Jax

I am so glad you and @calvink669mentioned this. I totally forgot about a later sail away. I will be sure to check our dining time when I get an initial schedule from Shane but it’s possible he already thought of that.

I forgot to update this thread once I heard from our genie. It sounds the suite attendant and/or our genie will take care of filling the hot tub and the suite attendant will arrange for the treatment/testing as needed throughout the duration of the cruise. I will report back once onboard but it sounds easy enough.

Anyone else’s pet do this?

Rules for our suite hot tub. The “no speedo” rule may be a problem if I can’t find Lindsay some swim trunks. Plan B may be “swimsuits optional after dark”. Lol

I haven’t seen our schedule yet but our preferred dining time was 6pm +/- tweaking as needed. Now I am wondering if Shane will make adjustments to our dining time due to the later sail away.

Done @Lovetocruise2002 @calvink669 I think the key word on capacity is “so far”

Interesting post on the Facebook group page for our cruise reports the suite concierge confirmed capacity at 51% so far. I may ask Shane whether he can confirm. If true this would be nice.

Favourite travel items For those that followed along on my earlier Blog some of these items are included again because I love them that much. Saje Farmacy Pack includes a variety of must have roll ons. I always use immune under my nose while on the plane. New addition to this Blog is the Saje pocket diffuser. It’s so great for travel. But probably won’t use on the plane because it would spread throughout the cabin. That would probably be a good thing …… My Pillow travel size - love love My Pillow; if I could pack my king size I would LOL but the travel size works great with whatever the pillow is. I don’t use anything but safe sunscreen from Beauty Counter and my Dr Ho just in case of back pain.

I am so glad to hear that your preferred dining times were confirmed! You never know what can happen with Royal up in the final days. There could be a Festivus Star Class Miracle for you too!

Packing Cubes I used packing cubes for the first time on our last cruise. I got these Lug cubes from Costco and love them. They help organize all the piles that seem to be popping up all over the house. Do piles happen in everyone’s house or is it just me? Lol

Pre omicron, no quarantine while waiting for test results for fully vaccinated. That’s why your hubby and daughter didn’t have to quarantine pending their results. The heading on Canada.go.ca website that outlines the new quarantine requirements is titled “Temporary border restrictions and measures to address COVID-19 Omicron variant of concern”. This is all about the omicron variant. Let’s hope in the coming weeks this policy is relaxed.

agree; policies like these certainly don’t make travel easy. There is so much I could say but will leave it at that and hope that no more obstacles are presented between now and this time next week.

Due to the omicron variant there are new requirements for fully vaccinated travellers who have been in any country other than Canada and the US in the 14 days prior to entry to Canada. If selected for arrival testing you must quarantine until you receive your negative test result. This applies to cruises that leave the US so if we are selected for arrival testing we will quarantine at home until we get a negative test result. It’s an inconvenience more than anything and thankfully we have a few days before Lindsay returns to work and Reyd returns to school. I am just relieved that we are not required to quarantine in a government facility. Can you imagine going from star class to a government quarantine facility with few if any amenities. I can’t even imagine.

Testing update: I promised I would update everyone once I had a firm plan for our Covid tests. We fly out on the 17th, cruise on the 19th so our preference was to get our cruise test completed while still in Canada. The challenge is that our flight is mid morning and the airport testing centre at YYC doesn’t open until 8am. So that meant sourcing a mobile testing option. Tab Labs provides mobile testing and a variety of services including rapid antigen and PCR testing. A technician will meet us at the in terminal Marriott hotel at YYC airport and we will be on our way with results in 15-20minutes. To schedule, you upload their app, add your family members details, select your service and provide a payment source. Cost is $99.95 pp. To speed the process further Tab Labs sent me a spreadsheet to add all the required information, like passports, address, birthdates. This will allow the technician to populate this to their system in advance of the testing day, saving time. A technician was assigned right away and the company has excellent reviews. When it comes to mobile services reliability is key. But every good plan needs a back up plan so we are getting tested on the 16th at a local Shoppers Drug Mart. Cost $40pp. That way should something delay our testing with Tap Labs we have a test in hand to fly. Another mobile testing option was Numi. The cost $125pp with a $50 discount if 4 or more tests are done. I will report back on the overall service next week.

Couples pass Oasis $199

I just broke the news to Lindsay. It went better than expected. A short rant followed by “but we aren’t required to quarantine at a government facility are we”. I am not thrilled with the prospect of arrival testing and quarantine but @Lovetocruise2002reminded me it could be worse. Imagine going from star class to a government quarantine facility with few, if any amenities. I can’t even imagine that scenario. That would be a hard no.

This is good to know. There is a chance we may get a similar response from the CBSA agent but we have to be prepared to complete arrival testing and quarantine.

Well I am officially out of my star class bubble. I contacted the PHAC who directed me to CBSA as they are the agency that enforces the current quarantine/isolation policy noted in above thread. The CBSA agent confirmed that cruising outside of the US will result in arrival testing and quarantine pending negative test result. It doesn’t matter whether we leave the ship or not. The fact that the ship left the US is the litmus test. I asked how this will be flagged by CBSA because we are NEXUS and pre Covid didn’t speak to a CBSA agent. The agent confirmed that process has changed and after completing NEXUS at the stand alone terminals we will have to speak with a CBSA agent. Now I am contemplating how to break the news to Lindsay.

What a gong show! Ugh I still have no answers. I have been living in my bubble. This is what is on travel.gc.ca. Airports are ramping up capacity to test all returning vaccinated travellers in the coming weeks that were in a country other then the US, so by then this could affect us. I am worried about our passports reflecting that we boarded a ship; in which case we could be screwed. I am going to make some calls to see if/how this policy impacts cruising and if it matters whether we cancel all shore excursions vs Royal excursions. Worse case we stay at home for a day or two until test results are back. At least they aren’t requiring us to stay in the hotel jails. Temporary border restrictions and measures to address COVID-19 Omicron variant of concern In effect: There are new requirements for all fully vaccinated travellers who have been in any country other than Canada and the United States in the 14 days prior to entry to Canada. Fully vaccinated travellers who are selected for arrival testing must quarantine in a suitable place until they receive a negative test result. The Government of Canada is increasing the number of fully vaccinated travellers being selected for testing to reach 100% of vaccinated travellers in the coming weeks.

Yay, glad to hear we are still neighbours!

I received a welcome email from the onboard concierge team. I think they may still have us on their list of sky class guests but the email contained some useful information on lounge hours and protocols. I am thankful we are star class given the limited availability at specialty restaurants and CK mentioned in their email (copied below) Especially that reservations are based on first reply first reservation IMPORTANT NOTE: We encourage you to book your dining preference / requests (Specialty Dining, Coastal Kitchen, Dining Room) in advance to avoid disappointment. Our Restaurants are expected to be busy during your sailing as we have limited seats for the first seating ( 5:30 pm, 6:00 pm and 6:30 pm ) Reservations are based on first reply first reservations Please let us know if we can assist with your preferred reservation pre-cruise.

9 Days and Counting The Festivus shirts are ordered. I asked for tasteful with a bit of cheesy. Honestly I am not entirely sure what the final product will look like. It’s in the hands of my sister and brother in law now.

Is it terrible that I thought of you. Lol One of our commercial trucks is heading to Vancouver and will be out there for 2-3 weeks so we put an air tag on it. I am curious what kind of tracking I will get as it makes its way though the mountains tomorrow. Reviews on the air tags are mixed but I am willing to try anything Apple. Lol

I am going to try out a new purchase to track our luggage. I will report back on how they worked. Anyone else use Apple AirTags in their luggage. Full disclaimer, I am still evaluating their performance but there isn’t an apple product I don’t love.

I sent laundry out daily so I put it straight into the laundry bag provided. At the time the laundry bags were paper bags that always seemed to rip. Hopefully that’s changed. They were a pain. We had no issues with the lighting on the stairs. Our issues were with the HVAC system. Lol It received a failing grade from us. Same as Spectra Cabaret. We never noticed a difference in sea days vs port days and seemed to keep busy. A good genie will factor that into your schedule.