Traveler

Embarkation and some thoughts.
Last day came quick, although we got another day day before our flight we still had to go to the airport to rent a car.
I schedule a transfer with RCL (28 $ PP) and we did self carry of the luggage , we both love the fact that the luggage is with us until the last minute and no need to think what to leave for the morning and how to pack the left over to take with us. What we did not took into consideration is time we had to wait for the elevators. As always I was sent to bring some food , as lesson learn from pervious cruises we took some cutlery the evening before so I will have less things to carry. Around 7:50 am we went out with the luggage to go to floor 5 and wait for our number to be called. it took us 25 minutes to get into elevator and even that it was to first take the elevator up and only then go down , for sure we saw issue with the elevators before (which made us just use the stairs) but at the morning it was something else. Once we finally went down we continued to the terminal , it was very easy and no elevators were needed 🙂 .Exiting the terminal was very quick , the immigration officer just wanted to see we have US visa (for the last time as we just got a waver) and after 5 minutes we were out. We locate the shuttle , no one bother to checked if we have tickets or not, once the buss was full it started the way to the airport which took around 25 minutes. The shuttle is arriving to the shuttle bus center and no to the terminal itself which means you need to walk for extra 10 minutes to arrive to the terminal. We took the shuttle to the rental center and got our car. We knew the hotel will not be ready yet so we secure our suitcases and went to a near buy store to purchase several things in our list. For hotel we took the Holiday inn express and suites in shout center , its 10 minutes from the airport , new hotel and walking distance from many restaurants and a mall. its just a cross from the Green river and adjust to the green river trail which we did part of it. 
 


We got to do early check in , the hotel rooms are very nice (bigger than most of the holiday inn express which I stayed in) it also had a small refrigerator and microwave and most important two , yes two working elevators. We walked over to the local cheese cake factory for lunch and later got back to the room . Tons of restaurants around but we were tired and went with something we knew will be good. 
At the morning we eat the basic breakfast did checkout and went back to the airport , everything went OK and we went on a 2 hour flight to LA followed by 13 hours flight back home which went mostly by sleeping and watching some movies.
Several thought :
The ship - Ovation is a nice ship , there were some places it felt crowded but I guess it its due to the weather mainly.
Elevators - Something was wrong there , at least two elevators did not worked and it elevator seems to be very slow , good we could use the stairs most of the times
MDR - We went to the MDR only once since we were with My Time Dinging and it only started around 7 PM , the one time we went we got a very nice service and the food was tasty and enough , the main issues are the lines to the MTD if you reserved a time slots , the lines were crazy.
WJ food - The WJ buffet was never crowded which was nice , food was OK , it seems that quality went down comparing to pervious years , somethings were missing.
Cabin - We were at ocean view cabin , it was clean with ton of places to store our luggage and other stuff.
Bar services - No issues , never crowded and the service was very good.
Entertainment -   We saw several show , nothing to write home about , missing a big Broadway and ice show , the Spectra show was very nice from technical perspective. 
Weather - Weather was not as cold as we thought - light coat was enough, no need special things for Alaska beside a good per of tracking shoes.
Shore excursion - If there is one thing we are sorry not to reserve is an helicopter trip to the glaciers , we did planned to visit the glacier but it got canceled , I hope we will still be able to do it before it will be gone. I would suggest to make sure your cruise to Alaska is entering to one of the glaciers.
 
Until the next time .
 

I'd never be allowed to cruise with my phone again. Which of course would result in me hoodying up all in black and purchasing a burner with cash .... 

so i guess we should flood the appropriate channels with our displeasure 💃🏻😅😂 to see if we can ensure this potential voucher threat goes away…
it’s the vouchers that keep me sailing royal tbh. between the fares rising and the new wave of cruisers, as much as i love central park and oasis class — it’s a lot. have been exploring other lines and fares just to see what’s out there because there’s just a lot of “noise” these days. 
ironically, i will have made diamond plus after our sailing in december — but i know that there is NO way i make it to pinnacle unless i marry a captain of the fleet 😂 
diamond plus is wonderful for me; and 5 vouchers a day means i don’t have to buy a water package and can have champagne with dinner. maybe a corona at lunch. that’s it for me 😂

Embarkation and some thoughts.
Last day came quick, although we got another day day before our flight we still had to go to the airport to rent a car.
I schedule a transfer with RCL (28 $ PP) and we did self carry of the luggage , we both love the fact that the luggage is with us until the last minute and no need to think what to leave for the morning and how to pack the left over to take with us. What we did not took into consideration is time we had to wait for the elevators. As always I was sent to bring some food , as lesson learn from pervious cruises we took some cutlery the evening before so I will have less things to carry. Around 7:50 am we went out with the luggage to go to floor 5 and wait for our number to be called. it took us 25 minutes to get into elevator and even that it was to first take the elevator up and only then go down , for sure we saw issue with the elevators before (which made us just use the stairs) but at the morning it was something else. Once we finally went down we continued to the terminal , it was very easy and no elevators were needed 🙂 .Exiting the terminal was very quick , the immigration officer just wanted to see we have US visa (for the last time as we just got a waver) and after 5 minutes we were out. We locate the shuttle , no one bother to checked if we have tickets or not, once the buss was full it started the way to the airport which took around 25 minutes. The shuttle is arriving to the shuttle bus center and no to the terminal itself which means you need to walk for extra 10 minutes to arrive to the terminal. We took the shuttle to the rental center and got our car. We knew the hotel will not be ready yet so we secure our suitcases and went to a near buy store to purchase several things in our list. For hotel we took the Holiday inn express and suites in shout center , its 10 minutes from the airport , new hotel and walking distance from many restaurants and a mall. its just a cross from the Green river and adjust to the green river trail which we did part of it. 
 


We got to do early check in , the hotel rooms are very nice (bigger than most of the holiday inn express which I stayed in) it also had a small refrigerator and microwave and most important two , yes two working elevators. We walked over to the local cheese cake factory for lunch and later got back to the room . Tons of restaurants around but we were tired and went with something we knew will be good. 
At the morning we eat the basic breakfast did checkout and went back to the airport , everything went OK and we went on a 2 hour flight to LA followed by 13 hours flight back home which went mostly by sleeping and watching some movies.
Several thought :
The ship - Ovation is a nice ship , there were some places it felt crowded but I guess it its due to the weather mainly.
Elevators - Something was wrong there , at least two elevators did not worked and it elevator seems to be very slow , good we could use the stairs most of the times
MDR - We went to the MDR only once since we were with My Time Dinging and it only started around 7 PM , the one time we went we got a very nice service and the food was tasty and enough , the main issues are the lines to the MTD if you reserved a time slots , the lines were crazy.
WJ food - The WJ buffet was never crowded which was nice , food was OK , it seems that quality went down comparing to pervious years , somethings were missing.
Cabin - We were at ocean view cabin , it was clean with ton of places to store our luggage and other stuff.
Bar services - No issues , never crowded and the service was very good.
Entertainment -   We saw several show , nothing to write home about , missing a big Broadway and ice show , the Spectra show was very nice from technical perspective. 
Weather - Weather was not as cold as we thought - light coat was enough, no need special things for Alaska beside a good per of tracking shoes.
Shore excursion - If there is one thing we are sorry not to reserve is an helicopter trip to the glaciers , we did planned to visit the glacier but it got canceled , I hope we will still be able to do it before it will be gone. I would suggest to make sure your cruise to Alaska is entering to one of the glaciers.
 
Until the next time .
 

They can try like they tried to get money for Pizza ...
 

Yes, we are on Grandeur, the 4th cruise for us in Sept.  We disembark on Thursday and get a whole 7 days at home before going on a 15 night B2B on Mariner !  This cruise has been interesting.  As I mentioned elsewhere, this cruise is just overrun with children and I am not one to be bothered with children as a general rule.  The weather is making things worse since going outside or getting off the ship is really not an option.  The mania in the Centrum and WJ has gotten to me.  I think I am done with Grandeur, sadly.  The shining spots of this cruise have been the wonderful Staff and the good luck in the casino.  …and then, maybe I’m just ready to go home.  The internet is slightly better than it was on our 9-2 (Grandeur) sailing but still abysmal.  I feel bad for the VOOM staff.  I know there’s nothing they can do and they must field the endless complaints and complainers constantly demanding compensation.  On the good side, our JS is very comfortable and in a good location, so there’s that !  Tomorrow is PDCC (again !) then back to Tampa and home base for a week.  At the end of this one we will have 697 C&A points.  Hallelujah !

They are definitely making money (maybe indirectly, by requiring fewer services, i.e., bartenders and servers in the now-defunct happy hour venues) on Dan and me with the vouchers.  Most days I don't use ANY of mine and never once have I ever used all of them in a day.  The voucher system seems to be the one shining example of a positive change made by Royal.  I do NOT miss the happy hours and the vouchers are there if I want/need one.

I still think the voucher system actually saves RC money as compared to a happy hour.

Going back was quite OK,  we stayed one extra day in Seattle , quick flight to LA and 14 hours flight back , most of the time we slept so not bad.

Going back was quite OK,  we stayed one extra day in Seattle , quick flight to LA and 14 hours flight back , most of the time we slept so not bad.

Caught up on the rest of your cruise. Looks like you had a great time. Hope the trip home wasn't terrible

I know you're probably home now, so thanks for taking us along! I enjoyed all your pics so much and your commentary. 

Day 7 - Victoria.
The sun rises over our last cruise day. We slept finally until 8 but it's only because my spouse came under the weather , we quickly checked its not covid and I went to bring some food from 270. After a while she felt better and we went to pick our pictures (finally we remembered to pick our free pictures) I must say the photographer on the Ovation are doing better job than other ship  , or it's just the diet we done before the cruise 🙂 ).
We did not know if we want to visit Victoria or not,  after all its only in the itinerary due to the John's act , a filler like Nassau... We decided to go anyway and wow , it was a very good decision. The city is very beautiful with European filling and many interesting building. It was also a sunny day which is also a plus. We took the shuttle (15 $ for all day use) although you can walk (around 15 - 20 minutes). The shuttle dropped us near the beautiful Empress hotel 





 
From there we walked over the Government st ,on the way we did some whales watching excursion,  this time we got to see more than their tails.

We came to the local Chaintown which we decided it's a good time to eat lunch.

We found a nice resturant with lunch offers and got ourself noodles and a combo dish . Both were very good. The resturant name is Fan Tan caffe.


We did our way back in a parallel street



We went to the parliament house and decided to call it for today and took the shuttle back to the port . And no we did not eat the Poutine, not before the yearly checkout:-)


 
Hey what do you say can I work on the ship ? Here is my own first towel animal thanks to the cruise director program that explained how to make them 

Tomorrow  leaving the Ovation 
 
 
 

Day 6 - Sea day
The evening arrived and we left Stika , some people saw the north star light the night before but we missed it. We started to fo our way to the pacific we comes with its price. The sea was angry my friends "like an old man trying to return a soup in a deli" was not sure it was because we used all our drinking vouchers , too many honeymooners on the ship or just lots of waves . I liked it has its making me sleep very fast but I also like air pockets while flying so I am not a good example. 

We started the morning in the WJ for a quick bite following the captain corner,  sorry no new information about Nexus project nor about the loyalty program. It was interesting as always.

We participated in one trivia , before taken our first drink of the day . 

We skipped lunch only took Pizza and spent some time in the casino as it was also the ladt day its going to be open , it was better that time and I could take some money off the room charges. 

Today was the dream production in the theater, it was like a dream as we slept most if it. Today we finally went to the MDR , got a really good service and enjoyed the food.

This is melon and Avocado salad , free cruise to whomever find the Avocado 

The quest was today , just the quest not the crazy quest as it seems the PG version of it , although some new tasks. Our group came second, shame. Finally first day we used all the drinking vouchers,  good for us. We also had time to take our pictures as it was dress to impress night (although I quite sure I did not impressed anyone) . Time to go to sleep 
 

As promised a real Falafel recipe:
What you need:
2 cups of dried chickpeas/garbanzo 
1 chopped onion
Half cup of chopped parsley 
Half cup of chopped coriander
One spoon of sesame - optional
One tea spoon of paprika 
One tea spoon of cumin 
Half tea spoon of salt , you can add more if you prefer. 
Black pepper.
Two spoon of flour.
Optional one wet piece of bread. 
5 to 6 garlic cloves
Baking soda 
The chickpeas need to be soaked in water for 12 hours.
Wash and drain the chickpeas and add them with all the garlic , spices , bread to a food processor. 
Run the food processor until getting a rough paste,  if the paste is too dry you can add water.
Add the parsley, coriander , flour   sesame and  onion
Mix everything and put to rest in the refrigerator for an hour.
Just before frying the Falafel add the baking soda (optional).
The Falafel should be fried in 285 F 140C.
Create small to midsized balls (the mixture is good for 25 falafel balls) and fry several each time until they become brown/ dark brown.
Enjoy it with pita bread (maybe I will add how to do one at a frying pan) , chopped sald (tomato,  cucumber and onions), Thaini and Humos
 

I myself for official nights  will wear nice pants and collared shirt. I think in all the airline baggage restrictions and cost I don't see myself bringing  suits/tuxedo or even a sport coat. Better to use the extra space for local wine/liquor to bring back and other interesting things. I could care less on what other people wearing,  don't see how it influences my experience at all , my dish taste the same if the guy next to our table wearing a tuxedo or shorts. I would appreciate people that push themselves to a crowded elevators to take a shower often and use deodorant.

Day 7 - Victoria.
The sun rises over our last cruise day. We slept finally until 8 but it's only because my spouse came under the weather , we quickly checked its not covid and I went to bring some food from 270. After a while she felt better and we went to pick our pictures (finally we remembered to pick our free pictures) I must say the photographer on the Ovation are doing better job than other ship  , or it's just the diet we done before the cruise 🙂 ).
We did not know if we want to visit Victoria or not,  after all its only in the itinerary due to the John's act , a filler like Nassau... We decided to go anyway and wow , it was a very good decision. The city is very beautiful with European filling and many interesting building. It was also a sunny day which is also a plus. We took the shuttle (15 $ for all day use) although you can walk (around 15 - 20 minutes). The shuttle dropped us near the beautiful Empress hotel 





 
From there we walked over the Government st ,on the way we did some whales watching excursion,  this time we got to see more than their tails.

We came to the local Chaintown which we decided it's a good time to eat lunch.

We found a nice resturant with lunch offers and got ourself noodles and a combo dish . Both were very good. The resturant name is Fan Tan caffe.


We did our way back in a parallel street



We went to the parliament house and decided to call it for today and took the shuttle back to the port . And no we did not eat the Poutine, not before the yearly checkout:-)


 
Hey what do you say can I work on the ship ? Here is my own first towel animal thanks to the cruise director program that explained how to make them 

Tomorrow  leaving the Ovation 
 
 
 

Day 5 Stika .
We arrived early to the port (which did boy prevent for keep sleeping or at least trying). We did not jad special excursion for today just to go and visit Stila on our own as it seems easy place to do so. We went fir a quick bite and a coffee in the diamond club, I happy to say the coffee machine was working perfectly during the entire time.

We went down to the pier to catch the complimentary shuttle bus to "down town" Stika , it took around 7 minutes and the driver share some information about Stika. We arrived to the shuttle center and took some nice pictures from the nearest view point, there was a queue there but we successfully took some photos. 



We started doing our way to Stika national park , it's taken around 15 minutes in a very nice sidewalk which takes also to a boardwalk with a view over the water with many birds and other animals (we saw few seals and what we decided sea otters) 



 
The national park center is the star point for easy round trips inside the forest that contains also many impressive totem poles polls. We spend 40 minutes there before starting our way back to the town center.




Now who said tree Ents dose not exist ?

 

We passed by the place were the salmons come to spawn , unfortunately for many of the is also the place they come to die , let's just say we skipped the Salmon chowder for lunch. At that time it started to rain and it never stopped, not heavy rain just annoying one. We decided it's a good time for lunch and we went to the small Russian restaurant that call Pelmeni , they serve Russian dumplings ( this is more like tortellini or some may know it as Kreplach) they serve it with or potato or meat topped with vinegar, hot sauce and sour cream. They cost 9 $ for a plate which is one of the best deals in town.

It was tasty. There are also many food trucks around selling different chowders, crab sandwiches and hot dogs.

I think from all our 3 Alaskan stops Stika is the most beautiful . 
We had enough of the tain so we catches the shuttle back to the ship. Dinner was at the WJ we found several good things there Today we finally got to see Spectra. As always story line was not that important but they really took advantage using all the equipment and technology of the 270, impressive

 

Day 7 - Victoria.
The sun rises over our last cruise day. We slept finally until 8 but it's only because my spouse came under the weather , we quickly checked its not covid and I went to bring some food from 270. After a while she felt better and we went to pick our pictures (finally we remembered to pick our free pictures) I must say the photographer on the Ovation are doing better job than other ship  , or it's just the diet we done before the cruise 🙂 ).
We did not know if we want to visit Victoria or not,  after all its only in the itinerary due to the John's act , a filler like Nassau... We decided to go anyway and wow , it was a very good decision. The city is very beautiful with European filling and many interesting building. It was also a sunny day which is also a plus. We took the shuttle (15 $ for all day use) although you can walk (around 15 - 20 minutes). The shuttle dropped us near the beautiful Empress hotel 





 
From there we walked over the Government st ,on the way we did some whales watching excursion,  this time we got to see more than their tails.

We came to the local Chaintown which we decided it's a good time to eat lunch.

We found a nice resturant with lunch offers and got ourself noodles and a combo dish . Both were very good. The resturant name is Fan Tan caffe.


We did our way back in a parallel street



We went to the parliament house and decided to call it for today and took the shuttle back to the port . And no we did not eat the Poutine, not before the yearly checkout:-)


 
Hey what do you say can I work on the ship ? Here is my own first towel animal thanks to the cruise director program that explained how to make them 

Tomorrow  leaving the Ovation 
 
 
 

As promised a real Falafel recipe:
What you need:
2 cups of dried chickpeas/garbanzo 
1 chopped onion
Half cup of chopped parsley 
Half cup of chopped coriander
One spoon of sesame - optional
One tea spoon of paprika 
One tea spoon of cumin 
Half tea spoon of salt , you can add more if you prefer. 
Black pepper.
Two spoon of flour.
Optional one wet piece of bread. 
5 to 6 garlic cloves
Baking soda 
The chickpeas need to be soaked in water for 12 hours.
Wash and drain the chickpeas and add them with all the garlic , spices , bread to a food processor. 
Run the food processor until getting a rough paste,  if the paste is too dry you can add water.
Add the parsley, coriander , flour   sesame and  onion
Mix everything and put to rest in the refrigerator for an hour.
Just before frying the Falafel add the baking soda (optional).
The Falafel should be fried in 285 F 140C.
Create small to midsized balls (the mixture is good for 25 falafel balls) and fry several each time until they become brown/ dark brown.
Enjoy it with pita bread (maybe I will add how to do one at a frying pan) , chopped sald (tomato,  cucumber and onions), Thaini and Humos
 

Well we found those two packages here which we never ordered , anyone know if it's the new C&A gift or someone thought we will be very very thirsty?

Last night's dinner in CK was great.  
The wedge was overdressed so i ate from the bottom but otherwise great. 

I once again wanted to pick up that rack with my hands and go to town.  I asked our waiter if he could put a towel over my head so i could do that in shame. Which eventually led to a conversation on ortolan. Because why wouldn't it?

The lamb was better in CK than Chops.
Batman had the lobster. 

Day 7 - Victoria.
The sun rises over our last cruise day. We slept finally until 8 but it's only because my spouse came under the weather , we quickly checked its not covid and I went to bring some food from 270. After a while she felt better and we went to pick our pictures (finally we remembered to pick our free pictures) I must say the photographer on the Ovation are doing better job than other ship  , or it's just the diet we done before the cruise 🙂 ).
We did not know if we want to visit Victoria or not,  after all its only in the itinerary due to the John's act , a filler like Nassau... We decided to go anyway and wow , it was a very good decision. The city is very beautiful with European filling and many interesting building. It was also a sunny day which is also a plus. We took the shuttle (15 $ for all day use) although you can walk (around 15 - 20 minutes). The shuttle dropped us near the beautiful Empress hotel 





 
From there we walked over the Government st ,on the way we did some whales watching excursion,  this time we got to see more than their tails.

We came to the local Chaintown which we decided it's a good time to eat lunch.

We found a nice resturant with lunch offers and got ourself noodles and a combo dish . Both were very good. The resturant name is Fan Tan caffe.


We did our way back in a parallel street



We went to the parliament house and decided to call it for today and took the shuttle back to the port . And no we did not eat the Poutine, not before the yearly checkout:-)


 
Hey what do you say can I work on the ship ? Here is my own first towel animal thanks to the cruise director program that explained how to make them 

Tomorrow  leaving the Ovation 
 
 
 

Day 6 - Sea day
The evening arrived and we left Stika , some people saw the north star light the night before but we missed it. We started to fo our way to the pacific we comes with its price. The sea was angry my friends "like an old man trying to return a soup in a deli" was not sure it was because we used all our drinking vouchers , too many honeymooners on the ship or just lots of waves . I liked it has its making me sleep very fast but I also like air pockets while flying so I am not a good example. 

We started the morning in the WJ for a quick bite following the captain corner,  sorry no new information about Nexus project nor about the loyalty program. It was interesting as always.

We participated in one trivia , before taken our first drink of the day . 

We skipped lunch only took Pizza and spent some time in the casino as it was also the ladt day its going to be open , it was better that time and I could take some money off the room charges. 

Today was the dream production in the theater, it was like a dream as we slept most if it. Today we finally went to the MDR , got a really good service and enjoyed the food.

This is melon and Avocado salad , free cruise to whomever find the Avocado 

The quest was today , just the quest not the crazy quest as it seems the PG version of it , although some new tasks. Our group came second, shame. Finally first day we used all the drinking vouchers,  good for us. We also had time to take our pictures as it was dress to impress night (although I quite sure I did not impressed anyone) . Time to go to sleep 
 

Well I wear pajamas all day everyday...