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That's not bad, I was worried it was gonna be 90%+ like some of the other ships recently.

I usually bring my fav Haribo gummy bears onboard and store them in the fridge (I like them cold).  Excellent treat at the end of a long night.

My wife and I are going to be on this cruise as well.  You'll find me on the Flowrider all day everyday!

It's easy breezy there don't worry, drop your bags off, drive 50 more ft to the parking garage, park and walk 50 ft back to the terminal.

2 hours ago, Bill S said:

Seriously?  I went on it on Liberty last week.  My wife and friends made me do it. I'm in my 60s.  Everyone was giving me tips.  My wife knew, but no one else did.  I grew up in a beach community, and surfed a bit as a kid, but pretty much went to body surfing for the last 40 years.  I told everyone the truth: "This is my first time".   I had zero problems. Even on my knees. I got a lot of "DUDE!"s. But I just didn't get the appeal.  Real waves are just so much better. 

I love doing the standup surfing on the Flowrider, to me it's alot of fun and I get a very good workout from it.  I don't get to do Flowboarding on land (no Flowrider near me) so I try to get as much time in on the ship as I can.

Are these free chairs and umbrellas throughout the multiple beaches in Labadee?  We reserved one of those clam/shell for our upcoming trip but may cancel if chairs and umbrellas are readily available.

The Flowrider.  It's about 80% of the reason why I even do cruises.  

I visited PR for work years ago.  If you are looking to spend time on a beach, the San Juan ones are very crowded.   If you can rent a car you can drive west away from San Juan, within half hour or so there will be beaches after beaches with no one in it. 

Was on Symphony last Sept and Oasis in Dec, I saw  people playing pickle ball inside the basketball court every morning.

If you have an unlocked phone you should look into Google Fi, that's what my wife has started, plans are pro-rated depends on when you start the service and you can suspend anytime.  With Google Fi you will get internet when you are on any of the islands where cell services are available.

appreciate the info guys.  "There is an app/website", are you talking about the Royal Carribean app or is this a separate app that you have to download? do you know the name of it?  thank you again.

Does Royal provide free PCR tests for Canadian cruise across all its ships?  planning a cruise on Symphony of the Seas out of Miami with my wife's family (they live in Canada) and would like to see if we need to take the extra costs into account.

Thanks.

Wiping out (and watching people wipe out) is definitely part of the fun (as long as no one gets hurt).  Flowboarding is a great exercise too, it doesn't matter how much I eat on the ship, I usually end up losing weight when I go cruising because I'm on the Flowrider for hours everyday!

9 hours ago, JohnK6404 said:

Oasis last week was around 2,800 according to a couple of crew members. The Captain made a comment one evening in the MDR that there was almost a 1:1 crew to passenger ratio on our cruise.

Very few lines. One evening after dinner my wife and I were alone in one of the pools on the pool deck and alone again in one of the hot tubs. I felt bad for the lifeguard... he was pacing back and forth and there was no one in the pool! 

Even on sea days, we never had a problem locating a lounger or table in the solarium or on the pool deck. The only issue at times was the capacity restrictions in the pools (9 on the pool decks and 17 in the solarium pool - not sure why more in the solarium!) and hot tubs (6 for the normal sized hot tubs). Occasionally, they would ask someone to get out of the pool or sit on the ledge.

No lines for any of the activities on our ship... you could walk right up to the Ultimate Abyss, water slides, zip line, etc. The crew was amazing.

 

Going on Oasis in 2 weeks, how were the lines at the Flowrider with 2800 onboard? 

Was on Symphony last month and noticed they changed some rules as well.  Most noticeable one being they won't help you do standup anymore, you'd have to get into the wave yourself since apparently RC got sued because someone got hurt when the instructor "pushed" that person in.

I bring my small cordless handheld fan with me whenever I travel.  It's got a 5200mah battery so it lasts a long time.  I use it in my stateroom at night and while I'm eating at the dining room.

Symphony 9/4 had ~2000 passengers, crew said the weeks before that they were running at 1,300.  They also said they were about to ramp up to 3,000 in the coming weeks, but looks like someone here already point out the 9/18 sailing only had 1,800 so I guess no one really knows for sure with future cruises.

My wife and I recently watched some recent Nassau Bahamas walkthrough videos on YouTube (we are stopping there in 4 weeks).  Some videos as recent as 4 weeks ago still showed Nassau being almost a ghost town (Straw Market not open).  I'd recommend u watch some of those videos as well to get a idea.  

I'd suggest you call Royal and confirm.  There's a thread here i read where someone listed the capacity for Symphony for the past few weeks and it appears Royal does turn around quite a few people every sailing due to improper vaccine/covid test paperwork.

Formal night or not, it doesn't stop people going in wearing t-shirts and shorts.

We did try to locate the Avis locations but they are not near the terminal at all.  We ended up walking out and there were plenty of people trying to rent u jeeps, buggies, cars, etc by the port.  We ended up renting a Jeep for $65 with liability and collision included.  

11 hours ago, Srp431 said:

How is it managed? Is there a line or reservations .How long do you get until you have to leave?

Honestly I'm not sure how they enforce the max. limit for pools and hot tubs (there aren't lines or reservations).  I don't use the pool but I think just like the chairs by the pool they are first come first served.  I think naturally if people see the pool and the hot tubs are full they just don't go in.

By Dec they likely will be back at full capacity (crew said RCL is aiming Nov), so yeah the pool will always be packed during normal capacity unfortunately.

We boarded last Saturday at the Miami port and the lines were super long.  Our boarding time was 1:30pm and got there at 1:15pm.  There were 2 segments to the line though, make sure you talk to someone at the first segment of the line if you get there near your assigned boarding time so you don't wait all the way in the back along with people who got there much earlier than their assigned time.  We ended up on the ship around 2:15-2:30pm.

We just got off the Symphony of the Seas with 2000 people onboard.  We never went into the pool, but the hot tubs have a sign that says max 5 people.   For the 7 days onboard I was in a tub with at most 3 people.   I wouldn't worry too much about the limit unless they start ramping up the capacity.