MattG

NOTE: This will be a picture-heavy post, i'm making up for prior posts! DAY 6 - Sea Day Today was our second sea day. Normal wake-up time, and headed to Windjammer for breakfast. It was miserable outside, clouds, wind, rain and fog: The pool deck was pretty empty around 8:30am We dropped the oldest two off at Adventure Ocean, and kept the youngest as the nursery was full with reservations. We stayed and played at the "Play Place", which is an open playroom that anyone can come to at any time. A really cool idea that I hope comes to all ships: We walked up to the Solarium, and through the Solarium Bistro. The Solarium Bistro's breakfast is the same as the Windjammer, just paired down slightly. It's a nice, quieter place to eat breakfast. Chef's Table is in one of the alcoves at Solarium Bistro: The bridge wings weren't open, not sure if it was too early, or due to weather: We continued our walk around the pool deck, and saw the storm we just passed through: Splashaway Bay was not open yet, and about 1/4 of the water features were turned off (compared to earlier days). This meant the existing water features had a lot more water pressure. The wife, youngest, and I swung by the Schooner Bar for some general trivia. We didn't do great, getting 10/20. After trivia, we did a lazy walk to the Music Hall to watch the housekeeping staff do a towel-folding demo. There was an emcee who narrated each step as individual members built their animals, then showcased them: The Music Hall on Oasis has a bit of an odd shape. It's "T"-shaped, meaning you walk in the main entrance down a walkway with chairs on either side, until it opens up when you get to the dance floor and the stage. The view behind the stage to the Boardwalk is gorgeous. I do rather prefer the Music Hall on Quantum-class ships - it's much more of an open space, this feels very tight. After towel-folding, we did another lazy walk back up to Adventure Ocean, walking through Central Park. This space reminds me so much of The Via on Quantum-class ships: peaceful and serene, with a lot of small surprises: We played a bit more in the Play Place, then picked up the kiddos and headed to the Boardwalk for Johnny Rockets for lunch. It was the Boardwalk Celebration Party! I forgot about this event, and we picked a great time to go to Johnny Rockets There were a TON of people, along with a live band playing old-timey music. There were some neat kids games, like hula hoops, giant Jenga/building blocks, bowling, Connect4, lots of interactive elements. We all got lunch and the kids came back and forth from the games to the food. It was a really good time! After lunch, the wife took the girls to the art auction, and I took the youngest to the belly flop competition: There was a huge crowd all around the beach pool, and a great time was had by all! After the belly flop competition, we took the kids back to Splashaway for a bit, before getting ready for dinner at our second pass of 150 Central Park. Our youngest wasn't feeling well (he's also potty training, so we're pretty sure it's related), so the wife took him back to our room while the rest of us continued. This time I got the Lamb Wellington: It was interesting, a much smaller portion than I’m used to for Wellington. It was pretty good! Of course, got the fried cheesecake again. It's sooooo amazing: Tonight was another showing of "Frozen in Time", so the girls went with our traveling family and I went back to the stateroom. Our youngest was doing MUCH better, so I tagged out with the wife and she headed down to the MDR with a book for some quiet time. Tomorrow is our final day!

Also see 9:24 here:

One of the "Making an Icon" video showed a brief section of this, inside the sphere are small (like 5"x5") LED panels on articulating arms. They are throughout the entire inside face of the sphere. I don't think it's a sit-down show, but a really neat effect as you transit through the space. See here: (timestamp 2:32)

On Oasis, I was told the larger tables (and larger parties) are on Deck 5, with 2- and 4-tops being on the lower decks.

Going post-liveblog now, thanks for your patience! Day 5 - Nassau Because we've got little kids, it becomes a bit of a chore to "go out": Do we have water bottles? Does anyone need to use the bathroom? Do we need to bring snacks? Because of this, we usually treat Nassau stops like another sea day. A bit exhausted by the Windjammer, this morning we went in the Main Dining Room for breakfast. The line was short, the sunlight was beaming into the room, and we felt like we were back on Anthem again. The kiddos did well, everyone had pancakes (fresh!). I had the Harvest Bowl, which is all veggies topped with two over-medium eggs. It was a smaller portion, but still very filling. We dropped the kids at Adventure Ocean, and I headed to the spa for a deep-tissue massage. This is my first deep-tissue massage - everyone i've gotten in the past has been good, but I still wanted more. Well, this was DEEP. The masseuse DUG into my muscles, and worked out everything. My calves felt like I had just come from the gym for a few hours, and my shoulders felt released and relaxed. Unfortunately, I timed the massage just as the staff decided to test the emergency horn/bell, so I had two rude awakenings during my massage. It didn't bother me much, but was bad timing on my part. After the massage, I went back to the stateroom and changed into my bathing suit to hit the hot tub for a bit before picking up the kids at AO. Walking back, I saw something billowing down INTO Central Park - like mist or steam. I chalked it up to pool maintenance, and headed up to the Solarium. It was here that I realized we were docked next to Freedom and Independence, and our pool deck was at the same elevation as their smoke stacks. Due to the wind, their exhaust was blowing straight onto the mid-ship pools, and down into Central Park. Not pleasant at all. We had lunch at El Loco Fresh and Portside BBQ, and the youngest fell asleep mid-tortilla chip. The wife took him back to the cabin to nap and for her to do some work, and I took the girls Splashaway Bay for some pool time: After going back and changing, we headed to Adventure Ocean to ask for a copy of the scavenger hunt: The girls and I had a blast walking throughout the ship answering the questions. We did it somewhat lazily - we would end up on the Boardwalk for a question, and hang out and ring the carousel or watch Aqua80s rehearsal. Then we'd go up to the FlowRiders for question, and say and watch the surfers for a while. I got them a virgin Coco Loco to split, and they thought it was the best thing ever! After the FlowRiders, we went to the Sport Court and did some of the archery. It's pretty neat, they use suction cups to stick to a plastic board. When we walked back to the stateroom to get ready for dinner, I noticed a half-dozen Central Park Balcony rooms not in service: Not getting the obvious, I went to the stateroom corridor with these missing stateroom, and noticed the lack of doors: Walking for a bit, I saw an access door and lots of machine noises behind it. It was this point I realized that the pools are where these staterooms would be. Duh. Still interesting they don't dress the Central Park-facing area up at all. The girls and I headed back to the stateroom to get ready for dinner. Tonight was our first repeat of UDP at Chops. Our first night was on Embarkation Day, and the service was choppy then. Tonight, it was still inconsistent - 30 minutes from sit-down to ordering apps, lots of different faces, I wasn't sure who our server was. This time I got the "jumbo lump crabcake" that didn't have jumbo lump, or any lump. I got the branzino as my main, and it was really, really good. Total time to dine was 2 hours 15 minutes, and I feel a lot of that time was waiting - we were done courses and they just...sat. Not a great impression. As we wrapped up, it was windy and POURING RAIN in Central Park! We grabbed some umbrellas and shuffled into the elevator lobby. By the time we got back to the stateroom, the rain and wind had stopped. Super weird squall! Once we put the kids to bed, I was super exhausted, but the wife wanted to go out. We handed off to our travel friends and scoped out the Aquatheater to see if the late show of Aqua80s was still running. We saw it letting out at 9:30pm, almost 30 minutes later than expected. The host said they had technical issues that delayed the show, but still finished it, and still plan to run the next show on time. To burn some time, the wife and I rode Rising Tide twice, and I was so fried I couldn't make it to 10:30pm for the next Aqua80s show. Random Thoughts: The scavenger hunt with the kids was wonderful, and really gave me the breath of fresh air i've been looking for this cruise so far. I wish I had done this on Day 2! There's a consistent trend i've noticed of not everything being at 100% functionality. While it's lots of little things, they're all adding up: about 30% of the video games in Challenger's Arcade aren't functioning Two of the eight water faucets in one of the Windjammer entrances weren't sensing hands Lots of soap dispensers are out of soap Some of the water jets in Splashaway Bay are really weak, several others not working at all. Don't get me wrong - when you look at Splashaway Bay, you see lots of kinetic activity - the water bucket, the water slides, water jets everywhere. But when you look closer, you see lots of things not working as well. It makes me wonder how amazing this experience would be if all of these things were working.

I’m super jelly of all you still getting paper compasses with no resistance

Thanks for this - this is also what prompted me to go digging. So much of the marketing around the ship is “Use the app! Use the app!”. We didn’t see the “Cruise Compass going green” card in our stateroom, the first time we saw it was on the Cruise Compass TV channel. Yep, at Oasis’s Guest Services is the same thing: empty CC boards, but a QR code nearby.

Day 4 - CocoCay We’ve settled into a good rhythm in Windjammer breakfast. The quality is okay, the selection seems thin, but when the goal is to get food in kids stomachs, sometimes you have to make do. We’re a bit forward, so sometimes we walk down the stateroom corridor to the mid-ship elevators, sometimes we walk up to the pool deck and walk across. Our docking time was 9:00am, with gangway down at 9:30am, so we were approaching Coco Cay as we walked into the Windjammer at 8:00am. The future “Adults Only” section is still a pile of sand, with little in the way of progress or anything looking finished: We finished up brekkie and went to the room to change into bathing suits, and then headed to the promenade to wait for the cringe-worthy song (sorry) telling us the gangway was down. While waiting, the Wife pointed out a numbered facade on the Promenade, and inquired if it was some sort of inside joke among cruisers - she said it reminded her of Club 33 at Disney. Does anyone have any idea what this is? I didn’t get any photos of getting off the ship, but I did grab a photo of Oasis from the bridge to Chill Island: When we got halfway down the pier, I looked back at Oasis and said outloud “holy f*ck that’s a big ship.” It’s just like to took a skyscraper and laid it on it’s end, it’s just unconscionable that something like this exists, but there it is. We were lucky to be solo in CocoCay, no other ships joined us. It made the entire place feel comfortable and not overwhelmed. We posted up at the same place as our last trip, the back portion of the middle (smaller) of the three coves on Chill Island. There’s a cluster of palm trees that, with the umbrellas, provides us shade all day. We got ourselves situated then went down to the beach to play for a bit. The water was cool, but nice and clear. The weather was mid-80s, and plenty of clouds in the sky to provide relief every few minutes. It was truly a perfect day. After about an hour at the beach, we went (with a Coco Loco stop in between) to Captain Jill’s Galleon, the pirate ship at the Welcome Plaza. It’s a play area for smaller kids where Splashaway Bay may be too intense. There’s water jets, a few water slides, a rope climb, and a crow’s nest to climb to. All of the kids had a blast here for another hour before we headed to Splashaway Bay. Splashaway Bay is one of the neatest kids water parks that I’ve been to, it’s large enough to accommodate age groups up to teens, who would then be better served by Thrill Waterpark. One downside is the moment you set foot on the proper “park” portion, you’re going to get wet, as there are sprayers/misters everywhere. Our middle child doesn’t care for that, so she happily played in the perimeter sand while the oldest went up and down the adjacent water slides for another hour. Unfortunately, we were told adults can’t go down these slides, which was different than we were told last December (I definitely went down these slides!): After a bit more time at the slides, we went back to our chairs, then to Chill Grill for lunch. We brought out food back to the chairs and ate while the kids played in the sand, being careful to keep food covered so we don’t get a seagull bombing (which happened twice in 10 minutes!). It was difficult to get more photos from this point, as I didn’t want to carry my phone and get it wet. After lunch, we went back to the beach for a bit, then our youngest fell asleep at the chairs. I took the girls over to Oasis Lagoon and swam for a bit, before our middle child wanted to go back to the chairs and play more in the sand. After passing off to the Wife, the oldest and I played more in the pool, before wrapping up to head back. Curious about South Beach, we walked out the south end of Oasis Lagoon and took the tram road down to South Beach. This was my first time here, and I really liked it! It was more of a traditional beach, still having chairs but directly facing the ocean (no cove cut-out). The distance between the chairs and the water was much deeper too, giving more room for activities. South Beach is not very large, the entrance is right next to the overwater cabanas and goes for a little ways. It has its own Snack Shack for food. Due to its size, it’s very quiet and feels very secluded, you get no noise from Thrill Waterpark, Splashaway Bay, or any of the music/DJs of Oasis Lagoon. It feels like a different world. After touring South Beach, we grabbed the tram back to Chill Island to pick up the rest of the family, and head back to the ship at 2:30pm. It was much earlier than the all-aboard at 5:00pm, but the kids were fried, one was still napping, and we didn’t want to push prepping for dinner. Once the girls were ready for dinner, we saw that there was an open ice-skating session, so we decided to take it for a spin: There’s a waiver you need to sign at the entrance of Studio B, and they add a sticker to your SeaPass card. Depending on how busy the ice skating is, you can pick from one of four 20-minute skating sessions to participate. Because it wasn’t busy, the staff gave us passes for the current session. Once your waiver is complete, you head down into the open end of the ice rink to show the attendant your sticker, then pick up your skates and helmet. We went around the rink with the girls twice (well, the girls hanging onto my arms or the wall because they can’t really skate yet ), and we wrapped up and headed back up to the stateroom to pick up the rest of the family. Tonight was dinner at Izumi Hibachi. It’s located on Deck 4 in the same location as Izumi Sushi. When you walk into Izumi, you turn left towards the Hibachi tables. There are three tables with 10 chairs each, and it’s not a large area at all: Overall, it was a good show, and the food was okay. The fried rice was (and always is) my favorite part. There’s no fire like a normal hibachi show, and the chefs all did the same tricks. Some of the other chefs were more improvisational and had more outgoing personalities. The kids loved it. After the kids went to bed, it was close to the first seating of Aqua80s. I didn’t have a reservation, but I figured I’d find standing room somewhere to watch the show. There was a line for “No Reservation Guests” that was only about 10 people deep, and the host said “You can stand upstairs at the rock wall, or in the splash zone”. I asked how “splash” the splash zone was, and the host laughed, then with a serious tone said “we give you towels for a reason”. I went up to the rock wall, and not being impressed with the distance to the stage, headed down to the splash zone. I found a seat in the third row on the far right side, imaging I’d be safe. I sat down just in time for “Power of Love” start and see the flying rig in action. After Marty left, the opening act began, and guys, when I say this soundtrack is , I’m not kidding. I would pay cash money for a copy of this soundtrack, the mashups are SO GOOD. The choreography is good, the lighting is top notch, but the star of this show is the soundtrack, my goodness. Here’s a few more show shots: I have to insist anyone going on Oasis has got to see this show, it is a MUST DO! After Aqua80s, I headed down to the Royal Theater for the Love and Marriage game show: It was a great show, and the youngest couple won! The first time I had seen that happen, usually it’s the oldest couple that wins, but this young couple was on fire tonight. Tomorrow is Nassau. We have no plans to get off the ship, see you then!

Re-visiting my "TIPS FOR NEXT TIME" from the last cruise: Did this and don't regret it one bit. Magnet hooks continue to reign supreme. We lost about 25% of our hooks from the last trip, so we got another 10-pack of 25lb hooks and brought everything, and we're using all of them: Another win. One of the shoe-organizers was heavy, and used most of the magnet power before loading down, so we left that one home. The standard one has been in constant use with kids shoes: it gives them a place to put them (NOT ON THE FLOOR!) and they can easily pick the pair they want. We also use it for hairbrushes, hair ties, chargers, cables, etc: Still doing it! Definitely did this, but not enough socks this time. I paced myself on Day 1, but kinda forgot about this later in the week, especially the late-night drinking and affecting sleep. I realized this by Day 5 and cut myself off after dinner, and that helped sleep quality a lot. I forgot to refresh the downloaded content before we left, but we haven't had nearly as much screen time on this cruise as last time, so the content already downloaded plus the brief VOOM connections have worked out well. Can confirm - VOOM is a savior at dinner. We got a 2-device package for this cruise as we're sharing it with another family, though being able to bring another device online without kicking the other (like a kid's tablet) has been awesome

On our cruise on Anthem last December, it took until Day 3 to get regular Cruise Compasses (I was able to get our attendant to gather a Day 1 and Day 2 copy for me to complete the set). On our current cruise on Oasis, no amount of cajoling or reminding our attendant has produced consistent Cruise Compasses. We ask every day, and we've only been given Day 3 and Day 5 in our stateroom. I've seen them around in other guests hands so I know they exist. I've resorted to nicking them off the attendant's cart (sorry bro) or picking up folded-up leftovers. I could go to Guest Services but that would be a hike, plus however long standing in line. It's certainly made me use the app more, but for people like my wife, she'll just go without it and not really check the app, possibly missing out on something she'd might want to do.

We're in a Deck 12 CP balcony on Oasis right now, and there's a LOT of bleed from the pool deck into our room, especially when the band is playing. With CP on Deck 8 and the Interior CP View rooms on Deck 9, I'd recommend Deck 12 for a properly immersive experience.

Hi everyone, I've heard about the Cruise Compass "going digital", and all the activities are in the Royal app. I don't mind it, but my wife certainly misses the paper Cruise Compass - something to read in bed, or at a meal and plan the day rather than relying on technology to find events. Even then, it's several more steps (find phone, unlock phone, find & open Royal app, fix WiFi, re-open the app, find the Planner, etc). I've recently seen a few Cruise Compasses pop up in the archive that look like perfect PDF replicas of the Cruise Compass, but while on board Oasis there was no indication of how to access it. On Day 6, I flipped through the TV stations and went to the Cruise Compass channel, where I was presented with a QR code, which goes to: https://minio.rccl.com/compass/cruisecompass.pdf Lo and behold, it's the PROPER Cruise Compass in PDF form! While I can't print this out, it's identical to the paper Cruise Compass that's being phased out. The URL above should work for anyone connected to ship WiFi.

Also realized I never actually answered about the ACTUAL balcony experience: the CP balcony is nice to overlook the park, but on deck 12 you get a LOT of spillover from the pool deck, including the live band when they’re playing. I would recommend deck 10 if you’re doing a CP balcony. Additionally, when in Nassau, the exhaust from the neighboring ships spilled over into the pool deck and into Central Park, which was unpleasant for the day.

Thank you! I write these because I get so much info from the other live blogs, I feel the need to give back. In 2015, we had an Oceanview Balcony on Grandeur, and really loved it. With the family now, balcony staterooms are a "nice to have", and we'd rather save the money or put it towards a family-inclusive activity. That leads us to start at Interior rooms. This is the first time being on Oasis. Last cruise on Anthem we had two connecting Interior with Virtual Balcony rooms. We were also traveling with another adult in our party (so 3 adults, 3 kids across two connecting rooms). The connecting rooms made sense as it gave our other adult room for her clothes, her own bathroom, her own bed, etc. When we looked into this cruise, we initially booked two interior connecting rooms again (cheapest at this time was Interior Central Park View) , but a few months later realized our third adult wouldn't be joining us. I started considering other options, and saw 5+ rooms throughout the Oasis deck plans for non-suite staterooms. When I went to price out 5+ rooms, the 5+ Central Park Balcony staterooms were cheaper than 5+ Oceanview staterooms, so that's what led us to the room we have now. So, about the 5+ room: There's the normal "big bed", the sofa bed that folds out, and there's also a bed that, when stowed, sits flush with the ceiling. When unlocked by the stateroom attendant, it unfolds to a vertical position, then the bed nested inside unfolds again to be parallel with the ceiling. It provides a great afternoon activity space if we're in the stateroom in the afternoon, or if the girls are up earlier than the boy and want to play together. There's a free-floating aluminum ladder with hooks at the top, you can attach it to the side of the bed nearer the "big bed", or on the side near the TV. It stows with the bed when not in use. We watched a few stateroom tours of a standard Oasis room, and gauged our storage. There was enough for the Wife and I in the wardrobe, but not much else for the kids. Anthem had these great over-bed cabinets that don't exist here. The past few family trips, we packed the kids clothes in gallon ziploc bags - Day 1 Morning, Day 1 Evening, Day 2 Morning, Day 2 Evening, plus jammies, bathing suits, and extra sets of clothes. So basically each kid had ~20 ziploc bags with clothes. Then we put all their ziploc bags in their respective suitcases (actually duffel bags that collapse). When we get on the ship, we open the suitcase, stand up the ziploc bags, and sort them based on when they need them, then slide them under the "big bed". When it's time to change, each kid knows where their suitcase is, pulls it out, pulls out their outfit, and pushes the suitcase back under the bed. We have a giant (it can fit multiple bodies) collapsable duffel bag that we unfold and use as a laundry bag. It's actually a stroller gate check bag for Southwest. The kids (and adults) put all dirty clothes in the duffel, and at the end of the cruise, we zip it up and take it home with us. We then take the kids empty duffel bags and stuff them into one of the parents suitcases, so we have less luggage to travel home with. We also brought, like 25 magnet hooks and a hanging shoe organizer, and we're using a LOT of wall space. There's never anything on the walkable floor in this room. I say all of that to say: There's enough space in this 5+ stateroom for 2 adults and 3 smaller kids. We could probably pull this off until the kids are 10, and then we'd need more space. We could stretch those ages a little later if we had a Jr Suite, as the extra square footage and storage space would go farther. If we had older kids, we'd need more room for larger clothes, more space for getting ready, more room for accessories/electronics, another shower for getting ready, etc. I hope I answered your question! If not, let me know and I'll try again

Sorry for the lack of posts, I haven’t had a lot of time to sit down and write the narratives I like to write Rest assured, I’ve been taking notes so I can write them later, and taking more photos. I have lots to say on this let me write some things up and get back to you.

Day 4 - CocoCay I'm fried from today, so today's update is coming tomorrow. Here are some photos to hold you over

Thank you! My planning strategy is to have a few "anchor events" (meals, family activities), with pockets of time in between to fill in during the cruise of spontaneous activities. Unfortunately, a lot of the activities we wanted to are being completely ignored by us because some other circumstance takes over, like an unplanned nap, or a show being full, or AO missing a reservation, etc. We have to big challenges on this trip: The first is making sure everyone's having a good time - I think I'm starting to hit my own personal limit of how to make sure a 6 year old, 4.5 year old, and 3 year old are having fun doing the same thing. All three have different, unique personalities that need nurturing in different ways, so finding an activity that makes all three happy has been a challenge. The second one is that our 3 year old has developed a skin rash of some kind. It's very mild, nobody else is presenting symptoms, and his demeanor hasn't changed other than a tiny bit of lethargy. We're thinking it's an allergic reaction to something on the sheets, but he's become a bit of an unknown variable.

On Oasis now, and there's no sign of Starlink dishes anywhere. I've done a few laps of the top decks, and haven't found any sign of a Starlink deployment.

Can confirm: On Oasis currently and cocktails are at $14.

On Oasis now. We're in a Central Park balcony, and the HDMI port on the side of the TV are readily accessible. There are no streaming apps for the TV, you'd have to bring your own device, like an iPad or Roku (something that can handle a WiFi portal). I can't imagine the stateroom remote will let you change inputs so may be best to bring a Universal Remote with you. Attached is a photo of the side of the TV, as well as the sticker on the back with the make/model.

Day 3 Evening After Boat School and nap time, we get everyone dressed and head down to Park Cafe for a snack before dinner. The Wife is not quite back from her spa appointment, so myself and the three kiddos head down to Central Park to burn some time before dinner. We grab a kummelweck (duh), some kiwis, and some chips, and enjoy the scenery and some snacks. The Wife and our other family joined us at 5:00pm, and we enjoyed Central Park for a few minutes before heading into Giovanni's for our dinner. Giovanni's was the place I was least interested in visiting on UDP, but ended up being our favorite so far, simply because the atmosphere and waitstaff were so cool. All of the uptightness I felt for the past few days melted away, and our servers just made everything easy. It could also be because the kids are finally adapting to cruise life, but this was the first meal that felt easy. I'm gaining confidence in asking the waitstaff to make modifications to the kids selections that are more appropriate for our particular kids, and the staff has been amazing at accommodation. For dinner, I went with the mussels for an appetizer, and the bucatini alla bolognese as the main. Both were really good. Apologies for the lack of photos. For dessert, I went with the chocolate torta and the cannolis. The torta was an amazing combination of flavors (probably amplified by the several glasses of Chianti). I can't praise the waitstaff at Giovanni's enough - they handled our kids like pros. One of the chefs even came out and chatted with us for 10 minutes, really engaging us and the kids in conversation. Pro tip to any RC staff: any amount of engagement with our kids makes us parents happy. The more you engage our kids, the more loyal we are to RC. This includes housekeeping staff, bar staff, wait staff, etc. Chat with our kids, make our kids laugh, and you've got us hooked. After Giovanni's, the wife and her BFF headed out for a "night on the town", and us dads hung back with the kids. We headed to the Boardwalk and hit up the carousel for a few rides, before calling it a night and heading back to bed. Sorry i haven't taken more photos today, I will try harder over the next few days. Random Thoughts: Day 2 felt really stressful as everyone adapted to cruise life for the week. Personally, i'm an over-planner: A project manager at heart, I have to make sure everyone is happy. The first 36 hours on the ship was all I had to go on, and it was a bit rough. However, going into Day 3 evening, everything started to relax and it felt like we finally "took a breath". The kids are finally starting to adapt to ship life. The late night live instrumental music in Central Park is just wonderful. Central Park really reminds me of The Via on Anthem of the Seas - a quiet, serene place to relax. I think I prefer Anthem because its indoors, but Central Park is so well curated and designed, it has to be acknowledged how perfect of a space it is. I'm glad they're doing something similar on Icon of the Seas I've only now just noticed there's no giant TV/big screen near the pool deck on Oasis. On @Matt's Wonder of the Seas walkthrough, I recall there being a TV overhanging Central Park that's visible from Central Park as well as the aft part of the pool deck, but nothing like that exists for Oasis. I wonder why, it's such a typical staple of RC ships! The number of Genie sightings is high! Thanks to all you wonderful Star Class cruisers, the Genie wardrobe is so easy to pick out, and i'm pretty sure i've spotted three of the four Genies on Oasis. Two of them were facilitating their guests dining experience at Giovanni's. While waiting for their guests, I mentioned how awesome they are at their job (from what i've heard from other cruisers here), and we chatted for a bit about their love of the job. I didn't get any names, but rest assured, if you're cruising Star Class on Oasis any time soon, you're in good hands. Late-night Sorrento's pizza can't be beat. We just left cellular range of Port Canaveral, and Wifi is misbehaving, so no photos in this post. Sorry!

Day 3 Morning Everyone slept in a little later today, and got up around 6:30am. Dressed and out the door, we headed back to the Windjammer as it was the only real place open (Solarium Bistro is 9am, MDR is 8am, Johnny Rockets is 8am). There's always Park Cafe, but the consistency of Windjammer is what's getting the kids to eat. We got some food in them, and headed back down to mini golf to burn some time before 9am drop-off at AO. Our youngest is in AO Babies (the nursery), and they only let in one family at a time. Unfortunately this creates a bottleneck of parents trying to drop off toddlers. One of the families was in for over 20 minutes, and really ate into our reservation time. It would have been nice to have a second person checking in families right at opening time. This morning, I vowed to do all of the adult stuff I can't do with kids attached. Bathing suit donned, I headed to Deck 15 Aft. Ultimate Abyss: Super cool, a little slow, but I realized I have to lay waaaaaay back and pull waaaaay up on the front strap to gain speed. Gonna try that one again. Racing Slide (Orange): I swear I launched myself down this slide, only to end up going sooo slow. I was wearing a rash guard, not thinking it would be causing more friction. Maybe try that again another time. Supercell (The toilet bowl): What a drop at the top! Tore up my back a little bit, but spun around the bowl twice before dropping in to the landing zone. Definitely another try! Racing Slide (Pink): I ditched the rash guard for this one, launched myself down the slide, and FLEW through. Definitely ditching the rash guard going forward! Flowrider (boogie board side): I have never done this, but I have boogie boarded in the ocean. The concepts are the same, but staying centered all around is harder than it looks. I kept racing forward, then sliding back to the top of the ramp, then racing forward again. I ended up digging in my feet to control my forward/back movement. Wiped out a few times, but felt like I had better idea for the next time. The line for the water slides takes you to one of the highest points on the ship, where this morning we were coming up on the Space Coast. The VAB was immediately visible, as well as SpaceX's SLC-40 (which I mistook for LC39-A at first). As we got closer to port and I got re-oriented, I found ULA's SLC-41, re-found SLC-40, and in the distance found SLC-39A and SpaceX's new launch tower. Pretty cool for a space nerd. As we also got into port, With all of those items checked off, I headed back to AO for pickup. After pickup, we headed to El Loco Fresh and Portside BBQ for lunch. Half of us went to each, and met up at the tables behind facing Oasis Dunes. It was at this time that there was a ship wide announcement that, due to a water pipe burst, there was no running water throughout the ship. Oops. We got our food, and I have to say that Portside compares favorably to Mission BBQ for those on the eastern side of the US. Good tenderness on the brisket, the chicken is moist, and the sides are all good. The burnt ends are fantastic. The kids are still adapting and getting punchy, and some of the grownups have spa appointments, so we divide and conquer. Our middle child is super sleepy, so we take her and our other family's youngest back to nap, while the other three go to Splashaway Bay. Word on the street is they had a BLAST! Mid-afternoon, we do a shuffle for spa appointments, and I take two to do some quiet tablet time while the oldest do some boat school. Tonight is Giovanni's Table for dinner. Random Thoughts: No sign of Starlink antennas anywhere on the top of the ship. I've walked the length twice, and can't find anything looking like a Starlink antenna as shown on the other ships. No idea on headcount yet, but it's gotta be close to max capacity. AO Babies (the nursery) is fully booked on Day 6 and Day 7, so we've got the littles all day. The nursery said we can check-in a little after opening, and if there are no-shows, we can drop them off. Unfortunately we had the Escape Room booked for Day 6 morning, so we're going to play that one by ear. I'm a bit disappointed at some capacity caps. Specialty restaurants are understandable, but when it comes to entertainment, I feel like there should never be a circumstance that all of the shows are fully booked. We've been struggling since Day 1 to get Frozen in Time and Aqua80s booked, and the app just kicks us out of the reso process saying there's a problem. When I call the Reservation Help Desk, they tell us "Oh, those shows are full." Or "The only one with space left is the last day at 10:30pm". I'm bummed that the kids won't be able to experience both of these shows. I'm not sure how to resolve this, other than opening reservations the morning of? Starting to feel the fatigue of being on the Oasis class, and completely understand the draw of the smaller ships. Everything here is a hike. On the other hand, I'm also very grateful at the opportunities I have here that don't exist on Vision/Radiance-class. Trying to remember to take photos. I love the liveblogs chock-full of photos, and I have a bunch, but most are family photos I'm not comfortable putting online, and I don't want to duplicate photos that are already out there. Any requests? In the meantime, here are more food photos

I have to get better about taking notes in the moment... Day 2 Evening It's taken me a while, but I'm finally realizing that while kids are pretty adaptable, tossing them into a new environment really throws them off. Everyone's bit groggy, over-stimulated, being pulled in different directions. Putting myself in their shoes, I can imagine it's hard to adapt when you're still learning the concepts of planning, strategy, where are we going to eat next, etc. The parents always figure that stuff out, but it may not be what you (as a kid) want. Our youngest (M3) came out of Adventure Ocean in a great mood, but by the time we got to lunch, he was really cranky. We first chalked it up to tiredness, but his crankiness read a little differently. We decided to bring him back to the room to nap while the older two did "boat school" (some school lessons while on vacation). I stayed back and monitored nap time while writing yesterday's Day 2 Morning post. He slept most of the afternoon, and the girls came back from the pool to change for dinner right around the time he woke up. We all changed for dinner, and went to 150 Central Park. What a classy place They had our table for 9 ready, a 5-top and a 4-top, but similar to Chops, we put all the kids on the bench and wrapped four chairs around the other side and turned the 5-top into a 9-top. The servers adapted perfectly, and were fantastic. I ordered the garden martini, and it was sooo good. Super smooth, no taste of alcohol (but it was there!). All of the food was great - the wife got the scallops and the Tenderloin for one, I got the pork belly and the lobster Thermidor. The pork belly was a little tough, but had a great flavor. The scallops were smoky and wonderful. I'm a sucker for lobster, and the lobster Thermidor was a great hit. Then came dessert. You guys, the fried cheesecake is everything. All the reviews are true. It's unreal how good this dessert is. It's the fried sweetness of funnel cake, with the creaminess of cheesecake. I'm 100% going back again sometime this cruise to get it again, somehow. The caramel popcorn on top is a great garnish. After wrapping up at 150CP, we headed over to the carousel to give the kids a few rides before heading off to bed. Insert record scratch here We're coming to realize that, while dinner with our three kids is one thing, dinner with five kids (our three, plus two from the other family cruising with us) is a whole other beast. So many more dynamics to wrangle, while trying to teach good manners in a "fancy restaurant" and not bum-rush the cocktail cart. The youngest was also in rare form at dinner, both refusing to eat and saying he was hungry. I wrangled him and took him down to Cafe Promenade where we got him two apples, and he completely changed and turned back into a happy, bouncing boy. Kids are weird. Add to this that we've eaten at four different restaurants in two days (Playmakers, Chops, Izumi, and now 150CP), we're desperately missing the consistency of MDR. We LOVE the specialty restaurants, and want our kids to have these experiences too. We did MDR last cruise, and know the menus, know the food, and wanted to branch out and try ALL the specialty dining on Oasis, but the lack of routine is taking its toll on the kids. When we were on Anthem, it was a Windjammer lunch and MDR dinner every night and the kids thrived at that routine, and so did the MDR staff, getting to know our family and our needs. After some discussion and sleeping on it, we may see if we can shimmy our way into a 5:30pm MDR seating for dinner starting Day 4. We want the kids to have a great time too, and if they're fried from the lack of routine, it kinda makes us all miserable. Happy kids, happy parents, happy vacation.

Izumi Lunch: Sashimi x2 and the poke bowl.

Thank you for making the change! I just tried your click-and-hold-down method and it worked! It wasn't immediately intuitive, I was clicking, but nothing was happening. Once I held, it worked.