MicDay

No, you just don't have the right TA.

Exactly, If you pay "FULL PRICE" for a cruise you ether have too much money, booking too late, or you're just not trying hard enough.  

The best sale finding strategy is to have a shopaholic like my wife.  She spends about the first hour or two of every day going through Royal's site, Amazon, Best Buy, JCP, et al.  I don't think we ever paid the original booking price for a cruise yet, because of her.  So, I don't mind making my mind up, spontaneously, and purchasing a cruise, sale or not (it's really just the deposit anyway).  I know she will eventually find at least one lower price for that cruise, usually several times.  Both my daughters and their husbands work hard and don't really have time for that kind of shopping so my wife does it for them.  

I too am one of those people who will spend an hour or two browsing my top places to see if deals are to be had. I have found that RCG just changes the wording and always extends some sort of "sale." But I always book at a price I am comfortable with and usually early. I have seen a "sale" change midday on RCG websites.  

The best prices on Cruise Planner things that I have found have rarely been on Black Friday. I'd personally never hold out for it.  The best prices I've found on Shore Excursions haven't even been during published sales, but rather just randomly.  I always buy what I want, and reprice it as the opportunity arises.

Some fun things we saw on the way to the bus.
Nothing says “we are an international tourist destination” when they have to put this on the roads to remind everyone that the direction cars come is different than everywhere else.

 
We also like to find highly rated local restaurants to try out when we travel. It’s a good thing there are so many……


Next stop Tower Bridge

We hopped off the bus at Tower Bridge and explored the area. 
You know you are in Europe when you see this live in an amphitheater. If you know, you know!

 

Not sure of the significance of the monkeys, but we had to get a picture.

We headed into the bridge, and started up the stairs. 206 stairs, and this one made sure to count every one to give us status updates.

Once at the top, we headed across the upper walkway. There is a glass floor to let you see down.


 
This one said NOPE to that floor

 
This one loved that floor

The views were expansive!


Here was a neat view. This is inside the tower, looking up.

After the bridge we got to explore the engine room that housed the old steam engines that were in use up to the ‘70s until they were replaced with electric motors.

 

After we got off the bridge, we were pretty hungry. 
 
This sign lured me in. Like any typical male, I didn’t read the whole thing at first and was disappointed when I walked in.

 
Despite my disappointment the food was good. This place is called The Vault and is built into the bridge pier.
We got fish and chips, and we are firmly on the side of malt vinegar  @JLMoran

There was also a burger and some nuggets.


The Boss found her new favorite drink

 
 

After lunch we headed across the bridge again over to the Tower of London. This fortress was larger than I thought and we explored all over the place. We saw some of the carvings that the infamous “guests” left in the walls and eventually saw the Crown Jewels. They don’t mess around in there with their no photography policy. There were many teenagers who got yelled at for simply having their phones in their hands.
Traitors Gate

Johnny was ready to defend the fortress!

We didn’t try messing with these guys…

We were in awe as to what was inside here.

 

@Lovetocruise2002 and @GregD Thanks to you both for taking us along. You are beautiful people with beautiful families. Every evening I would look forward to your pictures and commentary. Last night hubby put in a DVD for a movie we wanted to enjoy, he was like "I'm ready!" I responded "I'm not, still catching up with Sabrina and crew!" He laughed and did something else until I was finished. Then he said didn't she go to Norway? So we revisited all of the photos from page 1! 
The content was amazing, you guys did great, I felt like I was there with you. I felt the cold, I felt the food coma (with zero calories) but most of all I felt the joy! Happy Birthday D16 and Happy Anniversary Greg D family. I enjoyed your journey and personally feel like I visited myself, thinking of checking this one off my bucket list, I even stayed Star Class! 
Safe travels all, be well and until next time... 🙂
 
 

That's b/c you leave their a$$es at home when you don't cruise in SC !  LOL
[just kidding !]

I feel for any future friends or partners later in life that ever make the mistake of saying to your future grown up kids "Let's go on a cruise!".  They have no idea the expectations that await them.   

Goodnight all!
📸Hubby

Tomorrow we are going to push disembarkation as late as we can (eye roll here, yes, we are going to be “those people” this one time) because we are spending one extra day in the UK before flying home on Saturday. The rationale here was that we did not want to face a long flight home on debarkation day. Staying an extra day gives us a chance to rest and reset before flying home. 
 
As we were packing up today, Hubby said to me, “We aren’t staying in some fancy hotel tomorrow, are we?” Well, I wonder if after almost 20 years of marriage he really knows me lol. I am also willing to bet he doesn’t know we had 5 Accor Suite Night upgrades and not 4. 😉
 

Now that we have everyone back, here is where the night got really interesting. After the show, the kids headed back to the room. The Boss and I headed down to the music hall to watch “The Perfect Couple” game show. 
 
The intention was to watch, but we ended up as contestants! This was well outside the normal comfort zone but we went with it. 
 
The game consists of four challenges that aren’t exactly PG.
The first was The Boss had to move a ping pong ball from the bottom of one pant leg, to the bottom of the other, with just her hands. Sounds easy enough, except the ball was inside the pant legs. As you can imagine, this conger interesting. We had the lowest time! One point in the bag!
Challenge 2, was we stood next to each other with our arms around each other, so my left, and her right arm were free. We then had to blow up a balloon and tie a knot. We were only allowed to use our free arms, and couldn’t talk to each other. Of course, to make it interesting, was the balloon was a prophylactic…..We again had the lowest time! Two points! Things are looking up!
Challenge 3, were the men were seated in a chair blindfolded. Then your arm was stroked by three people, one being your partner, and you had to guess which one was your partner. I managed to guess correctly here too!! 3 points! On a roll!  
 
Challenge 4……I knew I was doomed on this one. The Ladies were sat in a chair, and the men had to dance for them, and the audience would be the judge. Well this white boy can’t dance, and now was being told to give a lap dance to The Boss that was being judged by the audience. I knew that I would fail miserably here, and even the pity applause was pretty pathetic, but that’s okay because winning the first three challenges was enough and we won!
Our prize was two RC gold medals and a RC aluminum (aluminum?) water bottle, plus the embarrassment of having to give an admittedly horrible lap dance in front of hundreds of people 🤣
Well, I can cross that off the bucket list…..not that I even knew it was on there 🤦🏻‍♂️

Once back of board, dinner was in CK. It was lobster night and our server took care of me🤣 five lobster tails later, I was stuffed! 
 
After dinner we also went to WWRY. I second everything about this show that @Lovetocruise2002 said. If you have not sailed on Anthem and seen this show, stop reading here, go book a cruise on Anthem then return to keep reading this blog, don’t worry, I’ll wait…………

Back to why the kids were drenched after the boat ride…
This ride takes you not only to Pulpit Rock but also takes you right up to some of the rock formations and waterfalls. One waterfall in particular the boat was able to get really close to. So close that a crew member takes a bucket right up to it to fill, then they pass out cups so they you can have a sample drink if you wish.
 
My kids decided that they would sample the water too, in the form of a shower. They went to the front of the boat and pretty much got right under the water. Had this teacher been on supervision duty, she would have cared. But I am on vacation, so if they wanted to sit in wet clothes, well their problem, not mine lol.
 
D13 did manage to get some pretty cool pics before the shower though. 
 

The cruise was about 3 hours long with a 30 min stop for waffles right before the boat enters the Lysefjord. The kids were drenched from the boat ride so we headed back to the room after the cruise so they could clean up. This is what we came back to. Leroy has been so thoughtful along the way. D15 almost 16 loved it and she wore the necklace to dinner already! 
 

Good morning Stavanger!
 

Societies, communities and countries are slowly learning to live with the virus.  It's a process.  It's take time.  The fact that the CDC isn't completely losing it's mind over the current variant is proof that even they are learning to live with it in their own way.  
There will come a time as the world has inched its way forward that cruise life will move closer to the days before.  We just aren't there yet.  As every day passes we move closer.  

In this blog there is a "Roll Call" section for every Royal ship and probably all, if not most, of their sailings for about a year out.  If not, create one.  That's a great place to find social events for just about anything, not just the 18 - 20 year old ages.  Again, if you don't find a social gathering for the 18 - 20 year old ages, start one.  
I'm going to start one for sexy senior citizens, 70 and above to have a fashion show of Speedos, T-bars, and/or thongs.  I'm encouraging all to get involved.  🤢🤭🤮

Just go everywhere the adults go.  You just can't drink the alcohol.  I can't think of a venue you can't go into, other than the age restricted younger venues.  So, just enjoy yourself and put yourself out there, SAFELY!  

Some of the best people I have associated with have not been my age. Try reaching out to others. Life is learning experience and you can learn much from older people as well as the innocence of children.

@GregD and @Lovetocruise2002 such gorgeous pictures, thank you so much for sharing!
I have to ask, does it sometimes feel like you are in Alaska, even the towns remind me of Alaska?  
This is on my list as a must do but I was wondering that as I look at your pictures.