Ditchdoc

Walkie Talkies....you can buy them in packages of two, four and more very reasonably.

I concede to your experience and agree with your viewpoint about anger and grief over greed. I am sure there is a big hole in the life of the parents right now that is a storm of emotion from sadness to disbelief, anger and even confusion. They will grasp at most anything that will explain, resolve and maybe through some miracle change what happened. In their anger they are striking out. It has to be extremely hard to put the blame on a close family member. RCCL is an obvious target. They should have done something, anything to prevent this. All this and more is probably going through their minds. No doubt attorneys are right there like buzzards looking for a meal and trying to turn emotion into cash.

IMHO Royal Caribbean is only a target because their net worth is near 10 billion and because the family will not accept responsibility for their own stupidity. The bottom of the window is about 3 feet off the deck, about the same as any guard rail at the edge of any precipice. It would take an absolute fool to not recognize the window is open for anyone of a number of reasons including sight, sound and feel. The same thing could have happened from similar scenarios or construction in virtually unlimited places almost anywhere in the world. You can only protect the public through reasonable safety measures to a point before stupidity takes over. In my opinion grandpa was holding her up the to window, she was squirmy and he lost his grip. Now he is just too butt hurt to admit his stupidity and the family is trying to blame cash cow RCCL in hopes of reducing grandpas guilt and striking it rich.

We are supposed to stop there right after the new year. Hopefully things will have cooled off by then.

Not having been there, I cant really offer an opinion on how this event was handled. However, if the kids were being truly annoying (which itself is subjective), I do not think it is 'out of bounds for an 'adult to remind them the solarium is generally a quite area for adults to read, relax and nap so please be considerate of others. There are other pools where you can be loud and energetic. This can be done in a mean/hateful way which is wrong and probably counterproductive and it can be done in a pleasant/learning way that gets your point across and most likely will produce results.

We did westbound in November of 2013 on Legend of the Seas. 15 days and I believe the itinerary was: Fort Lauderdale Cruising Cartagena Columbia Colon Panama Crusing Puntarenas Costa Rica Puerto Quetzal Gutemala Crusing Puerto Vallarta Mexico Cabo San Luca Mexico Crusing San Diego It was a fantastic cruise. The highlights were obviously traversing the Panama Canal with took most of one day. The low point was Colon Panama. There was a tourist area at the dock with security guards stationed around advising you not to go into outside that area. You see Panama City in the distance as you enter the Pacific and it looks like a fairy land city or something from a science fiction movie. There is a lot to learn and it is all fascinating to me. Along the way, Costa Rica was absolutely great. Among other things we did the Tarcols River that is absolutely teeming with crocodiles.. In Guatemala we hiked a volcano and roasted marshmallows over lava. Cabo San Luca has a gorgeous waterfront and shops that seem to go on for miles with the ocean on one side and rocky hills as a back drop. We finished up by spending 3 days in San Diego and could have easily spent a week or more. We were initially concerned about 15 nights on the ship but it was pleasant and we found plenty to keep busy. We met nice people and ended up making a nightly pre-dinner trivia contest in the Schooner Bar that was casual and fun. At the end we were looking forward to getting off and spending time in San Diego while at the same we looked longingly at Legend knowing it was going back to all those fabulous places on the return voyage. We could have spent another 15 days on board going back.

I cant wait for the plexiglass hot tubs built into the wings.

I'd check your schedule but generally: Ships arrive early ... often by 5 or 6 am. Disembarking is usually arranged by stateroom color codes and designated meeting areas where you are called. Having said that, I am sure that passengers with early flights can let the room attendant know or work with guest services and they can arrange for you to be among the first passengers to disembark. There is a good chance you can get off by 7am. Couple that with Uber so you have a ride waiting and I think you have a good chance of getting out quirk. Also pre-enroll with TSA for airport security and save time. With planning, forethought and good communication you should do OK. Good luck.

Companies have different policies in that some count 'sick days' different from paid vacation time. I think in recent years Paid Time Off or PTO has become more trendy. More companies have established policies where they combine sick time/vacation time and so on into a fixed amount of PTO. It simplifies things. The logic is either you are at work or you are not and the reason does not really matter.

We have had laundry done a few times. The most was on a 15 day Panama Canal cruise. My wife is a real stickler about clothes and laundry in general and she only had good things to say about the service. Personally, I think the cost of a bit of laundry compared to the overall cost of a cruise vacation is trivial. I would much rather spend a few bucks on laundry rather than hours of my valuable vacation time watching washing machines and dryers spin.

I think most US companies start with 2 weeks and you typically earn more with years service to the company that tops out at around 4 weeks with an option to carry over a week from one year to the next. Add another 5-10 days for various paid holidays, usually Christmas, Easter, .Labor day, Memorial day, 4th of July, New Years. Depending on what day the holiday falls on you might get a extra Monday or Friday thrown in and occasionally an extra two days if for instance Christmas falls on a Wednesday. Its nice to get those 3, 4 and sometimes 5 day weekends. Its not uncommon for people to take a vacation day or two in conjunction with those 'long weekends' and get a week off for the cost of a couple of vacation days. Add to that, inclement weather days or snow days. Depending on the part of the country, its not terribly uncommon to get a few of those each each year. I have been an advocate for years for a clement weather day holiday. Here in the south where summer temperature and humidity can be miserable, occasionally you get a day between 65 and 75 with low humidity that should give you holiday to be outside and enjoy it ? I have also advocated for getting one week vacation for each year of service. That way, by the time you put 30-40 years in a company, you are there so little you just retire. Neither one of my ideas have garnered much support from employers for some reason. ??

No doubt you will get a different opinion form everyone. Personally I like my Nikon Coolpix A900. Its compact enough to slip into a pocket, cost about $300. The best feature other than being a 'Nikon' is the 35x optical zoom at the touch of a button. I have captured many wild life photos from a safe distance including bears, buffalo, mountain goats, ships in the distance and so on. Add a 128GB memory card and you can literally take over 10,000 pictures in high resolution.

Ship vs boat has been debated seriously and in jest for years. A classic difference is a ship can carry a boat but a boat can not carry a ship. But then there are specially designed ships made to carry other ships that have been damaged or are not sea worthy. Does that make what was a ship a boat? A more recent technical description is any vessel larger than 500 ton displacement is a ship.

Temps were relatively mild. Layer as others have said. The only really cold spot was Hubbard glacier. I put on everything I had and still could only stay on deck about 15 minutes. If you plan on any excursions to glaciers via chopper or dog sled I would plan on heavy clothes or check and make sure artic weare is provided.

Around the world.

There are 2 ports about 8 hours from me. I'd rather drive the day before and hotel it for a night than deal with airlines any day.

Never really thought about decorating the door. Might be a fun thing for a special occasion. I have seen a few decorated doors. Best I remember they looked like a thin silver foil had been scotch taped to cover the entire door with some message like 'Happy Anniversary'. At the time I assumed it was one of those little things you could order on board and the crew or your attendant would put it up. It seem to remember that, when you make reservations, you are asked if it is a special occasion ..... and I just assumed ....... I may have to go to the local Party Store and look for New Years door decorations.

Timely ... I just ran across an article from USA Today ... Some snippets: This past week a 55-year-old Canadian man and his wife were airlifted from Anthem because the man was suffering from abdominal pain. In April, also on Anthem, a 71-year-old woman experienced chest pain and the Coast Guard arrived and was able to evacuate the woman from the ship about 30 miles east of Asbury Park NJ. In December of 2018 a 79-year-old man had to be airlifted off the coast of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina with symptoms of kidney failure, again from Anthem. Seems like Anthem is having a string of bad luck when it come to cruisers health. At least they have plenty of practical experience if you run into trouble. .

While doing New England and Nova Scotia on Enchantment out of Baltimore: Its a bit different in that from Baltimore the ship has to travel south all the way down the Chesapeake Bay, past Norfolk/Hampton Rhodes before entering the Atlantic and turning north. On the way back there was a medical emergency and Enchantment made an unscheduled stop in Norfolk to drop the patient off. The dock was in an area used to load container ships and very 'industrial'. Waiting at the dock were an ambulance, fire truck, several security vehicles and so on. Half the ship was at the rail watching as the EMTs wheeled the patient off in the stretcher and loaded them in the ambulance. It took all night to traverse the Chesapeake but we arrived in Baltimore on time.

Doing New Years on Harmony ... wont be in CoCo until 4 Jan

Style and etiquette do not always see eye to eye since both are based on geographical social norms. I was brought up where men do not wear hats inside, especially at the dinner table. Social norms for others include wearing your pants almost to your knees. I guess you could wear your base ball cap and pants backwards if it suits you and if you don't care what other people think. Wearing shorts at formal tea with Queen of England would most likely not be allowed. At a formal dinner onboard, wearing shorts might be considered a faux pas in some eyes but again, if you don't care what some people think, go for it.

If its any consolation, once you have the passport its good for 10 years and in the future, to renew it is pretty simple. A short form, the old passport, a fresh photo, a fee and you are done. There are some expediting services that can get your application moved to the top of the pile. Combined with guaranteed overnight delivery you can have a passport in a very few days if you are willing to pay the price.

I do all the vacation detail planning. I used to travel all the time for business and the travel agencies and secretaries could never make what I considered good decisions. If I said I wanted to leave early morning, next thing I know I'd have a mid afternoon flight. I could easily check to see if going though Atlanta was better than going though DC and what fit my time schedule better. Someone else would inevitably choose something contrary to what I wanted to accomplish and I would end up doing it myself anyway. So these days, I can calculate travel times by car. I know about what time we get on the road and how long we want to drive each day. I know what kinds of hotels are suitable and when we want to splurge a bit or wing it. By the time I can detail out what, when, how and where, I can usually do it myself.

I look nerdy enough with out also looking like I am at a convention. I have managed to keep up with my license, credit cards, folding money, professional cards and more my entire life with out hanging them around my neck so I do not really see why I should start doing that while on a cruise. Just my opinion.