cloud_nine

Certain ships on Royal have an afternoon tea in the windjammer which includes scones, with jam and cream to add, sandwiches, little cakes etc. Its not a proper afternoon tea where you are served by white gloved waiters or anything like that but I do enjoy a few scones and some cake with a cuppa during that time. I've experienced it on ships out of Southampton and surprisingly, out of Puerto Rico, but not on ships out of Rome or Barcelona (on those cruises it's basically an extended lunch -probably due to them being more port intensive).

The new concierge lounge on Jewel is really nice! The views are incredible and it's a great space. We were in a GS on Jewel last August and used the concierge lounge much more than we used the windowless cl on Adventure. You'll have a great time!

Do all European cruises have a kettle in the cabin?

No, only when going out of Southampton.

large contingents of Spanish, German, and English people.

Great trip report. Enjoyed reading about your cruise. Just an FYI (and this isnt supposed to be snarky or anything, just letting you know for future reference - as currently it could offend some) the term used should be "British people" unless of course there were no Welsh, Scottish or Northern Irish people on board, then you would be correct in saying 'English'.

I said i have no problem tipping someone a couple of dollars who does a service for me,if someone else doesn't tip he/she is being mean.

Where is the hypocrisy in that.

I have always posted saying i pre pay or auto pay tips and on a 7 night cruise given an extra 200 dollars in tips,we get room service breakfast every morning and left 2-3 dollars tip.

But the $7.95 room service charge includes a tip. Therefore the person IS tipping because the tip is included in the charge. They are just not over-tipping by giving extra. This is like saying that someone is being mean by not tipping the bar staff a couple extra dollars per drink even though each drink already has an 18% gratuity added to it.

Following. Looking forward to your review.

Completely agree. Whilst I did love the ports we went to on Jewel, I felt more overcrowding than I did on Voyager class and found less options for food/entertainment/bars etc. Would I do it again? Not sure. If the ports were good enough possibly, but I much prefer the Freedom/Voyager classes.

That's horrible

Not horrible at all. They are still getting tipped out of the 7.95 I'm paying for room service. How much, we don't know. It could be $5, could be $2 but RCI says it includes tip so there you go. If you don't believe that they get the tip from that then you might as well not pre-pay gratuities because how do you know that they actually get paid those gratuities either? Don't know why people can't just agree to disagree on the matter of tipping. It's different in different countries so let's not keep going on about it.

please let me deliver your next pizza

I think you misunderstood. I wasn't telling you I tip 7.95 on pizza, I was basically saying that the 7.95 for room service includes the tip so was asking you would you pay 7.95 tip for something small like ordering pizza from room service? I actually only tip a quid for pizza delivery as this is the UK and nobody ever tips more than 10% tip for anything.

Would you tip 7.95 for pizza delivery?Over here, if you order a large pizza it costs like £15 or so. 7.95 would be a 50% tip!

When room service was free I would tip, now that it's 7.95 and RCI says that includes a tip there's no need to tip extra.

I would assume folks would still tip even if they paid the $7.95 fee.

Really? I wouldn't. $7.95 is quite enough for a tip I think.

Keep an eye on the prices and promotions. Occasionally you might get a kids sail free promotion (though that's quite rare in the UK) or the prices go down when a promotion ends for example if there are free drinks packages, free WiFi etc included, it's not really free they just put the price up a bit. Also agree with IrishComet's comment- if you can take them out of school the prices are a lot cheaper out of high season.

We just took the kids(5,5,8) on Freedom in April for a spring break cruise. It was a 6 night western Caribbean sailing, and the RFS cost $4800 with $400OBC. Gratuities were another $500. The suite was a great way to travel with the family, and i would definitely do it again. Not sure if that is above what you are willing to spend, but i was very happy with what i got for my money. Downside to the Family Suite is you have to call to book and/or get pricing. FWIW we booked this cruise almost 18 months before sailing.

OP is asking specifically about Med cruises which are generally a lot more expensive than Caribbean cruises. Plus we don't get OBC included over here unless it's part of a promotion.

Actually, even if there isn't, I'd still go there for that chocolate dome dessert!!!

To be honest, the dessert probably contains gelatine anyway... If this is something that would bother you I would wait until you board before booking and ask someone (you can also then ask them what other dishes on the menu are vegetarian).

On NCL we met the concierge before tendering and he would escort everyone off (if wanted), is that similar with RC?

I'm assuming you're on the Med Beaches cruise on the 8th? Villefranche is the only tender port on that cruise but the concierge will most probably escort the suite guests off. I was on Jewel last year and the concierge did the same for suite guests in Santorini.

We were on Adventure last November and drank Prosecco with dinner - was never charged anything extra. May have changed in that time I don't know but when we sailed Prosecco was around $11.

However I am not sure how it will work for Med cruises and VAT tax. Maybe someone with more experience can supply more information.

If you have the drinks package before you board there will be no VAT added on top for med cruises. If you buy the package on board there probably will be added VAT but I've always had it before I board so I'm not 100% sure.

I did notice the other day that the sign hanging on the ropes which separate the Suite sundeck area looks as above except that the wording now says something like, Access for Guests with Suite Concierge Cards only, - I will check out the exact wording today.

They probably changed it because people keep mistaking it for being a gold c&a member. This is what happened on Adventure last November. We were sunbathing in the suite area and a guy came around checking gold cards. People in the row in front of us weren't gold card holders but were gold c&a members and thought it was the same thing.

We were just on the Indy from Southampton to France and Spain.

I've found that cruises out of the UK are more formal than cruises out of other parts of Europe like Barcelona or Rome.

Ah, fair enough Bob. You learn something new everyday. I've never been on Brilliance so perhaps the ship's I've been on didn't have them. Or could just be that I missed them on the menu - you never know.

Zutcorp - I imagine cheap white wine would be around $8 a glass or so. Maybe more...can't remember if the prices have gone up lately. You can get a glass of juice for free at breakfast but if you want freshly squeezed that costs extra. I'm not sure on water...somewhere around $2 a bottle I think?

In our experience, the R Bar has some really fancy cocktails that can be over the drink package limit

Really? I've never seen any cocktails over the amount of the package and I drink a lot of cocktails in the R-Bar. I'm going to have to look out for them on our next cruises.

We're on the Adventure in September out of San Juan. My favourite drinks are Prosecco and Cava, both of which are more than $13 or more per glass, I've been led to believe. If the limit is $12 it looks like I'm going to have lots of small extra charges on my bill

We sailed Adventure out of San Juan in November with the drinks package. We drink Prosecco nearly 90% of the time and were never charged extra. I think Prosecco is about $10 or so. You won't be charged anything extra.

She gets pretty fussy and I'm worried that the Anthem menu is really going to throw her--the vegetarian options I've seen listed on the Anthem menus are not really going to be what she is used to.

In my experience, if you talk to the head waiter as soon as you board (go to the MDR and he/she should be there) and explain the situation, they should be able to sort something for you. They might not be able to sort something for the first night (unless she's okay with pasta?) but they will come around each night to sort something for the next night. To be honest though, I'm pretty sure I've seen Eggplant Parmigiana on one of the menus for Anthem so you should be okay.

Did you use the surf only package or the surf & stream?

I had the surf and stream as I thought it might be better than the basic surf package. It was really terrible - I couldn't even listen to music on Spotify without it cutting out.

Now because your cruise stops in Spain and doesn't include any non-EU ports you most likely

will have to pay Spanish tax if you buy the package on board but as it doesn't leave from Spain you won't have to pay the tax if you buy it from your cruise planner. So if you are planning on buying it I'd buy it before you go.

I was on Jewel last August after the refit and internet was shockingly bad - I wouldn't bother with it again.

About the VAT, where is the cruise going? You may or may not be charged VAT depending on the ports. If VAT is charged on board, it more than likely won't be if you pre-buy it before the cruise.

Yep, my last three cruises I lived on that raspberry flavoured Dasani water. I don't know what I'm going to do without it on my Navigator cruise :eek: