ThyriC

Baltimore's biggest issue is the Key bridge, which is lower than Tampa's which I believe would hinder a Radiance class from entering the port of Baltimore. Baltimore has the depth for pretty much any ship with the port's cargo vessel traffic, but the height is a problem. If they put a cruise port on the other side of the Bay bridge, you could sail an Oasis class into Maryland.

It usually depends on the destination of the cruise from what I've seen of the grandeur menus. The 9 night canada cruise, Parodeejay has a good video with some nice up close shots of the menu. But it has some very local type food (a fair bit of seafood) but if its a 9 day caribbean, it might be different. Maybe our resident Lady G expert @coneyraven might have some hanging around.

Hydrate hydrate HYDRATE! Whenever you take a drink, take a bottle of water as well. Before you have another drink, you must finish the bottle of water. Take Ibuprofen before you indulge. Keep it up on a 4 hour schedule for extended drinking periods. Take more before you go to bed. Dont eat heavy foods when you plan to do serious drinking. No fried foods, no greasy foods, no rich foods, etc. Healthy tummy before you drink means happy tummy the next morning. Pedialyte. I saw Amazon had a deal yesterday on their single water bottle powder things. Take this before bed and when you wake up. Its all about staying hydrated. Dont overdrink. Remember its a marathon, not a sprint. Keep the happy buzzed feeling going all day long rather than trying to "break even" on your drink package at night. This will also prevent hangovers. You want to enjoy EVERY day of your cruise, not just one and be laid up for the next day hungover and miserable and not breaking even that day. And then when you even see a drink for the rest of your cruise, you'll be reminded of the misery and you wont want to drink, thus not breaking even at all, just because you tried to superhero the drinking game on the first night. Dollar Shave Club actually had a nice article on day drinking and how to keep the feeling going all day long without overindulging or getting hungover. And it did involve enough drinks to MORE than break even on the beverage package, but you want to go slow and steady. Eat in between your drinks. Eat that healthy food. Salad, fruit, lean protein. That doesnt mean dont enjoy your food, but it does mean watching out at the Windjammer. If all of this doesnt work. Hair of the dog honestly, it does help. At least it'll get your head to stop screaming at you if its a severe hangover. With a hangover the headache isnt the alcohol, its the dehydration the alcohol can cause. The stomach upset, that's your gut responding to too much anything in it as well as dehydration. That's why most of these responses involve water and hydration of some kind. In hangover "cure" places in Vegas (yes those exist) they hook you up to an IV to hydrate you quickly. They do help. But you dont have an IV of electrolytes with you, so drink that water! Hangover pills DONT WORK. They're mostly just the electrolytes that you're going to find in Pedialyte and the pills recommend drinking a fair bit of water with them. Its the hydration that works, not the pill. Remember to do all of this BEFORE and DURING your heavier drinking. Afterwards is too late. Your stomach will not be pleased if you try to power down a gallon of water while your head is screaming bloody murder.

I get 6 paid holidays a year (yay thanks company) and about 7 and a half hours every 2 weeks which is a little over 24 days per year, so that's 30 days per year. I'm 6 years as a manager at an IT company. I get occasional comp days for working holidays, weekends, and just killing myself with the unpaid overtime that is being salary. But I'm a workaholic so I dont mind putting in the hours. Just 4 more years until I make the massive jump to nearly 1 PTO day per week. The 10 year mark is massive when it comes to accruing PTO at my company.

Oh I was just thinking about this one today. Mine would be a transatlantic (maybe including Iceland or Norway), then a month in Europe to go exploring and spending some time in each country, maybe tossing in a river cruise in there for good measure. Then a Greek Isles. Then maybe something like Dubai to Japan, then finish it off with a transpacific to a panama canal. My own version of a world cruise just with a few breaks in it to spend more time in some super interesting places.

Looks like I'll take Boston St around then. Thanks a bunch!

The only time I've found traffic in that area to be a tad slow is if there's an Orioles game or a Ravens game. Otherwise its a rather easy quick drive. Actually @twangster or @coneyraven is the terminal on the north or south side of the tunnel? I'm coming from the Towson area so trying to figure out if I want to go around, or just pay the toll.

I use the packing cubes from ebags. I get 2 large, 4 medium and 4 smalls and those fill my 2 suitcases with room for things that dont fit in the cubes. I love them. I dont use any compression cubes because I'm horrible at compressing things that much, and I dont have a vacuum for vacuum bags while on the cruise to repack. Mine are purple because.... they're PURPLE I have to have them!

Oh thank the stars I'm not the only one who spreadsheets the packing list. Hub gets on me about my obsession with making lists. I told him its one list (with 5 sheets on the spreadsheet). I'd normally use Smartsheets for lists like this but hub would get real annoyed with me if I had a cloud based list and tell me I need to leave work at work for once.

Hey Jane. It is specifically allowed now. But in mid 2018 when this OP was made, it was kind of an ugly grey area where it was a dont ask dont tell regarding sodas or water. So glad Royal clarified their carryon policy to allow a 12 pack of water or soda along with the 2 bottles of wine per cabin.

They have silicone straws that do the same thing, collapse into a little container. I love my silicone straws. I can stick the little straw container in a purse, on a lanyard, whatever, and then if I'm confronted with a paper straw or no straw, I can just break out my silicone straw. If you wash it thoroughly beforehand, any silicone smell or taste is gone. 2-3 trips through the dishwasher or soaking in super hot water and a little soap for about 10-15 minutes is fine.

I got those little straws too!! (maybe it was my recommendation? is your straw silicone?) They're AWESOME! Note to self... now I need a mango lava flow in my life, along with the regular lava flow with kraken in @Matt's honor

On my last cruise, I forgot the extra batteries and memory cards I keep in a little pouch (so I dont forget them!) on my bed at home. Thankfully I was able to get by with doing a LOT of charging and uploading photos to cloud storage, but I was in a mad panic for at least 2 hours about it.

See for me, I'd put the $50 towards a shore excursion that you hadnt budgeted for before. So maybe you budgeted to walk around the port (free), why not use the $50 towards a tour? You might not get much for 50 but you can think of it as one heck of a discount. Might also use the 50 to get a manicure or pedicure onboard. Maybe combo it up with several experiences? Like splurging on room service one night. Maybe a souvenir glass beverage another night. How about a keepsake photo of you and the captain or on formal night?

Its not a bug, its a feature! I honestly believe its due to not having a test environment that they can test deployments of changes to the cruise planner prior to deployment. And anyone in software development/programming can tell you, testing in the live environment is the LAST thing you want. Because if it can go wrong, it will go wrong, and it will go wrong spectacularly.

During sailaway would be awesome. If you're anticipating a yes and this isnt a COMPLETE shock, you might be able to coordinate something with the cruise director to bring you two forward to do it on the big screen. A more private option would be on your balcony during sunset or on the helipad during sunset. A blend between the two might be to coordinate something with specialty dining. Let them know "hey I'm going to propose, could you help me by bringing flowers, favored food, etc"

I'd love to +1 this suggestion for additions to the cruise compasses. Not that I'd ever mind ANY of the food selections available, I'm on a CRUISE! Then again I'm not a picky eater in the least and chicken liver with brussels sprouts would be fine by me if I'm on a cruise (I actually like brussels sprouts, but liver of any kind is grounds for divorce)

I highly recommend that you register the children with one of the kids or teens clubs. They have special activities for them and the children are well accounted for there. You can use the royal app if they have smartphones to text them, or they can text you in case they get lost. I always recommend those with children to take a photo in the morning of the kids. Especially on port days. The reason for this is in case of the worst, god forbid, you have an exact description of the child and what they're wearing. Saying a 12 year old brown haired boy in a white shirt is not a good description. Having a picture has all of the details of the child. You can do the photo thing onboard as well in case the child is lost. Even on a large ship, there's plenty of crew and you should encourage your child to ask directions from staff. You can set up a "I got lost" plan for the child to return to a specific location on the ship (your room, the pool, the windjammer, whichever location you'd like) if they ever get lost. They then can text you with the app, and you can retrieve them from the designated location. And queue times really depend on the activity and how high in demand it is. A high demand activity like the Florider could have a bit of a line. Same with the standby line for shows. On embarkation day the queue in the Windjammer can get a bit intense which is a great reason alone to get onboard as soon as you can. Usually the embarkation line isnt too terrible and it moves quickly. For me, the longest line was at customer service on disembarkation day. That's why I try to prepay for as much as I can before I cruise so my bill at the end is minimal. Usually it consists of ship souvenirs (blinky cups, ship models, RCI shirts), some duty free and additional tips I might charge.

Also remember if you bring on your own wine, that you "MAY" be subject to a corkage fee should you wish to consume your wine in a restaurant. Personally I feel the corkage fee is fine since the cruise will be responsible for your wine and hold onto it if you dont finish the entire bottle during your meal. So if you have one glass with a meal, you can have it at a future meal without needing to keep it in your stateroom. Experience with the corkage fee miles may vary though. Many people have not been charged the corkage fee, but some have been as well, so I'd expect to pay the corkage fee, and if they dont charge you, its a delightful surprise

Add me to the "peace of mind" club. I dont try to "break even". Its not a game of trying to get one over on the cruise line for me. Now if I didnt drink alcoholic beverages at all, maybe then it wouldnt be worth it. But then I'd buy a different drink package. I know I drink a lot of soda, so there's some money off of the DDP right there. Then I hydrate fairly frequently with bottled water. I like a fancy coffee or two in the morning. Then maybe 3-4 cocktails or glasses of wine throughout the rest of the day. At that point, for me, I've broken even. And that's before getting adventurous with trying new beverages that I might not like. I get the DDP because I dont want to try to figure out how bad my credit card is going to get hammered by a drink here and there, an excursion here and there, and other things that I'd want to do. I just like having all of it taken care of in advance

WOO thanks Matt!!

I actually have a question about this. And its going to seem REAL weird, but are you allowed to bring/use your own skates? Yes I realize they take up valuable bag real estate but I used to figure skate and got very very accustomed to wearing my custom skates. I think if I was allowed to bring my own I'd never leave the rink! My only concern would be Royal's desire to check all passenger brought skates prior to allowing them on their rink. I mean if you get a hockey player bringing actual hockey skates it could be very dangerous with how thin and sharp the blades of those skates are (heck even my customs are super sharp), and then you have the potential of the other end of the spectrum of someone with a very poorly kept pair of skates hardly able to be used on a standard rink much less a moving rink at sea.

I found these adorable silicone straws on Amazon that are collapsible and pack in this cute little pill shaped tube thing for easy bringing your straw with you. So I picked up 4 so that we will have eco friendly straws that travel small and can be put in a purse or pocket. They can be boiled to clean them, its safe to put in the dishwasher at home as well to clean. I just intend to clean my straws in the sink in my room with some hot water.

I love decorating the door. I had one made on Etsy and it just makes the door stand out to me, in the sea of identical looking doors. I'm horrible with remembering cabin numbers, but I'm great at finding the door decoration!

Welcome new cruiser! My suggestions would be as follows. 1. Look at the perks of the Oasis class ships, and then compare them to the perks of the Freedom or Quantum class ships. Not anything to knock on the giant ships (Freedoms are massive as well) but many Freedom class ships have similar perks to Oasis class ships with less people and less crowding. While on an Oasis you may need to make reservations for everything and have a little less impetuousness in terms of what you want to do for the day, on a Freedom class ship, you may just be able to walk into a show or an activity. 2. Make a list of your "must do" activities based on the perks of the Oasis class ships vs the Freedom class. Do you need an ice rink at sea? Do you need a zipline? Waterslide? Robot bartender? Water show? Look at your list and there will likely be a ship that matches your requirements. Have an honest talk with yourself about what you'll be doing a lot, and what might be kinda ok to try once but isnt a necessity. 3. A travel agent can help with these decisions as well. Not to mention they can be your advocate in case something isnt as great as it could be. 4. I'd recommend an eastern itinierary for a first timer. Not to say that the westerns arent fun, but most western itineraries are mostly just a trip to mexico, while easterns can include several islands but I'm a "see a lot of different stuff" kind of person with not a lot of "on the ship" time. Going to mexico just doesnt appeal as much to me as the multiple destinations of an eastern. But thats me. Maybe Mexico and western itineraries have exactly what you want. 5. In terms of getting the best price, the rule of thumb is buy early as you possibly can with the cruise tickets. Airfare tends to get in its sweet spot about 3 months prior to when you need to fly. Remember when booking airfare, do yourself a favor and fly in to your cruise port city at least 1 day before your cruise. Stay in a hotel overnight but with as often as there's weather that can cancel flights, you dont want to be that person who is trying to fly in to your cruise port 2 hours before embarkation time. Plus its a chance to "pregame" for your cruise. You can get full size toiletries that arent airline friendly, you can go to a local dollar store to pick up some sticky notes, some travel size toiletries that might be a bit bigger than the 3oz limit or some travel medication (there are TONS of youtube videos out there of pre cruise dollar store runs) This saves luggage room and luggage weight! Since its dollar store stuff, you can feel less guilty about throwing away those things at the end of your cruise. I like doing the same after my cruise as well. Especially with cruise ports like Galveston and Tampa, they can get affected by weather (the fog is real with those 2 places) and a cruise can be delayed by several hours or even a day due to the fog. Save yourself some post cruise stress and arrange for your flight to be the day after you disembark. Its a great chance to come down from your cruise, arrange your luggage for the weight limits of your flights and get in a whole lot of sleep before you fly back to reality.