Zeashore

Ohhhh,  you are correct; a different set of problems.   Good luck!!

Thank you for your service SpeedNoodles, my DH is retired 31 years from law enforcement and holds dispatchers in high regard. Your retirement is well deserved!
Enjoy your cruise.

I have transferred a cruise to a TA that I booked myself. I just told them I wanted to transfer it, and gave them the reservation number. They took care of the rest!!! 
I also have booked a nonrefundable, as my wife said "there isnt a snowballs chance in (h-e-double hockey sticks) we arent getting on that ship." lol Shes an RN, and unless we are, literally, dying......were "fine". 

Thank you!!!
It started out great....when we landed at FLL, it was 70 degrees warmer than when we left home. 

Thanks Twangster!  good to know!

I've got my shirt all ready for my April cruise and everything.
 

Airborne!

Scientists have done studies. They know. Here are some sources for you.
 
Drop a ketchup bottle on the floor, and you'll be thankful for polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, the nearly indestructible plastic used to make most containers and bottles. Drop the same bottle into a landfill, however, and you might have second thoughts. Why? Because petroleum-based plastics like PET don't decompose the same way organic material does. Wood, grass and food scraps undergo a process known as biodegradation when they're buried, which is a fancy way of saying they're transformed by bacteria in the soil into other useful compounds. But bacteria turn up their noses at plastic. Load their dinner plates with some plastic bags and bottles, and the one-celled gluttons will skip the meal entirely.
Based on this logic, it's safe to argue that plastic will never biodegrade. Of course, that's not the end of the story. Daniel Burd, a student at Waterloo Collegiate Institute, recently demonstrated that certain types of bacteria can break down plastic. His research earned the top prize at the Canada-wide Science Fair, earning him $10,000 cash and a $20,000 scholarship [source: Kawawada].Until other researchers can replicate Burd's experiment and waste treatment plants can implement any new processes, the only real way to break down plastic is through photodegradation. This kind of decomposition requires sunlight, not bacteria. When UV rays strike plastic, they break the bonds holding the long molecular chain together. Over time, this can turn a big piece of plastic into lots of little pieces.
Of course, plastic buried in a landfill rarely sees the light of day. But in the ocean, which is where a lot of discarded grocery bags, soft drink bottles and six-pack rings end up, plastic is bathed in as much light as water. In 2009, researchers from Nihon University in Chiba, Japan, found that plastic in warm ocean water can degrade in as little as a year. This doesn't sound so bad until you realize those small bits of plastic are toxic chemicals such as bisphenol A (BPA) and PS oligomer. These end up in the guts of animals or wash up on shorelines, where humans are most likely to come into direct contact with the toxins.
One solution to this environmental disaster is biodegradable plastic. There are two types currently on the market -- plant-based hydro-biodegradable plastic and petroleum-based oxo-biodegradable plastic. In the former category, polylactic acid (PLA), a plastic made from corn, tops the list as the most talked-about alternative. PLA decomposes into water and carbon dioxide in 47 to 90 days -- four times faster than a PET-based bag floating in the ocean. But conditions have to be just right to achieve these kinds of results. PLA breaks down most efficiently in commercial composting facilities at high temperatures. When buried in a landfill, a plastic bag made from corn may remain intact just as long as a plastic bag made from oil or natural gas.
 Keep reading for more links you might like on plastics.
Related Articles What is corn plastic? How Plastics Work Will alternative fuels deplete global corn supplies? How Composting Works Is your vinyl siding killing you? Sources
Gerngross, Tillman U. and Steven C. Slater. "How Green Are Green Plastics?" Scientific American. August 2000. Kawawada, Karen. "WCI student isolates microbe that lunches on plastic bags." The Record. May 22, 2008. (Nov. 22, 2010)http://news.therecord.com/article/354044 Ransford, Matt. "Why Trashing the Oceans is More Dangerous Than We Imagined." Popular Science. April 1, 2008.(Nov.22,2010)http://www.popsci.com/environment/article/2008-04/why-trashing-oceans-more-dangerous-we-imagined Royte, Elizabeth. "Corn Plastic to the Rescue." Smithsonian Magazine. August 2006.http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/plastic.html Shukman, David. "Warning on plastic's toxic threat." BBC News. March 27, 2008. (Nov. 22, 2010)http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7316441.stm Sohn, Emily. "Plastic decomposes quickly at sea, study finds." MSNBC. Aug. 20, 2009. (Nov. 22, 2010)http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32493098/ns/us_news-environment/   The Tiny Fennec Fox Is All Ears 1ST   There's a Pooping Man in the Catalan Nativity Scene

Did not know that the casino is smoke-free. May need to reconsider Empress for a future cruise

BTW - I am doing the Allure Eastbound crossing in March a month before Anthem does her crossing in April.  
I might blog some of that in the live blog section so keep an eye out for that.

If Swimming With Pigs at Coco Cay doesn’t work out, try Eating With Seagulls......it’s free!  ?

And you could quickly hang up any wrinkled clothes in there to get the wrinkles out....

And you could quickly hang up any wrinkled clothes in there to get the wrinkles out....

Be aware though that Southwest (if that is your preferred airline) no longer goes to Newark...

Happy New Year!  They raised the prices at the port to $25 a day ?
http://www.cruiseliberty.com/directions_parking.html
I don't know if that helps to drive you to a park/stay and cruise or fly/stay and cruise more OP but here's the info.

I like the sound of the Embassy Suites since there will be four of us.  Myself, sure and two sons (19&22).  May be I can book a white that's e effectively cheaper than two standard rooms... Even if not they always have breakfast, a bar, etc.  Makes for a nice stay.
I've read up on the port garage and it sounds all positive - Easy in, easy out. May be there's cheaper options but $22 a day isn't awful especially for the ease and convenience.

Thanks for that great blog during your Anthem cruise Sabrina. Well done!   We are now seriously reconsidering a January cruise out of Cape Liberty due to the cold. Not a fan. Not a fan at all. We enjoyed your insights on the ship, food, and activities as well.
Now going to sniff out an autumn or spring cruise out of Bayonne....

Thanks for that great blog during your Anthem cruise Sabrina. Well done!   We are now seriously reconsidering a January cruise out of Cape Liberty due to the cold. Not a fan. Not a fan at all. We enjoyed your insights on the ship, food, and activities as well.
Now going to sniff out an autumn or spring cruise out of Bayonne....

Following;  we have always flown down to Florida but with airfares 'taking off' (haha) we are seriously considering Cape Liberty from Cape Cod.
@FoxboroCruiser - please say hi to Gronk. 

We flew everywhere for cruises until trying the Anthem out of Cape Liberty.  Soooo much easier.  Itineraries (heading south) are not as exciting but having a 3ish hour drive home instead of a day of flying was quite nice.  It is an easy port to try different ships as the fleet is moved around.  I just have to remember that prices out of Cape Liberty can be the same as price of cruise/flight out of FL so we still keep FL in the rotation.  We are adding Baltimore to the mix in 9 days.  Guess we should try a cruise out of Boston soon too. hahaha

We debate this question every time we sail out of Miami.  Flying in from DTW, FLL is always cheaper than going to MIA. 
With our kids, we have always stayed in Fort Lauderdale pre-cruise and just taken a Lyft to Miami the morning of.  Like @tonyfsu21 mentioned, we find Fort Lauderdale easier to get around with the girls, not to mention that our favourite restaurant is there.  When it just Hubby and I, we always stay in Miami.  For starters, our favourite hotel is there and there is just something nice about going around Miami with your significant other, without the kids.
In March, we are debating this again.  Sailing Oasis out of Miami and flying into Fort Lauderdale.  We are currently holding hotel reservations in Miami and Fort Lauderdale so not sure if this helps at all lol.

Any other recommendations for hotel & parking for Cape Liberty?  We are driving down from Massachusetts.  We lived in NY for a long time butt on Long Island and Westchester so don't know the Newark area quite as well.  I guess we would prefer a hotel that has at least breakfast, and a parking /shuttle solution would be ideal.  I'll keep searching through older posts too, but thought it might be worth bumping this thread back up the message board ? 

My RoyalUp was accepted today. Going from Guarantee balcony to Grand suite ?
 
what extra perks arks should I be expecting?

Thanks for that Lovestocruise 2002.
Happy New Year!

In January we cruised in a Grand Suite that I found on sale as an upgrade to the Junior Suite we had originally booked.  After getting home, I put in a Royal Up bid on a GS for the cruise we are taking this week with my children on Enchantment to move from the JS (one of the rear facing potentially toxic ones, per the live blog!) we had booked originally.  I checked a few times and suites were sold out for at least the past 8 weeks, so no harm done, figured we'd settle in and I'd hope to not have any issues to deal with this cruise.  Two nights ago I logged into the app and our room number had changed and our bid was accepted...  
All that is to say, I have no idea how this works.  Unless someone cancelled above us, I can't see how we got moved up a class, but I am glad for the extra space.  My children, along with my spouse, will now be completely spoiled for normal rooms.