twangster

Early azipods were new technology in their day. Carnival must have been bitten early on or simply decided the innovation wasn't worth it. Just like the decision to cancel Project Pinnacle, more of the same, no change, low risk seems to be Carnival's approach. Why change? We are making lots of money...

High demand means higher prices are coming.

That's a lot of walking for the ATS Genies.

To be fair they tried them on a small ship in the 90's but didn't adopt them for Conquest class which are the Voyager and Freedom class era of ships. They used them on their Spirit class but refrained from using them on the Dream class relegating azipods to smaller ships only until Vista in 2016.

Carnival must be absolutely kicking themselves. It's only taken ~20 years for them to acknowledge their mistake. Back around the turn of the century they decided mega ships would never work. Around the same time Royal created the concept of Project Genesis now known as Oasis class and then Royal actually built it. Meanwhile Carnival kept on building medium sized ships and avoided azipods for decades more. Carnival had a mega ship concept, then cancelled it. Cute name don't you think?

As an example I booked Wonder for my Prime cruise. The cost to upgrade a cabin depends on ship and sail date. It isn't a fixed rate across the entire fleet. Everyone pays port fees and taxes for the Prime cruise. The casino Prime cert does not include port fees and taxes or daily service charges (gratuity). It also does not include insurance or transfers to the port. My port fees and taxes are ~$155 and gratuity for the week is $126. Those remain the same for an interior, ocean view or balcony cabin. In my case I paid around $600 to upgrade to an ocean view balcony (4D category). My sail date is a seven night cruise. For seven nights ~$600 to have a balcony on Wonder was within my realm of a great deal so I gladly paid the additional fee to upgrade from an interior to a balcony. A different ship or a different sail date would yield different upgrade costs.

Keep in mind that Jay Schneider has indicated more themes are coming to the Railway venue. The lack of reservations beyond August could be related to an additional theme becoming available. They don't want to sell three nightly sessions of the Wild West theme only to introduce a Silk Road theme and then having to cancel or change one session's worth of reservations to the new theme. Will they alternate themes to give the cast members for each a break? Do the same cast perform in each theme? Can one cast perform three or four sessions per night? There is probably a lot of decision making going on so until they figure it all out reservations beyond August are being withheld.

Back on the 10th when Jay Schneider announced reservations would open over the next few days he also stated it would be done in phases. Phase one was through the end of August. No word when they'll open up reservations beyond August.

Royal won't change a bit due to the NCL sailing from Philly. They'll likely open up 2026 bookings on their standard schedule.

One of the skaters who has been on three OA class says it's her favorite parade, as a cast member.

Sounds like a phone agent who didn't want to help. Call back and try again, assuming there is an unobstructed cabin available.

The nice thing about a mostly new to cruise voyage.

As an example here on July 23rd at 1:45pm I can still book Grandeur or Vision for their July 25th sailing. That's under 48 hours. There is only one cabin left on Grandeur so as people click on it it comes and goes from inventory. Since its the last cabin, Grandeur comes and goes from the website today. If someone actually books that last cabin then Grandeur will stop appearing on the website.

Balcony is not a category and there is no concept of subcategory. The type of cabin you booked as a guarantee was a balcony. The 1E or 2E deck 6 obstructed balcony is the category you were assigned. Once your cabin number is officially assigned you can inquire to see if there is a different cabin within the same category available, but that means staying within the 1E or 2E obstructed balcony category. It does NOT mean switching to a different balcony category such as a 4D or 2D balcony that is not obstructed. To change categories to something that is not obstructed requires paying the difference in fares at the prevailing rate the day you call.

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