Repeat Cruiser - Same old same old blues.

[DonnaK]

DonnaK - going back to your earlier post about canceling a cruise out of SJU because of high airfare, did you look at JetBlue?

 

From Lawnnng Island, shouldn't be bad.

 

 

It's been around $575 per person round trip on Jet Blue, up until the time we cancelled the cruise in the spring and rebooked on Caribbean Princess because no air needed. (I just checked - for 8/17 JFK to SJU, returning on 8/24, it's $583 in Jet Blue and $608 on American - cheapest nonstops that work with embarkation and disembarkation times).

 

We had gotten a great deal on AOS ($747 for balcony, and $549 for promenade) so for our family of four, the airfare really was almost as much as the cruise fare.

[Merion_Mom]

For me its not about the fixed entertainment. Its about the repeat jokes, game show questions, trivia questions,top 10 questions, etc. How hard could it be for a "professional" entertainer to come up with some new jokes or questions.

 

True story:

 

I forget which ship.

 

It's the last night.

 

Farewell show in the theatre.

 

Theatre has two large screens, one on each side of the stage.

 

They show the cruise-in-review video.

 

CD comes out on stage.

 

Launches into the "10 strangest/funniest questions asked by passengers" routine.

 

Looks to the screen for the 10.

 

Screens are blank.

 

He starts to falter after about #6.

 

I call out the rest.

 

:D :D :D :D

 

CD grateful. ;)

[The Big Booper]

It's been around $575 per person round trip on Jet Blue, up until the time we cancelled the cruise in the spring and rebooked on Caribbean Princess because no air needed. (I just checked - for 8/17 JFK to SJU, returning on 8/24, it's $583 in Jet Blue and $608 on American - cheapest nonstops that work with embarkation and disembarkation times).

 

We had gotten a great deal on AOS ($747 for balcony, and $549 for promenade) so for our family of four, the airfare really was almost as much as the cruise fare.

 

Yes, JetBlue ratchets them up on weekends. With our flexability, we avoid that and pay less than half.

 

And it looks like RCI still has trouble selling the AOS to mainlanders, what with the high airfares.

[DonnaK]

Yes, JetBlue ratchets them up on weekends. With our flexability, we avoid that and pay less than half.

 

And it looks like RCI still has trouble selling the AOS to mainlanders, what with the high airfares.

 

Those cruise fares were available when they first opened up, about 18 months or so ahead of the sailing date. Now they are substantially higher. We can only cruise the last two weeks of August, due to school and work schedules, so while cruisefares are traditionally low, the airfares run high due to Labor Day weekend "holiday pricing".

[critterchick]

Funny, I was just conversing with a friend last night about what constitutes "boring." To her it's reading and relaxing. To me it's the same old belly flop, sexy legs and other activities offered on every ship. But we do agree that drinking is essential.:D

 

I sail for the itinerary and service. If the entertainment is good, that's gravy. If not, or if I've seen it before, I can happily skip it and do something else. I don't have any trouble making my own fun.:)

[Puffinater]

True story:

 

 

Launches into the "10 strangest/funniest questions asked by passengers" routine.

 

Looks to the screen for the 10.

 

Screens are blank.

 

He starts to falter after about #6.

 

I call out the rest.

 

:D :D :D :D

 

CD grateful. ;)

 

So how long is that electrical cable?

 

New material please!!!

[pmc7704]

Sometimes all it takes is a slight variation in the game to make it new and more fun. For example, my DH always plays in the golf putting contest. On one of our cruises ( don't remember which one ) they made it a roaming putting contest. The first round was in the centrum, but for the next round, they picked up the green and moved to a different part of the ship. Every round was moved to a different location on the ship, We wound up putting uphill, downhill, in the dining room, etc, and it was a BLAST !! That's all it took to make the golf putting contest a huge success and loads of fun.

[theotherchad]

Sometimes all it takes is a slight variation in the game to make it new and more fun. For example, my DH always plays in the golf putting contest. On one of our cruises ( don't remember which one ) they made it a roaming putting contest. The first round was in the centrum, but for the next round, they picked up the green and moved to a different part of the ship. Every round was moved to a different location on the ship, We wound up putting uphill, downhill, in the dining room, etc, and it was a BLAST !! That's all it took to make the golf putting contest a huge success and loads of fun.

 

See, now that's what I'm talking about! I'm pretty sure that this sort of variety is within the power of the CD to do, if they have the imagination.

 

As far as the food, I'm happy with what they have, and they have come out with two new dinner menus in the last year, and depending on the ship, there are some new things on the snacking menu at the Promenade Cafe (on ships with a promenade).

 

But somebody really does need to rewrite the standard CD jokes which you hear from just about every CD on every ship (based on my experience plus what I hear from others).

[negc]

It is the same story with the menu and how people complain about the same menu.

 

I counter that with the question: how often do Restaurants revamp their menu. They may add a thing and take a thing away once in a while (just like cruise lines) but how often do you see a new menu.

 

In regards to entertainment: how often do change fixed entertainment venues from small (like Boomers, Chuckee'z Cheesez) to big (Disney World, Universal) their basic entertainment. As far as I can tell the parades in Disney World are the same as they were 10 years ago.

 

Once you start cruising numerous times on the same line it becomes repetitive. I cruise for the sake of cruising and the ships thus having picked RCI. If I cruise for the entertainment I would switch more often cruise lines.

 

You have to put it in perspective with real life. A cruise is no magic act where you can change things in a heart beat. And many cruisers are still new so everything for them is a first time.

 

I think that you have hit the heart of it. All too often those things that we veteran cruisers think of as "old hat" are things that when we first saw them we were fascinated by. We tend to forget that to many of our fellow passengers, these "old hat" things are brand new. It is a price we pay for cruising frequently and while, we obviously would enjoy new and different things, it isn't quite that easy to come up with something that is new or different and that will be as popular as some of the old standards. I remember fondly the first few times we saw "If I were not Upon the Sea" and also remember that after a few years I heard grumbling from passengers who saw it as the "same old, same old" and crew members who were tired of performing that "old chestnut". Maybe they could occasionally resurrect some of those old classics for those of us who would appreciate them and for those who never experienced them, but most everything has a short shelf life and I'm afraid that it wouldn't be long before they heard complaints about them. Frankly, I could easily live without seeing another "Love and Marriage" audience participation show, but I know that it is still wildly popular with some cruisers.

[cullinp]

"Do these stairs go up or down?" "Is the water in the toilet fresh or seawater"............blah blah blah blah boring!

 

On our cruise, I'd watched a documentary on Discovery many times before finally sailing on LOS.

 

Couldn't believe that when we got onto the ship the jokes and questions were the same! Like many have said before, it doesn't take much effort or massive budgets to come up with new material.

 

It seems also from the thread that this is a point that a good number of people agree with........maybe a group mail to RCI??

 

Still love them though and have no intention of jumping cruise lines. There is nothing more beautiful than an RCI Cruise Ship............!

[FL_Cruiser64]

Those cruise fares were available when they first opened up, about 18 months or so ahead of the sailing date. Now they are substantially higher. We can only cruise the last two weeks of August, due to school and work schedules, so while cruisefares are traditionally low, the airfares run high due to Labor Day weekend "holiday pricing".

 

What southern cruise did you plan on taking?

[FL_Cruiser64]

I think that you have hit the heart of it. All too often those things that we veteran cruisers think of as "old hat" are things that when we first saw them we were fascinated by. We tend to forget that to many of our fellow passengers, these "old hat" things are brand new. It is a price we pay for cruising frequently and while, we obviously would enjoy new and different things, it isn't quite that easy to come up with something that is new or different and that will be as popular as some of the old standards. I remember fondly the first few times we saw "If I were not Upon the Sea" and also remember that after a few years I heard grumbling from passengers who saw it as the "same old, same old" and crew members who were tired of performing that "old chestnut". Maybe they could occasionally resurrect some of those old classics for those of us who would appreciate them and for those who never experienced them, but most everything has a short shelf life and I'm afraid that it wouldn't be long before they heard complaints about them. Frankly, I could easily live without seeing another "Love and Marriage" audience participation show, but I know that it is still wildly popular with some cruisers.

 

That's exactly it. On any given cruise (unless its a members cruise) you probably have less than 1,000 passengers which are repeat cruisers. Most likely only half of them are Platinum and up. So for most people it is all new.

 

When we went on the Sovereign in April I took my sister and my dad. For both it was the first cruise. When we drove up to ship they said "oh my, is that big" and "wow" and "ahhh". The Sovereign?

 

Or when we go into embarkation. Look around you and look at all the excitement. We tend to just walk up where we belong (most likely the priority line). Most of us do it straight not looking around. It is part of us, yet, most don't have that opportunity to be cruising frequently. What for us old, boring and routine is, is for them new and exciting.

 

We joke around about the 10 questions and how tired we are of these things. But when you go to a theater, it is packed, with first timers or infrequent cruisers. They laugh, they find it hysterically funny.

 

With all that cruising, we forgot how it was when we all started and how much we laughed about these old boring jokes. I don't want to take away the fun from those cruising for the first time. I am on a cruise ship. Give me a drink and a bar, or a balcony, get out at sea and I am happy.

 

:D

[DonnaK]

What southern cruise did you plan on taking?

 

We had reservations for AOS Barbados route for 8/17/08, but cancelled them a few months ago because of lack of affordable airfare. We switched to Caribbean Princess 8/24/08 (no air needed).

[FL_Cruiser64]

We had reservations for AOS Barbados route for 8/17/08, but cancelled them a few months ago because of lack of affordable airfare. We switched to Caribbean Princess 8/24/08 (no air needed).

 

Probably to late anyways but I found roundtrip on AA for $390 pp from LaGuardia on the 16th (I am sure you would have flown a day early right?) and return on the 24th at 1:05pm.

 

EDIT: never mind. I just read that you were looking non stop at day of embarkation.

 

Hey, book Aruba for next year. Like...September 20...:D

[stompy]

Don't get me wrong. My wife and I are die hard cruisers and this will continue to be our vacation of choice for the foreseeable future, and we love RCCL and will continue cruising on this line, particularly since we made platinum and are starting to get some loyalty perks.

 

But here's my problem. Am I the only repeat cruiser who feels like the cruise lines (RCCL is certainly not the only one) need to update thier acts?

 

Yeah, I've enjoyed The Quest, and the Sexy Legs Contest and the Belly Flop and the Pool Olympics, etc. But isn't it time that they came up with a few new ideas? We still find plenty of things to do, but can we ditch some of the moldy oldies?

 

On Voyager, they did have a poolside chili cookoff with volunteer passenger chefs getting help from kitchen staff and they had a Kareoke Superstar competition with auditions and a finale in the main theater instead of just regular kareoke, but that's just a drop in the bucket.

 

Are there any new ideas out there we can pass along to the folks up top to get them to be a little creative?

 

Also, I am curious as to whether I'm alone in feeling this way. It seems like the same thing year after year (I'm on my 4th year of cruising) and it makes me wonder if it will ever change.

 

My wife got to take part in the cooking demonstration. The cruise had Ratatouille playing on the TV and in the theatre so I called her "Lil Chef" for the rest of the cruise.

 

She made the cruise video and was on the TV for several days. Folks kept coming up to her for the whole cruise-we still have the chef's hat they gave her...

 

Yeah the Quest is the same but they do change up some of the stuff they make you get. The craft sessions are different things. they do different events in alaska than they do in the Caribbean. It's really up to you to go seek out new things. Also, there's no reason you can't contact the folks if you have an idea, they may just do it!

 

-that's the chef who did the demo, not my wife-

[icruiz2]

Sometimes all it takes is a slight variation in the game to make it new and more fun.

 

Or more difficult.......You'd think after playing the "Quest" 7 or 8 times, we'd know what to put in my purse and win at least once! but, noooooooo...... :D