AshleyDillo

My preference is to get down to Ft. Lauderdale the night before the cruise so you don't have to worry about getting there in the morning before the cruise. There won't be much of a price difference between hotels in West Palm Beach or Ft. Lauderdale or any of the cities inbetween as long as you aren't looking to be in the downtown Ft. Lauderdale area or on the beach. I've stayed at Embassy Suites and Hyatt Place in the 17th street area of Ft. Lauderdale. There is a grocery store and several restaurants immediately in walking distance from both. They also offer shuttles to the port in the morning, but typically I don't want to wait for their schedule and I catch an Uber/Lyft. It was a $8 Lyft to the port from the Hyatt Place at the beginning of September. The shuttle from the Hyatt was $7/per person. How are you planning on getting from the airport to the hotel? Will you be renting a car/van or using rideshare/taxis? Uber fare estimator for a regular Uber (4 people with limited luggage) is about $65 for WPB to Ft. Lauderdale; it's $75 for the comfort Uber. You will likely need several vehicles for a party of 8. You can one-way car rental it for around $50-$70 per vehicle depending on car size which might be a better option. Returning the rental car and then ridesharing or catching the free rental car shuttle back to the port is a fairly easy process as well.

Yup..Royal math at its finest. You are preaching to the choir here. All I can do is book when I am comfortable with the bottom line price and then hope I can luck into a price drop at some point before final payment.

Some cellular providers offer an international package where you can add it on for the month or sometimes even pay per day for service, so that would be the first place to start as @FManke stated. You'll want to check to make sure you have coverage for the Bahamas, United States, and Mexico. Just remember that the cellular service will not work when you are at sea, so you'll want to keep your phone in airplane mode to prevent outrageous charges for connecting to the cellular at sea. Royal also offers a WiFi package called VOOM that will give you internet access while on the ship and at CocoCay.

I loved this itinerary on Anthem out of Cape Liberty in 2017. I loved all of the ports and it's such a difference change of scenery over the Caribbean. I am doing it again October 2020 as well, but this time on Brilliance out of Boston.

It's hit or miss. Sometimes the bid will change to expired and there will be no rejection notice. Other times you won't find out via a rejection email until the night before the cruise. Just the drawbacks of trying to score a deal!

We stayed at the Fairmont Pacific Rim after our cruise debarked in Vancouver. It is walkable from the cruise port. It was a nice and modern hotel and plenty to do in the immediate area. We ended up using the bus and rail system and went on an adventure exploring Vancouver for the day. It is pricier than the other hotels in the area, but we found a credit card that had a sign-up bonus that scored us the rooms for free.

Port Everglades has the facial recognition as well now. It canbe done if everything goes right and you are off the ship with the first wave of people. FLL is very close to Port Everglades. This is possibly the only port I would even consider this just because of proximity alone. But it is one more thing to stress about and I'd hate to ruin the end of my cruise with worrying about making my flight.

They will have door hangers in the room. Fill it out and put it on the outside of your door by 3am. You get to select a 30-minute delivery window. They do call the room to let you know it's about to be delivered, though. So keep that in mind if you have any concerns about waking the others in your room. I call the delivery my coffee alarm ? It's a pretty decent selection of stuff for breakfast. You can get pastries, bagels, toast, fruit, oatmeal, cereal, milk, juices. You just need to make sure you put how many of each item you want when you order and don't forget to include the condiments you may need. They do have eggs, bacon, pancakes, etc. but that cooked stuff will incur the $7.95 + 18% gratuity if you order it. They clearly delineate it on the menu in its own section.

I don't see it much on AA, but I do see it on Delta. Those are the most prevalent domestic carriers from my smaller airport. There's actually a fair amount of hidden-city ticketing that I can do to get cheaper prices, but that's only good if you aren't going to be checking bags. (For example it's often cheaper to book from my home airport with a layover in MIA and then to another destination than it is to book the straight up flight to MIA..and yes it IS the same flight number for that leg to MIA!). But then it's usually WAY cheaper (like hundreds of $) for me to suck it up and drive 2.5-4 hours to a larger airport. Just not as convenient, but I'm not much one for paying for convenience a lot of the time.

Nice! I never knew that existed! That would be pretty cool to be able to watch the take-offs and landings. I know when I've stayed at the Hampton Inn and Suites that's across the street from the MCO runways I had fun watching all the activity. I still wouldn't opt to stay at the Hyatt unless I got in super late just because I'd feel trapped at the airport by higher priced food offerings and just the general ease of getting off the property if I needed anything. If it made sense money-wise though then absolutely it's a good option.

Room service is complimentary at breakfast for a limited continental breakfast menu. They definitely don't charge the service fee then. I'm not sure about just ordering coffee outside of those hours. I would assume they would charge even if it's just coffee, but I've never attempted it. I'm not likely to want/need coffee delivered to the room outside of the early AM hours, so haven't had a need to test it.

See you there! ?

The UDP does not cover the upcharge menu items in the dining room. For Enchantment effectively purchasing the UDP means you can eat in Chops whenever they are open (subject to seating availability). I'm not sure the UDP has much value on Enchantment as the only option seems to be Chops.

If you don't have an issue with paying, Playmakers will be open on embarkation day. It's ala carte and has sports bar food (nachos, wings, burgers, etc.)

This one really only gets my vote if you get in late the evening before your cruise. I can't imagine wanting to spend a big chunk of your day cooped up at the airport. If you get in early, I would definitely look into one of the other options that does have a pool. I'd also rather do the trek out to the port area the day before so that's one less thing to deal with in the morning.

It wasn't available for booking last time I checked.

One of my port stops switched days entirely and Royal just switched my excursion for me to the new day. I got a cruise planner cancellation notice and then a cruise planner confirmation notice of the rebooking. If they are easily able to do this for your excursion they will. It really depends on if the tour operator can accommodate the new time schedule. If they can't reschedule then you will get a complete refund and will have to search for alternate plans for that port.

No problem! I don't really delve into the "luxury" lifestyle at all..so I don't really experience these situations a lot. I tend to refer to things like valet service as being too "pinkies up" for me. But I find myself enjoying it on a cruise ship. I know how long and hard the cruise line employees work and they are always so genuine when you do tip them that I just figure it into my costs for cruising.

We actually got in off the train and were able to get on the ship then got off again and took the shuttle go to explore Seward. It went around to several stops. There's a street that had some restaurants and bars and shopping, but it's a very quaint little town. A lot of the activities would be water based. They did have a fjord cruise you could take from Seward that looked interesting but we ended up going to the Alaska Sealife Center for a couple of hours and then went back to the ship. I'd imagine that you could spend a few days there and really explore, but we had come from the cruisetour and Denali and were ready to relax by that point. We went end of May and had great weather and no fog issues. But you never know with Alaska! It never really got dark during that time of year. Even 3am was still dusk.

I can't think of any situation on a cruise where it would be rude to offer one. Tipping is very subjective and with added gratuities to drinks, room service, daily gratuities for room cleaning and dining it isn't really expected but is always welcome. I usually expect to tip for: The porter when I arrive to the port. This will be the person that rushes you to take your luggage to a cart so it can be loaded onto a cruise ship. This is probably the only point where I ever feel pressured to give a top. They often do expect one. The porters are NOT employees of the cruise line. I generally tip a few bucks per bag. Depends on what I have convenient in terms of small bills. They also are around when you get off the ship and can be a big help to get you through customs faster. I would tip more for that for sure but I've never actually ended up using one. Bartenders. Even though you are charged 18% with your drink I find that you can brighten someone's day and even get better service by handing over the occasional cash tip. You can do it drink by drink, every other drink, or if you visit the same bartender over and over again just do it in a larger amount one or two times. Room service. Unless you are ordering continental breakfast or are in a Grand Suite or above, there's a charge for room service. It's a single charge per time but you can order as much food as you want at once. You are charged an 18% gratuity to your room service order. I always tip whoever delivers. If it's just a tray with coffee in the morning it may just be a couple of bucks. If it's stacks of room service plates, then they will get tipped more. Dining. If you eat in the specialty restaurants you have the chance to leave a tip on your bill just like at a regular restaurant. I tend to tip $5 per person for lunch and $10 per person at dinner. It's been a long time since I've eaten in the MDR..but when I used to we would give a tip to the waiters at the end since it was a set dining time and you always had the same waiter team. Room steward. I end up tipping $20 at a minimum to the room steward, even if they don't do their job. If they are excellent and I have a good rapport with them I will give them more..usually hunt them down the morning of embarkation to give them the tip. Excursions. I tip for rideshares, taxis, tour guides. Some ports have folks out in the port area that expect tips if you take photos with their pet iguanas or monkeys..so be aware of that. If you have a cabana or waiter at a beach, you tip them. That's all I can think of off the top of my head that I deal with regularly on cruises. Ride on the gratitude that you feel when you give them the tip..I know that tends to make me want to be even more generous.

https://www.royalcaribbean.com/faq/questions/what-are-the-benefits-of-the-suites-program

Airfare for the Freedom Blog Cruise Group Cruise this December was shockingly high. Now I was expecting higher prices because this is a New Year's cruise, but even Southwest never even offered Wanna Get Away fares available for the return flight home the same day as the cruise. At about 130-150 days out from the cruise the airfare to get there dipped about $80 on Southwest. At around 120 days out Frontier dropped their price for the return trip home by a large amount so I jumped on that. The cheaper end of the choices that I had for flying from Orlando were on Southwest, Frontier, Spirit, Alegiant and Jet Blue. None of the US domestic legacy carriers even came close to touching the prices. JetBlue's price never waiver from when I originally was looking at the prices 5 months out. Long story short, airfare prices are nearly impossible to predict with much accuracy. Consider adjusting to stay extra before or after if it ends up being a cost savings when you figure in the hotel stay.

There seems to be quite a few available right now at reasonable prices..but it's also late September and not tourist season up there. I was seeing prices between $70-$150 a night for this weekend but if you search for June 2020 the prices jump to $120-$200+ a night..lots of bed and breakfast in there. My quick search only finds a single Best Western as far as chain hotels go.

Photos from 10229 on Allure for reference. And the Central Park view.

He does..he invited himself on my Thanksgiving cruise on Oasis ??