1982CruzStart

I think the key is the word "collected". You may put your laundry out before 9 am but if the cabin attendants don't actually collect it until after 9 am, the guarantee to be back by 9 pm doesn't apply.

Thank you FlyerTalker. Those are all great suggestions and advice. I was hoping you would add your 2 cents based on the limited information you were given. You and some others on this forum always have such valuable information. Now TheShag needs to do further research on the airline websites to determine if there are any J fare seats available on the routing options that they prefer. Regent has told their passengers that if they wish to deviate they need to look for routings where lowest or non-refundable business class fares are available. There is no way to really know who they have contracted with until you talk to them and now when you deviate they charge $75pp everytime you talk to them after the initial deviation call. You really need to know your preferences and as many specific flight routings that you are willing to accept before you make that initial call.

TheShag, I am surprised you are not getting as much detailed help as i have seen these wonderful posters give others in the past. I did a quick look at ITA matrix and then onto the individual airline websites and based on a very brief look i found AC and EVA flights that might work for you on the dates you stated. I know Regent uses AC at times because i have flown with them to and from Regent cruises, most recently in Jan/Feb 2023. Not sure about EVA but it is worth checking the options out. Spend some time doing some research based on what advice you have been given so far. Good luck.

Thank you for the review.

theShag. I see you already posted on CC Cruise Air. Though the responses have been not as detailed as i have seen in the past you may yet get some detailed answers. RSSC doesn't necessarily book the cheapest itinerary, they do book the routing on airlines they have contracts with have availability at the lowest BC fare.

TheShag, I recommend you visit the Cruise Critic Cruise Air forum. The people there are experts in flight information. If you post the dates you want to arrive and depart, the City of departure at both ends of the cruise and if you have any airline preferences, they generally give you very detailed information. Make sure to mention that you want flights where non-refundable or lowest Business class fares are available. I have found them to be very helpful and if you provide them with all the pertinent details you will be surprised how much info you get. Though most of them are very helpful they can have a bite with their responses so read them with a thick skin. It may not happen if you give all the important info upfront. Some tend to get frustrated with people who ask for help but don't give them enough to work with. Once you have the information to approach Regent make sure you have your airline loyalty #'s, if applicable and what seat assignments you want. Some airlines let you control your seat selection as soon as you agree to the deviation and others don't. You don't want to potentially pay $75pp to pick your seats if you find out the airline won't let you do it online and then have to contact Regent. AC is notorious for this. My experience with Regent is we never get assigned our seats of choice automatically. As far as what is reasonable, only you can answer that. Are you willing to accept mutiple stopovers or do you want the most direct route and willing to pay for it. We have never paid an upcharge and if we don't get what we originally request then we have found something that works for us. I have never flown that routing so can't be helpful with your specific request but think a visit to CC Cruise Air forum maybe invaluable. Good luck.

We were able to book our classes for our August 2024 Grandeur cruise already. We picked a 10 am class as we will consider it lunch. We didn't want to miss out on dinner by doing the 4 pm class. We just wouldn't have been able to eat between 4 and 6 and then go for dinner. We don't like to eat late. This will be my first culinary class on Regent. We have only been on Explorer once and by the time i looked for that cruise all the options i liked were already sold out. All our cruises have been on Voyager except that one. My DH even agreed to come and cook. That shocked me. Should be fun.

On our recent Regent cruise on the laundry form where it says special instructions or something to that effect, i would ask for specfic items to be hung to dry or washed in cold water. When the laundry came back i didn't have any issues. they seemed to honor my requests. On anything i am really concerned about i pay for dry cleaning. Overall i was thankful for the included laundry. I feel it is the best perk. When we turned gold we got 1 laundry bag per week included. They gave us a $100 per cabin OBC when it went universal. Some people complained but i was so grateful that it went universal and unlimited in quantity. To me this was way more valuable than missing out on 1 perk for being gold.

For our Jan 29,2023 cruise we didn't receive our documents until Jan 7th. Now we tend to be a bit later as our documents come via our TA in the southern US to a smaller city in the interior of BC, Canada so that adds a day or 2 to the courier process.

Rachel, what beautiful pictures. Thank you so much. As always I am enjoying your reports.

I suggest you call them.

Go to 'find a cruise' and find the specfic cruise that you are wondering about. Scroll down past the itinenerary info and the pricing area and just below it there will be a line that tells you what the air credit is if you chose to do your own air. Example A savings of up to CA$5,050 per person is available when arranging your own flights and transfers. Ignore the CA as i book through the Canadian website so hence it gives me everything in CAD. On the US site i am sure it will just give a $ amount.

i believe this has changed from midnight to an afternoon time. I think 5 pm est but i am not sure and i can't put my fingers on the email right now. There was a thread that discussed this so if you do a search on this forum you should be able to find it. I am sure someone out there will give you the exact time. It was great for those of us on the west coast cuz we were able to book at 9pm the day before. No staying up late at night. I think Regent changed to make it more "fair", whatever that means.

I looked through some possible shore excursions for our 2024 Grandeur cruise and thought the offerings below were different than what i had seen before and might be of interest as a trend to doing more inventive tours on Regent. These are just a small example of what i think are out of the box from the regular bus and walking tours. SALINAS CHICLANA ENVIRONMENTAL RESOURCE HIGHLIGHTS Visit a protected coastal reserve for birds that was once a salt works . Gain insight into how the wetland was transformed into a more eco-friendly habitat . Discover how fish are raised and collected there using a traditional, sustainable method . Sample a selection of local wines after touring an environmental resource center . DESERTIFICATION PROJECT, SOIL RECOVERY HIGHLIGHTS See how desertification is being reversed through sustainable agriculture at Danyadara . Discover how the farm promotes better water usage and helps to retain carbon in the soil . Become inspired by Danyadara’s hopeful environmental messages . FENWAY PARK & PUB CRAWL HIGHLIGHTS Take an insider’s tour of Fenway Park, the oldest baseball park in America. See iconic features of the park such as the Green Monster and Pesky’s Pole. Stop for a drink in as many as four pubs in neighborhoods surrounding Fenway Park. BOSTON & VIP GAME-DAY FENWAY TOUR HIGHLIGHTS • Enjoy a panoramic driving tour through Boston as a prelude to your time at Fenway Park. • See areas of Fenway Park that are only shown on private VIP tours. • Observe America’s oldest baseball park as it is being prepared for a game.

We would do 2 tours in one day if possible because the destination is more important than the ship experience for me. We had the opportunity to do 2 on our last cruise and it worked our great as the morning tour was mostly on the bus and the afternoon one was a walking tour. Got to see more of the port and area than if we had just done 1 tour even an all day one.

Thanks Rachel for bringing us along. Always a great read. Loving the pictures as well. Have a wonderful time.

You don't know who Regent contracts with but before contacting them you check what options you have from your gateway. For instance if you like to fly Delta and your gateway is a Delta hub there is a good chance that Regent has a contract with them. If you go into Delta's website and put in your routing and your dates and options come up. Click on Delta One suites fare (their business class) and if there are 2 fares available both Delta One suite - 1 fully refundable and the other not then there is a good chance that there are seats available with Regent if they do indeed contract with them on that route. So when Regent says if the lowest fare isn't available don't ask for that flight, they are saying if you click on the business class fare and there is only fully refundable fares available don't expect to fly that route. For Air Canada their 2 business class fare classses are Lowest and Flexible. If i check on a proposed flight i want and there is no Lowest available then i can forget about taking that flight with Regent. When i call Regent i usually have a couple of airline options that i have checked to see if there is a lowest business class fare available on the route and dates i want. That way i will usualy get one of my choices. When flying to Europe i usually check AC, BA and KLM routing and fare classes.

It does seem that at most ports the timing of the excursions are such that you can't take a morning and afternoon excursion. I think in the cruises we have taken there has been only 1 instance where we could book 2 excursions in one day. The morning one always seemed to be 15 minutes short of meeting the minimum. Just a coincidence i am sure.

They are suggesting you check airline websites or sites like ITAmatrix or google flights that give you lots of options for routes and if it is not on any site at the lowest business class fare, don't ask for it as you won't get it.

I am not impressed with this change. Yes, it is nothing in the big scheme of things of paying 10's of thousands of dollars but that really isn't the point. We always deviate, never had a problem with paying the $175 or for us the $225 per person to get the flights that we want. We always pay to fly in a day or 2 before the cruise and sometimes for staying a day or 2 after. No problem happy to pay for the ability to get something close to what we want. For us on the west coast of Canada there is no way we could get anywhere near business class flights for the credit we get from Regent. It is one of the MAJOR reasons we tried Regent out the first time and have mostly stuck with them. However i do have a problem if i have to pay every time i need to call them to correct their screwups on our flights. For our last cruise, Jan 2023, the flight schedule was an ongoing exercise if patience. If i had to pay $75 ( probably $100 for us)pp every time i called to fix their screwups it would have added 100's of dollars to my cruise. I accepted the flights, paid the deviation, had many schedule changes (not their fault), some of which made absolutely no sense, continuously tried to correct screwed up seat assignments and ended up with flights that were not what we paid the deviation for. Now i get to pay for the privilege of fixing their issues. I do extensive research before i contact Regent Air to make sure the process is as painless for me and the Regent Air rep as possible. I always have a couple of options and to the best of my ability my preferred seats. I have never failed to have to call them to fix seat assignments that they didn't want to deal with at the time i was making the arrangements with them. Now i would have to pay for that? After our last cruise we are questioning continuing with Regent and this may be the teeny tiny straw that broke that back. It is not the fee itself, it is the direction that Regent seems to be headed. We have Grandeur booked ofr 2024, will pay to deviate and hope that we con't have to pay extra fees just to get what we want.

If memory serves, and it may not be right, they served a smoothie in CR and room service that contained ginger. Hopefully someone onboard will be able to check and let you know.

Thank you for adding 'Madeira', i knew i was missing something. Can't believe i left it off as i love a glass of Madeira. The sauce was so delicious i could have just had a bowl of it.

On our Voyager cruise in January we got both the electronic version and the in-person muster drill. We had to watch before we left home and when we arrived onboard as well as take our lifejackets, go to our muster stations, put them on and walk to our lifeboats. Not a big deal to me. Better safe than sorry. The problem with watching the video in the suite is that you can play it but not pay attention to it and it fulfills the requirement.

Personally i would buy through Westjet especially with such a small cost difference. We had some interesting(bad) experiences with codeshare flights when we didn't book with the operating airline.

In CR, the truffle sauce with either the filet mignon or the veal medallions. excellent.