KristiZ

Depends on the fare basis and class of service you booked. American has (for the most part) reverted to pre-pandemic policies on changes and cancelations.

Actually some of the newest screening setups at airports will impact almost any film -- once everything went digital the manufacturers stopped caring.

Just like in the airport, make sure to carry on your film (don't put it in your checked bags) and ask for hand screening of the camera and film. Should be no issue at all.

Sometimes there will be some excursions available that far out, but usually only at ports that Royal goes to very often. I'll check occasionally that far out, but I get serious about looking at about the six month mark.

You can just stop by for takeout ala carte, or you can make a reservation onboard to dine ala carte, rather than the fixed price deal they sell on the Cruise Planner. We always do ala carte at Izumi Sushi and always come out ahead on cost -- we just don't eat enough to justify the fixed price thing!

Nah, just standard childhood rebellion. She’ll come back when she’s grown and say “mom, you were right, I’m sorry”

Welcome to the boards! Here's a thread with some suggestions: We strictly use taxis, and there are always taxis waiting outside a cruise terminal, no need to schedule or call ahead.

Welcome to the boards! Check out the articles here to get started: https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/getting-started

Here's the Suite welcome letter from Enchantment back in March. Yours should be the same/very similar. Hope that helps!

This website can help you in the Ft. Lauderdale area (or elsewhere in FL): Florida COVID-19 Testing Sites - Florida Department of Health COVID-19 Outbreak (floridahealthcovid19.gov)

Where in the US are you sailing from and/or staying prior?

I would pick Alaska. There will still be swimming and other activities on the ship, but then also a chance to see whales and seals, hike in the forest, and just take in the dramatically different scenery.

Welcome to the boards! Yes, that sample menu is what is offered at the meal. You can always cancel your cruise planner purchases, up to 48 hours before sailing, no problem. Refund will go back to whatever form of payment you used.

The MDR will also have a nice menu for the holiday. The actual holiday is one of the times I avoid specialty dining! Otherwise we love sailing over Christmas/New Year. Enjoy!

Also, realize that just because there are available rooms in an area now, doesn't mean that's where you will be assigned if you do get a Royal Up -- other people will also be bidding and moving up, so you may very likely end up in a cabin that does not show as available right now.

As long as the Bolognese is up to snuff, you're good?

MisterZ is with you here! Just off Jewel where they actually had Newcastle Nut Brown Ale on draft in the Schooner Bar. He was over the moon!

On this Jewel cruise I just got off of, there was an instruction card I the cabin regarding sharps disposal and my stateroom attendant asked during our first meeting if I would be needing to dispose of any sharps.

So glad you enjoyed it! This is the chocolate dessert at Giovanni's. MisterZ says "it was delicious. 10/10 would eat it again". And also "next time I will make sure my MIL orders her own so she doesn't eat half of mine!". I forgot I was going to comment on the wifi! It was actually surprisingly good for 1) how old the ship is, and 2) how far north the ship was. It was certainly slower than on land, but there were almost no outages at all, only briefly once or twice when the fjord was very narrow and tall. It was actually better than our Enchantment cruise in the Caribbean last March.

Welcome to the boards! The Main Dining Room (MDR) is one location where complementary breakfast, lunch, and dinner is offered. The dress code varies each evening, with at least one night being “formal” or “dress your best”. In the MDR, you can have either Traditional Seating (early or late), or My Time Dining (MTD) where your time can be different each night. Dress code applies to both Traditional and MTD. The Windjammer is also complementary and also open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Dress is always casual and your dining time is completely flexible — seats are first come first served. Depending on the ship, there may be other complementary, casual spots for food. There will also be various specialty restaurants that are mostly open only for dinners (lunch also on sea days, usually). Lastly, there will be a few “dining experiences” that are additional cost, like Chef’s Table, Taste of Royal, Sushi and Sake, etc. Hope that helps!

Day 13 - Debarkation Hi, Amsterdam! Everyone had to be off the ship by 830a, which was earlier than I remember any prior cruise. I suspect it was in part to force people to the airport sooner, in hopes they wouldn’t miss their flights. We had breakfast in Chops. I was glad they still offered the suite breakfast this last day. Much less stressful than the Windjammer! We disembarked at about 815am. We were in our taxi by 835am and at the airport by right about 9am. Our flight was at 1255pm and MomMe’s was 400pm (was supposed to be 230pm but she was informed of the delay the day before). Schipol is a nightmare right now. Everything you’ve read in the news, true. People in the sailing’s Facebook group were reporting 4-5 hours in line to clear security! We were all in business class, so dropping off our bags took less than 10 minutes and we headed to the Priority Line for security. We were in that line for 15 minutes (and had made it about half way to the escalator) when a skycap took one look at MomMe and said “you guys follow me”. He was pushing a woman in a wheelchair and just added us to her (non-existent) “family”. In fairness, had I realized how awful the security and immigration lines were, I would have gotten MomMe a wheelchair anyway. She would never have made it standing in line for the estimated 1.5 hours it would have taken us (and remember we were in the “priority” lines!). That guy was absolutely my favorite person of the day! Even inside the terminal was a mess. Anyone transiting who had to go through immigration also had to stand in huge lines. They were announcing “if your connecting flight is in more than two hours, please go away and come back to immigration later” in an attempt to get people through more smoothly. Awful! Our flight was lovely, and we are back in the (exceedingly marginal) Crowne Plaza in Panama. Our last leg home to Managua is tomorrow. Thank you for following along, and I hope this blog was both helpful and entertaining!

Day 12 - At Sea This was a much needed sea day! Four big ports in a row is a lot when you’re supposed to be on vacation We did a lot of relaxing, including time in the spa and the bar. The C&A entertainment chat was today, too, so that was fun. Here are my notes and thoughts for the second half of the cruise, again in no particular order: - There were definitely Covid cases onboard. People were cruising like there had never been a pandemic and it came back to bite some of them. Nothing severe, as far as I heard, so that’s good. For example, the cabin next to us, on day 5 the husband had to go to isolation but the wife got to stay on vacation as long as she masked when she was out and tested once per day. She was negative the whole trip. I thought that was a nice compromise. - I expected there to be more children on this cruise, since European vacations are in full swing. Instead this was the cruise on Royal that felt most like a Holland America cruise. LOTS of B2B (or B2B2B) people and definitely an older crowd. The majority of families onboard were the “adventure vacation” type, so they were off the ship as much as they could be. - I *loved* all the nationalities and languages! Super interesting! - It was really nice to have so many good tour guides. A lot of them were not Norwegian. They were young Germans or Belgians or whatnot in Norway on working holiday for the summer. Many had been doing this for a number of summers in a row. It looks to be a very busy cruise season for Norway, but they seem to be positioned to handle it. - While I love Radiance class ships, and Jewel is lovely, I really hate The Pit Stop. (It’s in the pub location behind the casino.) I think it’s ugly and doesn’t fit with the rest of the ship.

A few more random photos:

Day 11 - Kristiansand Another absolutely gorgeous day. We have been so lucky! I got ambitious today and booked two shore excursions, with an hour and 45 minutes between them. Could have made the gap longer, but I chose to cater to MisterZ’s dislike of alarm clocks while on vacation. Actually, he hates alarms clocks any time… First up was the Setsedal Mineral Park. There has historically been a lot of mining in Kristiansand. The park is actually a family destination — there is a lake to swim in with inflatable obstacles, a challenge course in the trees, picnic spots, and play structures in addition to the mineral museum. I am an unabashed rock geek, but I will spare you most of it. Here are a few shots from inside the museum: We all piled back in the bus to head back to the ship. Interesting fact — buses in Norway are being outfitted with breathalyzers, so that they cannot be started without the driver blowing clean. Any time a bus sits more than 60 minutes, the driver has to blow again. However, as with any technology it tends to be pretty neat right up until the point it doesn’t work. Bus driver nearly hyperventilated getting the bus started — lots of “keep breathing” notices from the machine. Then, even though it was running the bus wouldn’t get in gear, as it was insisting that there was a door still open. After many gyrations and a call to tech support, the bus driver accessed a little panel in the back of the bus and rebooted the whole system. Yup, he literally turned it off and then on again, and it started working. Whew! Unfortunately, this made us about 30 minutes late getting back to the ship. What was supposed to be a comfortable lunch before heading out again became a wolfed-down cheeseburger and a sprint to the cabin to retrieve the next tickets. At least for me. MomMe decided it was too much, and I was unwilling to spend the domestic currency required to get MisterZ onto the next tour in such a hurry. So they had a leisurely lunch and away I went! Next up was the Setsedal Railway Line. This was a historic train used during the peak of the lumber industry, with 8 kilometers of track, two cars, and an engine saved from the ravages of time and progress. 150 kilograms of coal and 1000 liters of water are needed to move the train on those 8 kilometers. Pictures of the station and the train: Scenery along the way, including the log sluice that was used to get the trees off the mountain. It’s now used for hiking: On the way back we toured a bit through Kristiansand proper. Quarantine hill: Fish market: Street art: Back to port: If you have done the White Pass railway, this one is tiny in comparison. Still glad I went!

Welcome to the boards! Are you departing the ship in Rome, or is it a port day for you? If it is a port day, where you have to be back to the ship at a certain time, I would think long and hard about doing it on your own. I would be terrified the entire time of some sort of disruption in the train making me miss the ship — it’s quite a way to go.