Are low capacity rates reaching a concerning level?

[firefly333]

8 minutes ago, Iamcruzin said:

You have been hanging tough through this entire pandemic. It must really be bad now if even you are discouraged.

Yes today discouraged. Just now saw someone ask on a roll call if someone gets a note from their doctor they cant wear a mask, can they not wear it? ..asking for a friend he said. I said i hope the mask police nag your friend to death while he waves his doctors note around.

[Blizzard54]

I agree that sailing with low numbers is probably more economical that cancelling.  The fixed costs are still there.  There may be a slower than anticipated increase but I am confident that it will happen.  I believe that at least part of the problem right now it the change in requiring all over 11 to be vaxed combined with some issues getting the testing done in a timely fashion.    

We will continue to do our part in filling the ships. 

[orville99]

3 hours ago, Jimbo said:

200 refused boarding? , Wow , that has to be  the most for 1 sailing that has been reported thus far. 

Estimate from one of the officers on board Allure last week (executive chef) was that they had expected around 2000 passengers, but that there were several hundred cancellations when the vax-only and pre-test protocols were put in place.

[spunks]

I will try and give more information as my comment that 200 were turned away on the Independence drew attention.....Many claimed to have gotten confusing emails about testing at the pier. In fact they kept telling us that we needed to get a time for testing at the pier as we were not vaccinated. We kept telling them that in fact we had been vaccinated and were bringing documentation......The precruise information from RCCL was quite disorganized.....My advise....no matter what you are told before hand...Get the Antigen test and bring the results with you.

 

There was in fact an emergency clinic that would do the rapid test( for $50.00) but if you flew, you had to find a cab.....also unless you got to that place by noon you were mostly out of luck.....you could not get back in time. Remember....they would not let you in the building before your assigned time to find out you needed to find a test site.

 

The guy without his CDC test card was a Pinnacle and he had paperwork that he claimed was the same thing. Fortunately for him, his wife did not believe him and brought the cards without telling him.

 

The cruise was great....staff wonderful....RCCL did a bit of a poor job with communication.....we cant wait to go again.

[Jimbo]

7 minutes ago, orville99 said:

Estimate from one of the officers on board Allure last week (executive chef) was that they had expected around 2000 passengers, but that there were several hundred cancellations when the vax-only and pre-test protocols were put in place.

That would be a first too for any ship having anywhere close to 2000 passengers on a a Royal Ship

[ADunk]

2 hours ago, udamom said:

So now that they changed to all 12 and over vaccinated were there any changes in indoor settings? Had to wear a mask every time you went indoors still correct? Even in vaxxed only venues?

thanks for the info!

 

Right?! Im on Allure in less than 2 weeks. Over holding my breathe for the mask policy to be revised (hopeful thinking) but to the point of many, Allure is very open to the outside so it shouldnt be too bad.

 

Ive been tracking the Allure's capacity and it is steadily rising on average and should be up around 2000 for our sailing! 

[flamingos]

4 minutes ago, spunks said:

I will try and give more information as my comment that 200 were turned away on the Independence drew attention.....Many claimed to have gotten confusing emails about testing at the pier. In fact they kept telling us that we needed to get a time for testing at the pier as we were not vaccinated. We kept telling them that in fact we had been vaccinated and were bringing documentation......The precruise information from RCCL was quite disorganized.....My advise....no matter what you are told before hand...Get the Antigen test and bring the results with you.

 

There was in fact an emergency clinic that would do the rapid test( for $50.00) but if you flew, you had to find a cab.....also unless you got to that place by noon you were mostly out of luck.....you could not get back in time. Remember....they would not let you in the building before your assigned time to find out you needed to find a test site.

 

The guy without his CDC test card was a Pinnacle and he had paperwork that he claimed was the same thing. Fortunately for him, his wife did not believe him and brought the cards without telling him.

 

The cruise was great....staff wonderful....RCCL did a bit of a poor job with communication.....we cant wait to go again.

This just happened: I am with a group that is going on the Mariner in October, and an email was sent with the vaccination form.  I clicked and got the page with the updated information, but another person got an older one that says unvaccinated can board - from the SAME LINK.  What the heck?

[BecciBoo]

5 hours ago, lovesthebeach2 said:

We were just on Allure last week with only 1,600 others. I thought it was great! We will appreciate it while we have it this way, because it will change and we’ll never see it like this again.

When the pandemic has officially died down, we'll see normal 5000 passengers on Allure again, makes me almost feel priviledged to be in the few, the proud, the brave first cruisers back.  I'm not worried about RCCL, it will do just fine.  If there were any problems would they be building ships, they could've paid a much reduced penilty to scrap plans for Icon, (Celebrity) and Wonder, etc.  They know what they're doing and with the smallest help from the CDC they could do well.  You'll see these reduced capacties until the masking/distancing stops.  But I think the testing will continue.

[BecciBoo]

25 minutes ago, firefly333 said:

Yes today discouraged. Just now saw someone ask on a roll call if someone gets a note from their doctor they cant wear a mask, can they not wear it? ..asking for a friend he said. I said i hope the mask police nag your friend to death while he waves his doctors note around.

I am not discouraged in the least, I have at least 20 different masks we are taking and will be wearing them gladly.  This will not affect me in the least and I have pretty good medical excuses NOT to wear them.  But I will comply, I am so excited to be back on the ocean I might P.  I hope people like Niksmom and EXM and other half full cruisers can influence others to be hopeful and caring of others.  Let's roll....

[Sunshine3601]

33 minutes ago, firefly333 said:

I doubt I'm the only one trying to figure is this cruise within 14 days of a already booked cruise, needing a extra test. Or hates the idea of getting a precruise test. I doubt I'm alone. Just saying no to more bookings.

 

I saw someone post a rumor rcl is considering doing the testing. I think that would do wonders for their bookings. People dont want to worry is this the right test, will cvs run out of tests and I lose all my money. I think rcl has to decide to do the tests. 

There are several testing options in my area and overall our covid case load has been reasonably low in my County so they are not getting overwhelmed and running out of tests at this time but that could all change by my next booked sailing on Oasis for 9.26.     

 

Other than our sailing out of Barbados on Grandeur (may not want to fly there either) we are going to stick with drive up ports of Bayonne (first revenue sailing on 9.05) or Baltimore (royal not sailing from there yet).

 

If we fly to Florida for cruises we usually do b2b's or b2b2b's but right now we have no interest in flying and wearing masks for 6 +/- hours (total in airport and on flying).     And it would really stink to test positive for the 2nd leg of the cruise and then have to quarantine in a hotel in FL before we could fly home. 

 

I think a lot of people have the same concern about flying to port.    What is the point of testing 3 days in advance then go to an airport jammed pack and hop on a plane crammed next to a bunch of strangers.     It would make sense for Royal to do the rapid test at the cruise terminal but I can only see this being done with ships sailing at less than 50%.     Can you imagine having to test 2000 to 4500 people in a matter of hours.    You wouldn't want to give them your luggage until your tested.   

 

  

[Iamcruzin]

14 minutes ago, spunks said:

 

The guy without his CDC test card was a Pinnacle and he had paperwork that he claimed was the same thing. Fortunately for him, his wife did not believe him and brought the cards without telling him.

Like I said, "Arrogant". Lucky for him his wife had the good sense not to listen to him.

[BecciBoo]

2 hours ago, udamom said:

So now that they changed to all 12 and over vaccinated were there any changes in indoor settings? Had to wear a mask every time you went indoors still correct? Even in vaxxed only venues?

thanks for the info!

 

That's not what we hear from the live bloggers here.

[BecciBoo]

WE will be doubly covered, we ordered the Abbott tests for back up and will schedule Thursday next when Walgreen's gets the days on the web site.  We'll save the Abbotts for Odyssey if we don't use them for next week's Allure.   It shouldn't be so stressful with so many options.  But I know other areas of the country have different problems.  Nobody seems to be traveling from our neck of the woods so Walgreen's is not a problem...in fact we've already done one dry run, schedule/test/results all in same day and on a Saturday.😁

Edited August 31, 2021 by BecciBoo

[Sunshine3601]

36 minutes ago, Jimbo said:

That would be a first too for any ship having anywhere close to 2000 passengers on a a Royal Ship

The most I heard was 1700.     I think that was on Odyssey or Allure in the last 2 weeks.    

Well other than 2500 that sailed on Anthem UK sailing this past week.   

[cnssu123]

We were told by numerous sources that Oasis will sail at around 3k for 9/5. 
 

Seems high compare to others 

[cnssu123]

4 hours ago, thjeepster said:

Praying my Oct Cruise on Odyssey will be low occupancy!!!......We will be getting married on it and in a Grand Suite so that will be very nice!

You can even try to royal up for a star class and get a Genie, if budget allows. Chances of Royal up with minimum bids are pretty high these days 

[dahirsh]

As a passenger, my hope is that they are not much above 50% for my December cruise, but yes it's concerning for the future of the industry.

[BecciBoo]

37 minutes ago, Sunshine3601 said:

I think a lot of people have the same concern about flying to port.    What is the point of testing 3 days in advance then go to an airport jammed pack and hop on a plane crammed next to a bunch of strangers

We joked about wearing the cheap Hazmat suits to fly!  Maybe not so far fetched, right:

 

 

[orville99]

1 hour ago, Jimbo said:

That would be a first too for any ship having anywhere close to 2000 passengers on a a Royal Ship

What we were told by multiple FOH staff, including our concierge and the chefs that we talked with was that they were expecting ~2000 but ended up with ~1800 passengers on board. My best guess based on what we actually experienced was that the number was closer to 1600. 

[Jimbo]

22 minutes ago, cnssu123 said:

We were told by numerous sources that Oasis will sail at around 3k for 9/5. 
 

Seems high compare to others 

Hope they aren't pushing the envelop to fast, seems like they are doubling  their passenger count in just one week. May be pressing their luck, hope not. Guess we will see?

[cnssu123]

Just now, Jimbo said:

Hope they aren't pushing the envelop to fast, seems like they are doubling  their passenger count in just one week. May be pressing their luck, hope not. Guess we will see?

Last one was a test cruise.

I am guessing they book more in anticipation of some last minute cancellation and denies on board.

 

Also maybe because they already had experience on other Oasis class

[spunks]

The mask policy was not too bad from our standpoint. You had to wear the mask indoors when you were walking from venue to venue. EVERY RCCL employee would remind you about your mask. However, when you got seated you could take off the mask. As for the unvaccinated, they could not even enter most venues( these were only children on our ship) but could sit upstairs in the theater and main dining rooms

 

As for the guy that wants a Dr note to excuse him from the mask....The rule is simple....no mask, no cruise!I am sure I could find/pay some Dr to write a note saying I HAD to smoke a pipe every waking moment, but they would not allow me entry.

 

Y'all have to remember these rules are set out by the CDC and not Royal. Address all complaints to the CDC.

[Sunshine3601]

24 minutes ago, Jimbo said:

Hope they aren't pushing the envelop to fast, seems like they are doubling  their passenger count in just one week. May be pressing their luck, hope not. Guess we will see?

I suspect the Oasis sailings out of Cape Liberty (bayonne) will do well as a lot of people in the northeast are excited to have an Oasis ship sailing from this area as well as excited to get back on a cruise ship that we can drive to port.    

Children in my County and other surrounding counties started school this week and others start next week so expect there to be hardly any children over the age of 5 or 6 onboard.     

3000 passengers does sound like a lot and I wonder if that total included crew as I still see some bookable cabins for sale for the 9.05 sailing. 

[ReneeFLL]

5 hours ago, alexgtp said:

I am Looking forward to low occupancy ships, for the trips i have planned out the rest of year.

Same here so we added an extra one for next month.

[bucfan2]

7 hours ago, Biker19 said:

It's so nice that folks care about the financial well being of a large corporation.\sarcasm

I do care about the financial well being of a large corporation that provides a service I love.  Kinda thought that's why we we're on here -