Dining Options

[getupgo]

I haven't sailed RCI in 5 years once I discovered Carnival's Your Time Dining and Freestyle with NCL. I cannot ever go back to assigned dining agsin. Now, I have heard that RCI offers a similar program. Is that true? Vision of the Sea has some itineraries out of Tampa that I'm interested in if they are offering an Anytime Dining option.

[joepeka]

RCI's program is called My Time Dining and if you're familiar with Carnival's, it works the same way. You can, with Royal (don't remember if CCL supports this), make advance MTD reservations or just show up each night whenever it's convenient. Oh one thing with Royal (and again, maybe CCL does it this way now but I know they did not last time we sailed Carnival) you have to pay the gratuities at the time of final payment - they don't add it to your onboard account and there's no other option if you select MTD for your dining. Some people like that (it gets a cruise expense out of the way before departure) and some don't.

Edited April 2, 2015 by joepeka

[cb at sea]

ALL of the cruise lines (mass market, anyway), now have Your Time, or Anytime...whatever you want to call it!

[dplusd]

MTD on Royal is very well run. You can make reservations in advance on the website, or daily while on board, or not at all. Wait times are generally not long and they make every attempt to seat you in the same area and wait staff each night.