LXA350

Rules are rules, but on another note, not sure how smart it is to take a "recovering" alcoholic on a cruise and torture them even more by having the rest of the travel party drink all the time.

Rules are rules, but on another note, not sure how smart it is to take a "recovering" alcoholic on a cruise and torture them even more by having the rest of the travel party drink all the time.

Better to enjoy Magic Carpet for a drink. Often it's too windy and the food served is nothing special, you really just pay for having dinner on the magic carpet. Eden is a great experience, hence if you want to do speciality one night would definetly do it in Eden. Since it's a set menu on Magic Carpet it will be much easier to choose items from the Eden Menu + in case a special requirement is needed this can be prepared on the spot.

The food in Blu over the years has gone down in quality and also the more healthy approach has disapeared, I assume lot's of complaints by american cruisers that didn't accept the healthy elements. Anyhow on E class ships I don't see the added value as the dinning concept there makes the MDR experience much better. Whereas on M and S Clas ships with the one main dinning room I would always book Aqua Class.

For what you get on the Retreat the prices are not justified. As some of you said, you can cruise on a real luxury cruise line and get better for the same or less. It starts with the little details in the Suite, the products in the bathroom are not anymore from a high end company such as LeLabo, Hermes or Bvlgari. For the slippers, at least on a recent cruise these were also cheap and not like before from Frette for instance. At least in the Royal Suite and above a Dyson Hair dryer would be a stanard amenity to excpect. Luminae, is in my view a complete failiure, except for the design especially on the E ships which is beautiful the food concept is terrible. They try to make it high end but then to meet the North American taste, a concept that just doesn't work. Also, Luminae should offer much more freshly sourced high end products starting from the selection of fruits and vegetables. I understand that especially on certain itinararies it is logistically not possilbe to load provisions for the whole ship on ports of call, but for the Retreat / Luminae which basically is a Luxury Cruisliner within a large ship the concept should be focused on freshness and exclusivity + offer a variety that meets the North American, European and Asian travellers just like in every Exclusive Hotel or Luxury cruise Ship. Therefore I would excpect to be served freshly caught fish, the freshest local vegetables and fruits to be sourced at each port of call and not the same medium to poor quality product available on the whole ship. One more example is the Smoked Salmon at breakfast, a joke of what for poor quality it is.

Covercharge up to USD 50 including all service charges are ok, but anything more is not worth it. Le Voyage is already completely redicioulous, it soon costs as much as going to a top michelin restaurant on land. Daniel Bouloud is maybe a very good chef but one of the top Michelin chef's he is not.

It depends on the staff and the maitre'd, some are not willing at all to go any extra mile others will try to make things happen especially if it's less complicated things like getting items from MDR.

For this port condider a shore excursion, then you also don't need to wait for tenders. As mentioned in a previous post, the chance you will actually make it to Port Stanley is 50/50. From the 4 Cruises Eclipse did this year they made it also only twice.

It would have been also time to modernize the rooms to the design of the newer Oasis Class ships including new bathrooms. Somehow RCL likes to forget this during amplifications

In case you want to fo to Capri I would organize it yourself, just buy the Ferry tickets in advance and especially for the return ensure to be back in Naples at least 90 minutes before all on board time. A day could look like this (assuming departure from Naples is at 18:30 or later): Depart Naples at 08:35 (09:25 arrival Capri)* Depart Capri at 15:25 (16:15 arrival Naples)* Buy the tickets online before, there are several companies operating the ferry such as SNAV and NLG, depending on the schedule you choose you need to book one way tickets on the website of the respective companies. (Best to book it directly with the ferry operator, not any 3rd parties). totaost rount rrip should be approx EUR 50 per person. For instance the above would be both ways with NLG. Also, unless it changed, you will only eceive a confirmation online, but the actual tickets need to be printed out for you at the port. Just go to the counter of the ferry operator. They will then print the tickets also forthe return leg. 1. After arrival take a bus to Anacapri and walk around there, optional take the chair lift up to Monte Solaro, for great views (EUR 14 round trip per person) 2. Take a bus to Capri Town, walk around the town, have some lunch etc 3. When it's time to catch your ferry, take the funicular down to the port (since there can be queues, be at the funicular station 45 mins before the ferry departure. The cost for the bus / funicular is EUR 2.40 per person per ride. Best is to buy the tickets upon arrival in the morning at the ticket office. For the funicular it's a different ticket, therefore you need to specify. You would need 2x Bus tickets + 1 Funicular ticket per person. In summary RCL offers a shore excursion covering the above at more than double the price absolutely not worth it. Here you can schedule the day per your liking on your own.

This seems to be correct, in order to reduce congestion they finally started to operate shore excursions by using round trip Athinios port. Looks like this excursion as well, however it points out that due to weather conditions you might be droped off in Fira at the cable car instead.

It better not be the CEO, but then agan why make this whole fuss if its not her anyhow. Then better this Q&A thing should not have been implemented in the first place. It's not about ordering from a different Restaurant, it's wanting an item that is not on the menu in that Restaurant. If you can't get what you are looking for in Luminae then the othe option is receiving it from a other Restaurant. When paying such prices also in luxury resorts you can request for customized options. Since this often is not possible in Luminae the next best option is to ask for a item available in a other venue.

From some of her responses it just shows that she has no clue of the actaul onboard experence and seems not to care from this superficial approach.

I guess this was a great exapmple of a CEO not enough experienced with the onboard experience. You can't just order something from the MDR or Blu, if at all you can pre order the night before or in morning that you want speciic items served that day from these venues. Even then it is to the discretion of the maitre D / venue manager if they want to go the extra mile in organizing this. Same applies to preparing specail meals such as a Indian Curry etc. even if it would be available at another venue.

Speciality Restaurant pricing is reaching new highs and absolutely do not justify the price when looking at the overall cruise fare paid. EDEN is really cool but still more than USD 60 (including gratuities) per person it's really not worth it.

With extending the status match to all tiers throughout the Royal Caribbean Group it is clear that they want to provide it's customers flexibility of the different kind of cruise markets within their own group. Yes Royal Caribbean is currently focusing on the family "resort" style vacation and and at young adults that want to have a few days / week of a great time partyng. This type of clientele is very important and the offering still has potential for growth. However a family vacation for instance does not only go on a resort / beach holiday, they also want to explore something differnet, such as Alaska including a land tour. A ship is needed to replace Radiance currently doing the one way cruises from Vancuver to Seward and back. Same goes with exploring more exotic destinations involving culture and unique experiences. All of this you also want to experience as a family and for this a class of ship should be created. It's a great thing that there is now the full status match across the group but still not everyone has the budget to cruise on Silversea or likes this type of cruise ships. Hence, there still has to be a other option to explore the world. Yes there is also X but also here it's more adults and less so meets the full multi generation criteria.

I think they wanted to add it originally during her refurbishment before the pandemic but didn't add that venue at the end for some reason.

Not sure if they ran out of stock but on recent Edge Cruise no premium Slipers (used to be from Frette) and same bathroom amenities as in regular cabins (Bigelow). Anyway, since X has a colaboration with LVMH they should offer proucts from Bvlgari or Aqua di Parma for instance in the Suites.

X is going crazy not only with the Spa prices, also with speciality dining. Looking at the poor spa experience the price value is not justified anymore since years.

Slippers usually are provided as of Aqua, quite bad quality now a days and in Suites quite good from Frette same as bathrobes.

The Menu selection on Dinner on the Edge is usually nothing special and somewhow a combination of MDR and Chef'sTable quality. It's more about the atmosphere, but then again it could be windy or even cancelled last minute due to weather. I would rather go for Le Voyage and Magic Carpet you can enjoy on most days for drinks anyhow.

In summary, a error happened in the whole process. Either the upgrade confirmation was confirmed by the system almost simultaniously when someone else bought the cabin at full fare / someone else already received the upgrade. That you end up with your orignal cabin is ok but the whole process seemed quite unprofessional. You should have received a simple excuse that the upgrade was processed by error and as a token of appreciation they should have offered you USD 200 OBC, issue closed.

Great summary. That kin of cruise X, HAL etc are offering has nothing to do with a Antarctica expedition. It just gives you you a little preview of that part of the world, but to properly explorin it you need to spend there a longer time and be able to get off the ship. It's a bit like bein the first time in a City and getti on a bus and taking a panoramic city tour without getting of and walking around and exporing. Nevertheless it still gives you a small impression of that place 😉

Never had an issue on E Class to receive dishes from MDR so far.

Is your cruise full, there must be a reason X has cancelled the entire next season to South America + Antarctica? Given the many sea days + a very high likelyhood of a additional sea day given the stop at Falkland Islands is often cancelled they should rather spend at least 1 more day in Antarcitca which is the main reason most people choose this cruise. Yet again, given the size of the ship it at least gives the opportunity to get a small glimpse of this remote part of the world. Given the beautiy most people owuld probably want to return but then it would only make sense through a expedition to get the full experience.