from FL or LA to Rio. Different strokes for different folks, as they say. Rob

Thank you, Dwight. We agree with your assessment, too. My only other observation would be to consider a stop in FL or NYC or San Juan or somewhere else on the US East Coast, prior to the eastbound TA crossing. Hopefully a decision will be announced sooner, rather than later. Rob

I do not know what the current protocol may be for late arriving tours, but in addition what May B has noted about a limited food service in the Crystal Cove, in the past there would be an assortment of sandwiches, soup, fruits and cheeses awaiting us in our cabin when we returned from late arriving Crystal-sponsored tours. We never requested that unsolicited room service, it was just there upon our return. Rob

🤪🥴🤩😂🤣 We are sailing with unexpected $$ in our account. No idea that the EI was not in concert with additional accrued milestone benefits fare reductions. The appropriate Crystal representative responded quickly and clearly. Final point to my initial post, and subsequent follow-up post: milestone benefit fare reductions cannot be deducted from the fare if the fare was already reduced by use of the EI certificate, or any other marketing fare promotion/reduction. Peace. Out. See y’all onboard. 😁 Rob

I saw this earlier on another feed. Gloria is now 80 years young. She certainly "can never say goodbye".... Rob

We are pleased with the continued updates to the Crystal website. The daily listing of casual vs. formal/optional suggested evening attire in My Account is a very helpful advance planning tool. The advance listings of guest entertainers and special interest lecturers is also much appreciated. I am not familiar with any other cruise line that offers this type of advance information to its guests. Rob

Additional Update: I received this correspondence from the Manager, Crystal Guest Relations. It appears as though we can redeem our accrued milestone credits for OBC, but not as a fare reduction. The conversation with our TA last week now makes more sense. Rob "Thank you for your email inquiry. I appreciate the opportunity to clarify this for you. You have redeemed your Exceptional Initiative certificate for this booking which does not allow for any other redemptions. I have included the below from our brochure and have attached the Terms and Conditions for your reference. Please let me know if you have any further questions, COMBINABILITY Crystal Society rewards may not apply to certain promotional offers. Crystal reserves the right to exclude or limit combinability with the benefits or rewards of other marketing partnerships or promotional offers not specified herein. More than one fare reduction Milestone may not be redeemed on a single voyage segment. Exceptional Initiative sub credits are considered a fare reduction credit. An exceptional Initiative sub credit is combinable with a milestone reward redemption, excluding a fare reduction milestone."

If it is not an imposition, is there a way that you can cut-and-paste and post the survey options? We looked at this WC and the current itinerary did not hold much interest for us. A modified itinerary may sway our decision. Thank you! Rob

Thank you for the update. As with our current Society Benefit conundrum (OBC vs. fare reduction), this may need to be escalated to a different set of decision-makers at Crystal. It is a frustrating, and seemingly inconsistent/illogical application of the written Society Benefits documents. Please continue to let us know how this works out. As will we on this thread. Thanks again for the clarification. Rob

Not necessarily so. But here’s the proof required. If this will be your 11th cruise on Crystal, and you haven’t sailed on any Crystal voyages since the A&K acquisition, then this milestone upgrade should be applicable. Crystal knows you have cruised 10 times in the past and want to use your milestone on this, your 11th Crystal cruise. If this will be your 12th or 13th or 14th cruise with Crystal, they have no records if you actually used that 10th cruise milestone already. Hence the request was declined. Make sense? Rob

Yes it is. The issue has been escalated to additional decision-makers at Crystal. I will update my post here once either I or our TA receive any further clarification. Rob

You have confirmed my message in post #2 above. Thank you for validating that the protocol remains valid. Rob

Apparently not. There was no way the Crystal personnel were going to apply a milestone award to any type of cruise fare reduction. Onboard credit only.

Our TA continues to pursue further clarification. But it was “Crystal clear” this afternoon. No fare reduction. Onboard credits only. If anyone reading this thread has a different experience when achieving a designated milestone level, please post here to share your experience if it differs from ours. Rob

And the operative words here, and in the past, have always been “subject to change at our discretion”, or some such legalese. Sloppy proofreading and/or marketing not vetting this appropriately. Rob

Update: we have two cruises booked later this year. Final payments are due over the next few weeks. There remain inconsistencies in the milestone award descriptions in the attachment that was provided to Keith and posted here on 4/22. We will achieve milestone levels on both cruises that award us with per-person "as-you-wish-credit" OR "cruise fare savings". We instructed our TA to request the "cruise fare savings" to our final invoices applicable to the two cruises that we will achieve corresponding our milestone award levels. Our TA and her consortium had a lengthy conference call with the appropriate decision-makers at NC this morning. Our TA was informed, and this is a more-or-less accurate transcript of the call, that "at this time, Crystal can only offer the noted milestone as-you-wish-credit as onboard credits and cannot apply these milestone benefits as cruise fare savings." Our TA was informed that a subsequent Crystal Society Benefits brochure will be distributed that clarifies this "apparent confusing milestone benefit description". The onboard, milestone as-you-wish-credits cannot be redeemed for cash nor can be refunded/transferred to another future cruise once applied, even if the total amount is not utilized on the sailing to which it is applied. We would have preferred our accrued milestone awards be deducted as cruise fare savings, but that does not appear to be an option at this time. We have accepted the onboard as-you-wish-credits. Rob

We found it nigh impossible to get reservations in either Umi Uma or the Italian specialty restaurant for our "included" second reservations (it was longer cruise where the 2nd reservation must be booked onboard), as well as any additional reservations as part of our 50+ milestone perk. Reservations in Tastes was never a problem. The Serenity was a nearly full-up sailing. Perhaps the situation has improved since January. For our next sailing, we will enjoy our pre-booked first reservations and really not expect to be able to dine again for a 2nd (or 3rd...) time in either specialty restaurant. Our expectations have been lowered. Fortunately, every meal in Waterside was excellent, so we certainly never felt deprived of a fine dining experience. Rob

Yes. We can attest to this 50 cruise perk. However, the operative word is “if available”. We found it challenging, if not downright impossible to get additional reservations beyond our pre-reserved online reservations on close-to-capacity sailings. Rob

If you change your mind once onboard, you can always rebook onboard if there are still open spots on your selected tour. And waitlists generally clear if your tour shows sold out once onboard.

You cannot find this information until you are onboard. It is not available in advance. Once onboard, there will be a printed copy of all available excursions in your cabin. On that printed copy, it will list the cancellation terms. Printed vouchers of your booked excursions should also be in your cabin once you board; the cancellation terms will also be printed on the vouchers. As a general rule, but it varies, excursions are usually cancellable without penalty 48-72 hours +/- prior. Some excursions have lengthier cancellation dates, but those are generally indicated when they are initially booked. I printed a copy of a sample excursion form from our January cruises on CC a while back, but I can't seem to remember/find what post I attached it to. If I find it, I will post it again. Rob

Thank you, Terry. The "current" PDF is rife with typos and outdated references. It's obvious that it's just the old society brochure from 2019 with some, but not all, references to the pre-A&K ownership updated and edited. Appreciate the PDF version; thank you for posting it here. Rob

Examples for contemplation: 1. Once you have completed your 25th cruise on OC or NC, you would be eligible for the $5000 credit upon booking your 26th cruise with NC. 2. Once you have completed your 50th cruise on OC or NC, you would be eligible for the $5000 credit upon booking your 51st cruise with NC. 3. This $5000 credit also applies at the 70th cruise milestone level. Once you have completed your 70th cruise, whether with OC, or a combination of OC and NC, the $5000 credit would be applied to your 71st cruise with NC. Milestone benefits are not retroactive if you have already passed these milestone levels on OC. This is our understanding from our TA who has been in contact with Crystal. Rob

I agree. I do not subscribe to Facebook either. Rhetorical question: why is this not on Crystal's website? That was the first place I searched. (Maybe it will show up there eventually....🤣🤔😆 Rob