CruisinUngs

In addition, you will incur a penalty.

Day 2 – Sept 17 – Day at sea
We were up pretty early again – 6.30am or so – still not quite off of UK time.  We both got up and headed to the gym for a bit of cycling to burn off that key lime pie from the night before.  After that we got changed and decided to check out the solarium.  The pool there wasn’t open by that point so we headed to the main pool which was just opening. We stayed in for only about 20 mins but it was great.  Nice and warm and completely empty except us – the small benefits of early nights and early starts.  R even jumped in for a bit which was testament to how warm it was.  I had not expected to see another empty pool this trip after the Ft. Lauderdale hotel but it seemed that even on a ship with up to 6,000 other people, we were some of the few who didn’t party hard on embarkation day.
After heading back to the room to dry off we headed for breakfast in the WJ around 8.30am. It was certainly busy enough but similar to yesterday, it wasn’t too bad.
This was to be a day for exploring so we started off by heading downstairs and checked out the arcade for a bit including a quick game of air hockey – one of our favourite competitive exploits.  We then headed to a table tennis tournament at 10am.  I consider myself as decent at table tennis.  I can certainly beat the average person who does not play regularly however R’s badminton skills means she usually beats me pretty handily.  I got beaten in my first game by someone who could only be described as the Queen of Spin.  She started all meekly, overhitting a couple of early shots and apologising while smiling coyly.  It wasn’t long before she was hitting shots from below the table when you couldn’t see the ball anymore and the ball would loop over with an unpredictable swerve.  I can’t remember the final score but it was probably something like 21-12.  However, it seemed luck was on my side - I got a reprieve and got to play again due to odd numbers and… I got beaten again.  This time it was to a guy who was pretty good – although he also started off a bit rocky.  I got most of my points early and then went on a losing run of about 10 points.  I think I did slightly worse in that one – maybe 21-11.  R narrowly lost her second match but got a silver medal for 2nd best female.
Next R wanted to have a go at the rock climbing wall so we headed to the Boardwalk.  She had her eye on the wall ahead of the cruise since it is a bit of a novelty having one so accessible.  I watched while she had a couple shots, doing well on the second go.  We messed around a bit with one of the cornhole games on the Boardwalk before walking over to Johnny Rockets.  We had no intention of paying for a burger but I had read on the blog that milkshakes were now included in the drinks package, although I wasn’t sure if this was only if you were already paying for a burger.  We were happy to find that they were free at any time and we enjoyed a chocolate milkshake.  It is good to find small areas where they add to the value rather than chip away at it as most companies like to do these days.
Being a sea day, we decided that there would need to be at least some laying by/in a pool.  We headed back to the stateroom to change in to our pool gear and then on to the Solarium.  Being childless we had decided that even though the Solarium pool is a little small that it would be the place for us.  With no kids running around and a bit of heat and UV protection from the glass overhead it definitely seemed like the best option.  We had a chilled out afternoon on the loungers and in the solarium pool with many drinks.  Being a sea day, it was definitely busy but not too bad (you see a pattern here).  No problem getting a lounger although the pool was a little like human soup at times but it was all good.  I’ve never been a particularly heavy drinker of frozen drinks even on holiday but with the heat (and the drinks package) I was certainly enjoying them.  A Miami Vice was one of my favourites.
After a few hours there we headed back to room as we had an early dinner at 5.30pm due to a show later on. It was the first formal night so we changed in to our finery and headed down for dinner.  Only had two courses and we were early so it was very quick – in and out in under an hour.  I had French onion soup and beef tenderloin.  I have to say the beef was fantastic.  I’ve had plenty of fillet steak in my time but this was some of the most tender I’ve had and perfectly medium.  R had lobster bisque and duck a l’orange.
We headed back to stateroom and changed out of formal gear after what felt like no time at all since we had put it on!  We then headed up to the windjammer to check out the desserts.  This had been our plan since the desserts on the MDR menu did not seem all that interesting.  It was our lucky day – they had the same key lime pie as the MDR from yesterday so I was very happy.
After that we headed to the Aqua Theatre for the Ocean Aria show which we had previously booked.  It was very good.  I thought that it would have been impressive enough if it had been in a Vegas hotel so it was unbelievable that it was at the back of a cruise ship. We headed back up to the room after the show.  Another early start and no naps meant that we were pretty tired.  Another spoiler – there was never any evening activity noted in the cruise compass that we thought sounded unmissable so mostly we stuck to the early night/early start pattern for most of the trip.
 
Photo 1 - A crackin' Kraken Colada in the Solarium.
Photo 2 - All these activities but R is already climbing the walls!
Photo 3 - The very warm french onion soup.
Photo 4 - The very good beef tenderloin.
Photo 5 - Waiting for Ocean Aria to begin.

Day 1 – Sept 16 – Embarkation Day
 
After a solid amount of sleep, we awoke around 6am.  Since I knew that with the jet lag and the early night we would wake early, my plan was to get up and go for a swim in the hotel pool.  However it was still very dark outside. Scotland be a cloudy, gloomy place so it is easy to forget that even though in Summer Scotland is light very early and until very late, lower latitudes are not so – even though they have more sunshine in general.  So we lazed about for a bit until it lightened up and then headed down to the pool once the sun had decided to show up.  The pool was pretty basic but crucially it was empty (people-wise, not water-wise) while I was there which was nice.  At that point, I was fairly sure that I wouldn’t have an empty pool on the cruise at any point.  Spoiler alert – I was wrong! 
We took some dry clothes to the pool so that we could go straight to breakfast.  Again pretty basic but, as a Scotsman would say, ye cannae beat free!  The highlight was definitely the waffle maker allowing you to make fresh waffles which were superb.
Back up to room to shower and pack up before heading to port.  Again we got an Uber from the hotel and arrived at port around 11.15am – this was contrary to our set-sail pass instructing us to arrive from 2pm.  Check-in was quiet however one small issue was that US immigration in the airport had not stamped our passports which they had done on previous trips to the US and that the cruise staff feel like they should have done.  Luckily I had a copy of the ESTA printed which smoothed feathers.  However, I feel like therein lies a tip!  Even though it is meant to be wholly electronic, print a copy of your ESTA confirmation.  My father will be proud!
The holding area unfortunately was quite busy so we had to wait a while before boarding.  We did get boarded at about 12.30pm which is long before we would have been boarded if we had arrived at the port at 2pm.  Since this was our first time on a RCL ship, let alone an Oasis class ship, I can attest that it is very disorientating when you first get on.  You emerge on the Promenade and, with no directions on where to go next, stop dead.  All while the RCL veterans behind you file on with their tried and tested battle plans.
Contrary to some aforementioned veterans’ advice (and perfectly in line with others’) we headed straight to the Windjammer for some lunch.  There was a short queue but really not that bad seeing as it had been open a while and was peak lunchtime.  It was not the doomsday that some say will befall you if you dare enter the WJ on embarkation day.  Glibness aside, I will however take this opportunity to point out that when I state that something was quiet, in truth I never found out how full the ship was compared with capacity.  Being a September cruise outside of any school holidays of which I’m aware, it is entirely possible that the ship was generally much quieter that it could have been.
Getting back to the food, we both had a small plate each plus our first of many sweet items.  More importantly, I got my first beer of the cruise.  Upon exiting the WJ we were also able to sort our dinner times for the rest of the week.  I had booked My Time Dining times for some key dates (namely embarkation and two days we had shows) but the available times online for the other days were not very convenient – Either 5.30pm or after 8.30pm.  Arranging the other days on the ship however allowed us to secure 7.30pm for all other days which seemed much more reasonable.
Conveniently the rooms were open by the time we had finished all of that so went down to dump our backpacks and have a read of our first cruise compass.  First stop was the theatre for a welcome presentation with a raffle.  We both got a Mai Tai on the way – as you do.  No prizes at raffle even though we managed to sneak double tickets by arriving at the theatre and then leaving again to go and get the aforementioned Mai Tais.
We then took a wander through Central Park.  I attempted to get another cocktail on the way however I was not allowed since it was close to the time for the muster drill.  The fact that this was the only lack of freedom for the whole week did not make the knock-back any less irking.  After said muster drill we headed to spa for another raffle but no luck again – this would be a theme.  We both grabbed a peach margarita on the way.  I promise not to mention every single drink we had for the whole week however for some reason it seems obligatory on embarkation day!  While at the spa, they of course use the raffle to drum up interest for their various health offerings during the week.  As a gym staff member announced that since we were there we must have some interest in staying healthy, I slowly lowered my peach margarita from my lips.
We headed back to the room for a bit and I watched some NFL while I unpacked.  R opted for a nap over unpacking and, much to my chagrin, managed to avoid at least fully unpacking for the entire trip!  After we showered and dressed casually (and casually dressed), we headed down for our dinner in the main dining room.  We were given a nice table for two in a corner of the MDR.  Spoiler alert again – without asking, the host sat us in the same area each night we went to the MDR and in hindsight, I’m glad they did.  Before the trip, I was not bothered about having the same servers each night but the ones we were randomly allocated on Day 1 were very nice and it was good to go back to the same ones each night.  The ability to get a table for two however still certainly makes MTD the better option in my opinion though.  In my opinion, strangers do not make for a relaxing dining experience!
Back to the food, I had antipasti and a pork chop.  Both were very tasty although the pork chop had a lot of bone which made it tricky to cut.  R had crab cake and a fried fish platter (white fish, prawns and scallops) which she enjoyed but was not blown away. We shared a slice of key lime pie which I have to say was fantastic.  Other note was that I had a kind of wholemeal bread roll which had some seeds and cheese on top. This too was very good, and it got me thinking; you can tell a lot of a dining establishment by their bread.  If they don’t care about the quality of their bread, they probably won’t care about the quality of much else.
After dinner we headed up to the deck 14 sun deck to have a look outside while at sea.  Although we didn’t make it there for sail away, I was keen to check out this as it was one of Matt’s hidden tips for Allure.
After grabbing a couple of bottles of water (thanks free drinks package), it was back to the room for a relatively early night.
 
Photo 1 - R enjoying the balcony
Photo 2 - Antipasti and the top quality bread rolls
Photo 3 - The tremendous key lime pie

Day 0 – Sept 15 – Travel Day
We awoke pretty early (4.45am) at our home in Scotland’s Central Belt.  We packed as much as possible the night before but as always there were a few items to finish off in the morning.   My parents were kind enough to take us to Edinburgh airport for the flight and the roads were not a problem at that time in the morning, especially not on a Sunday.  Eggs Benedict at the Wetherspoon’s pub in the airport is becoming a bit of a tradition for us at the start of holidays.  R departed slightly from tradition and went for Eggs Royale with smoked salmon (traitor!).  
Luckily we had no issues with our flights.  Even traveling out the day before embarkation, with two flights between home and Florida I was conscious that it wouldn’t take much disruption to cause problems.  We also did not have a long layover in London which added to the concern but ultimately worked well.
On the main flight I partook in some in-flight entertainment.  On a day time flight it always seems like a bit of a treat to sit down and watch three films in a row.  When else do you have the time?  Adding to the treat is the lower concern of the quality of the film because, well, what else are you going to do?  Watch the clouds?  Specifically I watched Tomb Raider, Paterno and Game Night.  All of which I thought were perfectly watchable for airplane films.
We took an Uber from Miami airport to where we were spending the night – Hampton Inn Downtown Ft. Lauderdale / Las Olas.  Getting an Uber involved obtaining some roaming data on my phone as it was not possible to arrange this pre-trip.  My mobile provider is somewhat unreliable but luckily experienced no issues with that.
We were on the earlier flight out to Miami and arrived at the hotel for around 5.30pm.  A novelty since we are used to spending all day traveling to the US, arriving at a hotel late in the evening and going straight to bed.  So once we arrived, we showered and headed out to Las Olas.  We both like Mexican, and I had already pre-researched what looked like a good option – Rocco’s Taqueria.  Fortunately, while I was in the shower, R did some research on the fly and found the same place.  “Let’s go here” she said as I exited the bathroom.  I probably had a confused look on my face while I tried to determine if I had already mentioned the place or not.
It was a walk of only just over a mile but it was pretty dang hot for a couple of Scottish milk bottles.  When we arrived it was a bit of a wait for a table so we grabbed a couple of margaritas until one freed up. It was a good sign since on our walk there were not many places which were doing a roaring trade at that time in the evening.  Funnily enough, I seem to remember the only other place that looked busy was another Mexican place (something Cantina from memory). 
We opted for some fresh guacamole made at the table and for main I had three different tacos (chicken, pork, steak).  R had fish tacos and we shared some fried jalapeños.  The tacos and guac were very good.  R also enjoyed her tacos however not being a fish fan, I did not sample.  The jalapenos we got on the side were good initially but a bit samey after a few.  Only so much ‘fried-ness’ you can handle especially as you start to get a bit more full.
On the walk back, we tried to get to a CVS to pick up some extra sunscreen but we came up the wrong street and overshot it.  I didn’t have any more roaming left at that point for an en route GoogleMaps check.  I ended up going back out to find it myself after we got back to the hotel and I checked the best route.  I have to admit, after dark, alone, in downtown Ft. Lauderdale it did not seem like the safest of walks – even for someone used to wandering Glasgow.  However when I arrived back to the hotel room, jubilant, with trophy sunscreen clutched in my hand, I was sure I would find my dutiful partner, her hand quivering over the 911 buttons of the telephone anxiously awaiting my retu… nope – she was asleep.
I joined her for some zzz’s of my own at the back of 9pm.  Understandably I was very tired after a long day. Officially we were up for about 21.5 hours after only 4 hours sleep night before and about half an hour, max, on the plane.  However with some tacos, and a couple of miles walked (unmurdered!), it seemed like a successful travel day.
 
Photo 1 - view from our hotel room
Photo 2 - a tortillia-chip view of the fresh guac
Photo 3 - trio of tacos
Photo 4 - fried jalapenos with avocado ranch

Great!  I'll bring my own foil...
 

After more than a year of lurking in the forum, vacation time has finally arrived! With all the help I got from this board and all the live blogs I read to live vicariously through, I decided to return the favor. This will not rival Twangster’s quality live blog, but we’ll try our best and offer a new-to-Royal perspective. I’ll do the typing and hubby will provide the pictures. If you’ve got any questions, I’ll do my best to find the answer. So without further ado...
 
Who are we and why this cruise?
Kerstin and Michael, in our mid-thirties, from Germany (Bavaria to be exact) and on our first TA, first Royal cruise – and first time out of Europe. We’ve cruised before – 3 times with TUI Cruises (German cruise line, joint venture with RCI), once with AIDA. We usually cruise for the itinerary, but made an exception for this cruise. After a brilliant video of Harmony from our favourite German Youtuber – the Schiffstester – we knew we wanted to try Oasis class – and that really experiencing it would take more than 7 days. We’d originally planned to book a Med B2B and not leave the ship, but the price on the TA was just too good – YOLO! I hate flying so to make it worthwhile, we added a 14 night Caribbean cruise on Caribbean Princess (RCI itineraries just weren’t to our liking).
 
Cruise preview – Barcelona to Miami
Ports of call: Malaga (Day 2) – not sure if we’ll get off the ship, maybe just for a stroll; Port Canaveral (Day 12) – Kennedy Space Center Guided Tour with Royal to avoid the long lines for immigration
Food & Beverage: we both got the deluxe drinking package and 5 night dining package. Additionally reserved Izumi Hibachi and Jamie’s as we plan to check out all the options.
Entertainment: all shows reserved, we’ll participate in a few CC events (Meet & Mingle, mini golf tournament, pub crawl, scavenger hunt). We’re also planning to book the all access tour.
Cabin: 8411 - inside stateroom at the fore
 
Pre-cruise & post-cruise
We’ve already prepared everything we want to pack and will pack tomorrow. Friday morning, we’ll drop off the boys (our five coonies) at the cat hotel, rush home, throw the luggage in the car and drive to my parents. They’ll drop us off at the airport Duesseldorf for our evening check-in, we’ll stay at the airport hotel as our flight is at 6.45am on Saturday. We’ll stay at Hotel Catedral in Barcelona and have booked a walking tour of Barri Gótic for the afternoon.
Post-cruise we’ll stay at Sense Beach House in South Beach until we board Caribbean Princess on 11th. It’s our first time in Miami, so we rented a car to get a good overview and do the essential shopping – I might pillage the Disney store as my sister is expecting her first child on November 23rd.

As little as I can...
And I volunteer at RoyalCaribbeanBlog.com ? 

All great suggestions but as eluded totally not a big deal so we will (or better yet my husband) will suck it up. We have our young son with us so thought if my husband could unload his carry on it would just make it that much easier.  
You bring up a good point- I can tell my husband if we upgrade to a suite he will have no issues... if only. Not this time but maybe cruise #2.?
I am however way too excited to board that “late”.  My excitement overrules his potential grumbling over carry the water. Sorry honey lol.

Hi all!
I'm planning to try my hand at live(ish) blogging my upcoming cruise.  As of right now, I'm just 3 short work days (including today) away from setting sail!
Who's cruising
Myself (Phill), wife (K), Sister-in-law (C) and her husband (G).
We all caught the cruising bug back in 2014 when we enjoyed our first cruise on Explorer of the Seas - a 9 nighter out of Cape Liberty. Since we had such a wonderful time, we pretty much decided that cruising should be an annual event! This will be our 4th cruise (The wife and I didn't cruise in 2017 since we went to Disney & also St. Martin).  It's now just over 2 years since we've set sail, so needless to say, I am ready!
Cabin
Both couples are booked in balcony rooms right next to each other on deck 12 near the mid-ship elevators (12654 and 12656)
Itinerary
We live in Southern New Jersey across the bridge from Philadelphia, so Cape Liberty is about an hour and 45-minute drive for us.  G works in Newark so we will be able to park at his workplace and hail an Uber or Lyft to the port.  We embark Saturday the 27th, (just in time for the huge Nor'easter to roll in!) and will be at Port Canaveral on Monday the 29th, Coco Cay on the 30th, and Nassau on Halloween!
Cruise Planner Bookings
G and I both have the drink package (look out!) and my wife and her sister have the refreshment package.  We also booked the 3-night dining package starting on night 2.  We are thinking Chops, Jamie's Italian for sure, and the other night is up in the air!  I may get brave enough to try Wonderland... we'll see.  We are booked on NorthStar for day 2.  As far as the shows go, we booked The Gift on night 2, Spectra's Cabaret on night 3, and We Will Rock You on night 6. Whether or not we go to all of these shows remains to be seen, but at least we have the option!  We purchased the 2 device plan for Voom Surf and Stream to share between the four of us.
Excursions/Plans
In Port Canaveral, we are planning on hailing an Uber/Lyft and heading to Kennedy Space Center - we also have a friend that lives in the Orlando area who will meet us there.  For Coco Cay, I was able to get a great deal on a bungalow, so we booked that for the four of us - hopefully, we will be able to tender as this will be my first time at Coco Cay!  In Nassau, we will most likely walk around the port area and I will most definitely be hitting up Pirate Republic Brewing Company https://www.piraterepublicbahamas.com/  We visited when we were on our Oasis cruise in 2016 - they had some great brews!
Blogging
Most of my blogging will probably be done in the morning while my wife sleeps in and I'm sipping coffee on my balcony ?
Let me know if you have any Anthem questions and I'll try to answer them. Thanks for following along!

Managed to get a few shots in. Didn't have a whole lot of time to take pictures on my tour and have a very hard time not being in the moment  - so I forget to take pictures most of the time. The first is The Port Royal Golf Club. The middle is up top from the road  looking down Horseshoe Bay.The last two are Horseshoe Bay. As you can tell I need more practice with the camera.

En guarde! Allez! I'm in!! 

Lol!  That is how it always starts!

Yes I have seen your posts and can feel your excitement! I’m excited for you.
For our second cruise we will probably cruise without my son and from Baltimore (here we come lady g). Bmore is only an hour from us. We luckily live with my in laws and they will watch him whenever so we are not stuck on certain dates. Might try and price some suites on there or look for a last min deal. I know Grandeur doesn’t always have the same price point as a lot of the smaller ships but doesn’t hurt to price it out. 

You can still fly on Anthem... iFly that is ?
I quite enjoy Anthem, have sailed her three times.  She'll be missed over here.

Suite staterooms are also ready around 1pm.  The only ones you can get into before 1pm are the Star class suites.

Non suite staterooms are usually ready for occupancy after 1:00 pm. So, you can wait to board the ship until that time, or later. 

It’s  12  17 oz bottles allowed so it won’t be too heavy 

@CruisinUngs never tried it but some have reported that they have stuck a luggage tag on it and left it with the porters. I suppose you would have to take a risk of not getting it.

I think there is carry-on storage on Grandeur...at least there was a while back.

You get the pleasure of hauling it around.  Think of it as a work out to burn some more calories before the food onslaught begins.
Not very many ships are offering carry-on storage that I've seen.  Only Mariner in my experience.

I am not long back from my first cruise with RCL with my girlfriend (referred to as ‘R’ throughout) and we had a great time.
On the run up to our cruise, I very much enjoyed reading some of the other members’ live blogs.  I wanted to give it a bash, but knew I would struggle with the commitment of blogging while we were away, especially without a laptop.  However, I decided to take some notes in my phone while I was away to allow me to write up a retrospective blog once we were home.
I will write up one day at a time – partly to recreate the feel of a live blog, but mostly just to give me the chance of writing up each day!  I will also try to provide a few photos from each day.  I tried to remember to take some food photos in true blogger style however that was not in my nature and I’m afraid I don’t think I remembered to take any ‘Windjammer recon’ photos.  I think whenever I was there I was too hungry to think about grabbing a camera rather than some cutlery and a plate!
Since I took some notes at the time of the cruise but am writing it up afterwards, apologies if there are some past/present tense mix-ups.
I also acknowledge that this is coming a decent while after the actual trip, however it did take me a bit of time to write up as it coincided with some busy time at work and a bit of further travel for me – specifically a trip to Bermuda to visit some friends.
I will start tomorrow with our day of travel.  For now, here is some background…
It was a 7 night cruise.  Itinerary: 2 days at sea, St Maarten, Puerto Rico, Labadee, day at sea. It was both R’s and my first cruise with RCL. We were in stateroom 12680, a Deck 12 balcony room, slightly aft. We have no kids so no opinions on family activities/experiences. We both had the drinks package as it was included in the deal we got. We did not have any specialty dining package and didn’t feel the need at any point to partake. We were on My Time Dining.

Thank you again @twangster for another great live blog!  I always enjoy them but this one was one of the best!  Maybe because I am from Canada or maybe because I really want to sail that itinerary myself one day, who knows.  But thank you again for taking them time.  Safe travels back home and to Barcelona.  And I know you will have a great time with the whole gang on the Symphony TA!  Did I mention that I am so jealous and I want to be like @twangster ?

We're getting on Serenade on Sunday.  No Johnny Rockets = no milkshakes for us.  Boooooo...

Here's what i've been looking at doing for a TA in 2020. As for a ships list of those doing TA's in 2020 is unbeknownst at this time, so were looking/hoping an Oasis or Quantum class ship (Balcony or higher) sailings, then pair it up with a Med or European cruise once were there on a smaller class ship Radiance/Vision class (Oceanview) as more port intensive thus no need to splurge for a balcony or higher cabin and spend that money on excursions.
Depending on how the itinerary lines up will determine what route we take.  We hope for a sailing to Spain on a TA, then a b2b could be done easily.

What is there to see or do in Nassau?
The only thing I recall doing there the one time I got off the ship was a “tour” of Atlantis followed by a drive around the island in a van we hired locally.
This is me on Nassau days... (on the subsequent cruises)