elleluv

We sail Brilliance on Saturday. I told BF we should get the later flight home just in case, but no...Oh well. We'll just play it by ear, I guess.

I've come to the conclusion after sailing out of Tampa several times that it doesn't much matter if your flight is scheduled for 11:00 or 2:00, you are still likely going to miss it if there is fog.

It seems as though most of the time that there is fog the ship doesn't get in until between noon and 4:00, so you'd probably need to have a very late flight to make it.

When traveling solo, I always tip additional to my stateroom attendant which at a minimum equals what they would have gotten had there been two guests in the stateroom.

It really isn't any less work for them with just me there than it would be if I was traveling with my husband and it doesn't seem right for them to get a pay cut that week because I'm traveling alone.

I tried too. Like fingernails on a chalkboard. Five minutes in I flipped to another channel.

You lasted longer than I did... I love Anderson and wanted to see the coverage on Quantum, but as soon as I heard her voice I flipped the channel. I probably had it on for 30 seconds.

We actually did Silver Moon just last week... they have a new boat, so we were asking our Captain about it. Apparently they sold the two boats they used to have to a company who is planning on using them for cruise ship excursions. Silver Moon still owns two boats with their new boat purchase and are still available by booking direct.

We had a great day with them... it's our favorite excursion in Barbados, we spend the day with them every time we go.

This reminds me of the other promise that was made with the O3B Internet -much better (lower) latency. You don't need much BW for most apps, but live video or audio will really suffer with poor latency - that really can't be avoided with satellite technology - you can't really get around the laws of physics.

Funny thing is that we used both MagicJack and FaceTime on Breakaway in June with great success... there weren't any dropped calls and the reception was very clear... so I know that a good enough signal can be had onboard a ship even without the new satellite technology... it just didn't work worth a darn on Quantum.

We were on the 12 Nov to 14 Nov pre-inaugural and found the internet to be a big disappointment. It worked great for downloading email, but we couldn't get a good enough signal to have a clear conversation on the MagicJack or Facetime.

The internet was free on that sailing and there were a ton of media onboard, so I'm sure it was getting more use than it would on a normal voyage, but based on all the hype I really would have thought it would have worked better than it did... I'm hoping that they'll be able to get it working better over time, but as of two days ago it really wasn't working as advertised.

Ellen, I finally got the cruise planner to work for dining, as well. (I also had a very good live chat experience, for future reference. It was handled very quickly and efficiently.) :)

Good to know... it's always nice to have a Plan B option. :)

We got our invitation for the sailing on the 12th a few hours ago as well... we were able to book both dining and entertainment using the cruise planner.

Hello Ellen. The invite came from C&A via email for a balcony cabin. It arrived a week ago. Have fun!:D

Thanks, Celia... that's good to know. :)

Since we will already be on the road from another cruise, I had to change one flight and book another. I'm a bit apprehensive. Are you flying to/from the cruise?

I'm planning to fly home to SLC for a few days after getting off Brilliance in Tampa; then I'm turning around and flying back to Newark for Quantum. It would probably make more sense just to go to straight to Newark from Tampa and spend a few days there, but I want to come home and see my husband. It'll have already been 3 weeks since I've seen him at that point, so being able to spend 3 days with him makes it worthwhile to fly home. :)

If by "slow" you mean unorganized, I definitely agree. My concern is that in 2 weeks we leave for our next cruise (and you, as well), and without the documentation, how do we get to the ship? My AR side is not happy.

Definitely disorganized... (I was being nice)

We still need to finalize air arrangements... call me paranoid, but I'll be happier doing that once I've got a cabin.

Got our invite as well but had to decline since we'll be cruising on the Allure. Everyone have a great time and take photos, please!:D

Do you mind me asking when you got your invite, Celia? Was it an email or phone call?

The invite that I currently have was through my Business Development Manager. I haven't gotten an invite from C&A at this point and I've been watching for invites to go out to some of us newer Pinnacle Members.

So you're two days before us. I guess I'd better stop holding my breath. I wonder what will happen if we don't have the information before we leave for Brilliance? :confused:

Right there with you... hopefully we'll get the information before then and if not we'll hope they email us the information. I'll let you know if I hear anything while we're on board if you let me know. :)

In the same boat here... have an invitation to sailing on the 12th, but no reservation number at this point.

I keep checking here because I figure if nobody else has a number it's not a problem that I don't have one, it just means they are just slow. :rolleyes:

 

The senior VP was really talking about compensation to avoid losing a valued customer or to avoid damages to the companies reputation. We don't know the particulars of this case or whether RCI ultimately made the OP happy. However, in this case giving the OP an Ocean-view would have meant taking an Ocean-view from another passenger. What is the right thing?

There really was an easy solution to this problem that would have been the right thing... Royal Caribbean could have contacted passengers who booked an OV cabin and offered them the $150 OBC to move to an inside cabin and then given the vacated OV to the OP. Based on the number of people on this thread who've said they would be happy with that deal, you'd think that someone would have been happy to take them up on that offer.

Hi, interesting info. Thanks for sharing. I'm in Florida and our BDM may have had even more invitations to send out. I book only for myself and family so I don't generate a lot of sales revenue - well, I do book a LOT for us. :) That being said, I got the 16th invitation.

 

I'm also PC and have been for over a year but got no PC invitation. At first I assumed it was PC related but after the call to the D+ desk, I realized I was wrong and looked more closely at the invitation.

 

I think the UK invitations may be done in a completely different way. USA agents aren't likely to be invited there nor are American PC C&A people.

 

Gina

I gather you are hoping for a C&A invitation for the sailing on the 14th as well then... ;) Hopefully we'll both get lucky and I'll see you there.

It does sound as though there may have been more invitations available for Florida agents... My BDM mentioned that she had one invitation available for the agency I work for (which has 600+ agents). I feel very fortunate to have been invited.

I'm a Travel Agent who is also a "Baby Pinnacle".

I received an invitation from my Business Development Manager a couple of weeks ago for the November 12 sailing. She actually called me to make sure I was able to go prior to sending the email invitation. Each BDM was apparently given an allotment of slots to fill. I'm based in the Western part of the country as is my BDM and she mentioned she had very few invitations compared to those BDMs who covered the Northeast.

The additional information they sent me once I submitted my RSVP has 3 Event Dates listed... November 12 (which I was told was basically Travel Agents and Media) and then sailings on November 14 and 16.

I'm still hoping to receive an invitation from C&A... it would actually be my first pre-innaugural invitation from them... the following sailing on November 14 would be ideal ;). I guess we'll see if all Pinnacle Members end up getting an invitation, it would seem to me with 3 sailings they should be able to accomodate us all.

Does anyone know if Royal keeps track of the old NCC...I ask because I am sure I have 1 but I cant for the life of me find it....I remember it had a number on it but not sure how to proceed...I bought 5 used 4 and seem to have lost 1....

 

Any ideas?

 

Thanks

If your member number was referenced on the NCC you can call the C&A department and they should be able to pull up the reservation number for you.

Although this was Carnival, the satellite internet service is likely the same on all ships at sea...my daughter was able to face time friends while walking the ship so this I don't think is a bandwidth issue as much as it is a traffic/user overload issue..speeds will be horrific during peak times, so if you need to face time I suggest doing it off peak times, when people are not using the wi-fi, and be near the hubs throughout the ship...

The friends that I sail with quite often have had really good luck using Facetime when we've sailed together on Carnival, Princess and NCL... they've had no luck at all on Royal... totally unable to get a connection. I haven't even been able to use my MagicJack on any of the Royal ships, no problem on the other lines.

Sounds like it was a group booking. Balcony discounts can't be combined with group bookings

There may be travel agents who won't allow you to do that since it affects their commission, but Royal will absolutely combine a balcony discount with a group booking...

It's a good reminder so we carry some cash with us, Carol... thanks.

We get so used to putting everything on our card that we often leave our cash in the safe.

Carol, we always tip even in the CL & DL:cool:

 

We usually tip each night we go to the DL/CL as well, but I know a lot of people that tip their lounge bar server at the end of the cruise.

I am so sorry that we did not meet!!!!

 

 

Or did we, and I didn't know that it was you? ;)

You never know, Carol, when you may end up in the elevator of a hotel or something with one of your CC friends. :D

Thanks for the affirmation! :D It's good to know the term "connecting" might be more universally understood, however.

 

 

Was there a lot of noise that filtered through the connecting door?

 

 

There were no "doors" per se on our Oasis balconies, but the metal wall only came halfway out from the side of the ship to the railing - the other half was a removable partition that I believe can be slid back or otherwise removed for the duration of a voyage.

There was some noise, but we didn't think it was bad... I wouldn't have wanted to have the connecting doors if I didn't know the people next door to us though.

The metal wall that divided our two balconies was solid all the way across... the wall on the other side of the balcony (adjacent to strangers) was exactly as you described.

As I'm sure you know, they build the ships in blocks and my impression was that our two cabins wer at the end of one block and the beginning of another. I found it odd that we had a connecting door to the cabins, but didn't have a balcony door.

We were in 12564 and 12562 if you want to see where we were... I would expect that the balcony wall would be the same all the way on all the same decks in that location on both sides of the ship.

For what it's worth, I'm in the U.S. and use the words adjoining and adjacent the same way you do... :)

We had adjoining (connecting) Ocean View Balcony cabins with my parents on Allure and did have sofas in the rooms. The connecting door was across from the bathroom, so the furniture layout is the same as it would be in rooms that don't connect.

Our two balconies did *not* have a door between them though... there was a metal wall.

JOIN US ON THE LIVE GOOGLE HANGOUT AT 1:30 EASTERN TIME!!

 

 

Event Page: https://plus.google.com/events/c1r2obo2lrblgkua09mj0p3au20

 

YouTube Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDQOLrbxuBM

 

 

 

LOOK FOR EMMY & I FROM CC ON THERE!

Thanks for posting these links... I had signed up but didn't receive the reminder they said they'd send out with the link, so I wouldn't have been able to attend if you hadn't posted this.

It was a very interesting discussion, both you and Emmy did a great job! :)