IRMO12HD

I don't think they go as all out like Carnival does though.

KEY WEST: “Conch Fritters” and “Cracked Conch” in the Conch Republic. What a “conch-y” day!

DAY 7: Grand Cayman
This early bird is quite lonely on the tender... wake up, people!!!

DAY 6: Sea Day
Bottomless Galley Brunch
Note: Only the drinks, champagne and fruit punch, are bottomless.  The brunch is pick one option per course - appetizer, main course, dessert.  The guy at the table next to mine asked for a second main course, he was told he would be charged for it. This package should be renamed, “Bottomless Drinks Galley Brunch”

 
Sorry, I was too hungry to take a picture of the Filet Mignon ? 

CRUISING TIP: Using a Pullman bed with magnetic hooks for organization.

After six Sushi Making Classes on six Royal ships, I should be able to teach the class. ? 

SEA DAY: Sushi Making Class

Well Good Moring From The Port Of Miami.

Well Now It Is Sadly The End To This Great Cruise. It Took Me Just 10 Minutes To Get To The Car From The Ship.

With That It Is Time To Head Back Home To Orlando. Here Is On Last Shot Of The Navigator.
 
Well That Is It For This Blog. I Hope You Enjoyed It. If You Have Any Qestion Please Let Know. 

After Dinner I Headed To Back To The Helipad To Take Some Photos Of The Stars!!! Here Is One With A 5 Second Shutter 
 
And A 30 Second Shutter.

We made it! ?
I will update tomorrow. Our internal clocks are telling us it's 2.30 am and that's way past our bedtime even if the actual clock says 9.30 pm!

Our flight to Lisbon was on time and uneventful. We checked in to the hotel where we found everything to be as expected, having stayed here twice before. The rooms are small but are fine for an overnight stay.

Ours is the door on the right at the far end of the corridor.

The lobby is already decorated for Christmas.

And there are vending machine and a scale so you can weigh your luggage before heading to the airport.As I mentioned previously, the hotel is less than 5 minutes walk from the airport and there is a metro (underground, subway) station at the airport making it very easy to get into the city centre. Tickets cost just €1.50 each way. Very convenient.
That's it for tonight. Tomorrow morning we will board our trans-pond flight. 
Goodnight and thanks for following. ?
 

In the words of the old John Denver song – “All my bags are packed, I’m ready to go”! I’m not quite standing outside the door yet though since we don’t set off until tomorrow afternoon.
We (myself and DH Fernando) will be flying from our local airport – Faro, in the Algarve, which is mainland Portugal’s southernmost province – to Lisbon, where we will overnight at the Star Inn Lisbon Airport Hotel. We have stayed here twice before. It is less than a five-minute walk from the terminal and offers a very decent included breakfast. I would definitely recommend it as a good option if you just need a room for the night in Lisbon before an early flight.
While this overnight is not strictly essential, it does mean we avoid the dreaded 3 am start to catch the 6 am feeder flight, which would then be followed by a 4-hour layover in Lisbon. Not a great start to a holiday and guaranteed to have us arriving in Miami utterly exhausted.
On this particular occasion it will also give us the chance to go and see the Portuguese version of the musical Chicago, which is showing in Lisbon at the moment.
Our flight to Miami International departs from Lisbon at 10.35 on Thursday morning, arriving stateside at 2.55 pm. We are flying on TAP, the Portuguese flag-carrier, who are operating the flight with one of their very new Airbus Neo aircraft, so that will be an interesting change from the much older and very tired airbuses they previously used for this route.
On arrival we will try to Uber or Lyft to the Best Western Plus Oceanside Inn in Fort Lauderdale for a two-night pre-cruise stay. We have stayed here before too and find it to be a pleasant and reasonably-priced option within walking distance of just about everything you could need, as well as offering a very decent included breakfast. Yes, there’s a pattern here. We do prefer included breakfasts!
We are hoping that the weather will cooperate and we will be able to spend the day on Friday riding the water taxi.
Saturday the 23rd is Cruise Day. We are aiming to board at about 1 pm, just as the cabins open up. The morning will probably be spent relaxing by the hotel pool. For us, the hotel stay is part of our overall holiday and we prefer the comfort and convenience of boarding later, so we don’t feel that we are missing out by not getting to the port earlier.
Our ports of call on the 8-night cruise are Labadee, San Juan Puerto Rico, St Thomas and St Maarten. We have booked one excursion through the ship – the 5-star island tour in St Thomas – and will be doing our own thing in the other three ports. We have also booked the 3-night speciality dining package so will be looking to eat twice in Giovanni’s and once in Chops. No Izumi for us as we don’t like sushi and Adventure does not have the hot rocks option.
At the end of the cruise we will book an excursion with airport drop-off; we just haven’t decided which one yet. Again, the convenience is the deal-breaker for us.
I will try and post at least once a day, including pics of the daily compass and menus, and I will be very happy to try and find the answer to any questions while we are on board, so feel free to ask.
Oh, and one last very important note to close on for this evening… This will be our very first cruise as Diamond C&A members. Uber-excited would be an understatement.

Good morning everyone!  As the title says, we will be doing a side by side sailing coming up a week from Monday out of Miami.  As long as data/wi-fi/VOOM cooperates I will try to post as live as I can.  I'll put some of the background and details below, and will also be commenting on our before/after plans as well so feel free to skip past all that if it's not your thing.  Forewarning this first post will be a long one.  I was back and forth on doing a blog, but I know I really appreciate reading them to get me by until my next sailing.  As we go throughout the trip, feel free to ask questions and I will do my best to answer as I can.  
 
Who: 
Myself (Cody) and my wife (Ainslie).  I'm active duty AF currently stationed in Colorado Springs.  Just got back to the area in April after living 30 minutes south of Port Canaveral for almost five years, so this will be our first cruise in years where we have to fly to the port which was a big driver in the longer trip.  No kids, so aside from getting the vacation time we have the flexibility to cruise any time of the year.  We love this time of year as the weather is perfect, it's typically cheaper, and longer sailings (Explorer) often have a much more laid-back feel to them which we like.  We are Emerald C&A members coming just short of Diamond after these sailings and won't be in suites so I won't be much help in regards to those aspects/questions.
Why these sailings?: 
We did 14 nights b2b on Navigator a couple years ago over the exact same timeframe and loved it.  We got off that sailing and immediately knew we had to get back to the ABCs, which this time is on Explorer.  We considered doing the 5 night over Thanksgiving and making it a true b2b again, but this one went to Labadee & Jamaica and we're already doing Labadee the second sailing.  We really enjoyed Navigator and were excited to see the amplified ship so got a great rate a year ago on the 4 night Thanksgiving sailing and we get to go to Coco Cay.  I went in September but my wife has never been as we missed it the previous two attempts before the pier was installed.  We'll get to sail on one new ship to us and one revamped ship coupled with getting back to our favorite ports in the ABCs so it was a no-brainer!  Escaping the Colorado cold doesn't hurt either.
Staterooms:
Navigator we'll be in a deck 7 Promenade Room.  Originally had the exact same room # on Explorer, but after final payment date the rates on Oceanview Balconies dropped to the point where we upgraded for less than $100, so we'll have a deck 7 Oceanview Balcony on the Starboard side which we prefer.
Onboard Extras:
We purchased the Deluxe beverage package + VOOM for myself and the Refreshment for my wife on both sailings.  I waffled a bit on this but in the end got a rate we were happy with and I love not having to worry about a bill at the end for drinks.  Coupled with the fact that due to work we may not get to cruise next year and it was a fairly easy decision.  On Navigator I booked the UDP for us as there are some new venues I wanted to try and the price was $99pp so not bad.  VOOM came with my DX package but we would've purchased anyways.  No specialty dining on Explorer as we have some longish port days so a couple nights MDR but a lot of casual WJ meals for us.
Travel:
More in the itinerary to come but we're flying on the red-eye from Denver next Saturday morning at 12:45!  Flying into Orlando to spend time with friends.  We're flying Frontier (I know), but the ticket price was a few hundred cheaper than other airlines which allowed us to spend some time both before and after the cruise in Florida.  After disembarking on the 8th we'll head back up to Orlando to get a couple days at WDW before flying out late on the 9th back to Denver.  Got some great pricing on one way rentals both Orlando to Miami and in reverse with Avis.  Dropping of the rental the night before the cruise so will use Uber/Lyft to get to the ship.
Itinerary:
23 Nov- Fly to Orlando, spend day/night in Melbourne with friends
24 Nov- Drive to Miami, one night at the Gabriel downtown
25 Nov- Board Navigator
26 Nov- Nassau (8:00am-6:00pm)
27 Nov- Coco Cay (7:00am-5:00pm)
28 Nov- Sea Day (Thanksgiving)
29 Nov- Turnaround day, board Explorer
30 Nov- Sea Day
1 Dec- Labadee (8:00am-5:00pm)
2 Dec- Sea Day
3 Dec- Willemstad, Curacao (9:00am-8:00pm)
4 Dec- Kralendijk, Bonaire (8:00am-8:00pm)
5 Dec- Oranjestad, Aruba (8:00am-7:00pm)
6-7 Dec- Sea Days
8 Dec- Disembark, head to Orlando/Disney
9 Dec- Fly home late
Excursions:
Nassau- My wife is doing some sort of dolphin thing (I believe) and I'm going to just walk around, get a bite to eat, and spend some time at Pirate Republic Brewing (I'm a big beer guy)
Coco Cay- I've got the all-day waterpark pass, but aside from that a leisurely day
Labadee- Nothing planned, just relax
Curacao- Rented a car through Advance and plan to drive up to some of the more remote beaches.  Afternoon/evening will be spent walking downtown and getting a bite to eat at our favorite place
Bonaire- Snorkeling again with Woodwind and then relaxing in town
Aruba- Local bus to our favorite dutch pancake restaurant, then plan to spend the rest of the day at Reflexions Beach Bar while my wife shops in town
 
Again, apologies for the long post and congrats to those who stuck with it!  I will start with the live portion next Saturday once we start traveling.  I will not be uploading the compasses daily but if you have specific questions on those I will try to answer.  Have a great weekend and thanks for following along!

I'm hoping the TV's have WiFi access points built into them and you can stream to the TV's from your devices.  That was a concept they mentioned a while ago but never said anymore about.  WiFi in the TV would solve a lot of poor WiFi coverage issues.  

Hmmmm....that is a great idea.  I had forgotten that THE bot was going to be on this cruise, too.

UGH.  You know how bad I am at this...but I will make a special effort.  I might EVEN try a live blog.
I just hate lugging a camera around - even a cell phone.  But this is going to be a special cruise.  I will do it for YOU, Sabrina !

Miami is tidal.  Oasis class can only arrive or depart nearer high tide during certain periods of extreme tidal swings (super or king tides).  That can make scheduling challenges.  Port Everglades is not tidal to the extent it impacts ship movements.  It's an easier port for Oasis class to operate from.  They can come and go whenever.  
For a few days of non-standard operations where the guest terminal experience doesn't matter Port Everglades is a logical choice.  

Also not a fan of them.  This may not be accidental.  Generate faster turnover.
Portside BBQ: Eat yo' meat, then get out yo' seat.  

Photo By Nick Weir Of The Work At The Boardwalk. 

Just some good advice, be sure to give credit to the person that took the photo especially if that person is in the photo.
I always try to give credit to whomever took the photo. No harm in doing it, and it's the considerate thing to do.

Some Photos From The Internet Of The Dry Dock.
 

Hey @CHRIS WONG hope you are happy with your new ship!! Super excited for you!!

Wow !  She looks so clean.  ...like she just came out of the car <ship> wash !
See you on 11-1 !!!!

Many of us here know that @JLMoran is about as far from rude as you can get. 
Perhaps it did not come off the right way, but I think that he is simply trying to offer advice and perspective to @CHRIS WONG who seems to have a serious interest in vlogging.  Sorry @CHRIS WONG for the side track on this post. ?

Which is why I prefaced my comment with (emphasis added):
My impression of Chris is that he is attempting to be a serious vlogger, maybe even an influencer to get people more interested in Royal. He is actively trying to grow a subscriber base, putting out videos very regularly covering a wide range of aspects about ship life, and doing other things that bolster this impression.
As such, a very common piece of equipment that I am aware the vast majority of influencers and serious vloggers invest in at some point is a gimbal.
I made as polite a request as I could figure out the words for, and Chris is perfectly free to ignore it if it's totally impractical.
Done here. Chris, very sorry for this particular sidetracking of your thread.