WannaCruise

Day 5 - Sint Maarten 
After room service breakfast, we headed out for a shore excursion: St Maarten Beach Rendezvous. This included a bus ride to Kim Sha beach, the use of a lounge chair, and lunch. It was $5 extra for a beach umbrella, which was totally worth it. 



Lunch tickets were provided for the Greenhouse Restaurant. The choices were baked grouper in creole sauce, bang bang shrimp sandwich, beef kebab, chicken in lemon sauce. Here are photos of the grouper and shrimp sandwich: 


 


After getting back on the ship, we quickly got ready for dinner at Jamie’s Italian. 
Our waiter told us that he has been working for RCI for 11 years in specialty dining. That’s pretty amazing! We’re trying to be smarter about our choices, so the Tagliatelle Bolognese and Penne Carbonara are smaller portions. Still couldn’t finish everything. Had to split a dessert: tiramisu. 









After dinner we stopped at the Bionic Bar for a cherry coke for our son. It’s become a bit of a thing. ? Show tonight was a ventriloquist. I’m pretty sure that we saw his show on DCL. Really funny. 


 
Day 6 is Antigua. We have another excursion planned: Catamaran Sail, Snorkel, and Beach Cruise. North Star is reserved again at 5 PM. Followed by dinner at CK. Spectra Cabaret at 830PM. 

Some more pictures as I walked around with my backpack loaded with camera stuff and my valuables while I waited for my hotel room to be ready.
Did I mention it's hot here and with the sun rising higher in the sky it was getting hotter before noon when many of these pictures were taken.

I had a 4:35am bridge climb booked so I wanted to find the meeting place in the daylight today.

I had also learned you can walk across the Sydney Harbour Bridge so I then set off to find that path.




Looking back and down to the Campbells Cove area I walked around before.



Great views of the Sydney Opera House from here.


If you look through the mesh of the fence you will some bridge climbers getting ready for their ascent.   I'm not sure I'd want to do the bridge climb in the heat of the day so make sure you plan your booking times carefully if you are thinking about doing this in the summer.





Constant ferry traffic into and out of Circular Quay.

My fake alias no longer needs to put her fake traveling companion in? Excellent (poor Ken Adams, he'll never get to go anywhere again).
Now if they'd just eliminate the nonsense of making you go all of the way to the end to see the refundable price and would let you see it before entering any names.....
(I went in to try this on two different sailings and I still had to put in the 2nd guest  ... boooo).

Thanks. Yes, we were there in September and loved it! We're considering going back in November too, but we may do a snorkeling excursion instead. Once this trip is over I'll start focusing on excursions for that one. 

What a nice celebration for your MIL and a wonderful trip planned!  Looking forward to your review.
We went to Paradise Beach twice, once with our kids and once just DH and I and quite enjoyed it...and sounds like you've been there too and really liked it. 
Not much longer now...Feb 7th will come quick.

Been on both (and we have the 2 stop Mariner cruise booked in August - and cannot comment on CoCo Cay as haven't seen the changes yet).  You can't go wrong with either, but ship for ship, I prefer Allure.  The shows in themselves are worth it....plus more food options, the different neighborhoods are unique and just wow overall.  I don't think I'd find Allure overwhelming, but I like the big ships.  Having said that....DH favorite ship is Mariner as he prefers the medium size ships so it's a matter of preference.
As for giving up a sea day, there is nothing that says that you can't stay on-board.  There are a few less organized activities running compared to a sea day, but you can still enjoy the facilities.
PS - Last year we were debating on a 4 night on Brilliance and 6 night on Adventure....similar pricing.  We ended up booking Adventure just for the extra 2 days so that as well is a bonus.

100% this.  Every day is a sea day if you want it to be.  ?

+ 2
This was a big thing for me.  I'm not a big drinker, but we treated ourselves to the drink package for the first time on our last cruise.  It was great being able to just try new drinks without the guilt of "what if I don't like it", and end up tossing it.  And from our trip, I've discovered that I love mojitos (gonna try a frozen one next time) and Blue Hawaiian.  
Our cruise had it at $45 (converted amount) and I just broker even.  I generally had 2 specialty coffees (one with Baileys), an afternoon fun drink by the pool, a wine with dinner (tried different kind each night from the menu), and a drink in the evening.  Plus, we'd get bottled waters to drink or for when we got off the ship.  I don't drink soda, but DH had his share, and I skipped the fresh OJ as the fun drinks have enough sugar, but if you like fresh juice, that is a really nice item too.  Without the package, I probably would have just had wine (which we would bring so same bottle) and maybe an evening drink.  With it, it was no issue to just try something and order a drink when I wanted.  
Fortunately, we purchased the package for $18 for our next two cruises (or $23 CAD), but in reality not sure we'll get it again at the current prices.  But I will say it was a real treat and glad we could do so.  Dh even commented lately how nice it was to have it.  As others said, it depends on the # of port days, the # of drinks you think you'll drink, if you want to try new things without thought, and the actual cost of the package (e.g. we have one that is $90 CAD so no way we would purchase for that cruise as we'd never break even).  

Been on both (and we have the 2 stop Mariner cruise booked in August - and cannot comment on CoCo Cay as haven't seen the changes yet).  You can't go wrong with either, but ship for ship, I prefer Allure.  The shows in themselves are worth it....plus more food options, the different neighborhoods are unique and just wow overall.  I don't think I'd find Allure overwhelming, but I like the big ships.  Having said that....DH favorite ship is Mariner as he prefers the medium size ships so it's a matter of preference.
As for giving up a sea day, there is nothing that says that you can't stay on-board.  There are a few less organized activities running compared to a sea day, but you can still enjoy the facilities.
PS - Last year we were debating on a 4 night on Brilliance and 6 night on Adventure....similar pricing.  We ended up booking Adventure just for the extra 2 days so that as well is a bonus.

Been on both (and we have the 2 stop Mariner cruise booked in August - and cannot comment on CoCo Cay as haven't seen the changes yet).  You can't go wrong with either, but ship for ship, I prefer Allure.  The shows in themselves are worth it....plus more food options, the different neighborhoods are unique and just wow overall.  I don't think I'd find Allure overwhelming, but I like the big ships.  Having said that....DH favorite ship is Mariner as he prefers the medium size ships so it's a matter of preference.
As for giving up a sea day, there is nothing that says that you can't stay on-board.  There are a few less organized activities running compared to a sea day, but you can still enjoy the facilities.
PS - Last year we were debating on a 4 night on Brilliance and 6 night on Adventure....similar pricing.  We ended up booking Adventure just for the extra 2 days so that as well is a bonus.

Cost aside, it is very freeing to not have to think about drinks. Want to try something new? Go for it! Hate it? Oh well! ? 
With that many sea days, you'll likely have an easy time "breaking even". Or at least I would. If you're comfortable with the $61 price, get it and then watch for sales. I've been able to snag it for less than that, which makes it easier to justify.

Art! Found this in an article. 
On Symphony, the car is a Volkswagon beetle that has been crushed into a round ball, thus becoming a sculpture rather than a classic car.

Can everyone explain why the one on Symphony is scrunched up in a ball?

Room Goodies 
 

Depending on how many in your party, you may just want to Uber/Lyft into the city.  You're looking at almost over $50 at least in NJTransit tickets if there's 4 of you.

Wow....what an amazing cruise!  It's incredible how you are able to experience all these different Royal ships and locations around the world.  
So crazy to think of the time change (or day change) and the difference in your travel there vs travel back.
Safe travels.  I look forward to following along...as always!

NJ Transit train from Newark to NYC will drop you at Penn Station it is then a short walk (about 10 minutes) up 7th to time square
You will also be close to Empire (but I would recommend pre-buying VIP tickets to get the red carpet treatment to the top....otherwise it is an all day wait often

Personally after staying out by EWR I'd rather stay in the Jersey City area. Out by the airport is really nothing. Out by the airport isn't a bad option if just looking for location that is a place to sleep for the night after a flight.
Transportation wise, Google Maps "Transit" feature works great in getting an idea for routes. The bus @Lovetocruise2002 had mentioned was a commuter bus that runs from the mall by Embassy Suites to the bus terminal near Times Square. For trail/light rail when I was researching it you'd have to head back to the airport (to take the AirTrain to the Newark rail station) or get a ride to the station in Elizabeth.

There is a the jersey garden mall which is near by ,its indoor outlet mall. 
Going from the airport to the city will take you around 10 minutes for the air train and 20 minutes from the train . the cost will be 13 $ each way ...

The outlet is right across the street from Embassy. Very walkable.

This was the very reason we cancelled our booking at the Embassy before the Anthem GC this past summer.  Originally we had it booked like the first time we sailed Anthem and then when @Matt decided that the pre-cruise meet up was in Manhattan and the girls wanted to see the city, I started looking into options to travel into the city.  I did not like any of them. 
Here is what was shared with me by some:
- Ride share/cab is the most direct but not a good option because with your times, you might hit rush hour.
- You can use the complimentary hotel airport shuttle to go back to the airport and take the PATH train from there into the city.
- You could also take ride share from the hotel to the nearest PATH station and hop on the train from that point.
- There is also the NJ Transit train that will get you into the city.  Not sure where the station is to that.
Also, at one point, @CGTLH told me that a city bus might be an option as well.
In the end, none of those options looked good to me, so we cancelled and stayed in NYC.  The ride to the port in the morning was less than one hour and was perfectly fine.  I guess it just comes down to what you want to do.  If you are fine with just arriving pre-cruise, getting settled and just relax, then stay at Embassy.  But if you have your heart on seeing the city, I would stay in NYC instead.  Less hassle.  This July when we sail Adventure, we will in staying in the city again as we just bought tickets to see a Broadway show!
 

Can everyone explain why the one on Symphony is scrunched up in a ball?

Can everyone explain why the one on Symphony is scrunched up in a ball?

I haven't felt this stress free in a long time and we haven't even left yet!

Following along. Congrats on your 10 year and Vow renewal!  Sounds like a wonderful cruise with everyone coming and how fun with the scavenger hunt!  Have a wonderful cruise! Excited to follow along.