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I like to help the greater cruise community. I find a chair for myself that is available. Then as I have observed an area for a while, I move chair hog stuff and return to my chair. Some innocent person comes along and starts using the now empty chair. Chair hog returns and confronts innocent person who can honestly claim they didn't do it, the chair was unused. Walking to breakfast if I notice a series of hogged chairs that are still hogged when I return from breakfast I grab the towel and drop it off somewhere. Chair is freed up. I consider it a community service.

So, a while ago, while roaming the internet, I stumbled across this awesome list of which activities were on which ships throughout the Royal Caribbean fleet. It was perfect! Maybe I lost it, maybe it was taken down, but I couldn't find it any longer. So I set out to make my own. After going through every deck of every Royal Caribbean ship's deck plans, I noted everything I could find onboard. Bars, dining, entertainment, I listed it all. Here is the result: View in full screen I find it incredibly useful and I thought that I'd put it here because you all might like to use it too. I hope you enjoy and let me know what you think. Disclaimers: This is my own creation and all information used is from https://www.royalcaribbean.com/cruise-ships/deck-plans (unless otherwise referenced) Therefore, there may be certain inaccuracies because of either certain things missing on the deck plans, or me missing something out If this is the case, please feel free to let me know and I will update it to reflect these. As said, I have not been on all these ships so do not have first hand experience for all these venues and activities, so please do let me know of any errors I may have made. It is quite large so it may take a moment to load, and you will need to zoom out. I intend to update it as new ships debut, or as ships get refurbished/amplified so it is hopefully always an up to date reference point. Thanks for reading and hope you enjoy!

Wrong cruise line?

You're lucky i'm not in charge, i would ban smoking indoors (to include the casino) and make the only place for smoking, in the aft (designated section) upper decks. If you get caught smoking in a non-authorized location, you would be dropped off at the next port. I'm surprised that Royal Caribbean hasn't been sued yet, by an employee that has been diagnosed with cancer from second hand smoke due to improper ventilation in the casinos.

6 days into our first ever cruise and we have booked our next with plans for 2 more before we go on that one. Addicted!! Thanks to everybody for helping us make this leap! Nikkoo

Fourteen cruises marks the most I've cruised in any single year so I thought I take a second to put it down in a post. I started 2018 as a relatively new Diamond member in the Crown and Anchor Society and finished just over the halfway mark to Pinnacle. Anthem -> Liberty -> Serenade -> Adventure -> Explorer -> Empress -> Radiance -> Mariner -> Enchantment -> Adventure -> Symphony -> Serenade -> Oasis -> Navigator The scary part is I missed a cruise when my daughter graduated from the Air Force or it would have been fifteen. Oh well, well worth it. Of all these cruises I think Navigator to the ABC islands was my best cruise, in no small part due to the ABC islands and my cruise mate (step daughter and scuba diving buddy). Other notable 2018 cruise events for me First Transatlantic (Symphony) First Canada/New England (Adventure) First ABC island cruise First visit/cruise to Cuba First Diamond Plus cruise (Adventure repositioning San Juan to Bayonne) First Radiance class experience First Voyager class experience Completed the Oasis class challenge (sailing all Oasis Class) Completed the Freedom class challenge (sailing all Freedom class) Completed the Empress class challenge (easy one here) My longest single cruise (Adventure 13 night Snowbird Migration) Paid for a cruise in full and didn't show up (cruise #15 above) Sailed six different classes of ship in a single year (would have been seven classes if not for the missed cruise) First time on a FlowRider Five Crystal Blocks First year not sailing in a full suite Sailed on a ship every month of the year First RoyalCaribbeanBlog Group Cruise!!!! What was your most notable cruise moment of 2018?

I’ve seen posts about buying small models of cruise ships and what not, so for the purpose of entertainment, how much for this model I made of Oasis? Let’s start at $50 :)

“I Dream of Genie” – Star Class - Harmony of the Seas – 03/10/19-03/17/19 Dreams…that is how many things begin; that is how this adventure began. But with every dream that comes true, there is always a journey. Here is our journey, almost 3 years in the making. Note: Pulling a @JLMoran here, it’s long winded lol. Back in May 2016, I read with keen interest, a blog post by @Matt that Royal was rolling out a new suite class program. The concept of Star Class intrigued me, but at the time, I knew that it was beyond our reach. However, dreams have no limits, and one can look but not touch. You all know that I am a shopaholic right? 😂 As the program rolled out, I read reviews, followed blogs, looked on in wonder and envy as I watched the Genies do their thing on Allure in 2016 and later on Harmony in 2017. This was pretty much me on those sailings... In February 2017, I came across a blog by @WAAAYTOOO. I believe it was her first time in Star Class and she had Reyno as her Genie. After that, I knew, without a doubt that this was something that I needed to try. The big question was how? The answer is that I really don’t know how I would have this opportunity without the help of some dear friends along the way, right here in the message boards. Somewhere between February 2017 and January 2018, I read a post by @tiny260 that really was the first glimmer of hope that Star Class could be a reality for us. @tiny260 basically posted that he had recently booked a good deal in Star Class by scouring the calendar week by week. There were only two problems with that idea: I did not have much time to go through each sailing, week by week and ship by ship, and there are only several times in the year that I can sail due to work. So, I set aside Tiny’s idea but made a point to remember his tip. In January 2018, call it God’s will, or good things come to those who wait, or fate, @WAAAYTOOO started a thread in the “Rumours and News” section here about a special STAR savings discount of $1000. I was also off work last year which meant I had all day to look. So, taking @tiny260's tip I went about an all-day effort to find something that would fit our schedule. Trouble was that my schedule was only flexible until September 2018 and I already had bookings for 2018 that I did not want to cancel. This is the point in the journey where sometimes intercession occurs, and you cannot logically explain what follows. During my search that day, I stumbled upon a sailing on Harmony (which I expected to be the highest price second to Symphony) for March 10, 2019. This worked out perfectly since this would be our March break, I would be off work, and Harmony is my favourite ship. For reasons that I cannot explain, this was also one of the lower priced sailings for a Star class cabin (compared to OA/AL/SY). How did I know that? Because up until this point, I had been tracking the prices on Star Class cabins and reading posts on the price that others were paying. Another example of how it pays to do your research. This low price, combined with the additional $1000 STAR discount, made it a no-brainer. I put a hold on it even before I had a chance to run it by Hubby. There are many that I have heard say, “Why would someone want to spend so much on a cabin?” or, “I would take more cruises over such an expensive one any day.” Here are my thoughts on that. We have taken enough cruises to know what we like. We are cabin and balcony people. We do spend time in our cabin, so to us, a nice cabin is important and worth it. My work schedule limits us to certain times of the year that we can cruise. Instead of taking our money and spreading it over a bunch of cruises (which we can’t do any way), we are putting it all into one. It all works out the same. Our original booking was for a Guarantee Star Class cabin. The code on the booking was A2-GTY. This was new to me and I did not even know such a category existed. I ran it by @WAAAYTOOO and a few others and figured that we had nothing to lose as the bare minimum would be an A2 on Deck 10. Hubby got home that evening and, after some persuasion and promises to curb the Lulu shopping, he suggested that if we were going to splurge on Star Class then we might as well go big and go to Deck 17, the “gated community” as some call it, and really live out that “WOW factor”. Ever since our inaugural sailing on Oasis, Deck 17 was always a wish of ours. I warned him that Star Class on Deck 17 could be quite a jump in price. Still curious, we called late that evening and inquired about what it would cost to upgrade. It was $100 extra (total). Done. No brainer. Again, an anomaly that I cannot explain. Since our original booking in January, I have re-priced our sold-out cabin 3 times for a total savings of almost $3000 less than what we originally booked for. The cost was many hours of tracking, but it paid off. We already had a great deal to begin with and it just got sweeter along the way. As we get ready for this grand adventure into Star Class, I must take the time to thank @WAAAYTOOO, @Mindybrite, @tiny260, @CGTLH, and @constable145. Your insight, advice, and blogs have been more valuable than you know. Words cannot express my appreciation. Finally, @Matt, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, thank you for creating this amazing community of people (enablers) who helped in making this a true possibility. I often say to my own girls, and my students, that we should never be afraid or give up in the pursuit of our dreams. Dreams can come true, this being the perfect example. So, without further delay, come take this journey with us, I would want it no other way.

Ok you guys, I'm SO excited. Mr. SpeedNoodles and I have not been on a vacation for 10 years (yes, you read that correctly). We've had time off from work, hauling the hounds to dog shows, but those are work. Lots of fun, but lots of work. This year is our 25th wedding wedding anniversary, his 50th birthday, we found a hound(s)/house sitter, and we are READY TO GO!!! I'll focus this blog mostly on the ship, since there's no way my photos of the scenery will do any justice of it, and Twangster did a superb job on his. Hats off to him - they were absolutely incredible! I don't know that I'll be able to post daily, but I intend to do the best that I can. We will have 36 hours in Seattle before we get on the ship, so we're super excited about that! Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick .....

Let’s add against the rules to that list...

Cabin Another story here…. After our Anthem of the Seas cruise in 2018, my wife, now unashamedly, is a suite snob. Frankly, I whole heartedly support this as well. So, when we booked this cruise, we booked a grand suite. The price was decent, done. The Owners suites were more than what we wanted to spend, and the 1 Royal Suite was WAY more. After the cruise was booked, I kept an eye on prices, made some adjustments here or there and the waiting game began. We thought, who knows, maybe we can try to see what could happen with a Royal Up bid A few months ago, while doing a routine price check, I see a 2br grand suite is now available. A quick phone call to Royal, and we are now sailing in a 2br grand suite for about the same price as what we booked the cruise for originally. A few weeks ago, we did get the Royal Up email. We had the option for an Owners Suite or the Royal Suite. We bid on the Royal Suite, but I’m not going to hold my breath since looking now, all the suites are sold out. Pre-Cruise Like I said, we are flying in a few days early. Friday 9/20 we are flying into FLL. Southwest flights were much cheaper and had more convenient times than flying to MIA. So, the plan is we will rent a car to use for the couple days prior to be able to explore around etc without a ton of Uber/Lyft charges. Embarkation day I will drop the family off at the port around 10, bring the car back to MIA and take the enterprise shuttle back to the port. I looked at dropping off at other locations near the port, but this was the most cost effective. We are staying at the Gates Hotel South Beach. We picked this hotel due to its proximity to south beach and Heather wanted direct beach access without having to pay a super-premium price. She is a Hilton member through her job, so that also narrows the choices. This hotel also includes its own area for chairs and other activities too on the beach. Post Cruise This is where it also gets fun. After disembarkation, we will be taking the shuttle to MIA for another rental car which we will drive to Orlando with. Friday evening, we have tickets to Magic Kingdom for Mickey’s No So Spooky Halloween Party. Heather is a huge Disney fan and is really looking forward to this. Much to my dismay, she has us all wearing Hocus Pocus themed shirts for that night….yay… Saturday, we have tickets to Universal Studios. Gotta check out the new Hagrid Ride…. And again, we have matching themed shirts. At least this time, they are Hogwarts/Harry Potter ones. Sunday, we head home. The Surprise Like I said earlier, this whole trip will be a surprise for the kids. The plan to make this work is that we will be packing in secret. We will drop the kids off at school on Friday, then load up the car. We will pick the kids up at dismissal at school and go straight to the airport. At this point, We will let them in on a little bit of the surprise, which will be we are just going to Florida and will be on the beach. On cruise day, we will pack up the car and say we are headed to another hotel, but not tell them that the hotel is the cruise ship. This is going to be so much fun. I plan on writing about our experiences at Disney and Universal as well so grab the popcorn and wine, its going to be a wild ride and thanks for following along!

Sail away was timed perfectly with the Costa Rica sunset. Lots of small boats out tonight. The flight of the Pelicans.

Vancouver is a great embarkation port and a beautiful city. The last time I was on Ovation they were building the Fish and Ships restaurant on deck 14 by the pool. This time it was open so I tried the basic fish and chips that included in the cruise fare. It's small but a good snack size. If you want a full meal I'd order two. I didn't know Vancouver had dry dock facilities for smaller ships. As sail away approached the upper decks grew more crowded. With that our sail away commenced and we headed towards the Lions Gate Bridge. As if there was any doubt we cleared with ease and made our way into Burrard Inlet. It's a very pretty sail away leaving Vancouver. I enjoyed some balcony time taking in the scenery. These pictures don't do the majesty of it all any justice.

We end up doing a Pub Crawl, Poker Run ...... All participants put in $5. At every bar, not only do you have a drink, you draw a card ...... at the last bar, you find out who has the best poker hand - that person wins the cash ..... I was fortunate enough to win two years ago w/ 3 Kings ... Nice .

Apparently it’s an 8,000 cruise point milestone for Mario onboard the Navigator!

You're gonna have to bear with me because I am about to go overboard with Queen Mary pictures. I just love this old ship. Arriving later than expected once settled in my cabin I made my way to the Observation Bar for a drink and a bite to eat. Walking around the ship you feel a deep sense of history. Not a bad place to catch the end of game six of the World Series with the city lights of Long Beach across the bay.

Itinerary for this 16 night cruise: Panama Canal, Eastbound. Los Angeles to Ft. Lauderdale. Day 1 - San Pedro (Los Angeles) Day 2 - At Sea Day 3 - Cabo San Lucas, Mexico Day 4 - Puerto Vallarta, Mexico Day 5 - At Sea Day 6 - At Sea Day 7 - Puerto Quetzal, Guatemala Day 8 - At Sea Day 9 - Puntarenas, Costa Rica Day 10 - At Sea Day 11 - Panama Canal Full Transit Day 12 - Colon, Panama Day 13 - Cartagena, Columbia Day 14 - At Sea Day 15 - Georgetown, Grand Cayman Day 16 - At Sea Day 17 - Ft. Lauderdale, FL.

Just curious where home is? Home is Tel Aviv , Israel

I totally agree that Grandpa used poor judgement resulting in a tragic mistake. But I don't think the family is necessarily trying to "strike it rich" - because I remember how I felt when tragedy struck my family, albeit under different circumstances. One of the early symptoms of grief is anger, and certainly this family has a lot to be angry about (Mom is angry at Dad for letting Grandpa take the baby over to the window, Dad is angry at Grandpa for lifting the baby up to the window, Grandpa is angry at himself for being responsible for the tragedy, Grandma is angry at Grandpa for causing the death of the baby, etc.) and when people are angry, they flail around looking for someone to blame. When my daughter was killed, I was angry at EVERYONE with whom I could find anything to be angry about, and her father was so angry he drove people away (a phenomenon you may have observed in other bereaved parents), but that was just a normal grief reaction that gave way, eventually, to the deep grief that comes when the energy provided by anger is spent. The only person I blame is the lawyer, who I think is the one trying to get rich by inventing this cockamamie story of it being a "kids area" and parading this family in front of the media. I don't hate lawyers, by any means. My dad was a lawyer, but he never chased an ambulance or a cruise ship or dragged his clients into the limelight. He honored the confidentiality of the lawyer/client relationship, that this lawyer apparently never heard of.

Just got off Harmony on a brand new itinerary: Port Canaveral, CocoCay (2nd time this ship visits here), Cozumel, Roatan (first time for Harmony), & Costa Maya Here are a few stray observations I had: 1) I did NOT purchase Voom, but discovered that if I simply connected to the Harmony-Guest wifi (for the app updates and schedules), I was easily able to send/receive iMessages to anyone, including those back at home! 2) The Stowaway Piano Man was on this sailing. I had the privilege of riding the elevator with him! 3) First time Harmony visited Roatan. The captain changed our arrival / departure times. Roatan local time was 2 hours earlier that ship time (that remained on Eastern time). Original ship scheduled time was 8AM - 5PM (ship time). New schedule was 9:30AM - 6:30PM (ship time). Evidently, the local vendors didn't want to be there at 6AM (their local time / 8AM ship time) to open up shops, so the captain delayed the arrival / departure time. 4) Got WOW bands for everyone in our group. They worked extremely well, and could be used anywhere on the ship in lieu of a seapass card. They also worked for entry into Thrill Waterpark on CocoCay. Every station on the ship had portable readers that read either your WOW band or your seapass card. This worked for everything from towel checkout to shops to entry into reserved shows & events. You still needed your seapass card for getting off the ship, and for entry in the ports back onto the ship. 5) The Soda cups for the freestyle machines were the same old-style ones I've seen before. I did see a few of the new ones (with straw and looped carry handle), but didn't know where they came from. I had a boardwalk balcony cabin, so got complementary soda cups. Even those that were for sale on board (with various drink packages) were only the original style ones... 6) There seemed to be professional photographers on the ship most every night, and not just formal dining nights. I didn't recall seeing this many days with photographers and various backgrounds on prior cruises. 7) Did the escape room (and made it out with 5 1/2 minutes to spare!). This event was extremely popular. Spoke with someone in guest services, and they said the escape room was completely booked within two days (all days and all sessions) of it becoming available to book on the cruise planner. Glad I booked it as soon as I saw it available! 8 ) CocoCay - Two things: A) Plan on doing the "highest" waterslide and the slingshot ride as soon as you can. With the volume of people on Harmony, the lines were extremely long (2+ hour wait for these two rides) past about 10AM. The lines finally shortened closer to about 3:30PM to 4PM. B) The lockers in Thrill Waterpark were complementary to use. Cost was included in the Thrill Waterpark ticket purchase. You just found a open / available locker, put our stuff in, and locked it. We could then open it and access our stuff, and simply re-lock it as needed. I have no idea if lockers outside of Thrill Waterpark were complementary or not... 9) Cruise Director, Marc, was excellent!!! Overall, we had an awesome cruise!!!

Today I went to collect our passports from the Chines visa agents , finally we found few days were we are both at home and can leave the passport for few days (it takes up to four days to get the visa if you are not paying for expedite process) so I guess it’s a good opportunity to start this “I do not know how live it will be” blog. It’s a different cruise for sure , many first times for us , first time going to China , first time on Quantum class , first time cruise to Japan and firs time on a cruise that English is not the first language. I am sure we will have much more first times , but that’s what make us so excited. Why we choose this cruise ? well , apparently it was a childhood dream of my spouse to visit Japan and it will be her first time there , for me it will be the second time but the other time was quite a long time ago and was a business trip, also it’s a new ship , and a new class , do we really need other reasons ? So what is the plan : Two days in Shanghai – Some tour in the city , still did not choose one although I so a nice bicycle day trip which we might take. I already booked a nice hotel near one of the main square , the location is important as we wanted to be at the center to reduce traveling , as we are landing very early in the morning I guess we will store our suitcase in the hotel and start to tour the area. I thought to book the hotel a day earlier so we will get the room once we will arrive but as I know both of us , we will get to the room and go to sleep and miss important hours in the city 😊. On 1-October we will do our way to the port . Our itinerary : 01 OCT - SHANGHAI (BAOSHAN), CHINA 02 OCT - Cruising 03 OCT – OSAKA, Japan 04 OCT- OSAKA , Japan 04 OCT – Kobe Japan 05 OCT – Tokyo (Yokohama) , Japan 06 OCT – Cruising 07 OCT – Cruising 08 OCT - SHANGHAI (BAOSHAN), CHINA After we booked the tour I found out that 1-October is also what they call in China the Golden week , this is a mandatory vacation week in all China so we expecting to have many local families and not many foreigners on board. We might experience some traffic as many are traveling this week but I do not think its going to be showstopper. We choose this period as we also have some holidays and many bridge days between. Post the cruise we will go to the airport and fly to Singapore , we considered to stay some extra days in Chania but was not sure if we will have multi entrance visa or a single entry which mean that we will have to use transfer visa on the way back, at the end we got the multi until as long as the passport is not expired. We will be in Singapore for three nights at our favorite hotel in the world (or should I say our favorite swimming pool in the world), it will be good for some rest time although I might need to have a face to face meeting with one of our customers for few hours. From Singapore we will fly to Thailand to chill out , currently only Bangkok but we might fly to one of the islands , depends what the weather will be. So almost three week vacation before going back home. There are many difference is cruise out of China : 1. Activities cost money (north star ,Ifly , skypad, laser tag) I will give the prices later. 2. Food in the MDR is different – the menu is a picture menu with many Chinese flavor. 3. Instead of sea class , sky class and start class there is golden class and silver class. 4. In the golden glass there are not just suites but also balconies cabins with suite services. 5. No coastal kitchen but golden dinning room and maybe silver dining room (not sure yet). 6. The solarium is only for Golden and Silver class. 7. Golden class have access to some other dedicated places (again not sure about silver) , there are also elevators just for suites class. 8. Wonderland with Chinese menu. 9. Dining package is not offer before the cruise. 10. No Diamond lounge – only the 3 free drinks during happy hour. 11. Many first timer. 12. MDR late seating is 7 PM. I am sure I will find more differences , but difference are many time a good thing , it will push us from the comfort zone to experience new things. More to come.

The majority of guests boarding Mariner have never been on a cruise before. Perfect Day is proving to be immensely popular for good reason. Combine the two and I can understand why they are trying this. If the feedback is positive they'll likely continue, if not they likely won't. The idea of two stops is appealing. That's taking me two cruises, one last week and another next week. Let's examine this concept that the new Perfect Day is a money grab compared to the old CocoCay. Thrill water park is a small section of the island. Beyond the water park the same excursions are available that always have been at CocoCay, except... Remember the old Aqua Park? $37 for one hour. That's it in the distance. Yep, that's what you got for one hour and $37 back in 2017. Remember the old slides from 2017? $26 for a day pass. Not included in the Aqua Park. Now for roughly the same price of the old aqua park and old slide you get an entire water park with wave pool and multiple slides that are incredible. Thrill water park is $62 in most of my upcoming stops at CocoCay. To me that represents pretty great value compared to the CocoCay of yesterday. BTW - see all those loungers in the top picture? Notice anything missing? The $20 umbrellas! Here is a Perfect Day picture from last week. Now, umbrellas all over the place and they are free! If you just want a relaxing beach day without spending a dime that describes 90% of Perfect Day including a free fresh water pool and now Perfect Day is so much nicer than the old CocoCay. If you want a water park, the price today has so much more value compared to the old Aqua park and inflatable slide of yesterday's CocoCay at the same price. Plus no more tendering! Come and go from the ship as much as you want. What's not to love about Perfect Day?

One reason that I love the Intercontinental Miami is their Club level rooms which give you access to their Club Lounge. Happy Hour and Breakfast are complimentary here in the club lounge. The hours are 5-7pm and 7-11am. Here are the selections for Happy Hour tonight: Mini sliders Chicken Croquette Chicken Wings Specialty coffee Make your own cocktails My pre-dinner snack: The wings were so good I went back for seconds on those. Needless to say, we were stuffed by the time we actually headed out for dinner.

Back when I blogged my first cruise on Freedom last year, I had posted a couple of pictures I'd taken of some art my younger daughter had drawn / painted while we were staying in the hotel pre-cruise. Here's the photo again, for those who hadn't seen... What a difference a year of high school can make! This was Kara's final project for the year in year in her Freshman Drawing and Painting class: Hand drawn, hand colored, all her own work and effort. I cannot begin to say how proud I am of her, and I can't begin to imagine the career and life she'll have ahead of her as an artist. Yes, she already has determined that being an artist is her career choice; she wants to major in illustration in college, but may double major in photography after taking photography 1 this year as well, and discovering that even with her benign tremor she is able to compensate well enough to take photos that have gotten her repeated praise from her teacher in that class as well, along with winning many "picture of the week" contests in her class and having some of her photos showcased at gallery events the school has held. #seriouslyproudpapa

It's a ship. No different than sailing a modern cruise ship. No matter what ship you board the same stories are rumored. Same with hotels. How old is the oldest hotel you've stayed in? More than 20 years old year? See any ghosts? I tend to use one bed for stuff so that leaves one bed for snoozing. That was 1912. This ship, the Queen Mary sailed for the first time 24 years later and for over 30 years since did that same route weekly, week after week. In fact the crossing to Long Beach was sailing 1,000. One thousand sailings across the very same stretch of water. Her sister ship did the same. Two thousands crossings and no Titanic moment. Learning from that tragedy the QM had lifeboat and liferaft capacity for 8,000 with a typical guest count of just over 2,000. The Queen Mary is proof that human engineering does evolve. It learns from mistakes. Those same lessons make cruising as safe as it is today. For me it's a time capsule or time machine. A very rare opportunity to go back in history and see where this whole cruise industry evolved from. Fly in an airplane? Want to list airline disasters over the past 30 years? Didn't think so. Indeed. Mankind learned a very big lesson that day that humbled a lot of learned scholars from that time. We can all thank marine disasters such as Titanic for cruising to be as safe and casual as it is today. That's the takeaway - this beautiful old ship learned from previous disasters and was an incredibly safe means to travel.

I'm glad to see the deal to sell Oasis fell through and these cruises are back on. 🤣🤣🤣

No love for me. Deluxe bev pkg is still only $52 with BOGO50 / 25% off. C’mon Royal!! Where’s that intern with another $18 sale for all 2019 sailings?!?

I think you still have your polite teacher hat on. Let me translate to vacation-speak...

I am here now on Adventure of the Seas. Left out of Port Bayonne/Cape Liberty yesterday. When they scanned our carry ons at security, they saw our three cases of soda and told us that only one was permitted per stateroom, and they took two away. Bummer! Yes, we knew the policy, but a lot of others on the boards said to give it a try, so we did. (Please do not judge😀). The ship is ROCKING like crazy! We are heading now to Bermuda and it has been nonstop back and forth. Never needed Dramamine in our lives, and everyone that we know is taking it! CONSTANT MOTION! Thank God we packed it! Food is great, easy to find lots of great food! Great mix of people here, all ages. We were told there are currently 200 children on board. My son is 15 and went to the teen meet and greet last night and already has a pack of friends now to run around with. We have a dry erase board on our stateroom door and someone keeps drawing naked genitalia on it?????? My hubby is mad about that, but it is kind of funny to me😂😂😂😂😂 I am open to any questions anyone has about the Adventure of the Seas. May take me a day or two to reply, since I am having so much fun!

All I can afford is my C&A cookies heated up using the hair dryer that comes with my interior cabin. Does that count?

Toss in a few night time shots of Adventure.

The current smoking rules save me a fortune. I avoid the casino on all ships but Empress which is smoke free. I lose money on Empress so it's kind of an inverted blessing they allow smokers in the casino.

I have yet to be to Perfect Day at CocoCay but this pic is my desktop background. I have high hopes of the time we get to spend on the island. I invite others who have been there to share their favorite memories there here. I hope this doesn't sound too corny.

Our tour was very nice. Plenty of time to see things and get out of the very nice van. Here are some highlights:. Park guell:  I apologize in advance...I'm taking most pics on my camera but trying to do some for here on my phone. I had beautiful pics of the buildings with the columns in the back. I also have some amazing pics of the tile work close up. The pics here don't do it justice! Give yourself at least an hour here... We only had an hour and we'd have liked at least another half hour or so. Jane

Backtracking a bit a today was a busy day! I need a cruise from all this land vacation nonsense! 😂 I think I left off this morning with the Naked Cowboy. He was the first thing we saw after the tour started. But just in case you missed the earlier post, here are some that D12 caught on her camera 🤣 The Viator tour was hectic but very comprehensive. Money well spent as we saw tons of sights. However, if you ever plan to do this tour, be ready to move and walk. Here are pics from around the city. 📸: Mostly all Hubby and one D10. Times Square (last night) The Lulubot always can find a home base. Hornblower Cruises Junior Photographer in training: Her work. 📸: D10 9/11 Memorial Rushing to get back for the pizza meet up:

Ok. Since it is confession time, I will join you. We always get the DBP too and I am a Coke snob so wouldn’t be caught dead drinking a fountain Coke. Dan doesn’t drink any soda at all. Not very time but SOME times, if I meet a worthy candidate, we will give our cups away to someone who will use it. I also recognize that this is not legal. Confession complete. Oooh. I feel so much better ! 😊😇

I do not have family in Rock Hill

Time to leave Key West. As we started to drop lines and get ready to sail away it seemed this one wouldn't be as majestic as the last Key West sail away sunset. The crowds gathered in Mallory Square to see me off. Okay, may the sunset had something to do with it. Yeah not as spectacular as last cruise. But wait, what's that? An opening between cloud layers? Maybe tonight would be a decent sunset after all. Like that it was over.

I wonder if it is the same Youtuber who got most of the facts and projections wrong when Oasis was damaged in the crane incident. Some bloggers and vloggers will do anything to get clicks and followers, even make stuff up. Fortunately here on royalcaribbeanblog.com @Matt sticks with known and confirmed information, not speculation. If you want reliable information you'll find it right here https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/

I've not seen it with my own eyes but I often talk to the crew and hear interesting stories. Bartenders who work the pool bar see a lot. When Freedom came back from Europe in 2017 she had an area marked for topless sunbathing. Sadly did not see any participants. Maybe all my camera gear scared them away.

So where did my wandering bring me this morning? To the Boardwalk where Johnny Rockets seemed like it would be a good idea. I tried to play Home Genie and get it “to go” so I could surprised Hubby with it. They would not accommodate that request. So it’s waiting for JR on my own this morning as I sit here to write this. Interesting observation here is that on Harmony, I know that they allowed meals and snacks to go (not referring to room service). I have read a few blogs where people were able to take breakfast to go and D12 was able to get fries and onion rings in March. Not sure if that was because both cases were star class? But here on Symphony, they would not allow it. They said the food must be consumed at the venue. Oh well, Hubby’s lost, and my gain, literally, in the waistline 😆 French Toast with “The Works”. Delicious 😋

Night 3 Pool Party I wanted to check out the pool party they referenced in the letter. It was well attended with many people still in their formal wear since this was a formal night. Entertainment staff led the dance moves. I had noted the Windjammer offered "Late Night Snacks" 10:30pm to 12:30am and then a "Burger & Sandwich Bar" 12:30am to 1:30am. There were a number of guests here at 11:45pm. Unlike the late night offerings on Mariner and Navigator recently this was more complete with much more than just burgers and hot dogs. It was pretty much a midnight buffet. It wasn't packed by any stretch but I was certainly not alone. There were even some dessert items. Wandering around the pool deck it was a beautiful night with a sky full of stars. It's hard to see them in these photos but it was a great night for star gazing. I wanted to include a picture of the kids splash zone and here at midnight it was void of kids so I took the opportunity to take a quick picture. I try not to photograph other people's children so this will have to suffice with the water features turned off.

It’s’ cruise day! Currently on the train from Anchorage to Seward. I had a detailed post from yesterday however, it wouldn’t let me post and I didn’t save my post. I realized because I wasn’t entering my email address. I think we were awake for almost 24 hours yesterday. Spent half the day traveling and half the day exploring the Anchorage area. The Crow Pass Trail to Crystal Lake was absolutely stunning. Took about 4 hours round trip. Took great photos and even saw a Dal Sheep. So excited for our day. The train ride is stunning so far. Doing a 6 hour wildlife cruise when we arrive in Seward and then starting our cruise. I will attempt to post photos on my phone. May need to wait till laptop access

2 weeks ago on Mariner playing the wheel of fortune machine with the gold spin. I hit a gold spin and it landed on 15 x multiplier and then the wheel of fortune hit $250 so it was a $250 x 15. $3,750.00. Fun night in the casino.

Support for the argument of arriving early...

BREAKING NEWS! We interrupt your obsessive reading about cruises to bring you this important report. We are no longer in “Guarantee” limbo. We have been assigned a spacious ocean view balcony on desk 8 starboard rear. More news as it becomes available. We now take you back to your regular cruise programming.

Day 6 - Hubbard Glacier Our progress at 4:22am: I was hoping for a sunrise and managed to get a glimpse of a sunrise through the breaking cloud cover. Our destination began to appear in the distance. It was pretty windy at this point but seas were pretty calm. Here at 7:30am the Solarium was still pretty empty. Some guests secured a front row seat. You can't see it here but it was pretty windy. The glass panels did a great job deflecting the wind but allowed me to stick my camera through the space between. Weather like this isn't unusual here. I've seen it be like this and clear up later so I wasn't too concerned about the high winds and drizzle. The shops had set up on the pool deck selling hats, gloves, jackets and stuffed animals. As we got closer the winds died down so they were able to run the North Star through a test cycle. This allows them to validate winds at elevation and ensure the ride is ready for guests. Something you don't see very often is the North Star going over the sides of the ship, at least not here in North America. This is part of the new North Star Alaska Experience that is a paid option. At this point it's 8:50am and we've entered Disenchantment Bay. Click here for more details on the North Star Alaskan Experience.

Sorry, but the reason I never talk about it is because I feel, in my not-so-humble opinion, to be at best an unsolicited sales offer and at worst a border-line racket. The shopping seminar is more about which stores have paid RC to advertise as stores to go to, rather than an educational overview of which areas of the city/island truly represent a good place for value or deals. Any store that is mentioned in these seminars have paid to be mentioned. Moreover, there is often a kick back for sales referred. Not to mention that "little hook up" is a ploy to get you into the store. If you want to learn about the port you are visiting and/or the best areas to shop, I recommend utilizing the internet and getting recommendations from other cruisers who have gone to these places.