ARandomTraveler

Is it plugged in? 😂

I think the "recommended" water consumption is to drink half your weight (in pounds) in ounces of water. So for me, I weigh 120 pounds, so 60oz is what I'm "supposed" to drink. Add water for exercise, hot weather etc. If I'm doing a lot of running in hot weather, hiking, skiing (eating a lot of salt 😂) then I get close to drinking 100oz. 120oz could be normal or a lot depending on how much you weigh and how much sweating you do.

The cost is way too high for a lightweight drinker. Even with low alcohol content as some people reference, the amount of liquid a non-drinker would have to force feed themselves just to make it worth it...isn't worth it. Decide what price per day would make it worth it, and then divide that price by $13. If the resulting number of drinks ends up being way beyond what she'd drink 7 days in a row, just pay out of pocket. If it's within a drink or three, maybe go ahead and buy it. At $73/day divided by $13, that's 5.6 alcoholic drinks. If you assume that she'll drink 2 non-alcoholic drinks a day at say, $9/drink, then the math comes out to 4.2 alcoholic drinks per day ($73-$18=$55. $55/$13=4.2 alcoholic drinks per day). 4 alcoholic drinks a day isn't that much for a "non-drinker" on vacation, but 4 alcoholic drinks 7 days in a row is a ton for a non-drinker (speaking as a minimal drinker myself). The package price would have to be $50 or less to be "worth it." And at that, I personally would still not be breaking even, but I'd consider buying it for the convenience and the price cap anyway. If you're waiting for the price to go down to a "worth it" level, it's not gonna ever go that low.

If your original room is at the front or the back of the ship, and you want to move to a room in the center, there's usually an up-charge of like $40 for that. Could that be where the extra charge is coming from?

My thought off the bat regarding what the "detractors" are as far as the inconvenience to you goes... you can't sit at the bar and relax with your drinks, enjoying the band or conversation with your neighbors or whatever else you'd be doing at the time. You'd have to keep excusing yourself, going to another bar, getting a drink and bringing it back to the bar you were originally hanging out in. This just seems like way more hassle than it's worth to save the $30 cost of 2 glasses of wine. On top of that, the bartender at the bar you're hanging out in is going to notice what you're doing because you'll keep leaving to get a drink from a different bar and bringing it back, and handing it to your wife. It seems like a lot less hassle to just bring on your 2 free bottles of wine (or in your case, since you're in different rooms, you can bring 4 bottles of wine) and let her fill up her own wine glass and drink that. Or, since she drinks so little, just pay out of pocket. Otherwise you're gonna be doing this secret-bar-shuffle game everyday just to save $200.

It sounds like I've either always misunderstood that rule with non-refundable bookings, or it changed since they originally implemented non-refundable in the USA. I always understood it that price drops were allowed with refundable bookings because people could otherwise just cancel and re-book, while non-refundable bookings could not do that as easily. That either changed or I always misunderstood it. That being said, it sounds like the person whose travel agent said they weren't eligible for a price drop is wrong, and it has nothing to do with cruise with confidence or non refundable bookings, so, they should definitely call their agent back. Sorry everyone for my spreading of vicious lies 😂

You might be right. My understanding of it comes from years ago, when they first introduced the non-refundable option, and people were upset upon finding out that when they booked non-refundable rates, they couldn't get price drops, but that may have changed since then.

🤔 hmmm. Maybe I've always misunderstood the rules with that. Are you sure it's not just in the last couple of covid years that you've been able to do this? Have you done it recently with a cruise booked after March 31st 2022?

Same here. I don't have diabetes but by the time I drink the requisite 60oz-80oz of water a day, I don't have much room left for that much liquid. I can fit about 3-4 more drinks in there, but that's pushing it for me. Generally at that point, my water intake is going down in order to increase my "other" drinks. I can do that for a few days of vacation, but anything more than that and I feel like complete crap. Maybe I need to stop being such a boring healthy person so I can have more fun and not feel such a drastic difference in my body when I indulge. Or maybe it's just me feeling the effects of getting old 😂. I also found that with the refreshment package, I was using the freestyle machines to fill my cup with ice and water, and rarely asked for a bottled water. I brought an insulated water bottle to fill with ice water at the freestyle machine when going to the beach because it can hold 40oz and stay cold all day in the hot sun. The bottled water ends up lukewarm, so, even the "Don't forget to count all the bottled water" argument doesn't add up for me.

Price drops are completely different than cruise-with-confidence. Think of a price drop like going into a store, buying a pair of pants, and then going back the next day and seeing those same pants on sale for 50% off. You could return the pants, get your money back, and re-purchase them at the new sale price. This is essentially what people are doing with price drops. The difference is that with a price drop, you don't have to wait for money to be refunded and then put new deposits down, they just adjust the price and give you a new, lower balance due to save everyone the hassle of canceling and rebooking. Price drops make the most sense for people who have refundable rates, because with a refundable rate, you can cancel anytime before the official final payment date and get all of your deposits and other payments refunded to you in full. So, if you see a price drop of any dollar amount, it's a savings for you. If you have a non-refundable rate, then any changes or cancellations will cost you $100 per person, making it so that getting a price drop (which is, essentially, returning your pants and re-purchasing them), costs you $100/person every time. So, your price drop needs to be more than the money you're losing to be worth it. If you have 2 people in a room with a non-refundable rate, the price drop would have to be at least $201 to see any savings, and with that example, your savings would only be $1. With a refundable rate, your savings would be the full $201. I think cruise with confidence had something to do with waiving those fees for non-refundable people, or people who were booking after the official final payment date. I hope that helps make more sense of it for you. edited to add: This is all assuming that the price drop is happening before the official final payment date. After the final payment date, even "refundable" fares become somewhat non-refundable, so price drops don't exist. Think if it like the pants example - you have a receipt that says you can return the pants within the next 30 days, and after 30 days, you can't return them. This may be another area where cruise with confidence comes in for people, I'm not sure. But it's possible that for people who booked their cruise prior to March 31st 2022 are eligible for receiving the amount of any price drops after that final payment date in the form of on board credit. I'm not certain on that though. With the pants example it's like having a receipt that says you can return within 30 days, and any returns after 30 days you just get store credit.

They're correct that you can't get a price drop on a category that isn't available for sale. Technically, there is no current price attached to it because there aren't any. They don't post arbitrary prices on something they can't sell. Keep an eye out though because someone might cancel or change categories and as soon as one Junior suite is available, a price will be associated with it.

Usually, if you're not in a star class suite, you would start making your reservations for dinner and shows for the week as soon as you get on the ship on embarkation day. Since you're star class, the genie will do this for you ahead of time, before boarding day, meaning, you get first choice of everything, and you're not in competition with everyone else to make reservations. If you're not in star class, and you get on the ship and don't start making your reservations right away, this is where people run into trouble (from what I've read anyway, I haven't done an Oasis class sailing yet). There are probably a lot of people who don't read cruise critic who don't know they're supposed to do those things, and they're the "losers" of this competition, as they get what's truly leftover after star class people, and then the people who know to book when they get on board.

I was reading reviews in the port section about Roatan Honduras, and came across a thread about Little French Key being under siege, burned down, taken over etc. Some posters are saying they were just there this week, while others are saying they've seen pictures of it being burned to the ground. So I did a quick Google search, which didn't turn up much, but did lead me to Trip Advisor, where the majority of the most recent reviews seem to be coming from fake people (people who have never posted before, so may or may not be real reviews). One had a response from management where the management was basically saying that the review wasn't real, that the place was under siege, and that it wasn't safe. However there's a couple reviews from people with reputable accounts who say they've been there. What the heck is going on???? Does anyone have any background on this, with details about why one side or the other may have differing info or are choosing to lie? I've attached a photo of the trip advisor review. And here's a link to the cruise critic thread (mitsugirly is a well known RC contributor so I would tend to trust her post more than any of the rest I've seen, but her post didn't give much background either so I'm confused).