sptrout

Very small shrimp.

Sorry, but I missed the OPs intent of this thread. In any case I cannot remember previous Luminae menus. However, as I danced around this subject earlier the menus can be "word-smithed" to say about anything. Items sounded good but delivery was lacking all our previous Luminae experiences. IMO no wow factor as in previous years. Lobster is a good example. My wife had lobster in three restaurants and even if they were cold water lobsters they were so small that they did not spend much time in the water. None were bigger than my thumb. Anyway, in my opinion the menus have not changed that much.

We were on the Beyond last week staying in a S1 cabin (corner aft, deck 12). Both of us noticed considerable food cutbacks. The portion sizes in Luminae were reduced, with just very small servings of sides (veggies, etc.), the sides that were included were more for looks than complete sides. The biggest cutback was in the size of the desserts, nothing all that special and many times could be found the next day in the buffet. I need not need big desserts, but the reductions were obvious. Note that the menus may look the same as previous Cruises, but that can be deceiving. As usual the service was great and very friendly. The food cuts, even though deep, were not bad enough to cancel our 11 day Beyond cruise January 2024. We also went to Eden and Le Voyage. Eden was so so, but with nice view. Le Voyage was outstanding and was the special meal of the week.

Just curious, but how were you able to get these detailed numbers?

Agree with the others. You cannot avoid COVID unless you live in a bunker 30 miles from no where. I rather have the flu than COVID, flu is the real danger now.

No. Mock bookings will give you an idea, but TAs hold blocks of rooms until?? Try different TAs websites and you will likely see different cabins available. The above comment subject to immediate changes the closer to sail date.

Off Beyond today, Captain Kate yesterday said that the passenger count was 84%.

Great picture! Rough seas LOL.

Let me add that there are two lounge chairs, two chairs and one small table. A lot of room.

I would guess at about 50/50 covered vs uncovered. For various unrelated reasons we have not been on the balcony that much. Beautiful cabin and view of the wake. Just be prepared to walk to about anything. It is a distance to the first set of elevators and a long walk to the second set of elevators. IMO this ship needs three sets of elevators, although crowds have not been a problem and per Captain Kate there are over 4,000 passengers on board.

We need to look into this!

We are on the Beyond this week in cabin 12284, which is an aft corner S1 suite, deck 12. Love the cabin but agree that it is a long walk to the Retreat areas. We need the walk, but are averaging 7500 steps a day and not leaving the ship. One issue that the cabin Attendant said was common is the smell of sewer fumes in the bathroom and even reduced levels in the main part of the cabin. We also noticed the same smell on deck 3 in the hall.

As soon as they become available in your Cruise Planner. We are on the Beyond in couple weeks and I booked two SRs months ago. At least one is sold out now.

A good article published this morning by PC Magazine (Internet version) that explains how much money Musk has spent to support Ukraine. $80M is being reported mainly for ground dishes so the folks on the ground can have some Internet connectivity. A large, unplanned for, number of dishes could seriously degrade throughput which is usually the real problem with digital communication systems. You can have all the signal strength in the world but if the backend cannot handle the data then the system can really slow down. https://www.pcmag.com/news/elon-musk-spacex-has-spent-80m-to-support-ukraine-with-starlink

As has been reported the past couple weeks, Starlink is having capacity problems even for land customers. They need a lot more satellites to correct capacity problems. Until they increase the number of satellites they will continue to have problems. I am surprised that RCG did not check these kinds of possible problems out before jumping in to a company wide change. It could be a long time before Starlink can correct capacity problems. I hope that RCG waits before converting anymore ships.

I just booked the Thermal Suite for our January Beyond cruise and it is still $119/p. Confusing booking requirements; must book each person separately and choose time for day 1. Could not book the same time for both of us and even though I booked two times 15 minutes apart (1 & 1:15 PM) the final conformation shows 1 & 7:30 PM. I understand that the IT booking system may be up to its usual standards, at least I hope it is. I also agree that $119 is a great price, which makes things a little more questionable. I guess we will find out in January.

Just an FYI - - If you have a Samsung Galaxy phone Samsung makes the "SmartTag & SmartTag+" devices that have capabilities similar to the Apple Tags. I do not have either at this time so "no dog in the hunt", but since we both have Samsung S21 Ultra Phones I will likely be buying the Samsung Tags. Both are available on Amazon or Samsung's website.