DDaley

My Jan 2021 cruise is about $500 cheaper when I price it for the JS next door to the one I have booked.. Didn't get OBC or any offers on my original booking so repricing it should be fairly easy, yes? I am still a ways out from final payment.

I just noticed Coco Cay Beach Club overwater cabana pricing was added! I want that personal slide so bad but for 2 people @ $1700 I will be eyeing them with jealousy from afar.

Loved this beach! It's on the southernmost side of the island and has a view of Nevis across the way. There is a large hill to the left that creates a bay and nice calm waters to swim in. We jetskiied out into the channel between the two islands. It was great! There are two restaurant/bars on either side of the beach.. we took an excursion to the Reggae Beach side that also has a water sports rental (St. Kitts Watersports) and it included two chairs, an umbrella and a welcome cocktail of our choice. The chicken roti was delicious!

If you're into a beach break, Magen's Bay was beautiful and easily accessible by open-air taxi in the port. $10pp/way, also $5 adult entry to Magen's. Beautiful beach, no waves with a restaurant/bar and beach waiter service. Highly recommend packing a small float for ultimate water relaxation!

How many times overall? Hawaii is only 3 hours different from west coast time so that seems weird you've already changed it so much!

Wow $24 pp/pd! That’s amazing! Which ship are you on?

I just booked a 2021 Double Dip cruise to Coco Cay and went to check out Thrill Waterpark prices. The 2-day pass is listed as $79 per person and the 1 day pass is $59.99. From these boards I know that a $79 1-day water park pass is a great price, let alone a 2-day pass so I added it immediately to the cart while I have these rock bottom prices. THE BENEFICIAL GLITCH comes when you add everything to the cart and go through all the motions of Yes I'm 40" and No I'm not 300 lbs, on the final final page of checkout, the price changes for the 2-day to $59 each. I thought I made a mistake

Wow, your stateroom attendant is so skilled! On our 7 night on Freedom we only got 3 animals, one of which was a string ray (1 square on top of 1 twisted tail) which felt like a cop out, hahaha. These are so impressive! I hope he or she can re-collect the eyes for recycling post-cruise.

This is the tent I just brought on Freedom! It works so well. There are thousands of Amazon options, I am surprised we got the same one. Took me 5 months to decide on which! haha

Once you're on that slow beachin' game you know you'll be an umbrella-and-chairs-renting high roller! I will be back with a report! For us, on this somewhat equivalent 7-night HAL itinerary, a Signature Suite was still 1k less than Freedom so I couldn't say no! I didn't realize there was a substantial price difference between the lines because of this but it could be that sailing in December (pre-Christmas) is always cheaper and I haven't priced out enough RC cruises to know that yet. Can't wait for your October live blog (if you choose to do another)! I am pretty sure your fi

Oh, nice! I was only ever in direct sun while swimming thanks to the tent. Helped to keep my tan brown and not end up red!

Closing Thoughts I hadn't been on a cruise in 14 years but I’ve already got another one scheduled for this December! It’s through Holland America (Oosterdam) so I can leave from my home port of SD.. just a 5 minute Uber from my apartment, but it means no live blogging! Get an RC ship back to the West Coast and I would be Riviera cruisin’ every month! We ate every night in the MDR (aside from one night of Windjammer due to laziness) and I would say it was perfectly adequate. Our Assistant Waiter Mithun was leagues more attentive and friendlier than our main server. I warmed up to her

Thanks!! I am sad to have to deviate from my new-found brand loyalty on my cruise in December. At least a fresh comparison may help me realize RC is the only way to go. haha

Day Ten of a 9 day vacation (never a good sign) We woke up at 4 and caught the Embassy Suites shuttle to the airport to find out in the security line that our 6am to Dallas/Forth Worth was cancelled due to thunderstorms in the area. Our 7:15 replacement flight was pushed to 9:30 due to the same stormy morning but we finally made it to Dallas at 11am! We got on our connection that was delayed an hour (or we would've missed it) and it sat on the tarmac from 11:30-1:30pm waiting on the catering truck to arrive. We finally made it home to San Diego around 1pm but my poor bag that a gate

Day Nine We had a leisurely morning on this day! Room service breakfast (surprisingly best room service omelette I have had, and I have had a LOT) followed by beach time at the Caribe's private beach. There were so many fish I had to send CBF back upstairs to unpack my goggles! If you stood still the fish would gather at your feet! So cool. There is a rock break to calm the waves and it's perfect for floating. We had our own floats but the hotel rents the big tube kind I saw a lot of people using. After a couple hours in the ocean we swapped over to the pool for one last piña. The p

Day Eight (Part III) We headed over to the newly renovated Caribe Hilton around 4pm. As a loyal Hilton Honor member I had already checked out a satellite view of the hotel towers and chose the ideal room for beach viewing ahead of time. haha The room and hotel grounds were GORGEOUS! We headed down to the pool after check in for a few more piñas since the Caribe claims to be the birthplace (I swear I saw several places claiming this - what about Barrachina?). They've got 3 pools including 2 infinity edges and one with a swim up bar and a children's water spout play area. This is aside from

Haha thanks so much! They were taking so long to load on Voom that I went back and added some more to the previous posts as well. Better for my future re-reading!

Day Eight (Part II) After El Yunque we headed back down the mountain and northeast to Luquillo Beach. We strolled the kioskos and stopped for a giant piña colada in a piña with whipped cream - best one yet - and some various Puerto Rican fried treats! We had alcapurrias (carne, pescado y pollo), pastelillos (carne, pollo y PIZZA), pinchos (pollo) and a pianono (carne). Everything was so amazing.. we stopped at a couple kioskos for all these items but I am not sure exactly which numbers... all between about #25-40. I would highly recommend a stop in Luquillo if you want some real Puerto Ri

Day Eight (Part I) Disembarkation Day Such a sad day! I kept waking up as we rolled into San Juan and even happened to see El Morro before the 180º spin! We did self-assist and skipped breakfast to finish packing the last of our items. We left our cabin at 7:10 and were in a cab by 7:20! Crazy! We were even stuck behind someone on the outside deck with no sea pass card and waiting for them to turn her away felt interminable. But wow, guess self assist is the way to do it! Today was also CBF's birthday and we got to spend another night on vacation in San Juan at the Caribe H

I might venture "Best Birthday Yet?!" It was amazing!!! I am definitely a cruising-as-an-adult fan.

I posted this image on my instagram story with a caption about it not being a good idea to dangle children out such an obvious window and so many people wrote me back shocked that that's what it looked like / how high it was. I guess the lawyer's story about it being down at the deck level and in a play area was widespread. Staying on a Windows Of Freedom theme, this was our only dinner time that was before sunset! I loved being able to see the ocean roll by - note to self - early dinners next time.

Day Seven Our first and only sea day! Today made me feel more at ease about my upcoming Holland America cruise that has - gasp - THREE sea days on our way to and from Mexico. I was worried HAL didn't have as many activities for a sea day but it turns out we just hung out entirely between the main pool area, solarium and solarium bar. We got two chairs around 9am after Windjammer breakfast in a very back corner of the main pool deck, as close to the Solarium doors as you can get. Turns out it was a great spot! We could see the big screen, were protected partially overhead in a brief r

Day Six Barbados! On this morning we WON a prize after answering a question CD Katy and AM Bern asked on RCTV. It ended up being a RC metal water bottle, and pretty cool to get the shoutout! LOVED Katy by the way, she has such great stage presence (not to mention a fun accent). Bern was funny too, we loved their awful attempts at jokes every morning. Oh and then we would get the Wash Your Hands song stuck in our heads for the rest of the day. It's easy when you only have two! Now I finally understand @Twangster's rcblog signature. haha Today we did another third party excursion

Oh wait! Forgot to note that we had told the Head Waiter Catherine about our birthdays on the 22nd and 24th during dinner on night 1 and she notated it - ended up with nothing at all, even after mentioning the birthdays to our waitress Theresa on both occasions. My thoughts on our MDR waitstaff later but thought it was weird when I know I have seen birthday desserts for others in the past! We did enjoy some post-dinner mini golf. CBF did NOT let me win for my birthday! haha

Finally back to regular life today! Was supposed to have a full day off at home to relax yesterday but we didn't make it home till late afternoon. American Airlines - never again. Now back to the blog: Day Five Castries, St. Lucia - AND MY BIRTHDAY! Today we woke up early again (as usual) to see the ship pulling into port - St. Lucia is the prettiest island we visited in my opinion! Passing the airport was just beautiful. Then we did a 180 in the basin and got to see both sides which was nice. Today we had an excursion with St. Lucia Rainforest Adventure