CableKC

That's my thought too. My initial plan is to do Chops or one of the other Specialty Restaurants on Night 1 and then do go to the MDR on Night 2 ( which I think usually is the Formal Night? ). I would like to do the Chef's Table on Night 3 ( for my Wife and I while having everyone else do their own thing ) and then finith it off with the MDR on the last night of the curise as a family.

It sounds like it's better to just go get dining reservations in person and as soon as possible. Assuming that I plan out where I want to go on which days, am I able to try to book dining reservations at the various specialty restaurants on Day 1 when we board? I figure that we'll plan to go to 2 specialty dining restaurants or 1 specialty restaurant and Chefs Table for a 4 night Cruise.

I have yet another stupid question. My 20 year old son and his GF will be joining us on the cruise. Are they are able to dine on their own because they're over the age of 18 for the Specialty Dining restaurants? I'm assuming that there isn't any age concerns over 18 years old, but I wanted to double check.

I have another question related to Specialty Dining on NoTS. Has anyone tried the Chef's Table specialty dining on NoTS before? I'm considering that as an option for my Wife and I but wasn't sure when it's offered and on which days. Is it worth it?

I'm definitely leaning towards choosing Chops as one of the Specialty Dining options that I go with. But I'd be concerned that going to Chops for lunch may be too heavy of a meal. Although it would mean that I can walk it off for the rest of the day, I also enjoy having a really nice dinner with the family.

Is there a routine MDR menu where NoTS picks the theme for each night from cruise to cruise? or Is it totally random where the theme nights are different from cruise to cruise? Also,what are the themes? Italian Mexican American? French? Just guessing here, don't really know.

Good way to look at it. I'm thinking that it also be would be a good way to set the a good tone for the rest of the trip as well on the 1st night of the cruise. Thanks for replying.

I'm considering booking a NoTS 4 Night Cruise and was looking at when to go to a Specialty Dining restaurant ( likely Chops ). Which day do you think is the best and easiet day to try to get a Specialty Dining Restaurant reservation? I saw some YouTube Short that suggested that it's a good idea to go to these popular Specialty Dining Restaurants on Embarkation Day since a lot of people want to start off in the Main Dining Room for dinner. Thoughts?

I was considering getting 2 spacious balcony room on Deck 9 midship because I was concerned about noise keeping us awake late at night or early in the morning. I looked and found that there are some Balcony Rooms on Deck 6 Midship that aren't too close to the elevators. These rooms appears to be located above Cafe Promenade on the Main Promenade deck. I have read that if you want to avoid loud noises that keep you up at night to get a room on a deck that is not above or below a main floor like the pool deck or the main promenade deck. For those that have stayed Midship ( or anywhere on Deck 6 ), was it very noisy throughout the day and night? The safer thing to do is to simply get the rooms on Deck 9 midship. But the reason I ask is that if I were to book the 2 rooms on Deck 6 instead of Deck 9, I'd save about $1400. But I get that it's also important to try to avoid putting myself in a situation where those "little things" ( like noise from above or below our deck ) could ruin a vacation. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks for your response and experience. My flight leaves LAX at 1:15pm on a Friday. I would estimate that I can get to LAX no later than 11:30am to give us enough time to check in our luggage and get to the gate. So, the hope is that this should be enough buffer time for us to get to LAX even if there is delays. Can anyone else share their experience with taking the Royal Caribbean shuttle leaving on Disembarkment day to LAX? I wonder if this is a common issue with the Cruise Port and the Royal Caribbean Shuttle service that goes to LAX.

Va4fam, Did you go on your cruise yet out of LA? Let me know if you were able to disembark and get to LAX before your 105pm flight out. Thanks,

Maggie M, just following up on this. What time did you arrive at the Cruise Terminal and how did it go? Was it too early? If so, how long did you wait at the Terminal itself? I finally decidedon which cruise I will go on and am starting to look at airfare. I'm hoping that an arrival time of 930am to 10am isn't too early. One of the things I wanted to do was to be able to arrive early and walk around and enjoy the ship before it sails. You know, get my money's worth.

Thanks for the suggestion. I will take that into consideration.

Given the likely arrival time and a guess-timate of how long it will take to get through baggage claim and shuttle pick up ( or car rental ), I would expect that the arrival time at the port would be no earlier than 9:45am....give or take 30 minutes. I will look into check-in times to see when the earliest that I can check in. I don't mind boarding early and wandering the ship before the 1pm-ish time that we can enter our cabin. I just know that with kids and a grumpy wife that's been up since 5am for a 6am flight, sitting in the cruise terminal for an extended period of time would be a bad start to a family trip.

Where do you usually fly out of? I was considering a 1:15pm flight out of LAX on Disembarkment day. How long does customs take to get through for a larger Party of 7? I roughly calculate that if I get off the boat by 9am that I should be able to get through Customs, drive to the airport ( either via Car Rental or Shuttle ) and get to the gate by 12:30pm to catch the flight leaving at 1:15pm on a Friday. The other option is to fly out of Long Beach, but the flight is much later in the afternoon and I prefer not to wait around for 4 or 5 hours.