Leaderboard

Today was Puerto Plata and we did the Ocean World Sea Lion Encounter & Snorkeling with sharks and Lunch. This is one of the best excursions we have ever taken. I have lots of pix but of course, they are not yet on my iPad so I will have to post them later. We had soooo much fun and saw so many awesome critters. Ocean World is a Dominican Sea World -an Aqua park with shows and exhibitions. I was very surprised to find it was very well maintained and well organized. I have been to aqua parks before in other countries that were…well….sad. But this one is not. It was thoroughly enjoyable. There were dolphin and sea lion shows as well as the shark encounter and multiple snorkeling/swimming aquariums. There were aviary enclosures (small but fun). There was a beachfront swimming area as well as fresh water pools. Some of the interactions were additional $$ (dolphins, in our case since we paid for the sea lions and shark interactions) but we did not pay for anything more than our original excursion included and we had a blast ! Lunch was a pretty typical Caribbean buffet….nothing to write home about, but it wasn’t bad….but was very busy ! Transportation from the port was in a big, comfortable, air conditioned bus….may 15 minutes from the port, fast, efficient and well organized. I will definitely recommend this excursion or the one like it that included the dolphin interaction. This excursion wasn’t cheap. It was nearly $200 PP but you got a lot for your money and I think it was worth the cost. We go on VERY few excursions. We were exhausted by the time we got back to the ship. The bus left the port area at 8:30 and we got back at 2:00 so it’s a very full day and there’s lots to do.

I used the Facebook group's slot pull as an excuse to take a break from my work and leave my room. But I got there too late and they had already started so I played a little video poker instead and I'm up $25 for the cruise and have 28 casino points despite not wearing red undergarments Since it was 2:30 and I have 5:30 early seating in MDR, of course I went to the WJ before it closes at 3:00. They had shrimp pad thai...burger bun for reference.

Dinner was very good. I had the garlicky shrimp and Dan had the seafood linguine. I was surprised that he chose the pasta dish as we had both eaten pasta for lunch at the B2B luncheon and Dan is not much of a pasta guy. But he did, and he said it was very good. I absolutely love their olive bread and you could tell that it had just come out of the oven. Oh, Lordy ! We both won a bit in the casino. We broke even on Dancing Drums and then played a bit of UTH and both cashed out ahead. I suppose my purple drawers we “red enough” to bring me a little luck ! Sea day tomorrow. We’re on our way to Puerto Plata, DR where we will be snorkeling with the sea lions and the sharks !

To the room... There are so few rooms in this little loop and it's behind a door so likely to be pretty quiet. The wifi is fast in the room too From the decor it appears this is a bunch of newer rooms perhaps? It definitely looks different from my last room here: Got my C&A amenity.. Even the bathroom is a different tone from the last one..

Day 3 was pretty slow. Woke up at 9:27 so missed our breakfast for the first time on this trip. Had to go to you-know-where and was NOT happy about it. On EX, they use Chops as overflow seating for the WJ so that’s where we sat. I just got some fruit and a bowl of grits. Happy to get in and out quickly. it was a zoo. I did my usual morning routine - up to the CL for a cappuccino, then down to the computer lounge, which is right around the corner from our room on Deck 8. Rozel always cleans our room while we are on our morning walk-about but she got a late start today since we totally dicked up her schedule by sleeping in. I’m sure she was cursing us but still all smiles when we saw her in the hallway. I don’t deserve such good service. Today is a sea day; on our way to Falmouth. Since it’s the first (of 2) sea day, it is the traditional day for the Top Tier event. For some completely unknown reason, EX has the TTE at 5:00 ! What a lame time to do it ! Early diners have dinner at 5:00. We totally missed the TTE on the first leg but went today. I’m guessing there were maybe 20 people there ? It was embarrassing, TBH. They usually have the TTE on the first sea day at 10:30, followed immediately by the TT (Cheers with an officer) luncheon. That makes SO much more sense than doing it like they did it here. Of course, no luncheon on this shorty 5 night cruise so I really just DO NOT understand doing the TTE at 5:00. We visited both the CL and the SL during Happy Hour today - first time on this trip. The CL was D.E.D. The SL was much busier, which surprised me. I thought it would be reversed. Shows how much I know…. I took some pix but, as you all know by now, must wait for the pix to populate on my iPad. Gigi, the Suites Concierge, is leaving tomorrow in Jamaica for vacation. Not sure who will be taking her place. No casino today or tonite. I won a little at Ultimate last night but are being lazy today and staying in. Kinda nice, actually. We went to the ice show last night. We always enjoy the ice show no matter which ship it is. Sorry…nothing really interesting to report - oh wait ! I met @JustMeJoe last night ! That was very cool. Looking forward to chatting more since we also have the next cruise together.

27 days to go....... Since I made my brother prime, he gets a nice number of monthlies. Usually, they match with mine but of lesser value. Most of my offers are OVs and my brothers are interiors or "1 complimentary guest." It works out the same for us moneywise, but gets us double point, so we booked 2 sperate rooms for the first two sailings as the upgrade option is just OV when you combine. I hate OV so I will often just take the interiors, in this case the first two sailings are GTY. I normally prefer an aft cabin and to pick my own, but I also like a cheap sailing. I really spend minimal time in my room, so location takes a backseat to savings. My brother was excited about his first B2B and then he decided it would be nice to bring our mother along. She of course is sharing a room with him . But she didn't have enough vacation time to do all three, so she will just join us for the first two. We are gifting this as her Mother's Day present. For the first cruise, check-in opened on the 28th of March I believe. The earliest slot was 11am, which wasn't a big deal because we are flying in the day of......first flight out as usual. I never recommend this, but I have insurance and live in hub city, meaning there are usually 3-4 flights after mine that will get me there. Which brings me to a side rant: there used to be more flights. I remember when there were flights between 8pm-10pm that went to Mia, MCO and FLL. Now the last flight is often around 6:45 to 7pm, which is not ideal when flying with my mother who has church until at least 3pm and requires another couple of hours to be ready. So 5am flights are what I have to deal with, and the sucky part is my preferred airline makes those the most expensive flights. So even though I complain and say I hope to never fly them again, I am often stuck with SWA...... and their crappy boarding procedure . I don't know if 10/10:30 opened up, I didn't bother to check. We will be on the ship for 11 days so I can care less about getting an earlier time. Plus, there are no reservations required for Freedom class entertainment. My brother brought his own snorkeling gear, the price for snorkeling all day at PDCC is like $50 on sale now . No ecursions are planned. I used the barcode trick as soon as I checked in and I was able to see our room assignments. For the first leg we are on deck 3 in rooms #3253 and 3251. On the second leg we are on Deck 2 in rooms #2567 and 2569. I chose my own room for the last leg with deck 9 and room #9391. I was happy that the rooms were assigned so close to each other. We have traditional dining for all three legs at 8:30.........which will probably be 8 in most cases. Since the reservations are linked, they should sit us together at a smaller table, if we are assigned to an 8-top I will request a different table. My brother doesn't want people judging him as he eats all his meals. I will not be pre-purchasing anything. I get 2 free days as D+ and then can use my prime discount on the remainder. I will also be using my BOGO. There will be the B2B'rs lunch so I will take advantage of that to avoid the WJ. Plus, we will do embarkation day lunch at Playmakers. I plan to prepack each leg in its own packing cube. I am also bringing a ton of casino-friendly snacks as I have a 2025 S2S2S or B2B2B to plan. I am following @AshleyDillo advice and bring specific clothes for the casino, so the rest don't get smoky.

Our family has always sailed in suites. DH and I in Jr Suites before we starting letting the kids tag along, and then the 2 bedroom grand every time the kids have been with us. We really love, and need, the extra space of the separate living room. DH is up without an alarm by 4:30 every morning, and he needs a place to go while the rest of us sleep until a more decent hour. DD is on the spectrum and needs a place to really move around to process the activities of the day before heading out to dinner. Being spoiled in the suite lounge has been a big perk for us too. We're budgeting to replace a car and living room furniture soon though, so we decided to try out connecting balconies for the next few cruises. We're almost diamond plus, so the drink vouchers help take care of what we are missing in the suite lounge, but we sure will miss the service and breakfast in Chops or Coastal Kitchen! Along for the ride: Myself, DH, DD (15), and DS (12) Rooms: 12150 and 12152 - pretty far forward for us aft facing dwellers. Itinerary: 7 day Western Caribbean - Galveston, Sea Day x2, Roatan, Costa Maya, Cozumel, Sea Day, back in Galveston. Pre cruise purchases: soda packages for the kids, 50 photo package (pared down from our usual 100), 24 bottle water package, 3 device internet. We have MTD with reservations at 6:45 each night. I would do 150 Central Park, Jamie's, or Sabor, but we were in a star class room a year ago on Allure, and didn't eat in the MDR. Since we have only had the new menus on our Liberty cruise this past fall, we will most likely stick with the MDR this time. Who knows, maybe DH and I will have a date night and just send the kids to the WJ. I'm sure we will do Johnny Rockets once for lunch - it's kind of a tradition, and the kids have already been asking about it. What else... I booked all our entertainment. I want to say it opened up about 45 days out. I meant to make a note, but forgot. I also was able to book Escape the Rubicon about a month ago. It's still showing on my calendar, and they haven't refunded my money yet, so hopefully it is opened back up. We have a little bit of OBC that will find its way to the casino from the RC card - we redeemed the points on the Bank of America site about 30 days out and they posted to the cruise planner just a couple days later. That's all I can think of for now - let me know if you have any questions, and I will try to answer them along the way.

Last night dinner was in Chops and we were extremely fortunate to have @JustMeJoe and Mrs JustMe join us. Our favorite waiter, Andriy was his usual enchanting self and we had a great time. Consumed 2 bottles of "champagne" and a bottle of red wine. Fun, fun Then we were off to the casino where I first lost and then ended up walking away a bit ahead. I have all but given up on the slots so I'm spending most of my casino time at UTH which is where I usually was before I tried slots. The machines just do not like me. I will be sitting at a machine and all of the ones around me are ding, ding, ding-ing away and mine just sits there and frowns. Today we are in Antigua with the Emerald Princess. Since we did the stingray excursion here 2 weeks ago, we are staying on the ship today. It looks like a beautiful day so I'm hoping that those who are going out will have a great time.

21 days to go....... Work has been stressful all around and the weather in Chicago has been bipolar. Sat and Sunday were like 30 degrees and today on Monday it was 65 and sunny. My documents were right on time for the first cruise but a full day late for the 3n and a day early for the last cruise. Royal IT strikes again. The luggage tags for the first two cruises are still GTY. Last time they updated around 10 days before I cruised to say the actual room number. So, I will wait until later and print them out. I believe I saw in another post that a few blog members and Matt will be on the May 20th-24th Freedom cruise. When I booked the cruises, it was just my brother and I going, each with or own room. But my mother turned Emerald after our Mariner cruise and now she is obsessed with making it to Diamond so she can relax in the lounge. Yes, not the drink vouchers or internet discount......but lounge access is her goal . She was upset that she couldn't go on Wonder, I had booked her, but she allowed her bf to talk her out of going. During that Mariner cruise I offered to help make her prime to get offers, she said she was going to be land traveling with her bf and don't bother. In March when she found out we would be doing these cruises she was sad, her bf had cancelled 2/2 of their land vacations. So, my brother was like, we can add her to my room, and she can come with us. She was so happy to be going. As usual she is brand new. I feel like she gets amnesia every time we travel, and I have to hear the same questions. This is her sixth RCG cruise and she texted me about luggage limits. Somehow her logic was that shorter cruises only allowed weekender bags and/or carry-ons . I just told her to pack as she would normally. Last week she fell at work and thankfully she is okay, but her front left tooth got chipped slightly. The dentist rounded it out and it is barely noticeable, but she was afraid she might have been toothless for the cruise, she is so dramatic. I did my pre-cruise shopping: which involves going to Kohl's, Marshall's, TJ Maxx and Walmart for any essentials, and giving Bezos his offering. After reading about wearing red (I hardly ever wear it) to ensure some casino luck, one of my casino outfits is a newly acquired red shorts and a red shirt. I am currently making my packing list and the plan is to pack a separate cube, with special casino outfit to contain the smoke, in each cube. I figured I will need about four cubes since I always carry an extra not in my checked bag.

Oscar has been killing it with the mini menagerie.. Matches the theme of the little choking hazard I found yesterday..remote for scale. And got my B2B letter!

I tried to pull a @WAAAYTOOO and grab my SeaPass card from my stateroom door, but it wasn't there. I didn't break any rules or go behind any signs that said rooms wouldn't be open until 1pm. But my room this time is tucked in a little hallway next to the stairs.

Morning #5....last day of leg #2. Sea day. Our SL Concierge (Gigi) disembarked yesterday in Jamaica for vacation and Vanessa, who was in the CL has moved down to the SL on deck 9. The other CL Concierge (I'm ashamed to say that I have not yet learned her name) is now in charge of the CL. I was able to give the new CL Concierge (I promise I will get her name and remember it before I disembark in 10 days !) a list of the specialty dining for next cruise. We have 2 BOGO (which I will use on nights 1 and 2 just to make things easier) and then a 3 night package to cover the nights that we do not care for, in the MDR - namely, USA, French and Caribbean. Then we will have 4 nights in the MDR. It's nice to have this taken care of before TAD and now I won't have to mess with it when we get back onboard, tomorrow. Since there is a complimentary B2B lunch on TAD, I had no need to purchase a specialty lunch for either of our TAD's. I only purchased a specialty lunch on our very first embarkation day. We met Mrs. @JustMeJoe yesterday. SOOO glad to have them on board next week. We will definitely make some plans to spend some quality time together. Not much (anything ?) planned for today. Dan is going to the sauna and I am pecking away on the computer in the computer lounge. Dinner tonite is the MDR. No idea what the menu is. It will be surprise ! Of course, we have to change cabins for the last leg (BOOOOOO) which means we have to pack tonite or first thing in the AM. Dan has already put the new luggage tags on the luggage. We will be able to leave whatever is hanging in the closet and only pack the "loose" items. Our current cabin attendant (Rozel....who has been wonderful for 2 weeks !!!) will move everything to our new home waaay up on deck 12 all the way forward. We have a Panoramic Ocean View for leg #3. We've had this category of cabin before and we like it. Yes, there is more motion all the way forward, but it really doesn't bother us. It will be nice to see the sun and the ocean again from our room ! Being in the Promenade View interior for the past 2 weeks, we never know what time it is or whether or not we have docked, etc. Our itinerary for next cruise is exactly the same as the 9 day cruise that we just completed. We have 1 excursion, which will be in Puerto Plata, DR. We are swimming and snorkeling with the sea lions and the sharks ! YIKES ! The passenger dynamic is undoubtedly going to change again on leg #3 as we already know (from being kicked out of the SL) that there will be many more upper tiers on this next leg and presumably, fewer children. Just for the record, we had 32 Pinns onboard on Leg #1 and 16 onboard for this leg (#2). I will let you know how many are on #3 once I find out.

It is time for the shenanigans!!!! It seems like I haven't been on a cruise in forever, but it's actually been like 90ish days . These 11 days of cruising are actually 3 shorties combined. It is a 4n, then a 3N, and then another 4N. They are all casino comps in some capacity. The first two are monthlies, which are random offers the casino sends out either through mail or email. The last one was earned on Wonder. I only paid taxes, fees and gratuities for them. Which amounted to a whopping total of $595.05 for all 3, making it only $54/N. I have OBC on some and Freeplay on all. Itinerary: Nassau and PDCC X3, I never get off in Nassau and PDCC is a casino day. People: myself, brother and mother x2, myself and my brother x1 Flights: SWA and AA Extras: Chocolate birthday cake $25.99 My brother's birthday is on April 27th and mine is May 21st. I ordered the cake for the 3n to split the difference. My 39th birthday, hence the title name , is on the second day of the last 4N cruise, and we will be in PDCC. This is the first time ever that I will be on a cruise for my birthday. Normally its work or Vegas. I mean truthfully, I don't really celebrate it, but I do acknowledge it. It is also the first time I will be sailing in May, my normal window is September through April, excluding March and Easter sailings. So, I am thankful it won't be too hot but warm enough from Chicago to not have bulky outerwear.

Ok. I’m gonna try and upload these Ocean World photos. Wish me luck. I know this is hard to read but it will give you an idea of the content of the Park. It’s much bigger than I would have thought before I saw it for myself. Again, maybe not so easy to read, but some idea of the show schedules This is the only photo I got of an actual dolphin since the dolphin encounter wasn’t included in our excursion. I will say though, they make it very easy for you to watch all of the interactions/encounters, even if you haven’t paid to participate. The shows are all readily visible from a distance. You just don’t get to interact with the animals if you haven’t paid for the excursion. Lots of opportunities to observe. We (at least, I did not. Dan watched a bit) did not watch the dolphin show but this is a photo of the dolphin show area. As you can see, it’s pretty easy to watch a show from this vantage point even if you’re not directly involved. Fresh water pool Dan actin’ the fool. This is by the kiddie area of the fresh water pool. OBTW, the fresh water pool was COLD They have 2 bird houses. This is the macaw area. Beautiful birds. The second bird house was for the smaller birds, primarily love birds. No explanation needed for this one… …or this one… The snorkeling area had a couple of plexiglass viewing areas. Lots of fish and coral to see. I really enjoyed snorkeling in this area but we were fortunate enough to have done this early. Later in the day it was crowded and chaotic as there were kids in there who had no idea how to snorkel and were thrashing about maniacally. I’m sure it was very disruptive to the fish. Glad I missed that… Bizarre photo of Dan in the snorkeling area. Actual arms and reflections of arms. Yikes ! This is a rather crappy photo of the shark encounter area. It’s actually quite large. The sharks in this interaction are nurse sharks and the are extremely wimpy as sharks go. They ran and hid in the rocks once the snorkelers entered the water. When this photo was taken (before the snorkelers got in) the sharks were just looking for a free meal. They know when the chow is coming out ! Moving on to the sea lions. Here is Dan about to get a kiss. While I was taking this picture, I had an employee telling me, “Sorry, no photographs allowed”. I just ignored him and took this one but put my phone away after that. I had no interest in seeing the inside of a Dominican jail. After the encounter was over, photography wasn’t a problem. This was during an actual sea lions show which was open to the public Obligatory balancing-the-ball-on-the-snout photo. Heres the sea lion (I can’t remember his name) giving mouth-to-mouth (or boca-a-boca, depending upon which narration you were listening to) to an unfortunate member of the staff who nearly drowned when this SAME sea lion pushed him off the rocks, moments earlier ! Scene of the crime… Welp, that’s all of the exciting things we saw and experienced at Ocean World. If you get the chance to go when in Puerto Plata, I do recommend it.

No SeaPass = no Crown Lounge so I just hung out in the public area up on 14 until the room announcements were ready. I like the location of my room other than it throws me at the aft elevators. Those are always the busier elevators since it's the side of the ship with all the food. Lots of people riding up to go down and filling up the elevators before it gets to deck 10. Fortunately I tend to spend a lot of my time on this ship on decks 11 and 14 which are close enough to be stair friendly.

Here we go again...it's early (5:15am) and Tallahassee International () Airport is hopping. Only reason I'm early is because I'm checking a bag. My flight boards at 5:45am.

@Ampurp85 curious if you're seeing the really low price for the OTW Beach Club cabana on your May 20 sailing.

Yesterday we had a mysterious bottle of “champagne” show up in our room. It had an apology note with it from C&A so we assumed it was due to the fact that they royally screwed up our loyalty gifts twice on both of our turnarounds. I bumped into @JustMeJoe this morning and he asked me if we had received our bottle and then explained that (apparently) everyone that was B2B on that last leg got a bottle. You may recall that our TAD was something of a Charlie Foxtrot due to the number of Guest Services “issues” on the 4-14 leg (those that were disembarking) and that disembarking and reboarding were delayed for over 2 hours that day. One thing that I failed to mention in that discussion was the weirdo fact that we actually checked in for our new muster station BEFORE we even left the ship on our turnaround ! First time that’s ever happened. It just so happened that our new muster station was in the Star Lounge which is also where we were assembled for rurnaround…so we scanned our new Seapass cards and completed the muster station requirement before we even departed the ship to go through CBP !

I skipped MDR on the last night..Caribbean night is not my fave and I had ruined my dinner with a late snack from Fish & Ships. Did some damage in the casino and ended up with an instant certificate...it was all 10-hand video poker. I am definitely qualified for Prime now despite my prior 2 sailings this month not showing points on the Club Royale site. I decided to hit up 3-card poker on the way out and hit a 4 of a kind so that was a nice little payout. Packed up for turnaround day...and set an early alarm and woke up before the sun had burned off the yuck. I was able to stay in my cabin and work until 9:30 and then I met up in the Star Lounge with about 50 others. They will have a lunch for us in the dining room at 11:30. Now we are waiting to be called to get our new SeaPass cards.

What we have to hide for two weeks

Packed a little but will pack the majority in the morning. Shouldn’t take more than 15 minutes. Pretty uneventful night. Dinner was in the MDR; Italian night. Dan got some kind of lamb curry dish and I got the chicken parm (who’s surprised ?). Actually, it was the best chicken parm I have ever eaten on Royal ! Maybe I was just super hungry but I thought it was really excellent. Having -0- Italian genes, maybe I’m just easy to please. Purists probably laugh at me. So leg #3 starts tomorrow. Day 15 of 24. We barely darkened the door of the casino. We both played some Ultimate for maybe 30 minutes and then both cashed out slightly ahead. I’m still down about $400 for this leg but I’m pretty sure Dan is either up or even. The slots were not particularly friendly on this leg. We played some pigs yesterday and we thought for sure we would get our pig to “pop” but he never did. He was quite the porker though…so fat his feet wouldn’t even touch the ground. IYKYK.

I had to check out Fish & Ships again for quality control. This room is handy for running up/down one flight and grabbing some..or some soft serve..or hitting up WJ for a to-go plate. The chicken fingers were different this time. The fish they were frying fresh in small batches. It tasted less bland this time too..maybe because it was fresh. Of course I had dinner 3 hours later. I'm at a 2-top in a row of other 2-tops so I have neighbors to pretend to ignore. No great people watching to share. Now I'm in WJ for second dinner I needed vegetables because the MDR doesn't know what those are. They are frying donuts up fresh tonight... Those mugs are labeled as sugar donut with chocolate milk..because everyone likes their milk to sit under a heat lamp.

The trolley stop is right there at the Metrorail station and it's only a couple steps..but the app said it's 20 mins til the right trolley shows and Miami is not air conditioned while my Lyft is..so Lyft it is. Good to know for the future, though.

I didn't expect our certs to show up until this afternoon (according to the release schedule) but they both showed up early this morning. I spent ALL morning on the phone (we are in Falmouth and I used the ship's phone to call) BUT we ended up with some great results. I was able to book both Dan's and my Prime comp cruises for B2B SY sailings (Miami) and we were able to get XB (ocean view balcony guarantee) for -0- upgrade as the XB category for our cruises was lower than the 4V interior room on both of our cruises !!! We are on 3-9-25 and 3-16-25. I am not a huge fan of ANY kind of GTY but in this case, it will be worth it, no matter where our OV balcony is. Yes, we will have to change rooms but we saved probably $1000 by opting for the XB over a chance to choose our cabin. ANY balcony will beat ANY interior ! So be sure to check and see if the cost of an upgraded category is actually less than the interior fare, which is most likely what your offer is based on, if you are Prime.

Here are our plans for the ports. Roatan: We booked the 3 Reef Stop Snorkel with Roatan Getaway Tours. We paid a deposit by PayPal and will pay the balance when we meet them in port. Communication by email has been pretty quick. Costa Maya: We're staying on the ship. The current plans are Flowrider in the morning, and we have Escape the Rubicon booked that afternoon. If that does wind up getting cancelled, we'll probably all laugh at how bad mom is on the golf course instead. Cozumel: Paradise Beach. We've been here a few times, but not since February 2020. Usually I can get the kids to wrap up our school year before we leave on an April/May cruise (we homeschool). This year though, they are both dragging their feet in a couple subjects. They will both have papers to finish when we get back and DD, who is taking Biology this year, will have a couple labs to complete. All their other subjects will be complete this week. This is also the last week for our co-op, so after Friday, my teaching duties are over for the year. I gave myself a break with work this trip too, and my last wedding is this Saturday. I'll have all next week to pack! DS is the only one who may need a new shirt for formal night. The rest of us are all the same size as fall's cruise, and I just replaced the kids' swim suits right before we went to Great Wolf. I actually feel prepared and calm - not normal for me, but I like it!

Consecutive cruiser lunch menu...only about 15 of us are here and they sat me solo

@OCSC Mikehas it right. Retirement is the key. Of course, our cruising style has taken a bit of a downgrade since retirement, but where the quality went down, the quantity went up ! Nothing truer than the old adage, “When you’re working you have the money but no time and when you’re retired you have the time but no money”.

Now I have to buy purple underwear. Prime is getting expensive.

It was the Macarena. Didn't want to leave you hanging.

Pre-gaming before work with a Crown Lounge coffee. Scoped out the breakfast snacks..same old usual.

I did meet my room steward yesterday. He is a talker. His name is Oscar..he is from Belize and he has done the drive from the US border to Belize and it is beautiful. Oh, and Quiet Riot is his favorite band. He asked me when I get up in the morning which is new to me. Usually they just tell me they clean once a day and give me their AM and PM hour range. This time he didn't even mention PM. So now I've committed to relocating from my cabin at 9am daily. I have to work today, so I will just spend a few hours working with a better view.

I was onboard by 11:05..very little waiting. You MUST spread yourself at least 3 escalator steps apart from the person ahead of you at Terminal G. They scream and berate people who do not follow this rule.

Here we are again it’s time for another cruise. This time we are celebrating our 35th anniversary. We originally booked these dates as a b2b. But things changed when the cruise line decided to cancel those dates and change it to a a transatlantic. I was so upset first because it was our favorite ship and it was going to be our anniversary cruise. So after many sleepless nights the transatlantic dates and cabins showed up so we snagged our new cabin choice. We changed the cabins we had on the b2b to just one cabin for the 14 days. Who will be going this time : Me, hubby, sister and sisters fiancé Saturday we made it to Miami with no flight delays. We are staying at Intercontinental Miami.

For those of you who Facebook, the official Royal Caribbean Blog Facebook page was taken down by Meta. @Matt has had no luck getting the page restored, so a new Facebook page has been created. Please visit the new page and like and follow it. Thanks! https://www.facebook.com/royalcaribbeanblogcom

If I'm being honest, I will say that the shark encounter was the least interesting of everything we did yesterday. They are nurse sharks, and they are quite boring, TBH. Big ? Yes. ....but they run and hide in the rocks whenever people are in the water. This is maybe one of the only species of sharks that doesn't have to continuously swim to keep oxygen in their system, so they go to the bottom, sit and hide. I totally understand the concern for SHARKS ! ....but these are wimpy, totally benign sharks. They look more like big catfish !

Sisters nails this cruise.

In our cabin

For me…once you’ve been to a few of them…you feel as though you’ve seen them all! Almost always same or very similar questions. Just not entertaining enough to sit through.

Any other Prime or above casino folks just order a drink from every roaming waiter that walks by to up the chances of actually receiving said drink and then ends up accidentally double fisting or is it just me?

Back onboard for the last leg. This is a 9 night cruise with the exact same itinerary as leg #1, 2 weeks ago. TAD was kind of a mess although it didn’t really impact us much. More of a problem for new cruisers boarding and, of course, for the crew. Apparently, the number of folks with “Account issues” was enormous, which caused a 2+ hour delay in boarding of new guests. When I passed by GS ~8AM, the line stretched all the way to the entrance of the MDR. I should have sensed, then, that this was going to cause issues. Apparently, it did. Finally, some time around 11:45, they began the B2B parade. Everything went smoothly once we got started and the B2B luncheon, which was supposed to start at 11:30, got underway at around noon. Presumably, general boarding began shortly after that. As was the case with leg #1, our Loyalty gifts were incorrect. On leg #1, we got a bottle of St Michelle “champagne” rather than the Chandon “champagne” that we have chosen. On this leg, the champagne was again wrong, as well as missing Cokes and missing water. We strolled down to the Loyalty Ambassadors desk and she, I’m sure, will rectify everything. We had to change cabins on this leg and we are now in a panoramic OV cabin on deck 12. These are the “newer” rooms created when they downsized the spa. It’s much bigger than our Promenade View dungeon and the sunshine and view are an extremely welcome change. I’m not as fond of the location of this new room but I’m glad to be here. We’re pulling away from the dock right now (4:45) so the last adventure has begun ! Dinner tonite at Giovanni’s (first of our BOGOs) at 7:00.

As a SPED teacher, I will be buying the shirt and doing the walk.

They are selling the Make A Wish shirts down in the Promenade. $19.50 of the $25 price is donated. At 11:15am each Sea Day they're doing a walk up the track.

I am super late to this party. The freeloaders have been keeping me so busy I have not been on the blogs for weeks now. This is the perfect time for me to read this blog. @TheBoss518 and I just booked Indy for August. We actually got a casino comp for the cruise. This is our first "free" cruise (we of course paid to upgrade to a suite gty) I feel pretty lucky because the last time we were in the casino was two years ago. I ran the Facebook page for that sailing and ran a slot pull. depite not spending any more money there, we still get offers and this was the first one we have been able to do. We are excited because we are leaving the freeloaders home with the grand parents for this one. I do have a question for all you casino pros. When you book a casino comp, do you get the opportunity for royal up bids? We did a suite gty rate because we would be perfectly fine in a jr suite since there aren't big differences in suite benefits moving to a GS. I don't feel like paying an extra 1k per person to book into a GS directly. There are so many rooms open still so fingers crossed we get a magical room assignment by default. I just found out that this cruise is also a Gaming and Anime convention cruise so I cant wait to see all the kids in their cosplay This should make for a fun blog when we go!

Pretty sure that was our chosen location on Indy a couple years ago when I was able to move whatever our GTY assignments were... deck 10 aft. Purely coincidence... definitely not the reason why... OK, it was the exact reason why, lol.

So here I go...."telling" on myself. Sheesh... I made the rookiest of rookie mistakes. I double-booked (overlap) cruises ! I still can't believe I made such a stupid, rookie mistake but I sure did ! When I booked our annual tier casino cruises yesterday, I booked the 9th and the 16th of March B2B on SY. All was well until I realized that we had JUST booked a 10 night EX cruise (an instant casino comp from leg #1 of this trio) for 3-20-25. That means that I would still be ON SY when it was time to board EX. OMG, the panic ! I felt like I was going to be sick. I had JUST spent HOURS on the phone with Club Royale to get these 2 bookings (plus fix another comp that had gotten totally FUBAR, but that's another story....) made and now I had to go BACK and move the March 16th to March 2nd. I was fully prepared to have to pay a $200 fee to move this cruise but it had to be done....moving the EX cruise was not an option since there was no other 10 night cruise in the casino offer to choose from. I got BACK on the phone with Club Royale and honestly, it could not have gone more smoothly. No change fee, she simply changed the sail date and that was that. I didn't deserve such an easy fix to a TOTALLY avoidable blunder on my part. The only problem was that there was a very small upharge for upgrading from the interior offer to the XB, Ocean View Guarantee for this sailing. For this particular cruise, the XB was slightly more than the 4V (which is the way it usually is.....I just got super lucky with my original bookings) but I gladly paid it to have my mistake behind me. In retrospect (this is not an excuse....just an explanation) this pricing upcharge is the reason that I originally chose the 9th and 16th instead of the 2nd and the 9th. The fact that I was already booked on EX never entered my pea brain. Anyway....crisis rectified. We are still on B2B on SY but slightly earlier than we were, originally. UGH

I like to take advantage of public transportation whenever I can since it's sorely lacking in Florida. And I like to save money. If you have a tap to pay credit card or can tap to pay with your phone you don't even need to purchase a ticket at the ticket machines...just tap and enter the turnstyle. There's only one way out of the Miami Airport station so hop on the first train. The first stop is the transfer point if you're going north, but the port is south so you stay on the orange line towards Dadeland.

So things really did pick up at Hideaway after my last post. By the time we left the place was packed. The music finally got to me….and I tagged out. Will I go back ? Probably not. There is very little at Hideaway that I could not get elsewhere on the island for -0- $$. 1. Hideaway pool is heated. I liked that…but I was still chilly when I got out of the water. 2. Dan said the choice of alcohol was better at Hideaway. E.g, he likes Grey Goose for his Bloody Mary and he said he couldn’t get that on the “regular” side. I have no idea since I’ve never had a [alcohol] drink at PDCC 3. Padded chairs and couches. I don’t recall seeing that outside of the Beach Club. Maybe they are somewhere that I haven’t seen. 4. No kids Other than these few things, the “regular “ side and Hideaway are the same (to me). We each had a crispy chicken/mozz sticks sandwich and I had 1/2 of a fried dough ball with powdered sugar on it (can’t think of what it’s called). Pretty tasty.

I hear those noises every morning when I first step out of bed.

Proof I got off the ship today! Then got right back on My first visit to Grand Turk... I guess it's convenient to have the beach *right* there at the pier, but you have to want to do the beach. There's also a pool at Margaritaville. They offered some tour the island and snorkel trips and rum tasting excursions but I didn't venture out of the port area so I couldn't tell you what the rest of the place is like. The water was very pretty and you could see lots of colorful fish by the pier and an occasional ray swim by. I'd imagine snorkeling here would be decent. This was a replacement stop for Labadee which does not have Effy, Harley Davidson, Ron Jon, or Pirhana Joe's so it's up to you to decide if it's a worthy substitution.

I have filled out many surveys after going on cruises, but I really didn't think anyone looked at them. Surprisingly, I received a response in email today: Thank you for your suggestion! We know our guests want a lot of things and we do our best to incorporate every little or big suggestion. I have added your email to our collection to better assist our future roadmapping team as to what we should work on next. Thank you again for your input, hope you have a great rest of your week Roman C Royal Caribbean International --------------------------------- On Thu, 1 Feb at 11:54 AM , Fox wrote: Please put the overhead announcements on the app during sailing.