This video is from May 2022 when Covid was still a huge pain in the ass. Port Canaveral did not have a plan for it but at least all of that is now gone.
My cruise is coming up on July 17 and it is harmony of the seas. First time with RCL. I am hearing many people complaining about short staff issues vs almost full passenger capacity, cancellation/alteration of entertainment, downgraded food quality and portion and elevated Covid cases on the ship. It is discouraging. This is our family vacation waited for years and we expect to be memorable in a good way. We may want to reconsider it seriously. Thanks for the alerting video and comments. It is very helpful!
It's a very challenging time for the cruise industry. I do want to point out that the terminal situation is controlled by Port Canaveral and they obviously need some direction on how to improve this. Just take what you read and hear on social media with a grain of salt. It is true that the industry is having some staffing issues but they're working on it as fast as they can and it's not necessarily going to impact your cruise. A head waiter on Harmony told us they are fully staffed but he did concede that some of the crew are a little inexperienced. I'll be releasing new vlog episodes from the Harmony on Fridays and you'll get a chance to see what it's like on the ship right now before your cruise. Thanks for the comment. 👍
Wow I really hoped your complaint gets looked at seriously. I have a cruise booked on this ship in August and hope their issues get fixed. Another thing is if everyone would just show up when they are suppose to it would make it less busy and hopefully a less wait time. Symphony had arrival time signs and you got in the line that was your arrival time and made it less chaotic.
This was so mismanaged that I'm not sure arrival times would have mattered. They apparently couldn't handle any sort of volume so what likely happened is as soon as the first rush of people arrived at whatever time, they were probably constantly behind with a long line from that point on. Thanks for the comment.
I was also on that sailing May 15. We didn’t have any issues boarding but the line was no where near the line you video when we boarded. We had 11:00am check in and we arrived at our check in time. The line moved quicker than we expected. We waited longer to get through security than for them to check our documents. All and all it took us like 45 minutes.
I really hope someone at Port Canaveral will go buy a clue and figure out how to run the terminals correctly for this ridiculous pre-cruise testing. Thanks for the comment. 👍
I've seen some crazy routes to get on ships at various ports. Miami for Scarlet Lady and Canaveral for MSC Meraviglia were both unusual from what I recall.
We were also on that cruise and yes, we experienced the same problem getting on the ship. What happened is no one honored their boarding time and just came when they wanted. The people in the blue shirts told me this and rather turn them away (as they threatened to do) till it was their check-in time they just let them get in line. There was a separate line for the Key but unless you asked someone you would never have know. They do not have separate lines for Diamond and above as they have in the past which made us upset. So much for honoring the loyalty program... We had a boarding time of 11:00 and arrived around 10:30. I think we got one of the last parking spots in the garage but we drove around a while before we found it. I tried to make reservations for parking but they no longer let you do it. So once you made it to the ship after waiting in the long, hot lines...you then have to figure out how to connect to the ship's Wifi, and try and book your entertainment. They do not let you know what the entertainment is before you board or let you book it before your cruise like you use to do. Finally, we found the schedule and the room you can go into to get help booking it. So we waited in the long, hot lines, dragging our luggage around the ship, trying to book our entertainment, then being told to go to your muster station, then after an hour of trying to do that we made our way to find something to eat. Definitely not as easy or stress free as it has always been and not a fun way to start your cruise. Thank goodness my Mojito helped calm me down :-) Oh, and no one wore masks as they also instructed people to do while boarding.... People did get Covid on the ship and they had to cancel Grease as the singers got Covid. It's back up to ORANGE statis. The ship was 1,000 shy of being completely full and the next cruise I believe was completely full. Good luck with parking and getting on the ship when they are all running at full capacity. They even had life preservers out on deck 5 and were counting them. The crew member said they had to make sure they had enough for all the extra people now on the cruise. We did have a wonderful time and the seas were so calm there wasn't any white caps. Just heard the Harmony hit a dock in Falmouth Jamaica yesterday. I'm sure Captain Johnny isn't happy about that....
I think I heard Capt Johnny got off on the 22nd when we came back into port and it was his alternate captain who was in command. I'm not sure on that one, just something I thought I read somewhere. I really hope Royal gets on top of this port situation. Thanks for the comment.
I watched this video before my December 2022 cruise on Wonder of the Seas and got nervous about how long it would take to get inside and board the ship. Luckily, my embarkation resembled nothing like this. There were not outside lines, and we were moved soo fast through the terminal that I didn't even get to look around at how the terminal looked lol. Hopefully, your next experience there will not be this chaotic.
Yeah this seen from May 2022 was very unusual and very annoying because it didn't have to be like that. The people in charge at the Terminal 1 at Port Canaveral (not Royal Caribbean employees) were clueless back then. Now that the covid testing paperwork is long gone, it should be back to normal. Thanks for watching. :)
@@OaklandTravel We also went on Wonder in Feb of this year, also on a Sunday and went right in to the terminal. No line whatsoever. Not sure why that happened in your case. Hopefully it doesn't happen too often, or at all.
@@neil5819 What you see in the video is a case study in how not to operate a cruise terminal during Covid. The short version is they were requiring Covid test results to even walk into the terminal but only had a handful of people capable of checking said paperwork and had them stationed right at the door. Thankfully for Royal Caribbean, these were Port Canaveral employees and this whole fiasco was on the Port Canaveral people. Hopefully, we never return to this again.
@neil5819 did you park in the parking garage? We have 10:30 arrival in a couple if weeks for Wonder and wondering if it'll be hard to find parking for our group of 5 cars
Hi I have an unrelated question for you. Was Harmony of the Seas offering Wow Bands for purchase? They are advertised on the website but I heard they may not be offering them. Do you know?
No wow bands that I was aware of. The Sea Pass card gets annoying sometimes. I was on my third card by the end of the cruise because the face of the card kept coming off. Apparently they just take a blank card and apply a thin laminate with your information on it. Thanks for the question.
When did they issue your sea pass? Did you have to go to the counter or do you just go to enter the ship once you got in the building. Of did you just not record that part.
Royal moved to a new system a few years ago where your sea pass card is now in a little poach at your stateroom in this little holder next to the door sensor. The new routine isn't bad. First step is you print your set sail pass at home and it has the barcode and your info. Second step is once you get through the clusterf of the garage to actually into the terminal building, go through security like always, go upstairs to the check in desk where they recheck the very same paperwork checked in the garage outside (why check it twice?? hmm), scan your passport, and verify your CDC vaccine card. Third step is once you're done at the counter (which moves pretty quickly), you go over to the people at the entrance to the ship, they scan your set sail pass, and then you board the ship. That set sail pass you print at home is supposed to work with everything on the ship until you get to your stateroom to get the sea pass cards.
Hopefully...it has calmed down by now. A lot of it might depend on your reservation time for the embarkation. If Royal will wake up and follow the other cruise lines, by Sept 11, you won't have to do the pre-cruise testing which would eliminate the bottleneck getting into the terminal. Have a great cruise!
@@kennethmoore2266 As of today (Aug 13th) yes, but...the other major cruise lines have already announced they're dropping their testing requirements on Sept 3 or Sept 6 (depending on the line). Royal hasn't announced anything yet but is supposed to announce something literally any day now based on a recent email to travel advisors. If Royal will follow the other cruise lines, they may drop the testing requirement before your Sept 11 cruise.
May 15 is where they had 2 ships, which is not normal. They had 2 terminals and the employee's were spread thinly. By experience and looking at your video, it appears that something else was going on. My first thought is computer issues. Once the upstairs is filled and there are no more seating, they have to stop. Then the upstairs is cleared, they can start the process, which is what it appears they did. The reason you saw the empty lounge, Royal has opened their doors and those that was waiting has boarded.
I'm going to respectively disagree with you :) If you watch the video again, you'll see the reason for the crazy line was because only 4-5 employees at the very front of the line were checking paperwork and allowing people into the terminal. With 1) a different configuration of the barricades, 2) twice as many employees, and most importantly, 3) all of them able to check paperwork and allow someone into the terminal, it would have been a completely different experience. I didn't capture any video because of where it is but security had hardly any lines and once we got upstairs, they were having no issues either. The problem was outside the building. Thanks for the comment.
I’ve been on Harmony at this terminal as well as Independence of the Seas. The problem lies that with the health check outside and especially people showing up well before their boarding time, especially now that the ships are booked full. That outside area can only hold about 600 people and when 1200 show up at once, there is no where to go. My hats off to the staff for at least controlling the chaos. Covid caused this and unless Royal does away with testing, not much more can be done. I was on Harmony 2 weeks ago and a new configuration to the line has been made which allows people to stand in their time slot line. However, it still gets backed up a bit. Also I counted 7 or 8 checkers at the front, not 4 like you stated. Also a huge problem are people who don’t have their documents ready when they get to the front and cause everyone to wait. I don’t know why you seemed so surprised since we all have to still deal with this pandemic. You should be grateful they are checking thoroughly so you don’t catch anything while on board. Right now, it’s not business as usual as it was before Covid.
As I stated in the video, the problem isn't with the health check, it's ____how____ the health check was being performed. You had quite a few employees who were doing nothing but waving their arms when they could have been checking paperwork and clearing people through to enter the terminal. Whoever at Port Canaveral decided that idea for a line to get into the terminal is the cause of the mess. When we arrived to check in for the Harmony and came upon that mess, I was very surprised at how poorly it was organized, not by the volume of people. They should have hired an industrial engineer to set that up properly if they were going to spend months checking the paperwork before letting anyone into the terminal.
@@OaklandTravel I understand your point but all I’m saying is we aren’t privy to the decisions being made there and I’m sure the terminal wasn’t designed to hold that many people outside, especially when they arrive well before their time. I talked to 2pm folks who were there at 11:30am. So I’m sure it’s not easy dealing with that. Also Harmony holds about 6500 people so from 10:30 to 3pm boardings, that’s on average 650 people every half hour, if they arrive at their time. Also, I have a child who needed to be tested and half of the first floor of terminal 1 is devoted to kids testing, so again, they are probably stuck with the outside health checks. These are pandemic problems that add to everyone’s frustration. I just think the problem you encountered lies with these Covid rules. I had the worst time at the Ft. Lauderdale terminal but that’s another story. I have both really good and really bad experiences getting on board ships, but these health checks since Covid have been frustrating for both passengers and port workers alike. In any event, Happy cruising!
As soon as someone at Port Canaveral decided on that arrangement to check the paperwork before letting people into the terminal, it was set up to fail. There are countless ways this could have been setup properly; stations all around the lower level of the garage where employees could check paperwork and put some sort of a stamp on it that could be shown when you got up to the doors, etc. Anything would be better than what they had the day I was there and what you see in that video. Instead, someone in authority just seemingly threw something together and it was likely the same on cruises before mine in May and probably after as well. When Royal finally drops the pre-cruise testing, this will all go away and hopefully they'll take the check-in timeslot system and get rid of it too.
Royal Caribbean is such a well oiled machine and this terminal situation does not jive with that at all. Needs to be fixed. We have had similar experiences at Cape Liberty in NJ but dealt with freezing cold weather with harsh cold wind rather than this heat.
I agree. I told the officer at guest services on the Harmony that the chaos at the terminal reflects on Royal Caribbean. I haven't heard anything back from my two emails to different parts of Royal but it's still early. Thanks for the comment.
If you look at the 03:22 mark in the video you'll see what looks like a suite access line. As far as getting into that line when you walk up, I'm not sure. Depending on what time you arrive and how crazy the scene is, my guess would be you'll need to find one of the blue shirts close to where this suite access area is located and ask them. Good luck and thanks for the question. 👍
Hi thank you for your video. So well shot I could really see the situation. Hopefully they will have more employees available to check documents. Was anyone checking for scheduled arrival times? Were they checking Passports, tests, and vaccine cards before you entered the building?
No one was checking arrival times that I could see. As for the documents; they were checking for 3 things before letting you into the building to go through the security screening: CDC card, proof of your negative COVID test result, and passport. Thanks for the comment.
I think it's actually the second line from the end. The problem with this mess is that those smaller lines where the people check the paperwork are at the end of the one mega line that goes all the way to the back and out into the sun in the parking lot. If you were there and had signed up for the key, I guess you'd have to flag one of the blue shirts down and essentially break in line? I'm not sure. This was just the most screwed-up thing I've ever seen. Thanks for the question. 👍
I've been trying to find out if Port Canaveral has "The Key" line as I've read some Royal Caribbean terminals do not have that. Can you tell me if there is a dedicated line there?
Thanks for sharing this! I also was on that cruise on that ship that date and the first day between getting on the ship and some of the issues I encountered when I finally got to my room mainly the key they gave me did not work it was not a good day. Thankfully the rest of the week was very enjoyable I understand that Royal Caribbean as well as all the other cruise lines lost a lot of their experienced employees and there are a lot of people in training now! They really to please all of the passengers and take care of them!! I did not care for the ship itself in particular nothing specific just a lot of things that I enjoyed on some of the other ships that I have been on that I did not like about this one but they did keep it clean and sanitized and about a safe as you could under the circumstances
Awesome video Patrick! Yeah, the parking situation at CT1 right now is not great at all! It has gotten so bad that they had to move one of the other RCI ships to CT5 so they can try to accommodate and Oasis class ship & the 3/4 night ship.
We were on the sailing prior to this one - May 8th - 15th. We had a similar line (all the way out in the sun). They were telling us it was due to a Coast Guard inspection and they were an hour behind. I thought it would take us forever to get on the ship but it only took us 40 minutes! Port staff did a wonderful job getting people checked in and on the ship. Worst part for us was the parking lot. They need a better way to route the people who need to drop off luggage and people who have already dropped off luggage.
Did they have the same bottleneck at the entrance? Only a few people that could check paperwork and allow you into the building to go through security? That's the part I've been laser focused on because it's makes zero sense. Thanks for the comment. 👍
@@OaklandTravel Yes, the same four lines checking paperwork before you could get in the terminal. The lines were moving so it all went fast. Next slowdown was at Security which was maybe 5 minutes. A quick check in and we were headed to the ship. We met people in line that we ended up having drinks with a couple of times. All in all, not the best experience but certainly it was okay. With more people cruising I’m sure they will need a little more practice to get back to normal.
Wow! I’m sorry your experienced such a terrible boarding process. I really hope they take this serious as this makes me extremely nervous to cruise in September. If they double check paperwork at the desk why not send half the people inside and check there. I don’t see the point to check and have people wait in the heat for hours! I hope they Atleast apologized for the inconvenience.
The only people that really seemed to take it seriously were the ship staff at the guest services desk on the Harmony. People in the terminal and more importantly the employees of Port Canaveral said nothing. I made guest services aware of this with the stories plus photos on my phone. They supposedly sent it to corporate inside RCCL. When we got home, I fired off a few emails to internal support departments inside Royal that are designated for travel advisors. I also covered it pretty well in the post cruise survey. For your September cruise, make absolutely certain you're watching the window for when you can do the online check-in for your cruise and do it on the day it opens and get the earliest time slot you can. That was my mistake. I wasn't watching it closely and checked in for the cruise way too late and all the early timeslots were gone. Have a great cruise!
We canceled after seeing this, even though we lost some of what we paid. Many of these customers are elderly and standing for about two hours in very hot and humid conditions can be very serious in regard to health.
This was our experience back in May 2022 when the Covid protocols were still a pain. I don't know what it's like now in Oct 2022. I'm sorry you had to cancel your cruise. :(
We are sailing on Harmony in a few weeks. We have 10:30-11:00 check in. I’m a little concerned after seeing this video. I really hope it was not due to all the people that showed up very early before their check in time. That’s a big shame if that was why. Hopefully you had a great time otherwise. I can see where this would make for a stressful and long day.
Thank you for the comment. With a check in that early, I think you'll be ok. If the same people/process is in place at Port Canaveral terminal 1, I think their issue is they can't handle much volume with that ill-concieved setup. So as you get later into the morning and more and more people are arriving, even if they're on time for their check-in appointment, the bottleneck at the terminal doors starts to have a cascading effect to where everyone is waiting to get into the terminal regardless of when they arrived. That's what I think happened to us and by the time we arrived shortly after 1pm for a 1:30pm check-in timeslot, we were screwed. I've never seen such incredibly poor planning and execution as what is displayed in this video. I'm not gonna lie, we were _not_ happy campers the rest of the day/night. Our first day of the cruise was a wash because our normal embarkation day plans were gone and we were off kilter the rest of the day. I absolutely got my point across, both to the officers on the ship at guest services and to the internal Royal Caribbean departments that I have access to as a travel advisor. I'm not sure what will come of it but hopefully someone at Port Canaveral will go get a clue and fix this.
@@OaklandTravel gosh. I'm so sorry. I'd feel the same way. Thanks for sharing your experiences. We make Diamond once this cruise is complete so we are very much looking forward to it. We live in the Tampa area and will be driving over to Port Canaveral. We will use the driving time to prepare for the worst and be hopeful for the best! *giggle*
I really hope you'll be ok with such an early check-in time. In hind sight, I was asleep at the switch when it came to our cruise and didn't monitor Royal Caribbean for the first day I could check in for our cruise. By the time I did finally check in, 1:30pm was the earliest available time; that was on me. You'll love Diamond by the way. The drink vouchers are worth it. Have a great cruise!
That's the problem with watching these videos. Typical Americans. Impatient and crybabies. They are spending more in a week than 50% of the planet earns in a year
I'm not sure. Every port employee we came across was just directing people to the back of the line. I saw a sign for the key but as you can see from the video, the whole area was so mismanaged, I just don't know.
Why would anyone subject themselves to this on vacation? It's land based all inclusives for me. I'm not paying extra for drinks, room service, minibar, etc. Much better value.
