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We Used to Be Cruise Pros...

Lokip53

By Lokip53,
in Royal Caribbean International

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Lokip53

Lokip53

Posted
Posted (edited)

We were on a pretty solid cruise rhythm for over a decade leading up to our last cruise (pre-covid) in Feb 2020 right before things lit off. 

 

We're excited to be jumping back in the saddle on Odyssey next month, but are sure that things have changed a bit (or more) over the past four years.

 

What should we be ready for? 

Edited by Lokip53
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time4u2go

time4u2go

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19 minutes ago, Lokip53 said:

We were on a pretty solid cruise rhythm for over a decade leading up to our last cruise (pre-covid) in Feb 2020 right before things lit off. 

 

We're excited to be jumping back in the saddle on Odyssey next month, but are sure that things have changed a bit (or more) over the past four years.

 

What should we be ready for? 

Worse food. Reduced menu. Very expensive specialty restaurants. 

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Ourusualbeach

Ourusualbeach

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Posted
20 minutes ago, Lokip53 said:

We were on a pretty solid cruise rhythm for over a decade leading up to our last cruise (pre-covid) in Feb 2020 right before things lit off. 

 

We're excited to be jumping back in the saddle on Odyssey next month, but are sure that things have changed a bit (or more) over the past four years.

 

What should we be ready for? 

Once a day room service

Smaller menus in the MDR with no more always available entrees.

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Lokip53

Lokip53

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1 minute ago, time4u2go said:

Worse food. Reduced menu. Very expensive specialty restaurants. 

Was afraid of that. Figured after getting crushed for a few years they'd be cutting left and right.

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SPacificbound

SPacificbound

Posted
Posted

I'm going to ramble a little bit here, bear with me.  😃

 

We had our first post COVID cruises late summer/early Fall 2023, B2B on Celebrity Summit for 24 nights, home 3 weeks and them B2B on RCCL Jewel of the Seas for 22 nights. 

 

We anticipated the changes, and honestly everything is more expensive now, groceries, utilities, everything.

 

Full disclosure, we don't eat in the MDR ever, we much prefer the buffet, it's just simpler, and much better for a vegan.

 

Summit Oceanview Café was not up to where it was previously, it was just okay. They seem to have a problem keeping hot food hot, consistently. Other than that service was good, we enjoyed most of the shows, bar staff was good. Cabin attendant was fine with our request of just once in the afternoon. 

 

Jewel was great, I wish I had booked all four cruises on Jewel!!

 

The Windjammer manager Dragos was absolutely wonderful. We usually have both lunch and dinner in the Windjammer, and when we would come in, Dragos would see us and come ask me what he could get for me. I adore him!  Fantastic service. We will be on Jewel for B2B in November, I hope he is there again.

 

Our Jewel cabin attendant was great, we told him to just get our cabin once in afternoon, when we  leave we don't come back until after the show. If we wanted something I just left him a note, and when we came back the request was filled. After the first night I left a note to ask for some padding, when we got back the second night, he had put two really good pads.

I was really surprised he did towel animals, really creative ones also.

 

We enjoyed most of the shows. Bar service was good in theater as well as the bars.

 

Royal Caribbean remains our favorite over Celebrity.

 

 

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Mum2Mercury

Mum2Mercury

Posted
Posted (edited)
20 hours ago, Lokip53 said:

What should we be ready for? 

We "returned to cruising" last year and found several changes: 

- Online muster drill 

- Necessity of claiming a boarding time 45 days (45 days?) ahead of time 

- Print your own luggage tags 

- The online app (a neceessity) is hit-or-miss, and you have to ask for a paper Compass.  

- Just as much fun!  

20 hours ago, time4u2go said:

Worse food. Reduced menu. Very expensive specialty restaurants. 

We have found the MDR's steaks to be of lesser quality, and we would like larger quantity of vegetables -- but, overall, we're not displeased with the MDR, and we've never frequented the specialty restaurants.  The newer, larger ships are offering more fast-food type options, which we have enjoyed. 

20 hours ago, Ourusualbeach said:

Once a day room service

I hate-hate-hate this, especially as it is accompanied by higher gratuities.  One or the other, Royal.  Hitting us with higher prices AND reduced service is just wrong.  

15 hours ago, bg2310 said:

Get ready for LOTS of complaining from "old time" cruisers who gotta let their opinions be (loudly) known and compared endlessly to how it is today. :classic_biggrin:

It's more on this board than on the ships.  

 

 

Edited by Mum2Mercury
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robmtx

robmtx

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I have seen guest cover-bands sort of just disappear from the schedules this year. We used to get cool tribute or cover bands in Music Hall, but now it's just the house band and singers doing smaller sets. 

 

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robmtx

robmtx

Posted
Posted

Another change - 

Many complimentary experiences, such as Northstar, iFly, etc., now feature paid extended experiences or paid primetime slots. They continue to offer complimentary times, but the "best" times now cost money.   It's still, in my opinion, pretty easy to find decent timeslots for the free rides, but just know that those spaces are limited.

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teddie

teddie

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15 hours ago, chiguypaul said:

Overall quality of the food in the master dining room is the biggest and most material change to me. 

 

Absolutely.

 

Off the Anthem last week and it was our 10th RCI cruises, What was really different was our choice of dinner venues. Most notable was that we only dined TWICE in the MDR--unheard of for us!  Between the harried seating, even with a MTD reservation, the menu options, and the food itself, the MDR has lost its "specialness"-- I suppose first time or more recent cruisers may feel differently, not having experienced how it once was.

 

I am that person that purports to love dressing up, yet my second formal night outfit stayed in the closet this cruise--I actually surprised myself, LOL! Instead, we had Izumi one night, room service another, and ate in the Windjammer for the rest.  I find the WJ on the Anthem to be damned good, and the selections were huge.

 

I am not going to spend extra $$ on the specialty restaurants, as we are not big eaters, and I choose to spring for the Beach Club on Coco Cay if the price appeals to me (think Black Friday sale!) and that will satisfy my upscale meal urge.  

 

It's a New Normal of RCI cruising now.  I am adjusting.

 

Teddie

 

 

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The Fun Researcher

The Fun Researcher

Posted
Posted (edited)
17 minutes ago, robmtx said:

Another change - 

Many complimentary experiences, such as Northstar, iFly, etc., now feature paid extended experiences or paid primetime slots. They continue to offer complimentary times, but the "best" times now cost money.   It's still, in my opinion, pretty easy to find decent timeslots for the free rides, but just know that those spaces are limited.

Depends.  Those complimentary ones can be REALLY hard to get.  They were opening up the iFly slots at a certain time each evening (for the following day) throughout the cruise on our July Alaskan cruise on the Quantum.  You couldn't just go on embarkation day and book a time for later in cruise.

 

I'm very tech savvy and still had no luck finding an open timeslot all week for iFly. (Northstar was down all week and has been for months prior and since).  It was not well managed unfortunately.

Edited by The Fun Researcher
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temple1

temple1

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We took a B2B on Independence, our first cruise since 2018. Since memory is a little fuzzy on anything that long before Covid, it is difficult to compare. It is also difficult to compare a 4 night cruise to the 7 night cruises we used to take. Our biggest disappointment was the Windjammer. Very repetitious in their offerings.

 

I do tend to over analyze things, so going through 2 musters close together and listening to the count down of the hundreds of cruisers who had not yet stopped at their muster station I have to wonder why the staffer welcoming us aboard does not specifically tell you to go to your muster station? Following up on that, we were in Schooner over hearing someone giving their first time cruiser friend completely incorrect info.

Edited by temple1
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teddie

teddie

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26 minutes ago, NoShoes2 said:

The one per day cabin visit from the room steward, which I thought I would hate but actually wasn’t that big a deal. We saw our steward often in the hall way, so it was easy to ask for anything that we needed. 

Agreed.  Our steward did a thorough job each evening, and left us double towels as requested.  It was fine, and was the least noticeable change.

 

Teddie

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time4u2go

time4u2go

Posted
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2 hours ago, Mum2Mercury said:

I hate-hate-hate this, especially as it is accompanied by higher gratuities.  One or the other, Royal.  Hitting us with higher prices AND reduced service is just wrong.  

I agree.  Cut service and increase prices...wrong!

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