4ensic
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Posts
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Joined
Posts posted by 4ensic
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7 hours ago, rjac said:
Like JT said above "Tough one". We've sailed on many of the classes and enjoyed them all. I guess our favorite are the ones that don't sink!
Or have waste rocketing out of the toilets like something out of a bad prank TV show. Ahh, we set a high bar, at least compared with the Concordia and Triumph.
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I've done non-Royal tours and saved a lot of cash over the years. Missing the ship is low probability, but severe effect - especially where there will be some sea days after your excursion.
If the problem is a traffic jam , chances are that the Royal excursion contractors will be sitting in traffic also (the odds of this decrease if your excursion isn't also offered by Royal).
But 2 years ago some friends had an experience that makes me lean toward paying the "Royal Tax" and booking through the ship. We were on a T/A that made stops in the Caribbean before the leg to Southampton. Our last port before a string of sea days was St. Maarten. Friends took the double decker bus tour around the island. They were returning to the ship and saw police and an ambulance responding in the other direction. A couple of minutes later, more police and fire equipment. Then the bus slowed to a stop and sat there. Yes, it had leaked out all the oil onto the roadway and caused a string of traffic collisions before seizing up. It took over three hours before the tour company could get buses out to return the folks on tour (partly because they were located behind the crashes and ensuing traffic jam).
The ship patiently waited. Friends might have spent an extra $25 a person, but spending at least one night on the island, missing the rest of the cruise, and paying walk-up rates for 1 way international tickets home would run more than that. (Though travel insurance might have helped out).
If you take private tours, be sure to take your passport, credit card and local port contact # for the ship. And if you buy travel insurance, check the policy before buying to see how it handles this situation.
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30 minutes ago, bcarney said:
This isn't off-menu, but on our last cruise (Adventure Nov '17) our waiter left a little bit to be desired so we hit the Windjammer two nights. One night they had an Indian food section that was solid, and the butter chicken was the best I've ever had. Another evening was "Caribbean Night" that was to die for. The jerk chicken was moist, spicy... great stuff!
I agree, their Indian entrees are top notch. Celebrity actually had an Asian food station at the back of their Windjammer-equivalent. It was freestanding, had a cook, and about 10 entrees from Indian to Filipino and Thai. Open for all 3 meals. And this was on a British Isles cruise.
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Like Lenny said, the Voom package is buying concurrent use instead of a particular device. With any device you'll log in on Safari with your code every time. While you can use the Royal app, there isn't a requirement to put anything special on any device.
What part of STL are you from? I lived in Bellefontaine Neighbors for 40 years.
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How many have ordered something off the menu? I don't mean a dish available another night, but something Royal doesn't offer at all. How'd it turn out?
Friends I cruise with do this on occasion and the results are usually worthy of a specialty restaurant. They usually ask early on the voyage for something generic like "Filipino food" for a meal at the convenience of kitchen staff (basically we'd be happy with a crew meal). Usually a chef comes around that evening and makes suggestions. On the Freedom, the chef (Filipino!) volunteered to prepare different meals for two nights. He did family style meals of: pancit bihon (Rice noodles with pork and vegetables), sinigang (sour fish soup), chicken adobo , goulay (local vegetables), and lumpia Shanghai (pork filled eggroll).
What's your experience been?
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40 minutes ago, Lovetocruise2002 said:
There are tons of people from the RCBlog community and RCperiscopers community on both those cruises with you! So lucky! You're going to have a great time!
An open invite: if a Periscoper happens to see a middle-aged Anglo guy on the President's Cruise with: a still camera with a big white lens, or a camera with a strap that says 'Cruise-Pics.com' on it, feel free to stop me and say hello. I'm also bringing some audio gear and would be interested in learning how to Periscope.
Oops, this doesn't really belong here. How do I delete/move a post?
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54 minutes ago, WAAAYTOOO said:
I have felt for many, many years that the 2 happiest cultures on the planet are the Filipinos and the Cajuns. They just love life and love everyone. I am very envious. How in the world did you end up there ?
The prior owner of my house in St. Louis married a woman originally from Hinunangan. They asked me to go on a medical mission there (both are MDs) to run the back end of the pharmacy and manage the supplies we brought over. I liked it and went back yearly on vacation with them. The wife is from a family of medical people (Her nephew is the town dentist and my next door neighbor) in the town.
She owns some lots in town and said her niece in Cebu (a commercial contractor) could build a house. The doctors had already built their retirement house there a couple of blocks away. For a very reasonable cost she built me a 4 BR 3 BA, 2 story house made of solid reinforced concrete. It's withstood a 6.9 earthquake and Typhoon Yolanda (a Cat 5 hurricane that killed over 5,000 people in Tacloban - about 100 miles North) without so much as an insurance claim. That's my story.
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1 hour ago, WAAAYTOOO said:
Welcome, Brad. You MUST share some of your stories about life in the Philippines. It sounds so exotic !
Thanks. Living in the provinces (as opposed to Manila or Cebu) is a lot like living in a small town in the Midwest, but in the 1970s. Hinunangan is the equivalent of the County seat and has a population about 1,000. There are 3 hardware stores, 4 bakeries and dozens of sari-sari stores - the Quickee Marts of the Philippines. Some so small you stand on the sidewalk and the owner fulfills your order. Prices are also about the same as the US in the 70s. If you eat local foods, you could spend $3.00 a day on food, all of it fresh. Rum is the local drink. A 700ml bottle is about $1.75.
The best part - it's full of Filipinos.
And the worst - While the Philippines is known for supplying the world with nurses, the hospitals outside of Cebu and Manila might well have equipment used in US counterparts in the 1970s. I bought some pulse oximeters (noninvasively measures Oxygen content) for our hospital. They are reusable and cost about $20 each in the US from eBay or Amazon, but the hospital was still doing arterial punctures (ouch!) to get oxygen levels. This was a bit self-serving. I wouldn't want someone sticking my arteries a couple times a day if I ever ended up there.
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Hello. I'm Brad, a Technical Special Agent who retired part time to a small town in Southern Leyte, Philippines and part time to St. Louis, MO.
My first cruise was a T/A from Port Everglades to Amsterdam on the Rhapsody in 2004. We paralleled a weak hurricane for 2 days. There were 90 knot wind gusts. A third of the crew was ill and the MDR was more than half empty. One of the variety acts was a unicyclist whose rather epic fall was replayed throughout the next day on shipboard TV. This was a real life Fellini movie. I was hooked.
Doing stage photography is my favorite activity onboard. I'm the one with the odd-looking white lens.
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Sep 29, 2018. Harmony (President's Cruise)
October 28, 2018. Symphony T/A, Barcelona to Port Everglades.
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5 minutes ago, Alex said:
Can you make phone calls with this package or just text to home... USA?
Voom is a data plan and doesn't allow directly for calling or texting on its own.
If your phone can do Internet calling, this package will provide it.
But for the majority of phones you need a Voice Over IP (VOIP) app like Skype, Viber, or WhatsApp. If you use a MagicJack or an Ooma for your home phone, the respective app will work fine with your home number.
For texting, the free Google Voice numbers work well, also.
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The cost of Surf and Stream has dropped for at least 2 cruises.
For the President's Cruise (09-29) on the Harmony, Surf and Stream is down to $10.79 a day.
The Symphony T/A (10-28), Surf and Stream is $11.99 daily.
Check your Cruise Planners, fellow propellerheads and save some coin.
Update: Still active for these cruises, possibly more, as of August 24.
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On 8/22/2018 at 6:46 AM, HeWhoWaits said:
Sounds like you should try an old fashioned at each bar on the ship. With the package, any that aren't to your liking can be discarded.
No doggie bags for anyone with the package? Darn.
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Good question.
On the ship, the entire catalog of The Beatles and Jimmy Buffett.
Can't have a DJ without hearing: Brown Eyed Girl, Sweet Caroline, Love Shack, Don't Stop Believin'.
At home: About any Classic Rock/Pop of the 70s and 80s. Especially Fleetwood Mac, Steely Dan, America, The Eagles.
And you?
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Thanks! The username is authentic. I'm a retired Technical Special Agent turned stage photographer. It was quite a change, the subjects don't have chalk outlines or markers and they keep moving. People either kept a sense of humor or went back to working on a regular squad.
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3 hours ago, twangster said:
The Genie for the Pit Suite was da bomb.
Funny story - my wife and I went to see Grease and the Suite Guest (Bill the Pinnacle from Buffalo was how he introduced himself) was being served a drink by his Genie. I said "Clarice, do you think Sandy's outfit could have been any tighter? It fit like a second skin". Bill and the Genie smiled at each other and then at Clarice. They took a real liking to us for the rest of the cruise.
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On 8/15/2018 at 6:32 AM, jticarruthers said:
I think there are legitimately people who need emotional support animals and like you I hope they are able to continue to have access to them, however, I think the whole concept has been massively abused by a lot of people who just want to take their pets along.
We have a running joke about it at my office ... we kidded about "emotional support llama's" come to find out there is such a thing .... WTF ?? Moved on to emotional support dinosaurs as our running gag ... guess what ... that's a thing too .
Having a T-Rex would be kind of cool. Messy though (when it gets around meat/people).
- henrysea13, JasonL and Deedeelynn
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On 7/30/2018 at 10:14 AM, ellcee said:
You clearly do not watch a lot of comedy...he's making $$$ making fun of himself by playing himself.
The Fabio of the 2010s.
Ultimate Beverage Package Question
in Royal Caribbean Discussion
Posted
But in a good way
... There are a lot of choices: cruise line, ship, itinerary, cabin type, excursions, entertainment, dining, drinking, lounging and more. There aren't a lot of set rules and you may find something you'd do differently next time, though there are almost no bad choices. Welcome to the club! With experience comes wisdom. Read the boards here, quite a few questions have been answered or at least debated even before you ask ("Is the drink/dining package worthwhile?, "What does cabin # XXX on ship YYY look like?" are frequently asked) and welcome to the waves. Cruising is a lot like life in general but with a cheat sheet to assist.
Friends gave me a nudge 9 years ago toward attending the production shows, which I thought I wouldn't like. "You can bring your camera" (no flash, no video) were the magic words. And 7 years later I'm a stage photographer.