Traveler

19.9 $ on Spectrum of the seas next month , 16.99 on JOS 2020. It's crazy

I should send email to the CEO , what a waste of money , the ship is build in Europe and not even a TA or a month of cruises out of Barcelona ? Is that a way to make your board and stock holders happy ? ?

Sorry , forgot the Not before the Tuxedos ? not many Tuxedos , he should be fine

Just to let you know , There were not many Tuxedos during formal nights , some suits but also Tshirts , I felt very comfortable with collared dress shirt .

Correct , The formal nights we had were on day 3 and 6 , but there are two different routes , one with Seniority / Dubrovnik and one with Athens/ Mykonos . For the first one which we have done two weeks ago it was 3 and 6 for sure. Now I also checked both are 3 and 6.

Cats has several issues ,first as @WAAAYTOOO said it's very long and hard to follow, the audience are not really familiar with most of the songs beside Memories and it's the same set during all the show. I think maybe if RC would hand out some explanation pages before the show people might enjoy it better.

Also I think they did poor job with the setting , it was very static and quite boring comparing for example to SNF on Liberty.

Not all Royal show were trimmed (for example cats and I think also Mama Mia) , Chicago was on one of the ships (Allure I think before Mama Mia) they did not really invest in the set it was very lean production. The key (my opinion anyway) is to have musicals which at least some of the songs are well known by many , have nice set that is being changed during the show.

Yes , thank you for reminded me , just added it to the list . I used it once , its working well also for international flights.

yes , use porters to bypass some of the ports lines.

Post our last cruise I thought of several ideas how to make the embarkation day more bearable , please feel free to add some more of your ideas : Do not try to get even with the ultimate drinking package – try not to drink too much alcohol during the last evening/night , it will make the morning easier. Try to go to sleep early so you will get several hours of sleep before leaving the ship. Avoid WJ at the disembarkation morning , try to go to another place for breakfast , WJ is a mad house during disembarkation morning. The best time to fly back from the port will be 11:30 am – 1 PM (depends how far the port is from the airport) so you can leave the room around 8 am and go directly to the airport without the need to figure out what to do until your flight. If you have very late flight consider to take day stay in one of the hotels , nothing worse than walking around with tired sad people around you trying to pass time until your flight. Check your bill during the day before the last day so if you need to fix something with guest services you will not need to wait in long lines. If you have enough vacation time try to take few days to continue your ovation after the cruise , for example, you cruised from Orlando with the family ? why not to add few days in the different parks. If you can , give yourself one day off at home before going back to work. If it is possible always try to do self disembarkation , it will allow you to control when to pack, when to go out from your room (up to 8:30 am) and you will not need to check if your numbers were called or not. User the Luggage Valet program if available . that way your suitcase will arrive directly to your home airport and you will not need to carry them before via custom. Use the porters , some time they can save allot of time by using special queues. ·

And on the Chinese embassy to issue us Visa in the short window I will have between travels this month

I did not saw any blogs on this site anyway about Spectrum , we should had one but @twangster canceled his triple back to back on Spectrum.

As everything good also our cruise ended. Last day was starting slow as every last cruise day , no one likes the last day , maybe only B2B cruisers. Breakfast at WJ , walking around the ship (windy) and relaxing at the solarium. Quick lunch at WJ , they brought tons of fruits and desserts out including chocolate station and other good stuff We went back to our cabin which was an ocean view Cabin , on the fourth floor , 4 rooms from the centrum. I know some people said such cabins might get some noise from the centrum but you hear anything only when the sound proof door is being opened. The location is so good , just next to anything we needed , MDR , Centrum , theater and other places. We will sure try to get this cabin again if we will ever go on a vision class . The ship itself is well maintained , although you can see some rust here and there if you really looking for it. It still an option if it has interesting itinerary or if it's very cheap. Activities were well participate , the karaoke finals in the Shell we dance lounge was so packed you can barely move. One issue the continues to bother us is lack of food after 9 Pm and for sure after midnight ,the solarium cafe is not really a good option , it's being closed around midnight for 30 minutes and than serve bad pizza (old Sorento type pizza which always make you think we're all the recycled plastic bottles goes on the ship). For our last dinner on the boat we went to Izumi for hot stone and some shushi . Shushi was good but not sure worse the price , but we both enjoyed it We went last time to visit the Casino which was empty most of the cruise so no smoke issue or fighting for a space in a table. I converted the points I accumulated during the week and played on one machine that gave out 150 , wanted to play another machine but someone just set there and drink wine so went to another , after few rounds we got 400 free spins and got. 250 more during the free spins , most of them did not gave much but two rounds gave 500 each and it started to accumulated at the end it was 1900 $ , we took the money and first thing we did was to pay the current cruise bill and the second was to put the rest in the safe. We went to sleep after to wake up around 6:45 am to catch our airport transfer which we booked from RCL , around 8:30 we arrived the airport , checked in and waiting now in the lounge for our flight. It has been pleasure as always to write this blog although sometimes it effects on some of the experience as you feel the need to document everything and take pictures :-). Sorry for the spelling mistakes , I can blame the speller , the keyboard and lack of going all over it to read it again but we'll the truth is that even written in my native tongue I do mistakes from time to time (thanks God for technical writers at work). Hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed written it. Until next time (if I will have internet pakage , it will be Spectrum of the seas Chains to Japan cruise ship at about a month from now , must start diet) J&A

I took photos of all the CC will send them later to Matt to add to the CC page

Yes penny slots I wish it was dollars ,bit still nice and required hand payment

Sometimes it's good idea to go one last time to the Casino , just to get my birthday present

And now for the worse part of any cruise : packing for disembark ... Oh well at least WJ still offers interesting cake , one mega red velvet just for @Sweety

Day 6 Katakolon We arrived around 9 am to this small port which we shared today with one of the MSC ships (even this information was not correct in the port lection were they said we are going to be the only ship). This is a docking port. The Katkkolon village is very small around 600 people and nothing really to offer beside it's being a gate to Olympia and some nice beaches. As we already visited 3 other very active ports we decide not to plan anything. It was quite and hot day and visit the ruines of Olympia were it's very hard to find shade can be a challenge. Yes I know it's historic place and who know when we will there again but we learn the hard way that sometime to push too many places to visit can has its price. So I decided to wait one year and see the Olympic games from our air conditioning living room :-). We visit the village center and bought some presents to take with us back (olive oil , olives , baklava) and a replacement to my belt which was broken , I refuse to admit it's because my too many visit to the WJ and more about the quality although it was bought in Italy in one of our pervious cruise. On our way back we saw our ship naked , apperently they conduct a drill and lower all the live boats. We got some light lunch (preparing for our Chef table) after that we went to tour the ship and rest in the pool. We went to get ready for the official day . I went to hit the shower again , the shower is very good it has a wonderful powerful stream but one small problem, the clips which should keep the shower head is not up to the task.i had a Kramer incident (when he buy a extra powerful shower head from the black market) and I lost control of it , let's just say deck 9 was not the only pool deck. After drying the floor we made our way for the meeting point of the chef table.Its our third time going to the chef table and each time it's different experience although the food is more and less the same , it's all about your table companion. This time we had a group from Norway , cupple from Texas and people from New Mexico. We had very nice conversations and exchanged emails so it was a nice group. Wine was as good and the waiter always suggested to refill the glass Food was good although last time we had a better filet . They replaced the truffled spaghetti with a fish fillet so we got two main course. For dessert we got the sphere again which always nice , they also brought some assortment of small desserts. I also got my cream covered cheesecake. We got chocolate martini with the dessert The dinner took 4 full hour, post dinner we went to the 80s show which packed . Q We ended up in the quest before catching some sleep.

Day 5 leftovers We came back from Santorini around 2 pm and went to catch some food and nap. I was do glad they have done the excursion early morning so it was not too hot. We continue our day st the diamond club before going out for the top tier party , must say it was quite empty. On the ship we have 70 platinum , 51 Diamonds , 25 D+ and 0 pinnacles . Too cruiser were with 444 nights ... The party included a performance of the too dancers and the band which were performing all week long. The Captain said few words and the cruise director Bill was trying to tell done jokes , he reminds me a 70s TV host show , he was Ok during the events but his morning shows were very short and without much interactions with the activities manager. Our captain Bill We continue for dinner at WJ it was lasagna night whic is always good. We continued to the love and marriage show which seemed as it was rushed but still funny , for some reason they have not emphasis this is adult only so there were we quite allot of kids in the theater, three of the were the grandkids of the older cupple. You can imagine how the cupple struggled to answer were was the strangest place they have done coffee (well as maybe there are some kids here 2) . I am sure lots of parents had to explain new facts to their kids ?

Big winner in the casino ?

And we are here again.

They actually have a shore excursion that takes you to all the places in Dubrovnik were they shoot it , maybe next time I will try it

Now we just need to convince @twangster to try this itinerary with his camera and photography skills

Day 5 Santorini. As you may remember we switch the clock forward a day ago , combine it with our 7 am shore excursion and you can imagine when we had to woke up . It's appear that RC wanted to avoid the crowds as we had around 5 ships docking near the island at some of yhe hours. After a quick shower (can not start the day without it) I went to the WJ to bring back something to eat , it was not a day to seat and eat for sure. Here is the pre morning sunrise We went to the meeting point to found it quite crowded , apperently many more thought it will be a good idea to book an excursion. We booked the AIO and Santorini tour which includes also a visit to a winery . We have been told that four or five groups booked the same tour. Once our number we call we started doing our way to the gangway we stuck into traffic jam of deck 2 corridors , during that time some poor person from one of the cabins tried to get out for breakfast , so what he need to face and run back inside. We finally board our tender which brought us to the new port From there a 20 minutes drive to Oia , our guide told us allot of stories about Santorini or at least I think that what she told as I and also 90% of the buss were sleeping. We got to Oia for some free time to take the same photos that everyone takes from the same exact points , don't get me wrong it's n amazing place with stunning view. So we took some photos and went to one of the places to drink a coffee. There we found also another known fact about Santorini, it's really expensive , 25 $ for two coffee and one cake , but you pay for the view , it was nice to seat and relax looking at sea and enjoying the light wind. This is a traditional Santorini dessert . Very good Our next stop was a winery , for some reason RC thought it will be a good idea to bring all the groups on the same time to the winery , 200 people trying to sample the wine (three kind) and eat some Greek cheese, olives and crackers. We tried only two type of wines as it was only 10 am and it was so crowded. No one explained about the wine or how to drink it , comparing to other winery yours we done at the past it was not that good , but they have amazing view. Next we went to Fira for some more photo ops and more coffee for us Making sure our boat not running away By 1 PM we were back on the ship just on time for lunch . Weather was very good and not too warm , we enjoyed Santorini with all the limitations that such short visit during the most busy time of the year.