Tralfaz1138

My wife and I didn't make it to Lola's Library during our cruise, but otherwise we caught all of those. I mean, they all have their strengths. We probably had the most fun at Miss Behave given it's interactive. We were at the "floor seats" for Another Rose, so it had it's interactive element as well I suppose. We're going on another cruise on Resilient Lady and I'm trying to think of which shows we might try again. We were not "on the floor" for Persephone the first time, so will likely try to that this time. I could see going to Miss Behave again given it's a bit more dynamic and it would be interesting to see how different it is with new people. We might skip Another Rose this time. We enjoyed the show, but I think we already saw it in the "ideal way" our first time. I am curious if the Mind Mangler changes much from show to show so we'll have to see if we go to that one again.

I'm not an expert on all of this (and have not used a TA) but MNVV's give $600 in sailor loot, but I've never heard of or read about bar tab included with those. I'm also not sure how the new rules work out for TA's (e.g. if they buy an MNVV and are not able to transfer it in 60 days, I assume it drops the loot to $300 like it does for any other person that buys an MNVV)? I've also read that the $100 bonuses some TA's can get can't be combined with using an MNVV to book a cruise. Again, not an expert, but this is the information I've seen people post about how bookings through TA's work these days. Also, unless TA's have different rules, a cruise booked with an MNVV can only be changed once, so since OP mentioned rebooking if the price drops later, this could be something to keep in mind.

I will admit, I didn't think about asking for the pour over. I should have, since I occasionally do them myself at home, but it's just something I don't typically get at coffee shops so I didn't think about it at the Grounds Club. I'll give one a shot on our upcoming cruise and see how it works out.

That's about where I was at. As will happen with drip coffee in an urn, how good it was could depend a little on how long it was in the urn, how full it is when you pour some out for yourself, etc. So the Grounds Club Americano was probably more "consistent", but on average the Galley coffee was probably better. I'm a black coffee person, so more flavorful is pretty important.

I wasn't that impressed with the coffee in the sense that it didn't seem like there was a huge difference between buying a coffee they made at the Grounds Club vs just drinking the coffee they have at The Galley. I got a manual pump espresso machine designed for camping off a Kickstarter years ago that I'm tempted to bring with me on our next cruise. The problem is it's an odd shape, so I don't know that it will pack that well, plus I don't know that I want to keep dumping grounds and cleaning something up while "on vacation". I figure I'll let my wife use our bonus bar tab for her latte's and I'll use mine for wine or whatever at dinner and stick with The Galley coffee. I'm a coffee snob in a way, but not to the extent where I can't drink what's available while on vacation.

A couple of things to note. One is that, in general, during embarkation Rockstar/Mega Rockstar passengers will be directed to someplace on the ship where you will meet up with the Rockstar agent assigned to your cabin. In our case the meeting place was in the Sip lounge. So that's when you ask to schedule anything you've not scheduled up to that point, ask for bottle swaps on the bar, etc. They will also add themself to the Virgin app messenger list and give you their number on the ship. So if you need something, you just contact them directly. Our agent also magically found us every day in various random places we might be and checked in to see how things were going. It is worth noting that they do have "work hours", so you probably will not get an immediate response if you message them at midnight. When it comes to swapping things in the bar, your mileage may vary. In our case, we were told we could swap 3 bottles of liquor for something else, and they swapped the cans of Heinkein for a different beer for me. I've seen other reports that vary regarding how much they were able to swap out. Do make sure to ask for any substitutions on the first day since they will not swap anything out after that.

I think it's new-ish. I know they had it on the repositioning they did around Africa from Australia but I'm not 100% certain if that was the first time they'd been there. They also have it on a cruise I'm on in September and it's now on all the TA's it seems.

I jumped on the April TA for 2025 and got a biggest terrace cheeky corner suite for not that much more. I don't remember what the XL price was a the time. That said, the weirder thing to me is that the XL sea terrace on the return trip for Scarlett Lady next year is almost $2000 more for the same number of nights and ports. I'm not sure what makes that trip "worth more". I've seen it with other repositioning cruises on Virgin as well, so I don't know if it's a time of year thing or something else that made one direction more expensive than the other.

My wife and I did a repositioning last year and I would agree. With the 15 night cruise we ate at each restaurant twice, plus a 3rd visit to two of them. Aside from at Gunbae, we never ate the same thing twice. I also didn't eat the same thing twice on the days when we ate lunch in The Galley. We have a 12 night coming up later this year and a TA next year and we're looking forward to both.

Virgin Classics was a thing (now defunct/sold off). That said, I like full orchestra classical now and then, but can't say I've ever been a fan of trio's. On the repositioning cruise we were on last year there weren't exactly "pop up" musicians, but there was a solo guy and a duo that played in a few different places on the ship (neither was classical, of course).

There was a person here or on Reddit that seemed to indicate the sound of the wake (ships wake, not the restaurant) when on the balcony of the 14th deck aft suite was loud. I was in the 9th deck aft suite and didn't really hear it, but perhaps a combination of sound reflecting off the 15th deck above and a more direct line to the rear of the ship amplified the sound up there? All that said, when I picked a cheeky corner suite for an upcoming cruise I asked for it on the 13th deck, just to be on the safe side regarding noise from the 15th deck.

I hope the artist at least tried to talk them out of that one. I got a tattoo done by a guy that showed me a drawing some younger guy came in to get tattooed on his chest of a skeletal hand flipping the bird. He said he told the guy he really didn't think it was a good idea, but they insisted so...

It's not quite eggs Benedict, but The Galley had eggs Florentine every morning (I think they were at Noodle Around). They were my go to breakfast a few mornings. I seem to remember they also had some eggs Benedict variant as well at least some mornings.

https://vvinsider.com/cabins/con/no-hammock/#utm_content=cmp-true

Assuming you mean prior to being on board, the only ways I've seen to do that are to use the app, call sailor services, or use your TA if you have one.

More specifically I believe they basically opened up the cruises out of Miami. I got an e-mail today about it. At first I looked at the prices they listed and was amazed at how low they were...then caught the part where the prices in the e-mail and off the page they were linked to were posted with per-sailor pricing. I hate cheap marketing tricks like that.

You see these things on the 3d printer forums all the time. If it's got anything resembling an arm, someone will 3d print it flipping the bird. If it's any consolation, though, the most common material used on 3d printers is basically made from renewable biomass, so that's likely not a single use plastic.

They seemed like refillable bags and didn't seem to have any "branding". That said, I imagine they could have been made on the ship, pre-made and stored refrigerated for a week, or could be frozen. I read elsewhere that, for ships out of Miami at least, they are pressed there and loaded up on the ship. But given the cruise I was on left from Singapore, I can't imagine they lined up a supplier there to provide those juices. So either they were prepared in Europe and loaded up in Athens then frozen to last for a month and a half, or prepared on the ship.

On Resilient Lady last year I was told it was just at Gym and Tonic, but I never tried anyplace else. Honestly, I didn't even have my SOR band on and they would just hand me a couple when I asked for them for my wife and I. The juices themselves were in bags they poured them out from, so they pre made at some point. There was one juice with ginger in it that ended up being the one I asked for most of the trip.

I believe the aft part of deck 15 is actually the outdoor sitting behind The Galley and the aft Rockstar suites stop at deck 14. So, in theory, there's room there to do something under that net. I also agree with what someone said about the seating on the Dock. Our muster station was there and we hung out in the area for a bit with some people we met, but never really went back during our cruise since it just wasn't a "comfortable" place to hang out. The wood chairs were low and uncomfortable, and the "beds" were not great if you wanted to have food or a drink there.

Since most of the excursions are basically 3rd parties they've booked, I usually search for tours that use generally the same one sentence description as Virgin's excursions. Then see how Virgin's vague description matches up with the other tours description. At the end of the day, most non-private tours of a particular area follow the same general itinerary so it's a half decent place to start. Plus it gives me an idea of how the pricing compares between the 3rd party and Virgin.

It used to be $200, then they bumped it up to $250 a few months ago. My wife and I got it last year and, at $200 it was fun and somewhat worth it, but at $250 it's, well, less worth it. The funny thing was that we wouldn't always eat all the "treats" at once and would leave some with the intent of snacking on them later. The cabin stewards kept removing the left overs when prepping the cabin for the evening. I commented about it a couple of times and they would deliver replacements, but it was amusing they were so aggressive about removing them. I somewhat get it since you don't want to leave a lot of food just laying around, but we would leave them covered with the saran wrap and it was still an ongoing battle.

I'm fairly certain Virgin has automatic triggers also (though maybe they decided to manually reprice this particular cruise). I've seen weird pricing at times like a higher level cheeky corner suite, aft suit, and sea terrace for less than the lower level ones in their general class. So no human would do that. Honestly, at $7500 the starting price for the XL sea terrace on the Panama cruise was more reasonable than I expected given their pricing on other "high interest" cruises, so not a big surprise the prices went up on the remaining cabins.

It's actually still up there. The site has honestly been a bit of a mess with how to find voyages, but I just clicked on the "book now" button for the Brilliant Lady inaugural voyages graphic on the page and it was there. XL sea terrace is sold out now, though, and the central sea terrace is now more expensive than the XL sea terrace was before it sold out.

I'm curious how many of those suites on the Panama Canal sailing have actually been "bought". I'm guessing most of that is just TA's reserving the suite and then turning around to sell it. (To reinforce this, I saw a TA post something on Reddit saying they had 3 different types of Rockstar Suite available before they either deleted the post or the moderators deleted it.) That said, someone posted the prices for those suites and they are way out of my price range anyway. But the price for an XL or regular sea terrace actually seem reasonable.