DDaley

I am late but I so love that you took the duck boat tour in Boston! I lived in MA for a few of my elementary school years and loved going on field trips to Boston and Plymouth Plantation. As an adult, I’ve been back to visit family several times and I finally got my duck boat ride years ago on my 31st-ish birthday. Even though I am way too old, the operator let me “drive" too because I said I had been clamoring to go on one since I was a kid! 😂 🦆
Your beautiful pics are making me think I need an East Coast/Canada cruise in my future! 

Top of Cadillac Mountain
Video clip on IG

Day 5 - Bar Habor

Back on the ship now and Hubby has gone off to do the Flowrider. Not sure what the kids are doing. Hubby left his phone behind so that I could filter through some of the pics on his phone. Here are some more random pics to show what we have been up to today. 
Walking off the ship earlier this morning and headed to the Holy Donut. 


Stops along the way from the Trolley tour. We booked this tour online through Portland Discovery Land and Sea Tours. 








When we reached Portland Headlight, they gave us about 30 minutes to get up and stretch and take photos. 

After the tour, as I already posted, we headed to Duckfat for lunch. 

Another great day in port today! These port intensive tours have a different vibe. We get up earlier than usual for a cruise, walk a lot more, eat a lot less on the ship, but they are fun. We are having some great family moments ❤️ 

I believe you could order a mocktail and it would be included on your package, then take your drink and visit a different bar or bartender and pay full price for a shot or two of the liquor of your choosing to add in. That way you’d only be “paying the difference” while working around their refreshment package limitations.
Not sure if this is considered “cheating Royal” and will be frowned upon here but I don’t thiiiink so? You paid for all the self-assembled parts of your drink! 

Seasoned cruisers may assign the "ship is the destination" a higher priority but on a typical cruise just over half of all guests on board are new to cruise or new to Royal.  For these newer cruisers they always look at ports with a higher priority over the ship. 
Nearly all cruisers when they are new want more ports stops, not fewer port stops.  Only once people have cruised a fair bit will they value more sea days over more port days.  Unfortunately these frequent cruisers are not the majority on the ship rather a small minority and that is not who the cruise lines target.   It's hard to fill ships consistently with frequent cruisers and there is less revenue from seasoned cruisers on a per guest basis.  
The bigger problem for larger ships is the need to tender on many west coast itineraries.  That will also limit ship size unless you remove tender ports but that means reducing the number of ports of call and that gets us back to the issue with new cruisers wanting more ports stops not fewer.  
Larger berths make sense if you are going to make any infrastructure investments for any port but that doesn't mean larger ships will be homeported there.   This is a case of "If you build it, they may not come".
However they can probably accommodate more not-large ships at the same time so if you are a loyal brand cruisers there is greater chance that your brand may operate from LA.  MSC loyalist?  Maybe a ship like Divina could homeport.  Celebrity and Royal and Princess on the same day.  Another Carnival ship in addition to Long Beach.  These are  likely the biggest benefits to west coast cruisers from the expansion announcement.  

When am I joining Icon Of The Seas?
 
A little update video from my hometown, since leaving Symphony Of The Seas.
 
 

@CHRIS WONG  Royal released this video of the CREW areas on ICON!  They look amazing!   
 

Royal is sending out emails regarding our Greenland cruise in September. 
 

RIGHT!? I still remembered paying $15/day like it was yesterday! Makes a huge difference when your cruise is 4+ days 😭

Yep, it was $20/day when I sailed last October, I had been convinced it was only $18! 

After breakfast, the kids took off. Hubby and I ventured down to Studio B to check out the Top Tier party. Mainly, I was curious to see how many Pinnacle members were on board because we feel like everywhere we go, we run into one. They have all been really nice just in case anyone is wondering 😉
Anyway, here are the stats from today;


Captain Mal is a fellow Canadian and he did a little Q&A with the audience. He is also pretty entertaining. Hubby wanted to ask him if he missed playing hockey. 


He got the puck in the little slot on the first try! 
After some remarks by the hotel director and loyalty ambassador, they finished off with a small performance by a few members of the ice cast. 
 

After we actually got in there, dinner was not too bad. I am still not in food coma status, but for all the complaints I have seen in the RC Dining group about the new menus, this was ok. Nothing that I am going to go home and dream about but decent. The kids really liked their meals though. D15 got the fried chicken and D17 got the spaghetti. My favourite of the night was probably the Spinach and Artichoke dip. 
 

@Lovetocruise2002 We were given a tea kettle on the Wonder when we asked for it in the CLS last month.  I was surprised because we were told NO on the Mariner (panoramic suite up front) NO on the Harmony in a CLS & NO on the Serenade in the 2 bedroom owners suite.  We don't drink coffee & I love to prepare tea in the cabin early to start my day, just another suites amenity that is being phased out it seems. 

so many different crew and passengers across so many ships, some sailing multiple times a week so your mileage may vary etc etc
all that said, I really thought these made a big difference on our Freedom cruise a month ago.  we were able to find a chair when we wanted to.  my tenth cruise overall (seventh with Royal) and first time seeing these signs, I really thought they made a difference and was happy to see them.  it's at least a gesture in the right direction, a shrug, haha hey something is better than nothing and this is a nice easy, passive (mostly) non-confrontational acknowledgement of the problem.  they're also bright pink and fun and very straightforward, now let's make something like this for the (now all but defunct) dinner dress code 
IF YOU ARE NOT SURE AND ARE THINKING ABOUT ASKING, THEN NO, IT'S NOT IN THE DRESS CODE.
 

Maybe I can shed some light on this, I was chit chatting with our cabin attendant about this too!
Not just Navigator OTS but many other smaller ships are slowly transitioning out of compact/mini refrigerators to coolers (no refrigeration) in their efforts to optimize operating cost on smaller ships. (Since the pandemic)
If you take a look at the sticker attached to the front panel door you can request for an actual mini-fridge if you require one for medical purposes BUTTTT you can also ask them for one even if you have no medical conditions.
Ive requested a mini-fridge and notify them I did not have any medical needs for one, they checked to make sure they had spares, sent a attendant to install it while we were out of the cabin. The attendant stated there was a storage room stacked to the ceiling with mini-fridges and there is more than enough for anyone who requested during the sailing.
All the oasis and quantum class ships I've been on have mini-fridges so far but several of the small ships similar to navigator has replaced them with traditional coolers.
Those coolers purpose is to extend the coolness of food and beverage for maybe a few hours but definitely not recommended for longer periods of time to avoid bacteria and spoilage.
They have mini-fridges prioritized for medical needs guest first but they have a lot of spares, don't be afraid to ask and let them know you have no medical purposes but would like one if available!

They of course both need a plug. 
These coolers, like a wine cooler you might have at home use Thermoelectric Cooling.  Essentially plates that transfer the heat from one side to the other.  They are reliant on the ambient temperature to be effective.  A fridge uses Compression Cooling where refrigerant is moved through the system. 

Our home for the next 9 nights is a Two Bedroom Grand Suite on Deck 8.
Kids love their space. This room is great for allowing the 4 of us to spread out but if you look closely at the pics, it is a bit worn in some areas. 
Not much opportunity to enjoy the balcony yet as it has been raining for the most part since we got on board. 
Photo dump ahead….
Entrance to the room

Second bedroom right as you enter 

Bathroom for the second bedroom. This is located inside the the room. 

Closet in the hallway for the second bedroom. The safe in this closet is the only safe in the whole room. I found this odd for a room of this type. 

Living area 

Master bedroom 


Master Bathroom 


Balcony. You can also see from these photos that there is not 100% privacy on this balcony. 

Seconding shoreexcursioneer.com. I have had ships not dock at the port and in other instances suddenly change my itinerary before departure and I have been able to cancel or replace my purchased excursions very easily. Their customer service responds only 1-2 hours later! Also, every time I book with them I get some money back in my “digital wallet” which I can use on future excursions. This knocked my Mendenhall Glacier kayak for 2 down to $404 from $550! I have successfully used this company 3 times and successfully cancelled/been refunded 3 additional times. Easy! 

Seconding shoreexcursioneer.com. I have had ships not dock at the port and in other instances suddenly change my itinerary before departure and I have been able to cancel or replace my purchased excursions very easily. Their customer service responds only 1-2 hours later! Also, every time I book with them I get some money back in my “digital wallet” which I can use on future excursions. This knocked my Mendenhall Glacier kayak for 2 down to $404 from $550! I have successfully used this company 3 times and successfully cancelled/been refunded 3 additional times. Easy! 

Seconding shoreexcursioneer.com. I have had ships not dock at the port and in other instances suddenly change my itinerary before departure and I have been able to cancel or replace my purchased excursions very easily. Their customer service responds only 1-2 hours later! Also, every time I book with them I get some money back in my “digital wallet” which I can use on future excursions. This knocked my Mendenhall Glacier kayak for 2 down to $404 from $550! I have successfully used this company 3 times and successfully cancelled/been refunded 3 additional times. Easy! 

Waiting for rooms to open. Kids have already disappeared. We are stuck babysitting the luggage 😔

After we were done going through Grand Central Terminal, we were losing steam big time. There was a restaurant (Mad Dog & Beans) that I had discovered online a few weeks ago. They have fried ice cream on their menu and you all know that we cannot resist places that have that on their menus. We headed over there for an early dinner. 

Dinner was good but still not my beloved La Bamba. I feel like we will forever be chasing and looking for a La Bamba replacement. 
Took another wander through Times Square on the way back to the hotel. 

No energy to do anything else. It’s been a long day and tomorrow is cruise day!