WAAAYTOOO

This is precisely how it work for me today.

It’s very unusual. I have never boarded a ship where they did not scan my passport.

Yippee. Yippee. Yippee. I know you’ll have a blast. We had a great time this week.

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This has been my experience as well. Boarding last Sunday in Galveston they were very strict on boarding sequence - almost obsessive. The Key boarded after all Suites categories and Pinnacles.

Thank you so much for taking us with you. Safe travels home.

I think it depends on the stateroom category whether or not you get a fridge. We sailed in an inside once and I’m fairly sure there was no fridge in that room. I’ve never been in an ocean view room (on any ship) so I can’t help you there. I’m pretty sure that balconies and above will have a fridge. Don’t count on them to actually keep anything cold though. It’s more like a chiller. For example, I cannot drink a soda that comes out of one of their fridges without ice. I have never had an issue storing our luggage beneath the beds but we have soft sided luggage. I think big, hard sided luggage might have an issue. I always store my small pieces inside the bigger pieces and have had good luck.

My experience has been that when your close-in Cruise disappears from the website, it is considered “sold out”. It’s entirely possible that it will reappear if cabins become available but if it has disappeared, you can consider it sold out. I really hate when they do this. I would prefer that they just leave it on the website but show it as sold out.

Update on Liberty's skunky water. Last year the taste of the water was so bad we could not drink it. Luckily we had the DBP so we just ordered bottled water. This year the water is markedly better but still a bit skunky. We do not have the DBP this time so we’re lucky it’s at least drinkable. It seems as though the later into the cruise we get the worst it tastes - kinda like they are getting towards the “bottom of the barrel”. Interestingly, that’s the opposite of what happened last year. The water started out rank and eventually got tolerable, last year, but this year it’s getting worse as time passes. Maybe others aren’t bothered by the taste and smell but it really bothers me. Dan says it’s just “Texas water”. Can’t say that I’ve ever noticed Texas water being a problem in the past. Oh well....

Lol. That’s another thing we love ! That’s one of the main reasons we love the Owners Suite. Love that bidet ! Even some of the big Star Class Suites don’t have a bidet. Shocking ! ??

Personally, I love this setup. I love it so much that I had a similar walk-in design put in my guest bathroom when we renovated. I don’t actually find that we get much water on the floor at all and it is SO much easier to keep clean than a full glass pane or nasty shower curtain. When I had mine built, the glass man was stumped. He had never seen a partial glass wall like this and tried to convince me to add a glass door. He said “you’ll be calling me to come back and fix it”. Nope. I love it ! ...and yes, it is a very European design. One thing I will say about the Royal rooms that offer this design....the sides of the tub are so high that it makes getting in and out so difficult. Mine is a walk-in (converted from an old fashioned tub/shower combo) so there is only a short threshold to step over.

I remember that mayhem. I think Royal learned a few lessons there and hopefully are handling things differently now. I recall that they were expecting cruisers to be prepared to cruise in the midst of Harvey, basically requiring them to come INTO the hurricane hazard area or risk losing their cruise investment. It was not cool. Hopefully they learned something from Harvey.

I went to visit Eliana in the Suites Lounge this morning. She said that all of the welcome emails had been sent to people boarding on Sunday. I recommend looking in both your spam inbox and your trash. For reasons which I have never been able to explain, some emails coming to me from Royal Caribbean go directly to my trash can. I also gave you bad intel. Eliana WILL be here next week. She is not going home yet. So she will be your Suites Concierge after all. For those of you who may have wondered where they hold the sushi-making classes on LIB (since there is no Izumi on this ship) it is Giovanni’s. They have 2 classes tomorrow in the afternoon.

So glad to hear that your pupper is feeling better and in good hands ! Concierges used to contact at 7 days out but lately we’ve consistently heard from our Concierge at 5 days prior to sailing. I’m not sure who your Concierge will be. I believe Eliana told us that this is her last sailing before going on vacation so there must be a changeover this time (could explain their delay in contacting you). TBH it’s probably one of the current Diamond Concierges and we haven’t even stepped foot inside the DL except once to grab a cappuccino only to find that their machine was down....so I have no idea who the Diamond Concierges are. I will try and find out something for you today. BTW, the weather here in Falmouth is lovely today. I had predicted deteriorating weather but as usual, I was wrong. Very hot and sunny and the ocean is like glass. Hope it stays this way all the way home. So glad to be heading to TX vs FL.

More Johnny Rockets recon. We went back for lunch today (Falmouth). JR opened at noon and when we got there at 12:05 the place was already packed. I guess a lot of people decided to stay on the ship today, like us. We went for chili cheese dogs today and while good, not nearly as good as they looked. So here are the details that I did NOT get last trip. The cover charge is $9.95 PP plus 18% gratuity which comes to a grand total of $11.74 PP. That is the price if you walk in off the street with no dining package and it includes unlimited food from the menu and sodas. It does not include milk shakes or malts. Those are $5.00 +18% gratuity for $5.90 all done. If you are D+ you can get BOGO shakes (once only) so you get 2 for 1. This is what we did 2 days ago when we went the first time. Either the refreshment package or the UBP will get you complimentary shakes and malts so if you have both the dining package and any beverage package (exclusive of the water pkg), you can get anything at JR at no charge. The thing you canNOT do is go and get free shakes without paying the cover charge, if you do not have the Unlimited dining package. If you do have both pkgs then you can get just the shakes or shakes, food and sodas. Everything is included if you have both pkgs. Yes, they do still have a line dance for “Stayin’ Alive” which they have performed twice - once on each of our visits. The wait staff on this trip appeared to be very “into” the dancing so it was fun to watch and participate. I have, however, been on ships were the JR staff appeared to be humiliated by the dancing, looking as if they would rather be anywhere else on the planet besides there, doing their little ditty for the gawkers. So I am ambivalent about the JR dancing. Personally, I don’t think I would be too happy to perform for the diners but that’s just me. Like I said, this group really had fun with it so I enjoyed it. I can’t think of any unanswered JR questions but perhaps there are some. I did not ask about children’s pricing. Perhaps that will just have to remain a mystery.

How’s the dog ?

I don’t think there is a 7 day deadline...but I could be wrong. I’ve done very little booking with A2S over the years.

I thought the same thing as we walked around the compound when we were there in July as well. All of those overhead shade covers would have to be taken down and then re-installed later.... so much work.

Update on the fake news Sabor saga. As I mentioned above, we had reservations at Sabor for dinner. When we arrived I politely asked why they had advertised that Sabor was open for lunch today. I was told that the note in the Compass was a mistake (no kidding!) and that it was actually Giovanni’s turn to be open for lunch on “Grand Cayman Day”. Apparently they rotate between Sabor, Giovanni’s and Chops to be open. It was Giovannis day today. I have no idea if THEY were actually open for lunch or not. It never occurred to us to check and see if Giovanni’s (or Chops, for that matter) was open. So the lesson here is that any specialty restaurant is likely to be open for lunch any day - Port day or sea day. On a side note, there was a similar quirk with Izumi on Freedom a few months ago. It was not advertised ANYwhere that Izumi would be open for lunch on any given port day, nevertheless, it was often open on port days for lunch. You just had to show up to find out, I guess.

I am on Liberty now and I did see the offer of the sushi-making class but since we’ve done it twice already, I paid no attention to the price or mention of where they have it. If I get info on it, I will report back. Frankly I was surprised that they would have the class since there is no Izumi on LIB but they do !

Royal promises to keep you safe but not necessarily, dry.

So very sorry to hear of your Grandmother’s prognosis. Hopes that she passes peacefully surrounded by love. I concur that waiting to see what the weather does, is best. You may actually end up with some OBC. Who knows.

I’m exhausted just reading this ! You will have a well-earned rest coming.

More Liberty intel. We went to Chops for dinner last night. We have the UDP. While I was not interested in ordering it, I did ask the waiter whether the upcharge 1.5 LB lobster would be included in the UDP. His answer was “no”. Still no red velvet cake at Chops - even at dinner. The waiter said that sometimes they will offer RVC in the Windjammer but that it is absolutely no longer available any time in Chops. ?? In today’s Compass it showed that Sabor opened at noon (even though today is a port day - Grand Cayman) so we decided that we go get some queso-fundido-by-another-name (queso fondue) and change our dinner reservations to a different venue since we have Sabor scheduled for 6PM. With queso fundido thoughts dancing in our head, we headed to Sabor at 1:00. FAKE NEWS ! Sabor was closed ! Overwhelmed with grief, we decided to settle for Sorrentos. To our great surprise, the pizza was the best we’ve ever had on a Royal Caribbean ship. We had a little Mediterranean olive salad, some tomatoes and mozzarella and a slice of pepperoni pizza. Not queso fundido, to be sure, but not a bad consolation prize either. So now we will keep our Sabor rezzies for tonite and someone will be questioned about the fake news Compass report that said they would be open for lunch. I’m sorry to have to report that my casino winning streak came to end last night. Dan’s is still intact. So I will see how it goes tonite. Last night was brutal ! Still up overall but I can no longer claim that I haven’t had a losing session on this cruise.?? Tomorrow is Labadee. As far as I know the hurricane will not affect our plans to call there but I cannot believe that it will be a great day, weather-wise. Won’t affect us as we weren’t planning on leaving the ship anyway. I guess we’ll see.

Not on Liberty ! ??