like_that;1747327 wrote:You can't do that on vacations outside of a cruise?

As far as the eating part, not without typically spending a boatload. The beauty of the cruise is that if you're an ice cream or pizza fan, you can go help yourself 24/7 and it's included in the cost of the trip. I prefer paying one lump sum up front. I don't drink so extra alcohol cost isn't an issue. The extra excursions you obviously have to pay for.

I actually prefer the vacations Like_That is talking about. However, in my job, I routinely have a Monday-Thursday or Friday "off". They aren't vacation days, but if I am working an event in California, take the red eye home Sunday night to get to Raleigh by 9am, I can make a cruise leaving that night in Charleston. Back Thursday or Friday morning and fly from Charleston to my next event. No days off used, but those days don't "rollover" anywhere. They are simply considered my "weekend".

BR1986FB;1747324 wrote:When I went on Carnival cruises, in the past, when dining in the main dining room, if they had four specials for the evening, you could order one of each.

And I'm with Laley on his views on cruises. I'm a little different in that I'd take a cruise 9x's out of 10 over a regular vacation. You can relax, eat whatever you want, whenever you want, etc.

You can't eat whenever you want. You have to pick a dining room time. It's miserable. Unless you want to skip out on the main dining room and just eat the buffet...but what is the point of that?

For me...all-inclusive. You get some of the planned activities that a cruise offers (the last trip I was on; there was a daily water polo game at 2 PM, for example) but extreme flexibility. If the pool bar is rocking at 6 PM, I don't have to stop what I'm doing to go get ready for dinner. Also, the drinks are included. The last cruise I was on, my sign and sail card or whatever had a 1000 bar tab on it after the week....and I took it easy a couple of days. It was absurd.

For my vacations, give me Vegas or all-inclusive in the Caribbean. I can go my whole life without seeing Europe and not feel like I'm missing anything. History bores me. So does sight seeing. Shakespeare wrote a sonnet in this park...let's walk in it! Fuck that. I would like to plan a golf trip to Scotland or Ireland, though.

TBone14;1747451 wrote:You can't eat whenever you want. You have to pick a dining room time. It's miserable. Unless you want to skip out on the main dining room and just eat the buffet...but what is the point of that?

For me...all-inclusive. You get some of the planned activities that a cruise offers (the last trip I was on; there was a daily water polo game at 2 PM, for example) but extreme flexibility. If the pool bar is rocking at 6 PM, I don't have to stop what I'm doing to go get ready for dinner. Also, the drinks are included. The last cruise I was on, my sign and sail card or whatever had a 1000 bar tab on it after the week....and I took it easy a couple of days. It was absurd.

For my vacations, give me Vegas or all-inclusive in the Caribbean. I can go my whole life without seeing Europe and not feel like I'm missing anything. History bores me. So does sight seeing. Shakespeare wrote a sonnet in this park...let's walk in it! Fuck that. I would like to plan a golf trip to Scotland or Ireland, though.

Not true. I've been on two cruises, and you can choose open dining. You still eat in an actual dining room with servers, etc., but you can go any time you want.

Yeah, I always eat when I want. You get like a 3 hour window...or you can skip it and eat something late night or whatever.

Fab4Runner;1747540 wrote:Not true. I've been on two cruises, and you can choose open dining. You still eat in an actual dining room with servers, etc., but you can go any time you want.

Laley23;1747552 wrote:Yeah, I always eat when I want. You get like a 3 hour window...or you can skip it and eat something late night or whatever.

Things that we not available on my last Royal Caribbean cruise. They must have gotten similar feedback from others like me and made the change.
That helps. I also heard that you buy drink packages now up front. That's pretty cool.

I do enjoy cruising but mixing it up a bit is good too.

I would like to plan a golf trip to Scotland or Ireland, though.

Our favorite vacation was a golf trip to Ireland. We traveled with 5 other couples on a package deal, and played 5 great courses. We had a driver assigned to us with a mini bus, and he was on our call. We had a couple of days where we all went touring, but on the golf days he would drop the guys off for golf and then take the ladies into town for more sightseeing/shopping.

If you do go, get on a golf package, and I could probably go back and find who we used. The package is definitely worth it. We were set up with Rocketballz rental clubs and were able to play top courses for half price. (If you were to just go and play normally, the cost would have been over 200 Euro a round.) You can use the money you save to get a caddie which was well worth it.

TBone14;1747587 wrote:Things that we not available on my last Royal Caribbean cruise. They must have gotten similar feedback from others like me and made the change.
That helps. I also heard that you buy drink packages now up front. That's pretty cool.

The one cruise I went on, pop was extra and I saw some family bring in a suitcase of Mountain Dew. LOL