Lovestotravel

Popular excursion can and do sell out early,  Along with the advice given by @Skid and @markm I would add it you see something your interested in book it now and then research that port of call and if you find a private tour you like better you can always cancel and get your money back.
I do know that when I was new to cruising i was hesitant of booking a 3rd party shore excursion. 
But I have since done a lot of research, Cruise Critic has "Port of Call" forum for most ports and I have never gone wrong on a highly recommended 3rd party from those forums.  Also verify them using Trip Advisor and seeing what is said there.  In addition i find many knowledgeable people on this forum and would not hesitate to ask here on someone I was considering.
Remember you can always cancel a ships tour for a full refund up to ? 48 hours before, verify that but I believe I'm correct as they just changed it recently from 24 hours.
I have also seen a number of tours through the ship go up after i booked them.

I would love a PM too!!  Heading to these islands in May!

So, what do you do in Curacao if not the beaches?  We will be in Aruba, Bonaire, Curacao and St. Marteen.  Trying to decide which island do do what!  It is overwhelming!

Standard boarding.  We are Diamond C&A but that mad about 2 minutes of difference.......maybe.

Hello, 
Let me try to help you:
1 - There are many hotels in the area but I will recommend you the Caribe Hilton, recently re-open after Hurricane Maria, it is maybe 5 to 10 minutes away (Due to the Traffic), but Sunday, that is the day you will board the ship, it will be no problem.  Dining, besides the restaurants inside the hotel, at walking distance, is "Paseo Caribe" there are different dining venues including a Fogo de Chao. At Uber distance there are lots of other local places very interesting that you may like.
2 - From the airport (since Uber can't pick you up there) you can take a taxi, with no problems, route rates are fixed and pre negotiated and given to you by a dispatcher, the driver will honor it. After that you can use Uber with confidence around San Juan.
Please let me know if I can help you with anything else.
 

Yep - same for us. Or, I'll order an english muffin and fruit for breakfast if we are planning on a big lunch or want to get off of the ship quickly in the morning. 

This also applies to room service for breakfast. It is the hardest meal to insure that it arrives hot and the farther you are from the kitchens the worse it is.
We like to order the continental breakfast early as a light snack while we get ready for breakfast in the WJ, later in the morning.

For what it's worth, if you want a hot breakfast and don't want to shell out the $7.95 for the order, you can always go to the Windjammer, load up a plate with an omelette / pancakes / sausage / bacon / etc, plus any cold stuff you want, then bring it back to your room. Some folks even snag a tray when they find one lying around, so they can bring back multiple plates for themselves and significant other / family members.
The practicality of this will depend in some measure on how close your cabin is to the Windjammer, just to avoid food getting too cold, but it's another option to consider.

We never hung the order menu on our door.  At night right before bed we called down for the continental breakfast.  It was always delivered by the time we asked for it, and as others have stated they call prior to delivery.
One day we forgot and called that a.m. It was there in 5 mins.  
Typically  what we did was one of us would run down to the promenade where they have Starbucks for our coffees and get some hot items like egg burritos and ham/egg/cheese mc muffin type sandwiches from their Sorrento venue.  We'd take them back to the room and eat it on the balcony while we got ready for the day.
We also do this because for me the coffee they serve at breakfast is very bitter, so with the deluxe bev. package why not get an iced coffee (me) and a cappuccino for me husband.  If you do this, make sure that you bring both seapass cards with you for starbucks. 

Good to know for the next cruise! 

The door hangar has a range of 30 minute intervals you can choose from, and we've always found them to be within that range and reasonably accurate. 

No microwaves anywhere for passenger use. 
Continental breakfast (bread/bagels/pastries, hot & cold cereals) juice, coffee, tea will be delivered free in the mornings if you want it -- here's a link to the menu -- first page is breakfast
https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2017/03/16/royal-caribbean-shares-new-fleet-wide-room-service-menu
Note -- the food on the light blue background can also be ordered, but there is a $7.95 fee for that, but you can order as much as you like (for several people) for that same fee.
You can either call & order in the mornings, but I don't know how long that takes OR -- there is a menu you can hang off your door at night & they will deliver it at the time you specify (up to 11am).
There is a $7.95 fee for lunch, dinner & anything in between -- again, you can order as much as you like for that same service charge/fee.

I will say, having someone call your room to let you know coffee and fruit is on the way makes for a pretty great cruise alarm clock. 

Thanks!  Good to know!

We regularly do specialty for lunch just because of the price point. Many of the speciality restaurants will be open at lunch at lunch at least one day of the trip. That’s one of the first things I look at when I get the compass for the next day, so I can make a reservation right away ? 

As @JohnK6404 said, you can get as many apps, sides and dessert as you want. You do only get one entrée. The servers, at least in our case, asked when we ordered one side each, if we wanted to order more. Same with the apps.

Also
Keep watching the cruise planner, that lunch price will probably drop to $19.99 lowest price I have seen before. We usually do Chops lunch on embarkation day to avoid the WJ crowd.

Great!  I think we will plan to do Chops for lunch, rather than the more expensive dinner option, during one of our at sea days.  Other than that, we will probably stick to the MDR and the WJ.  Of course, this is our first cruise, so who knows once we get on board?!?!?!

A lot of us just feel that your cruise starts as soon as you step on board. You can start your experience ASAP, may it be the pool, the food or the drinks!

Great!  I think we will plan to do Chops for lunch, rather than the more expensive dinner option, during one of our at sea days.  Other than that, we will probably stick to the MDR and the WJ.  Of course, this is our first cruise, so who knows once we get on board?!?!?!

Great!  I think we will plan to do Chops for lunch, rather than the more expensive dinner option, during one of our at sea days.  Other than that, we will probably stick to the MDR and the WJ.  Of course, this is our first cruise, so who knows once we get on board?!?!?!

Great!  I think we will plan to do Chops for lunch, rather than the more expensive dinner option, during one of our at sea days.  Other than that, we will probably stick to the MDR and the WJ.  Of course, this is our first cruise, so who knows once we get on board?!?!?!

However if you dig through the menu to find the water only option it still works without a coded cup, at least on the ships where I tried it.

Note that some of the freestyle machines have the water option and some do not. When there are two machines side-by-side, you will often find one with and one without. Where there is only one machine, it is very likely to offer the water option.

I often snag water at the cafe promenade (in larger ships) or in the WJ (all ships), especially when I can flavor it with lemonade, etc.  I never buy bottled water on the ship unless I want it for an excursion and I don't think I can get it on land.  Usually it is easy to buy water in port, often $1 a bottle or at most $2.