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Some more photos from Peggy’s Cove from Hubby’s phone. They gave us about an hour here.



 
Video clips on IG.  I forgot to mention that I have saved all my stories for the trip in highlights so if you were not able to catch it within 24hours, you can find it under highlights. 🙂

This morning we took a 1/2 day tour to Peggy’s Cove through Royal. It was called “Halifax Highlights & Peggy’s Cove”. The tour itself was not bad, but our guide was pretty awful. It sounded like she read off a sheet the entire time. 
For those who are headed to Peggy’s Cove, it was pretty chilly and windy there so be warned. 

Back on the ship now and Hubby has gone off to do the Flowrider. Not sure what the kids are doing. Hubby left his phone behind so that I could filter through some of the pics on his phone. Here are some more random pics to show what we have been up to today. 
Walking off the ship earlier this morning and headed to the Holy Donut. 


Stops along the way from the Trolley tour. We booked this tour online through Portland Discovery Land and Sea Tours. 








When we reached Portland Headlight, they gave us about 30 minutes to get up and stretch and take photos. 

After the tour, as I already posted, we headed to Duckfat for lunch. 

Another great day in port today! These port intensive tours have a different vibe. We get up earlier than usual for a cruise, walk a lot more, eat a lot less on the ship, but they are fun. We are having some great family moments ❤️ 

After visiting the lighthouse, the trolley returned us to Long Wharf on Commercial Street. From there, we walked about 10mins to a place that I have also waited 3 years to try. Back when we had this sailing booked in 2020, I had already scoped out Holy Donut and this place to eat at.
Duckfat is well known in Portland and they have amazing reviews because, like the name says, they use duck fat to make their food. And it truly makes a difference! They are well known for their poutine. Our meal was so good!!! Crispy with great flavour. And @asquared17 and @SweetPea, that ketchup was truffle ketchup!!! Another fantastic eating day in Portland. 
 

Day 5 - Bar Habor

Taken from the tender, leaving the ship and arriving at the dock in Bar Harbor.
It’s quaint and very pretty here. Like something out of a Nicholas Sparks novel 😉
 

Top of Cadillac Mountain
Video clip on IG

Thunder Hole

We’ll get back to the kettle talk later. 😂
First some photos of our next stop…Portland Headlight. Got here by trolley. Beautiful! I put a video clip on IG. The photos did not really do it justice. 

Dinner - Night 1 - American Classics menu in the MDR
We signed up for My Time Dining and made reservations each night for 6:45pm. That is when MTD starts. When we showed up at 6:45pm tonight, this was the scene. I will let the pics speak for themselves. 


Can you tell which line was for reservations and which line was for no reservations? Yeah, we couldn’t either. First comment out of D17 was, “I don’t remember Indy being this chaotic.” 

After we were done going through Grand Central Terminal, we were losing steam big time. There was a restaurant (Mad Dog & Beans) that I had discovered online a few weeks ago. They have fried ice cream on their menu and you all know that we cannot resist places that have that on their menus. We headed over there for an early dinner. 

Dinner was good but still not my beloved La Bamba. I feel like we will forever be chasing and looking for a La Bamba replacement. 
Took another wander through Times Square on the way back to the hotel. 

No energy to do anything else. It’s been a long day and tomorrow is cruise day! 

After spending about two hours in the library, most of the time spent going through the Treasures collection, we headed around the corner to Grand Central Terminal. We had never been here either in all our trips to NYC. It reminded us of King’s Cross station in London.

The main reason we wanted to come here was for the Treasures collection. It was well worth it. Inside there is a nice collection of “first works” from Shakespeare, Mozart, Beethoven, Euclid, various aspects of US History, and much more. We found this both interesting and we learned quite a lot too. 
 

NYPL

We are so tired! Going to try and backtrack the day from when we checked into the hotel and then head to bed. 
Staying at the Intercontinental Times Square. We like this property. It’s close to Times Square and once here, we can easily walk to pretty much wherever in midtown/Manhattan. This Intercontinental is not quite up to par with the Intercontinental Miami, also no club lounge, but for the prime location, it works well for us. 
Today we have a King Corner Suite. Kids are sharing the sofa bed tonight.




Because it’s a corner room, views from 3 windows.

I also can't believe the amount of people who did not wash their hands when leaving the bathroom on our last cruise!
Additionally...the amount of people who actually said "No Thank You" to the washy-washy person and walked straight into Windjammer was very disheartening.

And wash your hands. 
Still amazes me how many people use public toilets and walk out without washing their hands. 

On board Navigator they had some Utopia stuff.

I'm loyal to my wife, my son's and my dogs.
Royal and I seem to have a symbiotic relationship right now.  They are what I need, I am what they need.  When my 12 year old leaves for college, I'll have crossed 60 and won't really need as many family friendly things available but if everything keeps going well, Royal will generally get a first look.  If things start to go south for me, then I'll switch with the same feelings I have if I switch phone carriers.
I so love a Central Park.... 

Definitely not loyal.  On multiple occasions Royal has provided an over the top experience and on multiple occasions Royal has stated loud and clear they feel no need for any loyalty in our business relationship.   From those multiple occasions where they threw me under the keel it was absolutely clear we have nothing more than a business relationship. 
I sail multiple lines and during the restart I made a point of spreading my money across five different cruise lines.  Two of those were Royal and Celebrity but the other three were not in the RCG family.
Royal is the line I like the best, right now, but I will continue to test the waters elsewhere to validate I still feel that way and Royal will continue to throw me under the keel when it suits them.  I do most of my cruising with Royal but I'll eagerly cruise with other companies when something catches my eye just as Royal will drop me like a wet paper bag full of groceries if they can make a dollar more with a cancellation.
I feel like we both have a very clear understanding of our business relationship and it is not exclusive in either direction.  I think we are both okay with that.  

We stayed at the Hotel Golden back in 2015 when we sailed out of Civitavecchia and we also used Stefano's Rome Cabs.
So sorry to hear about the situation in Israel.

Pictures from today

It’s been a busy couple of sea days.  Up early yesterday to see amount Stromboli, breakfast at Windjammer, and some time on the flowrider. Lunch at Chops then I took a nap. Rushed up to our Northstar Key appointment, back on flowrider, then dinner at Giovanni’s.  
 
giovannis food was ok.  Not enough to complain about but enough that I changed some reservations from there to Chops for later in the cruise.  Went to see Tony Tillman and The book.  Key seating in Royal Theater wasn’t worth it as better seats elsewhere but keys seating in 270 was very helpful.   I fell asleep during both shows….  DH said Tony Tillman was energetic and entertaining. The book could probably best be equated to cirque de Soleil.  
 
After the shows, we used up our diamond vouchers (great bartender in Schooner), then went in search of vanilla ice cream. It was 10:40 so windjammer and sprinkles were both closed.  So with 15 minutes left before they stopped serving food, we went to Playmakers (included with unlimited dining) DH and I ordered the ice cream….   Huge amount and very good.  
 
This morning was another early morning.   Time moved forward last night by an hour, and Israel Immigration tickets were being distributed from 8 to 10 and  Main Dining room 4.  Since going through Israeli Immigration takes time, Royal has people disembark the ship by group numbers similar to tenders - anyone on Royal excursions and I’m sure full suites, don’t need tickets   We got down there 6:15 and were 1st in line (so group 1)   Line started getting long around 7 and they started giving out tickets at 7:30   
 
The boys also did Clash for Crystal city lazer tag today  they got there a little early so the did standby, then the reserved spot  Then Chops punch then older DS did his key turn on IFly   He enjoyed it so I booked a free spot for our day in Athens

 
 

We just had a wonderful dinner in Coastal Kitchen.  It was probably one of the best filets we’ve had - and definitely better than Anthem and Harmony. I should have taken pictures but I forgot.  Will try to remember day 7 when we go back.  
 
Some observations - for a 6:30 dining time, CK was not crowded.  I’d go as far as saying it was half empty. The host (Jose) was extremely welcoming and seemed willing to book as many nights as we wanted, although we just requested tonight and day 7.   Ship itself seems light this sailing.  Rumor is that we’re at under 4000 passengers with 70 pinnacles.   Haven’t seen many children but should have a better feel when teens go to teen club tonight.  

Ship started boarding 10:55.  NO priority given to suites or key.  You boarded based on order you made it through the bag drop in the terminal.  Odd compared to US ports
 
For this cruise we have 2 spa junior suites on the deck 12 hump by the elevators.  1 grand suite went for $7k more than what we paid (and we would only have had 1 bathroom). Star started at over $40k for a grand loft and we would have had to walk to the back of the boat.   
 
First thing we did when boarding was to head to Coastal to make reservations for nights 1 and 7 (filet nights). No problem making for both nights at our preferred times (6:30 tonight and 8 on day 7).  Also made reservations for the remaining nights (ultimate dining package) using the app.  Night 3 the only reservations available were really late and day 2 gave me an error message telling me I had a conflict.  Went to specialty dining reservation desk and they fixed the error on night 2 and adjusted night 3 to our preferred time.  All times ended up being with 15 to 30 minutes of what we were looking for.  
 
A little after 11:30, we headed to main dining room 3 for the key lunch.  Key Chops filet was good and service was excellent.  This is our first time doing key.  Not sure it will be worth it but we picked it up for a decent price.   Also made reservations for Northstar and IFly as they had a member of the sport staff available in the dining room
 
went and signed flowrider waivers for kids and me.    Tried out the wave - I haven’t had a problem getting my advanced band on the last 3 cruises and was mastering heel stalls and step ins on the last.  I could not even load today.  Wave felt “sticky”. Staff said many advanced on transatlantic had same issue and new surface is on order but they hadn’t gotten it yet.  We have a private booked for 8AM tomorrow, so will know more then - whether it’s the surface, not having my own board with me, or being stiff and sore.  Staff seems nice
 
Met my husband back in the room - rooms were ready 1:30.  Spa juniors are amazing and our stateroom attendant (Walter) seems nice.   Very convenient getting to the elevator.  Luggage just arrived (3:50 ish).  
 
a couple small issues - I purchased 4 24 packs of water (2 packages for each room) and only 1 was delivered to each room.  Stopped by guest services and they delivered 12 more bottles to each room. Ooof.  Another trip to guest services later and everything was resolved.  I also got an extra key to each room while I was down there.  
 
That’s it for now.  Want to unload luggage before dinner.