rolloman

The discount if applicable to your sailing results in a less than minimal savings... more than likely about 50 bucks, lol...probably not worth fretting over....play in the casino...that is where your real savings can occur once you become prime.

19 minutes ago, sgmn said:

True, but we prefer to look around a town or city rather than lie on a beach, but sometimes a beach day hits the spot.  Everyone's different. 🤷‍♀️

 

My original response was to a poster who said private islands was the future of cruising, my response was that there's a lot more to cruising than beaches and private islands such as interesting ports and history of an area.  In Europe as far as I know there are no cruise line private islands. 

For instance in Mykonos we'll catch the ferry over to Delos and explore the ruins. Back to Mykonos, explore the town and choose a taverna for a beer and souvlaki. Our choice, it's not for everyone.

 

Two places in The Americas 🌎 I would like to visit more extensively after having a taster on a cruise is Maine and The Maritimes 

 

The topic is about Coco Cay...a private island in the Bahamas...my response was about Coco Cay and private Islands in the Bahamas...somehow you want to twist it into Europe. The future of cruising the Bahamas and or the Caribbean is private islands ...is that better? Every cruise line has essentially doubled/enhanced their private island portfolio the past few years. 

It is a pure beach day and travelers who do not live near a beach will go as often as they can. RCCL gets all the revenue from this stop so it will always be part of future itineraries.  This private island thing is picking up steam with most lines now having at least two!  For example: Carnival has Princess Cay, Half Moon Cay, Disney- Castaway Cay and Lighthouse Cay, Royal-Labadee, Coco Cay, NCL- Great Stirrup Cay, Harvast Caye. This is the future of cruising...whether we like it or not. 

Do you have a friend who can bring an extra bottle onboard? You don't state how many bottles you need?  If you need 3, just have someone in your large party bring the extra bottle. Heck just bring the third bottle and make friends standing in the check in line. If you are looking for a money saver deal, they give out free bottles at Next Cruise. There are a few ways you could take advantage of that. Of course, if money is no object, the ship will be more than happy to sell you the headache in a bottle version they offer at an overly inflated price.

On 9/26/2022 at 11:18 PM, rudeney said:

 

Yep.  I live in a very large subdivision and we have a neighborhood bourbon club with over 30 members.  Several distributors have come to us to present their products and that's exactly what they said - plenty of booze, not enough bottles.  The main issue is that the bottles come from China.  The brands that source bottles from other countries (such as in the USA for bourbon) are doing better, but still challenged with a lack of trucks to deliver.   

Yes...Buffalo Trace is almost impossible to get in Florida. I say if it is a bottle issue...well time to do like they did back in the day with pop bottles...pay a return deposit for each bottle. 

I too have been eating conch in the Bahamas for 20+ years...no issues. I have tried it every way you possibly can. I enjoy conch salad the best vs. fried conch but would eat the conch strips over the hush puppy version. I would not waste my time eating it in Florida (except the Keys) as it is usually frozen and tastes like crap. Long story short, it is a Bahamian thing...and worth a try eating it fresh...however don't blame me if you wind up with some kind of colon blowout...

II order a martini straight up versus a shot on the rocks... this assures me of a better pour.

You sit in a chair and they massage your shoulders for about 5 minutes. They tell you how tense you are and advise you to book a full massage with them immediately. 

On 4/7/2023 at 11:38 AM, AlabamaFootball said:

For future reference... just spend onboard and charge to your mastercard for 2x points.  You get more bang for your buck paying off your cruise charges using points than you do using points to pre-buy on board credit.....   

another side hustle...  charge say $2,000 to your card at a slot...  play once(maybe you win)  cash out for the $1999ish.    let your MC settle your bill, and that $2000 is worth 4000 points.   4000 points pays off $40 of your MC Statement.

Now say you have a $25,000 limit....   Just saying!!!!

As I mentioned before...onboard purchases billed to your mastercard have not been providing double points...probably because people trying to game the system just as

 you described....

I am extremely happy with my PVP and consider her a reason I choose Carnival. I have peace of mind knowing I am being taken care of. She always responds to my email or phone message immediately or within an hour.  If Carnival did away with the PVP...I will be done with Carnival. Just an FYI, I am not happy Carnival recently pulled a dirty trick by not allowing Guests to hold a room online and then call their PVP to iron discuss and iron out a booking. 

If there is a show...I have a balcony seat. When there is no show, I have never had a problem. For the record, I book this type of cabin (as close to the stage as I can) every chance I get.

I was in 6160 and it does have a davit to the left but other than that the view is perfect. Even better is the location, especially if you are Diamond because the lounge is right below you. I heard no noise the entire 8 night cruise. Someone posted a nice you tube video of this room if you want to check it out. 

Pretty simple I would think...What does your itinerary say? If it says NY...you are scheduled for NY if it says NJ then you are scheduled for NJ.

From what I understand there is just one new particular offer which recently came out. It is for one person in a cabin only. I have heard nothing about sweeping changes to mirror this particular offer. IMO offers come and go and this is just something different. 

34 minutes ago, topnole said:

Apparently I’m not the one that thinks I’m special.  I don’t get too fussy about food and I’m not in the camp that the food is inedible.  But I also don’t think folks shouldn’t complain just because we have folks in the Navy.  Weird analogy to suggest people complaining about the quality of the food should just be grateful to cruise because others serve in the Navy.  Like I said, by that logic,

no one should complain about much of anything, ever.   I always thought the folks in the military fought to protect our freedom of speech (in this case

to complain about food).  Shouldn’t we celebrate the rights of those to complain versus telling them they should be grateful to those in the Navy?  

You don't get too fussy about food but you are reading and posting multiple times on a fussy food thread??? Lighten up about the Navy...he is just proud to be a Sailor and made a comment about food and how it equates to the food onboard a warship. Sorry you took it so literally. 

1 minute ago, jencruzin said:

He said he was in CR division, comms. He was in one of the ship's bands and played on the flight deck. That's pretty cool you guys were on there at the same time. He wrote a book about it.

Steel beach...We had the best steaks on those few and far between down days...way better than Chops!!! If he has the book from the 82 Lebanon deployment, I can be found in a picture on page 457 showing my ID to the master at arms to collect my allotted 2 cans of beer for being at sea over 100 days. Hopefully he has the book...lots of photos of the bands in there as well.

43 minutes ago, jencruzin said:

DH asks when were you on FID? He was on 81-83.

I was on during that time frame as well...IC E-Div

1 hour ago, jencruzin said:

Hubby, on cruise food (he takes over keyboard here, he's off today too):

 

On Cruise ship food:

It's better than US Navy dining. Be fortunate that you can all go on these cruises; bless the food you dine on whilst sailing on those big party boats, but stop and think about the people who are helping to keep those sea lanes open so you can bellyache about cruise ship food. Wonder what THEY'RE having for dinner?

 

 

Let's not get carried away... the food on the FID after a REPO was on occasion spectacular... however it was not worth waiting in the two hour long line extending up into the Hangar Bay!  Quite honestly the fwd mess burger blows away any cruise ship burger I have ever ate. Maybe because it had real cheese. 

1 hour ago, Kathscof said:

Well, the fact that the same dish was good once and bad the other time makes me hope it was the action of someone (the chef, the staff leaving it out too long, etc) instead of the "badness" of the ingredients and they can train that instead of continuing to buy "bad" food 🙂 

I am hard to shock these days but one thing I noticed on my recent Odyssey of the Seas voyage...they replaced real cheddar cheese with some kind of flimsy orange fake cheese (similar to the old Kraft American plastic wrapped slices) Beyond bad...What is hilarious is there is someone out there eating it and saying OMG...this is so tasty lol....

8 hours ago, NaplesGoBlue said:

Okay, you made some valid points, but this statement is absolutely comical.  You're saying that every chef and kitchen team has the exact same ingredients and exact same menus, so they should all essentially produce the exact same results?  How about we put the line cook at your local Waffle House in the exact same kitchen against Chef Bobby Flay, and give them the exact same ingredients to make the exact same dish -- let's say Chicken Parm....  You're telling me your expectation is that those two plates would result in indistinguishable dishes???  LOL.  That's like saying every pitcher in baseball uses the same official weight/size ball and throws from the exact same distance to home plate at 60' - 6".  So, the performance results of a high school pitcher should be the same as Justin Verlander, based on the fact that all data points (other than the actual personnel) are constants. Yeah, okay.   

Again, he said the food will get better and I said it will not. The current condensed menu, using the current recipe, in the MDR is the same fleetwide. For sure, if someone forgets to add one of the ingredients, such as salt, that particular night the same entree served fleet wide will be worse than usual. But at its peak, it will still be subpar compared to say 10+ years ago. Smaller portions, limited options, stressed out service.

4 minutes ago, Denversail said:

That is like saying food taste the same regardless of who is eating it.

Exactly right...the food is the same regardless of who is eating it... some people like a bologna sandwich and think they are great. Others prefer a more upscale dinner of which they have paid a premium for. Pay attention to what he said, he said the food will get better as he blamed it on the preparer. Which is delusional thinking as the preparer has the same menu and ingredients as any other chef onboard. It is what it is...the food will not get better unless the price goes up. It is the new standard until it is not. FACT

5 hours ago, Ret MP said:

Decent review with a little positive along with the negatives.  Good job.

 

Cruise on her again in a few weeks/couple of months and the culinary staff/team will probably have changed and the food MAY be the best you've ever had on a cruise line, MAYBE!  It's the people, not the ship that prepares and presents food.  And the food providers/sources/distributors may change as well.  

 

We'll be on her in January and hope we have the good culinary staff/team and suppliers.  

 

 

Delusional. The ingredients are the same, regardless of who prepares it. The food in the main dining room has taken a steep dive. You are not helping the situation by claiming it is an anomaly.  Soon there will be no such thing as a free main dining room. Thanks in part to posts like yours. 

On 3/24/2023 at 10:26 PM, Wendylet said:

Planning a trip at some point on the Wonder and we are gifting this trip to our two daughters, their husbands and their children and ourselves. I have one unenthusiastic son in law who flat out says he has no interest in a cruise…..even though it is free for him. I want to rap him upside the head!

One thing is for certain, you need to be careful asking questions on this site. As you have found out, doing so is a recipe for getting interrogated, Psycho-analyzed and berated. Now, in my opinion, your son-in-law probably has other reasons for not wanting to cruise, maybe he is afraid of being at sea...who knows, I would not look at it as a slight...in reality all you really want to do is spend time with the Grandkids so just take them and not force the issue. The fact that it is free basically means nothing...let's face it, there are a lot of things in this world you nor anyone else would care to partake in even though it may be free. Example-skydiving. Unless my life depended on it...not going to happen, no matter how hard you try to sell me on the idea.  Bottom line, trying to wear an ill-fitting shoe will only cause painful blisters. 

2 hours ago, mcatmcat said:

Hi 

I want to surprise my gf with a Swedish massage. I was wondering if it’s better to book before boarding the should or should I wait for better deals onboard if they are any. I’m diamond, idk if that makes a difference for pieces 

Thanks …

The best deal is to go to the sail away raffle in the Spa ...in the event you do not win a treatment, they always give everyone who attends a special offer...something like 3 treatments for $125.00...the spa team can be found throughout the ship (outside the buffet is common) and you can get a raffle ticket and discuss with them. Good luck!

3 hours ago, smokeybandit said:

 

And NCL seemingly screws up with every decision they make and are still struggling to fill ships.

Meanwhile RC is packed to the gills.

Not sure why you are going out of your way to be snotty. I am not an NCL fan... their history is to start trends...some of them have worked (drink package) some have not. Whether you like it or not, the future scenario I provided (elimination of MDR as we know it) is coming to life. You want that extra dish or another lobster...you now pay for it. You want room service... you pay for it.  Just like we were groomed for specialty restaurants, we are now being groomed for "self-serve buffet... or you are going to have to pay".