Starry Eyes

It is still one per couple. DH has been eight points ahead of me for years, so he tends to hit milestones 1 cruise sooner. The blocks consistently arrive on his milestone cruises and not mine.

I remember those days. Tongue in cheek: perhaps Royal simply needs to eliminate the chairs. People could stand at bar height tables to eat the snacks and mingle. No more actual lounging in the lounge😉😉

When my bids have won, the wins have come relatively close to sailing date (mostly within a week), and I have seen a lot of other people report wins close to sailing date (That makes sense if the cruiseline is hoping someone will book those cabins for full price). Certainly some wins are reported further out. Theoretically you could win shortly after submitting you bid. If you win, you will receive an actual cabin number. A few people have reported success calling and trading to another available cabin in the exact same category as the one RoyalUp assigned….but when I have received my winning bid assignments, no other cabins in those categories were available..and that seems quite common (RoyalUp wins often done close to sail date and many/all the upgrade in a certain category may be done at once, so all those cabins may suddenly disappear)

Why are you using 2nd quarter numbers rather than 3rd quarter numbers?

One of your bids (GS in your case) is “spotlighted” in the bigger box. You can modify or cancel that one. To switch to one of the other bids below, click on the stateroom name (Junior Suite, for example). Your JS bid will move to the that spotlighted position at the top where you can modify or cancel it. Your GS bid will be rotate to the bottom while you work on JS.

Of all the cut backs, a bag of chips is the least of my concerns. There are loads of chips, cheap chips and fancy chips, in grocery stores and delis near home. If you cannot live without bags of chips, pack some. I do not care a bit about bags of chips. I do care about the quality of the cooked food and the service in the restaurant.

Yes, you can bid when your gty cabin has not been assigned. Fair warning: Sometimes when your cabin is assigned, your bids will be cancelled, even if you were not assigned an upgraded cabin. If this happens, you can bid again. There is a chance the bidding ranges may have changed (up or down) since you originally bid. Sometimes your re-bids are cancelled again until the system settles. If your bids are cancelled, sometimes you receive more bidding options when your cabin is assigned.

Remember that most ships are sailing very full, so there generally are few upgrades available ( the occasional unsold cabin plus the occasional cancellation). Also remember there many people on your sailing offered the chance to bid for upgrades. Combining those two facts, on many cruises your odds of an upgrade, even with a decent bid, are not especially high. Don’t get your hopes up, particularly if you see few upgrade cabins available when you do a mock booking on your sailing. Also remember you can be assigned any cabin in that category. Once you win, you cannot decline the upgraded cabin you are assigned (and often there any not others left to trade into); you cannot go back to your old cabin. So, before you bid, look at the deck plans and be sure you will be happy in any cabin in the category before you bid. Do not just look at available cabins: someone might cancel or change categories vacating a currently occupied cabin. Personally, I initially try to ignore Royal’s bidding ranges and suggestions. Instead I try to decide how much the upgrade would be worth to me and mine: how much is the pleasure of that upgrade worth to us on that particular cruise. Sometimes the value I conjure is lower than the minimum bid; I do not bid on that category. If my personal value is higher, that’s what I bid, and theoretically I’d go to the max bid.

OK, enough of the Wonder cruisers will pull out of the garage for new ones to park😉

LOL, Ozzie26’s post did make me think about why they directed him and other Indy cruisers yesterday to a surface lot. The port authority must want the first Allure cruisers to have a shot at some decent spots in the T1 garage. Those first Allure cruisers can then hand off the spots to future Allure cruisers. Another possible reason: As they charge for both day of arrival and departure, the Port Authority makes a bit more money off the people parking for short cruises than for longer cruises. They should try to keep them happy if they can.

I know you are flexible. The port authority may feel there are fewer accidents and fewer complaints if vehicles from Wonder are interspersed with those from Allure rather than Wonder having most of the spots in lower part of the ramp and Allure most of the upper spots. The latter might tend to have happened current Indy cruiser were parked in the ramp and left on 10/27. Wonder 10/29 cruisers would have been the next embarkation. Just a guess.

It sounds like the Independence cruisers were sent to open lots so spaces for Allure cruisers would be available in the garage. The port authority probably thought that was better in the long term since Allure is replacing Indy. The Allure to Indy change should not impact you substantially if you are arriving before 10:30. I’m sailing Wonder Nov 5 and I am not worried. There are plenty of people on the current sailing of Wonder parked in the garage. They will pull out of the garage that morning, leaving open spaces for you and I.

A porter once told me the cruiselines sometimes ties Pom-poms to damaged bags😉🤣

Yeah, but that does not necessarily stop “stupid” you thinks, “Oh, my bag must have been damaged so, someone put duct tape on it.” It is really hard to stop stupid. A few years ago we were on a 9:30 shared shuttle with an extended family that arrived at FLL at 5:30am on a red eye and claimed their luggage. They sat in the airport with the luggage for 4 hours until their scheduled shuttle. Half way to POM, a phone rings. A woman is told by the airline she has the wrong bag. “Impossible, I picked my bag because it is an unusual color. Plus I have a distinctive luggage tag,” she says. The airline says they have her bag and another passenger looking for a similar bag. Our shuttle returns to the airport. The woman acts indignant. Turns out she just purchased the bag at a major retailer with that “distinctive tag” attached to every one of them. There are lots of bags like hers.

Will your next set of luggage have a scale pattern? The airline baggage handlers can probably add gill openings.🤣

https://www.portcanaveral.com/PortCanaveral/media/Communications/2023/CPA-Website-Schedule-Aug-Jan-2024.pdf

I just realized it’s probably Radiance and Feb was mentioned. As mentioned by the PP, MTD reservations won’t begin until 6:45. Those early reservations times were probably already snapped up by others months ago. Now that your cruise is only a few months away, the pre-cruise reservation options for a party of 10 in MTD are probably very limited and maybe later than late traditional dining. If you stand in the no reservations MTD line, it would be tough to get a table for ten. I think you are better off staying in traditional dining.

What ship and cruise date?

The incident occurred in Cape Canaveral. I’m not an expert, but I think that is the jurisdiction if the belongings are not returned. Hopefully the errant passengers will do the right thing and return the luggage they took to its owners. If not, the OP’s sister could try to file a police report. She could send a demand letter if she has the name and address. The couple would probably rather pay the mailing fee than deal with a lawsuit in Florida. Basically though, I think the OP and her sister need to concentrate their efforts on the people who actually took the luggage rather than blame the porter or Royal Caribbean.

OK, though when we do something stupid we may need to pay a “stupid tax.” This time the “stupid tax” is the time and cost of shipping luggage to rightful owners. The “stupid tax” is higher if “stupid” does not buy insurance and that luggage is lost or damaged in shipping.

You are not alone and I’m glad you are able to enjoy traveling extensively. I am glad that you have found another line that is taking you to new ports in a style you enjoy and can afford. I do tend to wonder, though, if your perception of Royal’s deficiencies (I am not denying deficiencies, LOL) is more acute because you have recently taken so many more and longer cruises. Almost a “familiarity breeds contempt” situation. Plus occasional or young cruisers might be more apt enjoy an over enthusiastic CD, the belly flop contest, the on board sales, art auction, etc that a mature, highly experienced cruiser might not.

OK I looked at your signature. I note a substantial increase in the number of Royal Caribbean cruises per year (roughly 4-6 per year in 2011-2019; about 10-13 per year in 2022-2023).

Anything is possible, though if one enters 3 guests there are still cabins available in several categories, including a fair number of 3D balconies. It must be harder to sell them, though, when your lead page says “sold out.” 🤔

It was the passenger’s fault. The rest is nonsense. Maybe the old lady is confused; more likely she is just shifting the blame. After all, if ribbons marked damaged bags, shouldn’t she have stopped and checked her ribbon-bearing bags for damage before leaving Port Canaveral. If she had, she would have found, no damage and someone else’s tags.

That passenger took other people’s property. She’d better promptly return that property, at her expense, before she is charged with theft.