twangster

Most bills start with one representative submitting them. It took both houses to pass it. Hawaii wasn't included in ATRA. All ATRA did was instruct CBP not to enforce the penalties for breaking the law. ATRA didn't change the law. It would be telling police not to issue speeding tickets for two months. That wouldn't change the speed limit, there would simply be no speeding tickets written. It's a small miracle ATRA survived without a legal challenge. Plus ATRA was no use to anyone who sought to do a B2B between Seattle and Hawaii, the subject of this thread. To change the law would require a massive effort and it involves international maritime conventions that make it very difficult to change anything without significant ramifications. There have been attempts to reform laws related to shipping from both sides of the aisle and every attempt to introduce bills to change either Jones or the PVSA have quickly died. I stand by my statement, there will no changes to the law anytime soon, cruise lines are not seeking changes and foreign companies carry little weight to lobby for change.

Odyssey shows include The Effectors and Showgirls in the main theater with The Book in Two70. Wonder has the sequel to The Effectors which carries on from the version shown on Odyssey. During the shutdown Nick Weir hinted that Chicago was coming back to a ship in the future but so far that hasn't happened. I suspect Royal got tired of paying millions to license Broadway shows and decided to sink that money into producing in-house shows like The Effectors and Effectors II. Odyssey Entertainment: OY Entertainment Guide 2021.pdf

On the ship visit https://minio.rccl.com/compass/cruisecompass.pdf Doesn't work on land, it will return an error, but on any ship that has the feature enabled this URL will give you the daily cruise compass for that day when connected to ship wifi with or without a paid Voom plan.

Royal doesn't charge a fixed amount to have the option to pick a room. Royal has automated revenue management that sometimes does crazy things like making interior higher prices than ocean view. It varies by each and every sail date as that particular cruise sells out. No rhyme or reason.

Royal Entertainment Guide https://secure.viewer.zmags.com/publication/8d5cc72f#/8d5cc72f/1

Yes

Foreign companies operating foreign flagged ships who pay very little US tax don't have tremendous lobbying power. For the same reason they received zero in bailout money during the pandemic they don't have a leg to stand on to lobby for change in US law. With 332 million people in the US Congress is not going to put a lot of effort or spend millions to revise law impacting a few hundred people every year, some of which who aren't even US citizens, just so a foreign company operating a foreign flagged cruise ship paying little US tax can sell those few hundred people a very specific vacation. Royal Caribbean is a Liberian company. Their ships are flagged in the Bahamas so they don't have to pay US tax on those assets. Having a headquarters in Miami doesn't make them a US company. Cruise lines know the current setup is a license to print money while evading US taxation. They don't seek change because they know change will come with other conditions that will break their golden egg.

It happens. There is a JS on Q class that is known for hearing the sound of water flushing down a pipe. People complain their neighbor must be "...taking a shower every five minutes". I avoid this cabin. The forward most loft suites on the original O class have smaller balconies. Go figure, I won one in a RU. I can confirm the balcony is smaller. Suite was great, balcony as a solo was fine but given a choice I would have moved. On some older ships there can be support poles in the cabin. Not an end of the world problem but there is a reason why that suite was empty. If you are good or lucky at RU the downsides can be dismissed on the promise of saving lots of money. If you end up paying full rate for a RU that is a different story.

The legacy satellite providers have to focus their signal where there are customers to buy satellite services so they focus their signal at land masses. They have no coverage in the middle of oceans. There is saying in the legacy satellite business... "You can't sell satellites to fish:". Newer satellite providers like O3b and Starlink use satellites that move around the earth in an orbit. Consequently they have satellites over the oceans on their way to fly over land masses where they make money. Rhapsody was never upgraded to O3b so she could only use legacy satellites. That is the only reason you had no signal away from land. Not enough fish buy satellite services.

With the switch to Starlink occuring right now we are in a bit of uncharted water when it comes to TA internet. In the past O3b ships, mostly Oasis and Quantum class had normal internet on TAs while non-O3b ships (most Vision, all Radiance and Voyager class) had terrible internet on TAs. Today, at this moment, Starlink doesn't cover middle of oceans. However that is changing in the coming months. Once they have built out their solution and added more of their next-gen v2 satellites there will eventually be Starlink coverage in the middle of the Atlantic. 2023 may be a year of mixed results. Spring TAs are on the bubble, I'm betting fall TAs will be better. 2024 I'm betting will have good TA internet all the way across.

Lately the GGG hasn't had the deals it used it before the shutdown. Sometimes the deals are there on the list but the one cabin at that GGG fare is long gone before the GGG ink is dry.

The overnight at OC are really nice. Sunset from the beach, nightly laser show and sunrise from the beach in the morning. It's also nice not going to Nassau on the 3 nighters.

Mine usually post on day 6 or 7 after disembarking.

No change will be coming any time soon. Like many laws the implementation has evolved over time to adjust for attempts to evade the law. If it was so easy to piece together a longer cruise by making it multiple segments to evade the law then cruise lines would do just that, selling cruises that evade the PVSA by breaking them into multiple segmented bookings. CBP sees past that thinly veiled marketing attempt by cruise lines and considers the initial embarkation point and final disembarkation point for a ticketed passenger as the end-to-end journey. Without a night off the ship between two cruise bookings on the same ship it is exactly what CBP looks for as an attempt to evade the intent of the PVSA.

Just be aware it isn't offered in July, August or holiday dates. However if you book early you can often get reduced single supplement fares during blackout dates that are available to everyone making DP340 inconsequential. In other words sometimes you don't need DP340 so if using the website check pricing without it.

She did one in August 2020 I think, during the shutdown, so expected mid-2025.

Extra blocks on hand: Odyssey, Wonder, Vision Looking to trade for : Radiance, Voyager. (Spectrum too but not expecting anyone has it to trade)

https://www.royalcaribbean.com/content/dam/royal/resources/pdf/crown-and-anchor-society-benefit-grid.pdf A Crown & Anchor Society member can be added into a relationship with other family members in the same household and receive equivalent tier status; however Cruise Points will remain according to actual cruises taken and calculated using the Program level accrual system described above. Pinnacle Club member tier status will not be awarded to dependents if earned by their parent and/or guardian. Pinnacle Club member tier status can only be earned by an individual, spouse or significant other* by one of them accumulating 700 Cruise Points or more in the Crown & Anchor Society program.

This has been addressed at length in numerous topics here and it's documented in the terms and conditions of the CAS program. It's is unfortunate you misunderstood. A Crown & Anchor Society member can be added into a relationship with other family members in the same household and receive equivalent tier status; however Cruise Points will remain according to actual cruises taken and calculated using the Program level accrual system described above. Pinnacle Club member tier status will not be awarded to dependents if earned by their parent and/or guardian. Pinnacle Club member tier status can only be earned by an individual, spouse or significant other* by one of them accumulating 700 Cruise Points or more in the Crown & Anchor Society program. https://www.royalcaribbean.com/content/dam/royal/resources/pdf/crown-and-anchor-society-benefit-grid.pdf

Within RFID cards used on newer ships are a chip and wires woven in a pattern. The wires are a critical part of how RFID cards work. If your attempt to punch a hole and you hit either the RFID chip or the wires it renders the card useless. Shining a high power LED flashlight through a card can reveal the shadow of the wires and the chip. Sometimes a ship will offer pre-punched RFID cards. In this case the manufacturer of the card stock has purposely run the wires to leave an area that is clear to punch. Sometimes it's like this card which leaves the bottom area clear to punch but in other cases the wires avoid one corner or one end of the card. Different manufacturers do it differently. They can't always source pre-punched card stock and it may cost more since the manufacturer has had to put more effort into the process. Some suggest that the smaller coil pattern of the wires makes the card less effective causing it to take longer to activate or the need to place the card physically closer to the reader. Given a ship can use dozens of different readers at doors, security check points and point of sale terminals there is some variability when it comes to reading RFID cards. Pre-punched may sound like a great idea but it may come at a cost beyond the actual price of card stock.

I don't think Starlink is very good about keeping their marketing up to date. A Celebrity cruiser posted their speeds from the middle of the Tasman Sea a few weeks ago. Take that map with a large dose of sea salt.

As soon as she opened for bookings a few weeks ago Adventure from Port Canaveral has had some great rates including suites. I guess it's so typical Royal for this sort of thing to occur (available here, not there) but if you have a method to book through the US process there are still some great rates on Adventure. Pricing is so good for 2024 I made it a B2B and will be staying on for New Years Eve. When I booked on opening day the balcony refundable rates was the same price as the non-refundable rate. They have since adjusted refundable balcony rates but they are still pretty good. Today - 2D balcony for two guests with no discounts applied for example - $1,850 $USD NRD vs. $2023 $USD refundable. Interior are a few hundred less while a suite GTY is just over $3k $USD. For a holiday Christmas cruise these are really good rates. If you have a US based TA consider making a refundable booking while you wait for the UK site to include Adventure.

That is exactly why I've been booking MSC out of PCN. I was close to booking a 3 nighter in January for a traditionally low fare period when overnight the interior went from just over $400 to $650 and eventually to over $700. Those are normally July peak prices. I think it's great that Royal is experiencing such high demand that they can fetch summer peak rates during what has historically been the annual off peak or slow season. Any discussion of pricing inevitably involves understanding what the cruise market in general is doing so that entails reviewing the competition. Has the entire short Florida cruise market become so much popular or is it limited to one cruise line for example. So when I discovered rates around $346 solo with drinks and 2 device basic wifi on MSC for several weekends in 2023 naturally I booked some. It seems the entire short FL cruise industry has not all doubled or tripled in price. Looking a few months into the future this includes Seaside and Seashore some of their newer ships so it's interesting to see how the competition is approaching the short FL cruise market since Royal brought all of their recently amped ships into the short FL market. All Freedom class for example and some Voyager class amped ships vs. newer ships from MSC. Royal seems to be taking the approach that having brought newly updated older hardware and establishing that as the baseline for the short FL market they now own the market so they can now set the rates and so a competitor has responded by applying their newer and larger ships while maintaining the normal price trends for this short FL market. Despite the would be internet police on this board who would seek to banish the mention of other cruise lines you can't discuss pricing trends without involving other cruise lines.

December 21 on Adventure? It's definitely on the US site. Great refundable rates on this sail date when booking on the US site.

First Oasis class ship to have them. Harmony was built with the slides (water and dry). Only Allure is missing the purple monster and water slides in this class now.