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...and the RC internet developers.... oh, wait.....

If you think that's bad...imagine leaving the sea pass card in your room and getting locked out and trekking down to guest services in your underwear at 2am..... Only time I 'lost" a seapass card..... I'd take losing a seapass card fully clothed anytime over that again.....

If you search for cruise ship crashes it becomes apparent that it happens fairly often. Mostly with piers or docks and sometimes with other boats and rocks. Navigating and piloting open and near shore waters are governed by volumes of national and international marine rules and laws. Many times it simply boils down to "don't run into anything." Conversation between a US naval ship and Canadian authorities off the coast of Newfoundland. US Ship: Please divert your course 0.5 degrees to the south to avoid a collision. CND reply: Recommend you divert your course 15 degrees to the South to avoid a collision. US Ship: This is the Captain of a US Navy Ship. I say again, divert your course. CND reply: No. I say again, you divert YOUR course! US Ship: THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS CORAL SEA*, WE ARE A LARGE WARSHIP OF THE US NAVY. DIVERT YOUR COURSE NOW!! CND reply: This is a lighthouse. Your call. PS ... it is a joke .. this did not really happen.

My wife told me we were in dry dock after next summer until my oldest graduates from high school and I retire from the Air Force in 2023, but I may show her those pics and convince her that Alaska should be our 20th anniversary vacation in 2021.

Day One- Embarkation Today was the big day! We drove to the PTA, which was about 20 mins from our hotel. The journey was a dream. We used a valet parking service from Central Parking who I’d highly recommend. The driver was waiting for us as was a porter for our luggage. Smooth. We paid €180 for the 12 nights. It’ll be a bargain, especially if we get our car back at the end. Then came check in. It wasn’t as smooth, particularly with a toddler, as it could have been but it wasn’t awful either. It was well organised and took just over an hour from getting in the queue to getting to the desk. They had snacks and things in the line and, for the seasoned amongst you, there were lots of queues for various C&A members or the key holders. The outlaws flew in this morning they are Emerald members, it took them less then 10mins to sail past us in the queue...although I guess the cost for those perks are really an investment of £10,000’s... of our inheritance!!! ? The staff were friendly, although they’d said there were problems with their systems so it took about 10mins at the desk as all of the pre information had to be resubmitted. We also got our sea pass cards at checkin, but the system of runners to do this was quite slow so I guess this held things up a bit. We started the cruise with lunch at Chops, at about £17per head. My wife and I have the 3 night dining package so we weren’t that fussed on doing this but, st the outlaws suggestion, it proved a nice and relaxing start to the cruise. The menu was reduced but it was practically empty and meant we had somewhere stress free and relaxing to start the cruise properly. Staterooms were ready at 1, 30mins earlier than advertised. We’re on deck 8 in an interior cabin, and the outlaws are directly opposite us in a balcony cabin which is great for babysitting! Both are nice. Ours is bigger than I expected. After throwing our bags in the room we went for a swim on the deserted pool deck (observations of the pool= deep and salty, but Henry loved it!), start Ed trying to break even on the Refreshment Package (we paid £11pp pd on Black Friday last year) and registered for the Nursery, which is going to be interesting for Henry as there is only one other under 3 on board! At 3:30 we went back to the room and the luge had arrived. Franklin, our attendant, introduced himself and we had an interesting discussion about the crib. We’d pre ordered one with our TA but Franklin said it would take up most of the room and so not really be worth it. Henry is too young for the Pullman’s, but the solution we reached was having a mattress from the Pullman on the floor for Henry. It’s worked well. After Muster, we freshened up for Sail Away and more drinks package breaking even (quite an easy challenge really). Evening meal was in the MDR. We’ve got my time dining but made reservations. The outlaws thought this defeated the point of MTD but on reflection I’m glad we did. There was a large queue for those without reservations. The food in the MDR was fine. Our assistant waiter, Carolina, was brilliant with Henry. The service was a bit slow, I think, but I’ve nothing to compare it to. Our reservation was for 6pm, we ordered at 6:15, , starters arrived at 6;45 and mains at about 7;10. We skipped dessert to make the show at 7:45. Henry was well behaved but I’m not sure how much longer it would have been until we entered “Let’s see if I can pull the table cloths off the table” territory! The show was excellent. The pre-entertainment (which was also very entertaining) was a near punchup between some guests in the row ahead of us over seat-saving. After some singing and music from the onboard entertainers, there was a shadow puppet show from an Italian Couple which was actually highly entertaining and our 2 year old loved it. After the show we headed to the WindJammer for our skipped dessert. The selection was impressive, and all of the food looked excellent, looking forward to trying it out. All in all, a wonderful first day. Brilliance is a lovely ship with lots of views all around. The staff have been excellent so far and Henry is having a blast! When he saw the pool he jumped up and down and shouted “I’m so excited!” Let’s see how that works out... I’m not sure how to space the photographs out, so they’re all below! They include: Henrys innovative seat in the check-in queue, Our Stateroom Evening meal from the WindJammer (which ironically we didn’t eat but I forgot to take pics of the MDR!) Cafe Lattitudes Menu & Today’s compass!

Looks like autocorrect struck you again. Fixed that. ?

Royal ships often don't restock mid-cruise, they've built their cold storage to keep enough for most voyages. During hurricane season in the Caribbean they maintain over two weeks of cold storage food on the ship. Fresh fruit and perishables don't last over two weeks so those turn over on a different timeframe. If a hurricane forces a diversion they can sail for over two weeks and not run out of food although fresh fruit may be replaced with canned varieties. This occurs on transatlantics and transpacific crossings sometimes. Try ordering a Mojito on day 13 and you may be told no fresh mint available. I was sailing in the Caribbean out of Florida when a sister ship pulled up beside us in St Maarten arriving on a crossing from Europe. The ship's traded supplies. Our ship took several boxes of paper in exchange for some of our fresh fruit so guests on that ship could once again enjoy fresh fruit and mint in the Mojitos before their arrival two days later in Miami.

Day Two Sea Day We presently live in Kent, but I hail from Merseyside/Liverpool. I say this, not to bore you with my life story but for two cultural reasons which will become apparent in this post! The first is that scousers are stereotypically savvy when it comes to money, deals and bargains (O.K... that’s an optimistic way of framing the stereotype, more pejoratively we’re labelled scammers and thieves!). I don’t mind spending money, but I’m keen to make sure it’s worth it. Again, this isn’t to give you an insight into my spending habits, but it becomes relevant on cabin choice! As I mentioned, we had an interior stateroom, and the outlaws had a balcony cabin directly opposite, for which they paid around £1000 more (We paid £2,700 for the three of us they paid £3,600 for the two of them). I’ll be honest- in this instance, I’m not sure the £1000 is worth it. The balcony view is great, but perhaps not worth the extra money for us, when the choice is between the room and other things that our budget wouldn’t otherwise stretch to. Our room is slightly bigger than there’s but the best thing about it? It’s PITCH BLACK. This, for parent of a toddler, is significant. For the past 4 months, as soon as it starts to get light (and on the Baltic cruise it can get light as early as 5am!) we’re awoken to delightful cries of “Mummy! Daddy! It’s morning, wake up!”. The inside cabin effect means that so far, We’ve been able to sleep in past 8am. Frankly, that would be worth paying £1000 for! Today was a sea day. We started off with our first substantive trip to the windjammer at around 9am which was busy but brilliant. The selection was vast. Often with Hotel breakfasts I find myself working through the same routine each day but I don’t think that’ll be possible here...there’s simply so much choice. After breakfast we dropped Henry off for his first nursery session. The opening hours are 9am-12noon and 5:30pm-midnight on sea days and just the evening session on port days, unless you’re on a RC excursion and book the nursery for that. I think these are reduced due to the 2 infants on board. We really debated putting him in but we’re really glad we did. We initially only booked these hours for the whole cruise but afterwards we booked more. He loved it...two staff to himself! The other reason that, retrospectively, it was a good idea to put him in was that today the weather wasn’t great. It was windy and a high of 15 degrees. This meant that Brilliance’s entertainment offers, which I’d often read are smaller than the big ships, were tested to their limits for a family and, in I think because Henry had a spell in nursery, they just about held up. Whilst he was having a blast we tried some activities he couldn’t participate in (Rock Climbing- Great fun) and visiting the Solarium (Lovely part of the ship, although busy today and lots of chair hogging which nearly saw a repeat of last nights seat-gate in the theatre. Unfortunately, no entertainment this time!). Lunch was a relaxed affair in the MDR. Impressive selection and, as we’ve always found, brilliant service. There was a live cooking pasta station and the Tutti Salad Bar is seriously impressive. After lunch, I went with one of the outlaws to listen to the enrichment lecture about the history of Stockholm. Then, on Henry’s insurance, we decided to go for a dip in the Baltic. Not literally, but it felt like it, as the pool was absolutely artic. I wonder if it’s a scouse thing (we’ve paid for the pool so we’ll jolly well use it!) but we were the only ones in it. It lasted about 3 minutes before we had to switch to the whirlpool. We got out and warm (the rest of our party were in blankets provided by the ship around the pool!) and warmed up with an ice cream (Henry’s choice). The inclement weather meant we couldn’t really spend any more time outside and, in any case, lots of the decks got closed so we couldn’t do the activities we’d planned, such as mini golf. We headed inside, spent some time in the free play session in the nursery and then sat in the colony club reading and drawing with some books we’d brought with us. This was fine and enjoyable, but the weather was somewhat restrictive with a little one. For dinner tonight we split up. The outlaws and Henry headed to the MDR where, again, I’m assured the staff were wonderful, particularly with Henry. We headed to Giovanni’s, as part of the 3 night dining package. (Incidentally, there hasn’t been a meal where we haven’t been approached by at least one member of staff trying to upsell speciality dining. It’s always been friendly, but a tad annoying). The food was super as was the service and the setting. It was very quiet, and a nice contrast to the hustle and excitement of the MDR and WindJammer. We had the sharing plank, pork belly and tomato and mozzarella salad, filet with risotto and carbonara and dessert. It was a really nice date night! The second ‘cultural scouseism’ is that we’re mostly interested in football (soccer). The spectrum ranges from fair-weather fans with a mild interest (me) to outright martyrs for Liverpool or Everton (my Dad and Mum respectively). Tonight was the final of the European Champion’s league with two British teams in it (Liverpool and Spurs- my father in laws team of choice). Despite a day of detective work, we couldn’t ascertain at all if they’d show the game anywhere on board. The best I got from a rather grumpy bar tender was a grunted “50:50 chance” with no eye contact. Alas, the game wasn’t shown, and this was quite disappointing for the many european soccer fans on board although it meant I didn’t run the risk of falling out withmyFather inLaw! Instead, we enjoyed watching a film the room whilst Henry slept and the outlaws caught “Tenors Unlimited “ in the Pacifica Theatre which they really enjoyed. We had our first towel animal this evening. Unfortunately I didn’t get chance to snap a picture of it- Henry ran to cuddle it and completely destroyed it. He shouted “Mummy! Fix it please!”. Thankfully...tomorrow’s compass says there’s a towel folding demonstration so here’s hoping!

That would be correct...although in my defense I have never cruised without it and this only happened once......so far Damn solo cabins on Brilliance......those doors close quickly behind you when you step out to look down the hall..lol Only good thing was that those rooms are about pretty close to Guest services(deck 4)..but nothing like walking through the centrum in your boxer briefs at 2am......

This happened to me just this past Saturday !!! Dan was out back on the deck sunbathing in his "Speedo style" trunks. He would NEVER wear them anywhere in public....but I went to tell him goodbye (leaving for an errand) and locked the deck sliding glass doors out of PURE HABIT. I locked him completely out of the house. Luckily I wasn't gone long. He wasn't too happy with me when I got home. I don't even remember locking the door ! It was pure reflex.

Years ago we changed door handles and locks on the house. Most handles unlock when you open the door but this one would open and leave the lock in place. Walked out in the backyard one early morning in my underwear to let the dog out. Shut the door and bam, no phone or anything. Nobody else was home. Had to walk to the neighbors and call my wife to let me back in the house. Changed the lock that afternoon! ????

Pre-Cruise Hello! We are currently cruising on the Brilliance of the Seas on a 12 Night Baltic out of Amsterdam. The “we” is my wife and I, our 2 year old son and ‘the outlaws’- my wife’s parents! The outlaws are seasoned cruisers but it’s our first time and in the build up I’ve found these forums invaluable, so I thought I’d share a few bits from our trip as they might be helpful for others. They’re written from the perspective of a first timer family! We chose Amsterdam as it meant we could drive from our home in Kent (no worrying about luggage weight and airports with a toddler!). We had 2 nights in Amsterdam prior to the cruise and we stayed in the Adagio Aparthotel in the south of the city. For us, it was a trade off between central location vs standard of hotel vs price and this hit the balance. It was a fantastic studio room- large, well equipped and clean. The location was in a quiet suburb with free parking and restaurants nearby. The journey to central station was 25 mins by tram and metro, very easy to navigate. In Amsterdam, we reverted to the trusty red hop-on-hop-off bus tours from City Sightseeing. We went for a 24hr combo ticket which included the bus route and 2 canal boat routes. The narration was good, although the bus was packed with pesky cruise ship passengers! The bus and one of the boat trips stops directly outside Passenger Terminal Amsterdam for those arriving on cruises. As a tip, we pre purchased these through TripAdvisor and paid £18, as opposed to the £25 online from the official website or the £45 they were advertising on the day. (Sorry about currencies- £,€ and $ will probably be used throughout this write up, perhaps reflecting the confused identity of a Brit, in “Europe” on an American ship...and that’s before the conversation of Brexit comes up!) Amsterdam is a lovely city, particularly if you can get out of the de Wallen area...which I thought smelt a bit too much like weed and felt a bit like Blackpool. Neither of which are a problem, if that’s your thing.!

Yes, the time does go quickly...faster every year. But when I saw that our next one was 339 days away, I said naah, too long. So now we have one 141 days out.

I never thought to look up what to do if I lost the SeaPass card in a port. Hope it is useful to others. My aunt lost hers in Atlantis, and didn’t realize until we were on tour bus back to port. She freaked out and started crying(first cruise for her was very nervous) I headed straight to where they check ID and card, to ask what to do, they said to go to port security which was right outside. Went and they checked her passport with ship manifest and let us through a side gate back to the ship. Once at gangway ship security supervisor came down to verify and let us through. Once we went through scanner we headed for guest services for a new card.

Welcome @SummerJoy72. As far as I know, the gratuities go to the dining staff in general, not only for those working in the MDR. The staff in Windjammer work extremely hard. Some may work in both venues. Personally, I would not have the gratuities adjusted.

*cough* *cough* yeah, I um, typed all that up on my Android using OneNote ? Gotta keep them busy so we can have some casino time.

Now we know that MSC is the acronym for Might Sink Cruise!

And I don't think the Beach Club will be ready until either December or January, if I remember correctly...

You know me.....I'd always say go for the GS but I can see the arguments for the extra bed and 1/2 bath. Here's probably what I would do. I would bid something slightly over the minimum bid on the GS knowing that it probably won't win. If it DOES win then you have a great upgrade at a real bargain. If it does not win then the worst that can happen is you have a great JS with extra bed and 1/2 bath and you saved yourself some money !

I booked a hotel for part of our honeymoon, but when we got there the nice lady at the desk told me no current booking for us. Turns out I booked it for two months earlier ?. There's money gone. I was so mad that we left and booked a room at a different hotel. More money gone, lol. And my original was a wine free booking! Looking back I wish I would've been drinking some wine so I could pass the blame.

This is simply a matter of them going off only what they can see in an xray. I had to get our bag from downstairs on one of our Edge sailings. They asked if I had a power strip, I explained I didn't. As we opened the bag they asked me if I was sure, I explained that yes, I was quite sure, as I packed the bag and they've not yet looked in it. It turns out it was my spouse's hair iron. Long metal object with a cord, which on xray, looks like a power strip - reasonable observation on their part and no big deal for me. It did make us put that iron in our carry-on when we sailed the next couple times to help ensure we didn't have our bag delayed again.

Well I took the plunge and booked it...at $124 each way I couldn't say no.......but I will watch the pricing to see what happens up to the 90 day mark..... Although this one may not follow the normal trend based on the time of year etc but will be interesting to see.

Thank you...right now I am surfing the boards while I watch the movers box up all my stuff for the next chapter, thinking about cruises is more fun than moving!

I STILL want this to be the name of a RCCL ship!

You’re very welcome! 203 days will be here before you know it! We also booked way out (over a year) and that time flew by with the help of all the great people on this forum!

Navigator of the seas Jun 10-14. First cruise and first longer than a weekend vacation with hubby in 28 yrs of marriage.

Apply it to your gratuities.

Thought it would be a good idea to post a quick photo look around of the offerings a Skipper's Grill on CocoCay. I'm going to assume that Chill Grill would have the same offerings. Per signage, the hours of operation are 11:30 to 3:00 Starting off it was nice seeing the beverage station outside of the buffet area. This area also has a soft serve machine. Getting a closer look at the beverage island area. Better view of the drink dispensers I'm not sure if the beer by the ounce dispenser is covered by the beverage package or not. Also want to say a hand washing station was on the other side of the dispensers. Fruit carving just so you know where you were. Skipper's Grill was divided up into multiple sections. Once for cold salads and pre-made sandwiches. Some sandwiches being made. Grill stations with the classic hot dogs, hamburgers, chicken, corn, and not shown fries. Next up was a taco/mexican station, here they had chicken, beef, pulled pork, rice, and beans. (Need to double check if I have any pictures) One highlight was the freshly made flour Finally two different topping stations. One geared towards burger fixings and the other for taco fixings. Finally a photo just for drool factor. This plate was a cuban sandwich (made with a soft sweet style bread), rice and beans plus some of the pulled pork. Also forgot to mention there is a small bar counter within the Skipper's Grill area. Don't recall if they did blended drinks but they did carry plenty of beers and spirits. Only major complaint I had was food temperature, nothing seemed really that hot. Most of what I tried was almost warm, some stuff was hot but for the most part it wasn't consistent. I might mark that as being there probably when they first opened around 11:30. Overall they weren't that busy at the time.

4:45 am alarm goes off. 5:00, maybe 5:20, stumble to coffee. 5:30 am blink and look at computer to figure out where I left off the prior day with work. Oh, that alarm – yeah, that’s my damn body alarm. When you wake up early (way early) and do a ton of reading about cruise stuff, you realize that writing up your own personal experience from start to finish is a cool way to document your vacation. Reading all the blogs tends to get you excited. You start thinking, yeah, cool, I can do this. No problem. Oh yeah, it was my sister that was the English major (#InsertExplicit). That just means I hope she never finds this thing. My grammar probably isn’t that good, but it’s communicable. Countdown started a long time ago, but now we are exactly 2-weeks from boarding. Let’s push the rewind button and see how we got here. April 2016, after taking a financial break from cruising (our last cruise was 2012 #ugh) to ‘fund’ our home renovations and finish our Master’s degree, we realized it was time to take a real vacation and celebrate a few things. One of our big celebrations was wanted to take the kids, my mother-in-law (MiL) and sister-in-law (SiL) on their first ever cruise. My SiL turned 50 and my MiL turned 70 – sshhh – ok, so those are big milestones, #meh, they won’t care. We needed a cruise that would accommodate all of us for a reasonable price. Many spreadsheets later and seeing as how we would ‘split’ the MiL’s cruise fare with my SiL, we landed on the Oasis of the Seas, A1-8330 Aquatheater Suite w/ Balcony. It was the 7-night Eastern Caribbean on May 28, 2017. Oh yeah, and it was our first time to experience Star Class (SC). #Ruined While on the 2017 cruise, there was a lot of discussion about when / where / how / etc would we do the next cruise. Well, we didn’t sign up on Oasis in 2017 for the next one because we just hadn’t figured out all the logistics. Maybe I’ll try and remember to write up something about that cruise later, but for now … need to fast forward a few months to the current cruise. There were months of research, discussion, pricing and justification before we finally landed on something. Let’s play from here. In January 2018 we confirmed the cruise ship, route and room. #MonthlyPaymentsStarted During all of our researching and planning, we laid out plans for the next 6 years of cruising vacations. This includes starting plans for the kid’s graduation cruises, one in 2023 to Italy and one in 2025 to Ireland. Plus, SC cruises in 2020 and 2021. We'll probably have to skip 2022 and 2024 to accommodate a 2-week vacation / cruise in 2023 and the other in 2025. More on those later. One of our cruise goals is to try all the new ships coming out for RCL. We prefer the larger ships with all the cool activities and shows. Finding the 9-night Bermuda cruise on Anthem was an awesome find. While we are still working for #TheMan, our vacation and cruise budget limits us to about one cruise a year. We booked the Owner’s Loft Suite 8720, which falls into the Star Class. I can blame the kids for wanting to only cruise in SC now. #Damnit #BadDad Oh, and since we found the Coastal Kitchen, we are now ‘required’ to book something that gives us access. #Spoiled Planning for this cruise is pretty much a weekly discussion over the weekend mornings while drinking coffee and scanning cruise ‘stuff’. Travel arrangements We booked our flight on 12/12/18 (about 25 weeks out) on Southwest. Flight on 5/5/19 and returning on 5/15/19. Since we are in Nashville, Southwest is our preferred carrier. Over the past few years, I’ve flown for work and we have taken a couple of Vegas trips, all on Southwest. So, those points FINALLY paid off. Rather than paying close to $1200+ to fly all four of us up to Newark, NJ, we paid about $50. I cashed in all my points for me and kids. There was almost enough left to pickup my DW’s ticket (I’m guessing this acronym means Dear Wife ? ) so, we paid the transfer fee to have her points transferred to my account to give me enough to get her ‘freeish’ ticket. Thus the $50ish buck was for the transfer and taxes. Not bad, fly all four of us roundtrip for $50ish ? #KeepCasinoBudget When cruising, we always fly in the night before just to make sure if there are any travel issues there is time to deal with it before getting on the cruise. I give credit to my dad for teaching me this. I’ve been cruising since early 2000’s and have always made sure to fly in the day before. Plus, we can start our vacation a day early. My better half did a lot of research on hotels around the port Bayonne in NY. She found a nice hotel, forget what it was, but really wanted to stay in something a little nicer. We talked about the Hyatt Regency Jersey City on the Hudson, but it was about $300 more for the night than what she originally booked. She really wanted to stay there because it looked really cool and is right across from the NY skyline. I felt bad because that really wasn’t in our budget. But wait, lookie what I found. We have some ‘cash-back’ rewards on one of our credit cards. Let’s us that to upgrade to the Hyatt and use our rewards to pay the difference. Done. Booked. Confirmed on March 5th. We’ll get to the hotel earlier enough that we are planning to go see the 911 Memorial and take the ferry over to the statue. Was hoping to be able to see the statue from the North Star as we left, but after a few postings and great information, that doesn’t seem to be an option. The only other pre-cruise travel stuff we did was book a spot to drop the car off. More than likely, we’ll grab us an Uber to get around everywhere else and to take us to the port on the morning of our cruise. Right now, we are planning to leave the hotel about 9:30 to give us an hour or so to make sure we are at the port and in the right spot by the Star Class to meet Yen. I’m the type of person that wants to be early to almost everything – I would rather wait than to have someone waiting for us to show up. #IsThatOCD We got our first RoyalUp email on April 26, about 6 weeks before our cruise date. This was the first time we ever received one of these. We talked about attempting to upgrade, but couldn’t justify an additional $2400 IF we sent in the lowest bid of $1200 pp. I mean, we ‘could’ have swung it but that would have taken away from our casino budget – yeah, we quickly shot it down. Now, if we could have bid maybe $500-$750/pp – that we would have considered a little more. Just to note, they would only charge us for the first two guests – so, technically, it was like upgrading with the kids sail free. Yeah, only way kids sail free is if we put them to work on the ship cleaning dishes or something. They are 12 and 14 now, so I’m SURE that would go over just peachy. Anyway, I guess we didn’t pay enough for this SC cruise so RCL was trying to get us to pay a little more. I’m not going to post what we paid but let’s just say I booked this thing about 16 months prior so I could make monthly budgeted payments. Yes – we actually have a cruise budget ?. We did reprice a few times over the course of time that saved us a little extra. A second email to upgrade came in about 2 weeks later on 5/7/19. I guess the second one was meant for @Lovetocruise2002, since she’s never gotten one. Lol Evidently, they wanted us to upgrade to the Royal Loft Suite which looks amazing, but, hey, we are happy to stay where we are at. There weren’t any other suites included with this email. Side note. We got the RCL credit card a long time ago on one of our past cruises. Yeah, the perks aren’t as good as other cards, but we designate this card for pretty much cruise only related stuff. Over the years, we obtained some of those MyCruise Points that we were able to use for some nice OBC. #BonusCasinoFunds We get double points by putting the cruise payments on this card, which can add up to some decent OBC. Plus, it keeps our cruise finances separate from our normal daily financials. Star Class Notes Our first welcome aboard email from the SC came in on 4/13/19. What’s this, about 8ish weeks or so before our cruise. It was just a generic welcome to the royal genie program where you can fill out a questionnaire. On 5/8/19 we got our first email from Yen Lee, our genie for this cruise. We are excited to have her and have heard great things, especially from @WAAAYTOOO. Here’s a snippet from her initial email: “Once I hear back from you, I’ll reach out again to confirm all the exciting details. From this point on, any questions or requests can be sent my way. I’m looking forward to seeing you onboard soon Please allow me to provide you with directions to the STAR Class arrival area and guarantee a VIP boarding. Kindly be advised that your drop-off point at Cape Liberty Cruise Terminal will be Zone 6. There is a large purple banner, which says Star Class, at the location. Please do not get off at any other zone. Once at Zone 6, kindly identify yourself as a Star Class guest and the assigned pier staff will ensure that your luggage is loaded onto a cart and will be sent directly to the suite while you go through the check-in and security screening process. Due to the nature of the Star Class program, you would understand the services and amenities listed in this email are exclusive and limited to guests residing in these suites. We appreciate your understanding when it comes to the exclusivity of these privileges. I would like to offer you Expedited Boarding services and I would also like to give you my undivided attention. May I suggest arriving at the terminal at 10:30 AM? I have 3 Star Class Families in total and I want to personally escort you inside the Ship. “ We are not the type of family to require a ton of assistance or demands on things, as we want to do all of our own planning and organization. But when cruising SC we allow some of our obsessive planning nature to be done by our genie. After coming up with a list of ‘must-do’ activities on the boat, we sent that over to Yen to allow her to plan the best times. Being in SC does have its perks – two of the main ones we enjoy is the ability to have someone help make sure we can enjoy ALL/ANY activity on board. This is really something that the kids enjoy. The second is the up-front reserved seating for all the shows. Of course, there a lot more benefits, but we can elaborate on those later. Over the past few weeks, we have been communicating with Yen to have her send us the dinner menus for the Coastal Kitchen #teamCK and the other specialty restaurants. I have 11 PDF files of these, so might load those in a follow-up to this opening blog. These will include Izumie, Jamie’s, Chops and Wonderland. We asked for the cruise planner, but haven’t gotten it at this time. Now being two weeks out, this weekend is dedicated to cruise shopping. We all need a few new things for the cruise like some new clothing, shoes and other misc. items. Our new suitcases came in last week, so those are setup in the living room to get ready to start packing. My DW wouldn’t really allow us to start packing any earlier. We don’t have a spare bedroom for a staging area, so have to use the living room. Oh well. Cruise Planner Being in SC, we pretty much get most everything available in the CP, with the exception of the excursions and a few other items (the photo package comes to mind). We did a lot of discussion around the excursions and talked with the kids to see what they wanted to do. For the most part, they just want to swim / snorkel the entire time. Paying some of the prices for the excursions was something we had a hard time justifying. On a prior cruise, my DW and I did a kayak, hike and snorkel excursion in St. Maarten but was pretty disappointed. Paying a few hundred for that excursion didn’t help us want to pay for another one, when we could potentially just walk somewhere and snorkel or walk and tour on our own. However, in 2017, we (all 6 of us, including my 70 yr old mother in law) did the Loterie Farm Zipline. Now, that was well worth the cost. So much so, that we booked it again for this cruise. This is our only purchased excursion in the CP. They did get hit really hard by the hurricane later in 2017, but from their recent pictures looks like they have rebuilt. We are happy to support them by taking this tour again. I’m going to pause for now but will pick up later as we get a little closer. I will also be attempting to do a few live periscopes as @CruisingHobby with #rcperiscopers and will also post more here during the cruise.

https://metro.co.uk/2019/06/02/least-five-injured-cruise-ship-smashes-dock-venice-9774386/ Per the article, the ship had a mechanical issue at the last moment and couldn’t be stopped. They didn’t just hit the dock like the collision in Roatan; they also hit a smaller boat in the canal at the same time. 5 people are injured, article doesn’t indicate how badly. MSC has not been having the best track record this past year. Still an infrequent thing for the number of sailings they do, but hardly a ringing endorsement for their older ships (if I’m remembering rightly that the Roatan dock crash was also with an older ship and was blamed on mechanical problems).

Alright, Drinkcalc V.2 is ready for testing. The underlying math is identical but the interface is better due to it being through a different service. DrinkCalc V.2

We’ve sat in several seats now...back row is good for a toddler!! But, it’s the kind of theatre where I think all of the seats are good. People tend to congregate near the doors but there have always been plenty of seats further in to the theatre

We’ll get you there one day. I know that 49th parallel is like a time machine ? my passport info lives behind a master password in LastPass. Just in case I lost it somewhere I’d have a copy for authorities to view.

I wouldn't worry about that..you can just cancel it at Guest Services and it will be refundable OBC..or have the Concierge handle it.

If you fill out the form @Skid linked to they will take care of what you need. The distilled water is a gallon jug of it and if it's a longer cruise, they call your stateroom at some point to check and make sure that you don't need additional water. In the event that you fill out the form and the water/cord aren't in your room when it opens on the first day just make sure to mention it to your stateroom attendant and they will take care of it.

That's pretty much EXACTLY what I do...... I literally have a manila folder that I place at the top of my carry-on that has everything in it ....... then I use it to keep cruise compasses, receipts, billing print-out, etc., at the end of the cruise.

Did it in April, booked thru royal, had a great time. Accessed the island on a small boat from a resort beach (the boat ride over was rocky) took about 15 mins. The island was small and beach & water was clean. I think they limit the number of guests allowed on the island there were 18 from our ship and 6 people from different resorts on the island. Drinks and food were included in price. I also was not sure about doing it since I couldn't find much info on it either but would book again. Would be happy to answer any other questions you may have.

Knew I forgot to take photos of a station! From what I recall it was fruit, cookies, and brownies. Personally, I'd rather head over to a Snack Shack for a funnel cake. Can also get the brownies with or without caramel sauce poured over at the Snack Shack as well.

Short answer is yes lol

When I did a galley tour on Navigator a couple months ago (right after refresh) they explained how the menu was created. It varies by ship and sometimes even sail date. The food and beverage manager sits down with the head chef and they plan the menu. They have a budget, such as $100,000 for a 9 night sailing. Historically they know how much lobster will be consumed on the 2nd formal night so that consumes so much of the budget. So many nights will have a steak entree so that consumes more of the budget. Historically they know for each and every entree - chicken, lamb, beef, etc. how much will be consumed so each offering is calculated how much of the budget is consumed. As the cruise progresses they track their estimates versus actual budget dollars consumed for that sailing. If near the end there is surplus budget they may alter a menu and add something they know will be popular and consume more of the surplus budget. They might even place lobster and other seafood in the Windjammer on the final night if the budget allows it. It's all tracked against the budget so they are constantly fine tuning the menu to stay within the budget as seasonal and regional or cultural differences trends change over time. Consequently they don't publish the menu in advance and the menu in the app doesn't always match what is actually offered on any given night of the cruise.

Based on the renderings I've seen, the cabana's there don't look that great: Do they look any better in person? They look all packed in, in a busy part of the water park. I really enjoyed the Cabana at Castaway Cay, and I also enjoyed a Bungalow at Coco Cay (pre-Perfect Day). I've gotten a cabana at Universal's Volcano Bay, and that was really, really nice. But there was a time where my kids were all sitting in the cabana relaxing and reading, and I was very conflicted. I was paying alot of money for the cabana, so I wanted them to enjoy it. But I also wanted them to enjoy the water park, which I also spent alot of money for. So I think you husband may have a point. Of course, it's also really nice to have a dedicated "home base".

I wouldn't recommend chichen Itza ruins as that is a ferry ride to the mainland plus a long bus ride. Travel time is several hours each way. At the very least make sure it is a RC excursion. Personally, I'd wait for a trip to the mainland to do the ruins. For an excursion for all ages including kids, I'd look at Paradise Beach or Mr. Sanchos. You can do those on your own and save money over an RC excursion as both are an easy taxi ride from the pier.

Not sure I agree with you about the definition of a "tourist trap". There are plenty of places tourists go to in huge numbers because it's a great place to visit. I was under the impression most people referred to tourist traps as overpriced and overrated places that only tourists go to.

Im from the Detroit area in Michigan. Winters here suck, summers here aren't great unless you go up north to see Michigan’s true beauty. I’d take a bad day in St “whatever island” over the greatest day here! ?

For me it is a legitimate fear. I once tried to check into a hotel, only to discover that i had booked the room for the following week. Luckily, they had plenty of availability. Thanks for all of the advice and kind thoughts.

People use their phones as their camera and bring more cameras like Go Pros for underwater or other active excursions or a DSLR or mirrorless camera for better photography. Any one with medical equipment lose an outlet to it. If both adults had CPAP machines there are no outlets left. A toothbrush charger consumes an outlet. There are lots of ways to consume your available outlets.

I can't understand how many people need that many plugs. I'm there for a vacation not to stare at a tablet or laptop

I considered over the water cabanas. From when I booked, to my cruise (6/19 with Harmony) , I got sick & am/might be wheelchair bound & this would have been the only “excursion” I felt comfortable going on. But OTW cabanas will not be ready yet, so booked the Chill Island Cabana. Want to mention that I found an **“issue” on the number of guests allowed, and have worked with RC Resolution Team and also with RC Corporate for 2 months. Resolution was not found & the excursion highlights to completing payment are still contradicting. I am mentioning this, if anyone is considering making the full payment & have friends chip in. Specifically 1)the excursion “highlights” state “room for up to 8 of your favorite people” which I took as myself plus 8=nine total. 2) the excursion “important notes” state “maximum eight guests per cabana” . 3) when you pay/complete this excursion it states “choose SIX people” . 3)RC Resolution team member Eva got back to me and stated it is “six adults and two children” will be authorized to use /be with me. We are traveling with 20 and it was difficult to pick& choose the 6/7 or 8 “ favorites”. Dissapointed that RC only offered a$25 credit for me finding the error. Hopefully other friends can stop in, but not stay. This is my first post, let me know if I should post my finding somewhere for others?