Dan Curtis

If your not looking for an expensive meal place, we really enjoyed La Taberna Lupulo, I,just looked up the address, it's 151 Calle de San Sebastián. I,wrote a good review last year, we had 8 people, service was good, kind of a pub type place. Portions were large.

Semi live blog, we’ll see how that works out!
 
10 days to go!!! Crown Loft Suite - Deck 17
 
Day 1 - Port Canaveral ?
Day 2 - Sea Day – Ship stuff – formal night, main dining anniversary celebration planned by TA
Day 3 - Sea Day
Day 4 - St. Maarten (Anniversary Day!) – Island tour, vow renewal in our suite, Izumi Hibachi, After Party
Day 5 - San Juan – Beach Day
Day 6 – Sea Day
Day 7 - Coco Cay – Overwater Cabana Booked!!!
Day 8 - ☹
 
This will be our second cruise and we will be celebrating out 10th Anniversary on this cruise. Myself, my wife and our 8 year old daughter are in a Crown Loft Suite, My sister in law and mother in law, and 2 other families that we are friends. 11 People total with 3 kids all 8 years old. Since we have the grandma on board so looks like we might have some good child care options for the kids! (not sure if grandma knows that yet though lol)
 
We are flying out of Newark, NJ the day before into Orlando and staying at a hotel near the port. We used to live in Florida so we are very familiar with the areas. I only care about 1 thing at the port, I needs me a Cuban Sandwich. You just can’t get good Cuban food in Jersey.
 
We put in a bid to Royal Up to a 2 bedroom aqua theater suite, that would catapult us into Star Class but I’m not going to get my hopes up too much on that! (but a guy can wish right?)
 
Things I am most excited for to:
·         The 10 year celebration! We are planning to do a vow renewal. I wish some of my family was able to attend but it just wasn’t in the cards. My sister in law is going to host the service and it looks like we will be having it in our suite.
 
·         The overwater cabana! We booked an overwater cabana for our Perfect Day at Coco Cay. It looks like we will be one of the first to get to experience this. Expect lots of pictures! (They are supposed to be opening these up on Jan 31st and we are there Feb second… hope it’s ready in time!!)
 
·         Sailing with friends and family! This is going to be great. We should get lots of “adult time” with other people. Our last cruise was just the 3 of us on a Disney Cruise. It was our best family vacation ever but it’s going to be great to experience a cruise with friends on board.
 
·         The “suite life”! We were ruined years ago when we upgraded to a concierge experience on one of our vacations, now we can only travel like this. We take full advantage of the perks and it really does add to our enjoyment.
 
I am an extreme over planner. Vacations are my jam. I have a bunch of activities already planned out. To make sure we see as much as possible I have been working on a scavenger hunt that will send us out in teams to take pictures of stuff and activities around the ship. I am very excited about this.
 
So what are some must see things for Harmony? Let’s hear them!
 
Now I just need to finish my vows…
Here's the invite my wife made to send to everyone traveling with us.
 

 

Yay Today Is The Day. It Is Cruise Day Y'all!! I Will Leave You For Right Now With This Photo Of Mariner OTS!

Day Two - The Butterfly Conservatory
One place that I had checked out ahead of time, and knew that I wanted to see, was the Key West Butterfly and Nature Conservatory. I spent a little time in the marketplace around Mallory Square before heading up Whitehead Street towards the conservatory. The conservatory itself is on Duval Street, but I wanted to walk up a little more scenic way first.

Lots of gorgeous homes, museums, and plant life to be had.

I saw a couple of beautiful Banyan Trees. They make such lovely branch structures.

Before I got to Key West, I had no idea how many chickens there were roaming freely, so I was quite surprised.

Though not as business heavy as Duval Street, Whitehead Street also had many shops and restaurants.
After a leisurely walk, I made it to the conservatory. My ticket cost $12.90 after tax, though I believe you can get a dollar or two off if you purchase online ahead of time. The ticket allows you entrance to the conservatory as many times as you'd like all day. I went in first to just experience it and enjoy it, and the a second time after a quick break in the air conditioning of the gift shop to take photos. The butterflies need a higher temperature, humid environment to thrive. I think the temperature was about the same as the outdoors, but it was noticeably more humid.
When you enter the doors after purchasing a ticket, there is a informational area with small exhibits, videos, benches, and even some power outlets, if you're looking for a place to get a quick charge. Through there, there are two more sets of doors, taking care to only open one set at a time, as a precaution to not let any of the butterflies out. The conservatory itself was beautiful, and had such a serene atmosphere. It was wonderful to watch so many butterflies zipping around. Everyone there had the biggest smiles on their faces, myself included. It was like being in a Studio Ghibli movie. My camera doesn't have a great action setting, so I wasn't able to fully get the experience of having all the butterflies flying around (and for some people, into) your head, but I did get some nice photos of the sedentary ones. 



The conservatory also has many birds in addition to butterflies.

Crashing my shot to get some fruit.

While on Anthem recently I dropped by the Loyalty desk and saw they had these out so I thought it would be a good "moment in time" snapshot of the current Crown and Anchor on board offers for various levels of the society.  
Gold.PDF
Platinum.PDF
Emerald.PDF
Diamond.PDF
Diamond Plus.PDF

Day Two - Morning in Key West
I woke up around 7:00am the next morning. My ear plugs worked wonderfully, but I was woken up partly by what I am assuming were vibrations from the ship coming into port. A little scary at first before I made sense of it. I hopped into some athletic wear to go try out the gym, located above the Viking Crown Lounge. It was quite busy, but I suppose a lot of people had the same idea of getting in a workout before the day in port. I picked out an elliptical, but didn't stay terribly long. I realized that I'm so used to streaming music, I only had about five songs actually loaded onto my phone. That, and the squeaking of my machine, made me want to wrap things up quick and get along with my day. We docked in Mallory Square, along with a Carnival ship. I did not hear the announcement, but we got the all clear to disembark around 8:00am.

Start of the day in Mallory Square
I went to Windjammer for the first time to grab some breakfast, taking great care to wash my hands. I was happy to find that they had whole kiwi, which is a favorite of mine but I rarely think to buy on my own. I found a nice barstool type area on the left side of the ship, near the entrance and what is the Kids Area for food at dinner time.

I enjoyed the waffles and fresh kiwi and much as the view.

A much sunnier morning than the previous day.
Once I finished up breakfast, I made my way back towards the rock wall. I was excited to try it out, as the last time I did rock climbing was back as a child at summer camp. When it opened at 9:00am, there was just myself and another family there. I got all set up with footwear and my harness, and the staff were very encouraging and helpful with tips on how to best scale it. I went on the easy side and, oh my gosh, I did not think it would be that difficult! All those little kids I saw flying up the wall the day before made it look so easy! The staff helped me get almost to the top before I had to call it quits and come back down. My arms were very tired, I think I was relying on them too much, rather than my legs. Even though I knew I was strapped in to the harness and very safe, when I got to the part where the wall starts tilting back near the top, it was an exhilarating sensation, a little scary. I thanked the staff, and happy that I gave it my best, went back down to my stateroom to grab a shower before heading out.
Around 10:00am, I made my way to deck two to disembark and start my day. I did not have a rigid plan of where I was going to go, but had a couple places in mind that I wanted to visit. In hindsight, I should have planned things out just a little better, as I did a lot of back-tracking to areas I'd already been. But, one of the benefits of solo traveling is that you know what pace is doable for yourself. What might have been too much walking in circles for some of my friends/family, was fine with me. A basic map of Key West had been provided with our Cruise Compasses the night before, so after taking a few minutes to orient myself, I started off on my journey for the day!

The Empress in Mallory Square
 

We arrived at Terminal A at 9:45 AM and went straight to the Suite Lounge. We waiting most for the elevator and now have been sitting in the suite lounge waiting. Bags dropped to relaxing was about 7 minutes. 


They have coffee, tea, lemonade, and sodas available to drink. Moved into a little alcove around the corner from the last time we were here.


Looks like some folks just started boarding (maybe back to back folks?) so we should be on shortly. Everyone is very excited over here on a breezy, cloudy morning in Miami. ?

@NerdDad can I just tell you right now how much this blog makes me smile.  I read about your description of your Dad, and it makes me think of mine.  My parents are simple in the sense that they are inside cabin people all the time.  They have taken more cruises than we have, always insides.  We're treating them to Star Class at the end of this year and I imagine that this is pretty much going to be their reaction too.  I am loving this!

And we’re off! Successfully made it up to Boston Logan without any trouble. Dad was very surprised about the limo and remarked, “wow, so this is how you do it.” My brother and I laughed.

After a relatively simple 1.5 hour drive and a few glasses of champagne, we were checked in with Delta and hanging out in the Delta lounge up here. Our flight leaves in about an hour so we got here a little early but nothing to complain too much about. Dad is enjoying getting his phone charged and having a cup of coffee... or two. “It’s all free?!” We’ll, if you fly way too many miles with them it is. ?

Dad has figured out that we’re in First Class and asked what they’re serving for dinner. Club Sandwich or a Salad. He is unimpressed. This is going to be a trip to remember to say the least! Will report in once we get to Miami and the Hyatt. ?

Hello everyone!  We are Matt and Lisa (or MO and LO)!  Matt is the main typer and poster with input from Lisa.
We are now down to double digits for this cruise after booking it with more than 400+ days until we boarded.  We don't remember the exact number of days because it was so painful to see such a high number so we did not pay attention until recently ?.  We booked it at Next Cruise on a previous cruise and got a $100 OBC!  Next Cruise is our preferred booking location for obvious reasons!  
Only 98 days until we board, 97 until we fly out!  We are flying from Minneapolis to Miami so you can imagine how excited we are to leave Minnesota in February from the cold and snow!  We initially had this booked on the itinerary right before this one but changed it after we figured out that the Super Bowl was in Miami in 2020.  We would have been flying in to Miami on the Saturday before the big game so we decided that it would have been EXTREMELY expensive, busy, and not relaxing or enjoyable for us so changed it to the week later.  Very glad we did this.
 
Why this cruise?:
We have never been to the ABC islands (Aruba, Bonaire, Curacao) and REALLY wanted to get there.  We really enjoy longer cruises since we feel like we really get to experience it and settle in.  For us, anything under 7 nights seems too short.  We also like the Voyager Class of ships so it was perfect.  From that class we have been on Adventure (March 2017) and Mariner (May 2019) in the past.  We recently did our first 9 night cruise which was on Serenade (Jan 2019) and learned that the boat was a bit small for us for such a long cruise.  This will be our 10th cruise together and give us a total of 100 points!  Our first together was our honeymoon in 1997 on Monarch out of Puerto Rico.  All our cruises together have been on RCCL.  I (Matt) have been on 1 extra cruise that I took as a kid with my parents on the Big Red Boat (if anyone remembers that one).   Flights: 
We are flying on Delta from MSP to MIA on February 6th.  We always go atleast one day early because the weather is unpredictable in Minnesota that time of year and also because the stress of flying and boarding is just miserable......especially if something doesn't go quite right and we get delayed.  We will not land until late at night so that day is purely a travel day.  Unfortunately we learned something about companion fares........they only have so many allowed per flight so you need to book very early.  We did not realize they only allow so many per flight and got burned on this.  Normally we fly out a day or two ahead and hang out but they did not have that option available with the companion fares.  So with the companion fare issues in mind, we had to stay TWO extra days after the cruise to get the first flight available home.  We normally fly out as soon as we can on disembarkation day but now we will have 2 extra days in Miami.  We have never stayed more than a few extra hours after the cruise is over so this will be interesting to try.  We fly back on February 18th. Room:
9th floor balcony  Excursions: 
So far we haven't booked anything but will update on that as we continue the planning Dining & Drink Package: 
We will be having every meal in the dining room because we love main dining.  We enjoy the personal connection and attention we get from getting to know the dining staff.  By the end of the cruise they have "learned" us  and our needs/wants and we love that!  We will be doing early dining (6pm on this cruise) so that we aren't eating so late at night!  That is always our preferred choice. We will be getting the Refreshment Package since we aren't heavy alcohol drinkers.  We WILL be taking part in the Diamond Lounge drinks every night though! ?  Full Itinerary:
Travel Day from MSP to MIA Day 1 - Miami  Day 2 - Sea Day Day 3 - Labadee, Haiti (8am-5pm) Day 4 - Sea Day Day 5 - Kralendijk, Bonaire (9am-6pm) Day 6 - Oranjestad, Aruba (8am-9pm) Day 7 - Willemstad, Curacao (8am-5pm) Day 8 & 9 - Sea Days Day 10 - Miami Post cruise day - Miami Travel day from MIA to MSP Hotels:
We are staying at the airport and downtown Holiday Inns.  Holiday Inn is our preferred chain because of quality and price along with consistency. This Live (or mostly) Blog:
We will be doing our best to give live updates as we are doing them but obviously not everything can be live so some things will get posted when we have a chance. Vlog/Recording/Youtube/Twitter:
We will be recording/vlogging as much as we can.  We have recorded numerous excursions for our personal collection and friends.  We recently thought that people, like us, would be interested in seeing some of these excursions so they know what they are like and what to expect.  It has helped us in our research of traveling/cruising.  This turned out to be very popular on our YouTube channel so we wanted to expand on that.  This will be our first attempt at that.  Our YouTube channel can be found at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-JW4jgv_suiK-NCHyhQIVA/ .  We will be posting these after they are edited and ready, which will probably be after we are home, but will try to get smaller/shorter things here.  Please subscribe to our channel so you will know when they are posted.  The videos will not just be excursions.  They will include lots of other stuff and we hope to have fun with them.  We will also post to our Twitter account with updates (https://twitter.com/MOLOonthego1).  We just bought the brand new GoPro Hero 8 Black to upgrade from our Hero 4 Silver to get some better quality videos (and not have them shake and bounce all over). Final Thoughts On First Post:
We are excited to bring everyone along and showcase how we travel and what we do!!!  We look forward to everyone's comments and reactions to our first trip to the ABC islands!  If you have any questions, suggestions, thoughts please feel free to post on here or reach out to us privately.  

I have Vision of seas listed already for January 25 th, adding Independence of the seas May 25 th, 2020.

This is great news! When we book suites we like the benefit of the Concierge Lounge. There is nothing worse then having it over run by Diamond + members who go in early and save seats. We pay a lot of money for this perk!  
 
On cruises we book in a non suite cabin we are happy to huddle with the unwashed masses in the Diamond lounge! 

After lunch the kids went back to the room for a nap, while my wife went back up to the pool deck to… nap. I went to the promenade to grab a coffee and a latte (for my wife – we got a coffee card) and relaxed on the balcony.
 A little before 3pm, we headed down for our skate session. Seeing as we flew in from Toronto, we wore our “travel” clothing on the ice. I hadn’t done any proper skating in about 4 years, so despite the skates not being a great fit (as to be expected with rentals) it was a lot of fun – like riding a bike. Other folks were not having as much of a good time – as you can see in the photos some were having issues just trying to skate, which if it was one of your first times, is not unexpected.
 
 


Tonight’s dinner was formal night, and as such we took a little extra time to get ready so we could get some photos taken.
 

The show tonight was Grease. Olivia and my wife were a little tired so Hannah and I went to watch. We figured getting to the theatre 15 minutes early would be sufficient for us to get some decent seats. We were wrong. Check out the crowd! And that pillar right in front of me! 
 

Believe it or not, this was the first time I’d seen a production of Grease from start to finish, and I thought the cast did a pretty good job with it. And I know that the musical has some themes that might be considered too mature for kids, but I wasn’t much older than Hannah when I started watching Degrassi Junior High, so I didn’t think this had anything that she couldn’t handle.
 After the musical, Hannah went back to the room and I decided to try my luck at some blackjack. And to say that I had no luck would be understating things. I don’t play with a huge buy-in, but I lost my stake in about 30 minutes thanks to a combination of dealer blackjacks and players that consistently stayed on 14/15 against a 10. I can usually grind myself back to even, but on this night I had no shot.
 With my wallet a slight bit lighter, I went up to grab a couple of slices from Sorrento’s. And was actually surprised as the pizza was better than I’ve had on other Royal ships. Not sure I’d have more than a couple of slices at any one time, but I’d definitely eat it over Big Chain pizza.
 After the pizza and some water, it was time for bed.
 The next day would be our first port – Grand Cayman.

Really?? Yikes, that’s not a good thing. I had to bust out the gravol twice on the Explorer and that’s a bigger boat. I guess it depends on the weather and waves. There is actually two on Freedom we have on our short list now, both out of San Juan. Only wish they were longer than 7 nights.

I have Vision of seas listed already for January 25 th, adding Independence of the seas May 25 th, 2020.

Isn't it Normally on the bar as you enter the windjammer, that's where I saw it last time.

I enjoy all of them except the empress, just to much motion on empress for me. I do think you get awesome service on the smaller ships. Personally the Freedom is our favorite. 
 
 

Leaving on Oasis today and just wanted to say thank you to all for the great advice, suggestions and patience from all my questions.  
Thanks again and everyone have a great week.
 
Dan

After watching the sail away from the balcony, we did some unpacking, and then it was time for dinner. We did get the early seating (5:30 on Independence), and our servers were Ryan and Mutsam (I may have his name wrong). Mutsam was fairly new, and this was in fact his first contract. I thought they did a good job over the course of the cruise. Nothing spectacular, but everything was done competently.
 
My first night main was the Caribbean Jerk Pork Chop. Cooked very nicely, although perhaps not enough jerk flavour. We also asked for extra vegetables for our table. Seems weird, but we do eat a lot of veg, so this worked out for us.
After dinner, we wandered around the promenade a bit. They had singers and musicians doing some standards – it was nice.
 
(So much better than two singers and an iPad)
We then went to register Olivia in Adventure Ocean. Hannah (my older one) was 12 so she went to look in on the Teen club meet and greet, but the kids there were mostly older teens, so she didn’t want to join in. She’s actually quite sociable, but I could definitely understand her apprehension.
After this, I think that we experienced a first day adrenaline dump, as we all felt quite tired. I’d planned on doing some more first night exploring, but, well, sleep beckoned, and tomorrow would be a new day.

The good news is that it gave me some time to explore Deck 11 and 12. Not having been on a Freedom class ship before, I was curious to see the layout. I liked it.
Splashaway Bay has a layout similar to what I saw on Harmony, with the addition of a kiddie pool that hopefully wouldn’t be a “kid soup” pool similar to DCL’s Mickey pool. If you’ve been on DCL, you know what I’m talking about.


The sides of the deck even had some windows open, to let in some air. 

The main pool area had a couple of pools bisected by a deck area, with a few hot tubs surrounding it. There was also a large video screen for movies.

Further back was Solarium, which was actually a nice layout.

In the bar, I noticed a BOGO deal on the drink package. Still more expensive than in the Cruise Planner, but hey, better than paying full price, if one were so inclined to purchase the package (I was not).

In the adjoining terminal, we could see the Majesty, set to sail out that day as well.

 

Just think, Royal is making a killing on these. Cancelled cruises inside the "forget it you lost it$$$" window and then putting in NEW passengers into those cabins (even at reduced prices).

I think Jewel is more suited for Panama Canal or even Mexico!!

Great!! And here i was thinking i was going to have a bunch of sleepless nights, wondering if my suggestion were worthy of RCI's operations planning. 

 
Now if they would just pay me what i'm worth!  On second thought...just let me cruise for free ?

Unfortunately it said on pier next to ship. No signage to wait here.

You can often find my bald, goateed head at the Schooner Bar!