Zobertlab

I'm sailing into Port Canaveral on December 11th (12-9) and was wondering if anyone would like to do a meet up?
If you live in the area it would be a good excuse to meet up and talk cruising over a drink or meal. I was thinking Grills or Fish Lips but am open to ideas.
So far it's my wife Jessica and I, Stephanie (AGSLC5) and her fiance Jeremy.
The more the merrier, we don't need to know each other to have a good time. 

Does anyone have a picture of what the suite deck/ suite bar area looks like?  Google has been less than helpful... Thanks!

Hi..I am sailing on the Allure in June with a large group of family and friends (approx 70 people). I was thinking it would be nice to have a group picture taken (we're having a group shirt made). Does anyone know if I could arrange something with RCCL to get a group picture in the Aquatheater area and have one of the ship photographers take it? Who would I need to contact for this? Thanks!

Hello!
 
I am wondering if anyone can shed some light on why the Beach Bungalows are priced per person ($250 per person for our cruise, $1,250 for the 5 of us) and the Beach Cabanas are a flat price per cabana for up to 6 people. I do not see that there is a big difference in amenities between the Bungalows and Cabanas other that the Bungalows can accommodate 8 people.  
 
Also wondering how strict they are with allowing 6 people only per Cabana, we are a group of 13 (8 adults and 5 kids under age 11) and planned on getting two Bungalows until we got to checkout! Not sure if they will allow one extra person in two Cabanas.
 
Thank you! We have never been to Labadee so not sure what to expect!

I am having some scheduling issues. I have been buging Matt with some questions, and now that I have another I figured I would get some opinions. I had originally booked all our entertainment and dinning for our Harmony Nov 12th sailing back in July when it opened up on the cruise planner. A week or so ago they changed some times, and cancelled some shows. I am now having problems fitting in both the Fine Line (Aqua Show) and Grease. My only option for Fine Line is night 2, as the other 2 shows are at 10:45 which is too late for my soon to be 7 y/o. Grease on night 1 interferes with the private flow riding lesson I am surprising my boyfriend with. So long story not so short, I just logged onto the cruise planner and it looks like they added a 3rd show of Grease on night 3. Perfect, right? Well, day 3 is my son's birthday. I feel like I am being selfish bringing him to AO so we can go to show. Am I being silly?

I'm sailing into Port Canaveral on December 11th (12-9) and was wondering if anyone would like to do a meet up?
If you live in the area it would be a good excuse to meet up and talk cruising over a drink or meal. I was thinking Grills or Fish lips but am open to ideas.
So far it's my wife Jessica and I, Stephanie (AGSLC5) and her fiance Jeremy.
The more the merrier, we don't need to know each other to have a good time.

You remember ships having a "tween" deck where's they captured extra space for cabins by creating an in-between deck when transitioning from public decks with higher ceilings to cabin decided with lower ceilings.

I booked a cruise on the RCL website for my family of four (me, my wife, sons age 18 and 15)  for an upcoming cruise.

I booked two rooms directly across the hall from each other; one balcony and one interior promenade view.

When I did the reservations, I had to put a guest over 21 in each room in order to complete the reservation.  This puts my son and I in a room, and my wife and other son in the other room.  The plan was to just have the boys stay in the interior room and my wife stay in the balcony room.  However, I am starting to realize that while it may work...there may be some issues with this arrangement (by the way, this is our first cruise...so I am new to all of this).

Will RCL allow me to switch my wife and I into the same room and put my boys together in the room across the hall (even though the oldest is only 18)?

Has anyone purchased art work from an art auction on board a ship.   If so how was your experience.  I just got home from Spain after being on Brilliance for 12 nights and bought a picture.  Now I am reading some not so favorable reviews about Park West Art Auctions.    Thank you in advance.  

I know we're a glutton for punishment, but does anyone know if an interior stateroom on Independence with 4 people can have the lower bed pushed together (queen/full size) with the two bunks pulled out of the ceiling?  The only pictures i could find have the lower beds separated.  if you have a picture please post.  Thanks!
 

Thanks for the update, Steve

I have a major birthday coming up in April 2018. I have booked rooms for my wife & I and our daughter and her family on the Allure. I booked them two connecting balcony rooms. The grand kids will be 8 and 12. Having never cruised with children of our own before, not sure how the sea pass will work for them. I can see those disappearing many times during the 7 day cruise, even if they are wearing them on a lanyard! Does RC offer non-destructible wrist band instead of a sea pass card for children?
Also,  is it possible for me to purchase a drink package for my daughter or her husband and put it on my account? Thanks!

Port of Miami is to be closed Thursday I read, so things are getting really messy. Between flights and hotels and cruise times being changed, wouldn't be a fun time to be travelling down there right now!

I have 2 questions. 
 
1. I am scheduled to be on a cruise leaving Port Canaveral on Monday on the Majesty of the Seas and going to the Bahamas. It looks like Hurricane Matthew will effect the cruise is some way. How will I now if anything changes with the itinerary or if the cruise will be canceled?
 
2. Is there a refund or the cost of this cruise toward another if it is canceled?

I just read your first Live Blog post, and I noticed you said you met your girlfriend on a cruise. I noticed also, from posted cruise compasses, that there is a singles meet on EotS.  Have you been to this before? As a single cruiser, I am curious to know what its like. I'm sort of a wall flower, and kinda shy, so I am uncertain if this would be for me. Hope you have a great weekend cruise.
 
Jeff

According to the Port Canaveral Instagram page, Port Canaveral was officially re-opened at 12:30 Eastern Time today! What a relief for the residents and employees that have been affected. Not to mention a favorite cruise port for many.

If you gave up on WDW Today after Matt left the podcast, go and listen to the most recent episode, number 1515.  Matt was coerced into saying a few nice things about Disney Cruise Lines. :-)

Hi all, my wife and I are considering a 24 night cruise from Seattle to Sydney and would love to hear from anyone who has done this cruise before. We are concerned that due to the length of the cruise, fresh fruit and food may run out, entertainment by be not up to usual standards and staff numbers may be down therefore service and attention to guests might be less than what we are used to. TIA.

We usually cruise once a year in Feb. Earlier this year my bf whined he needed a break so I booked the cheapest cruise I could find. Interior deck 3 (normally we're in a balcony). We were underneath the Schooner Bar (yes we could hear it and the Theatre). 
 
Most memorable thing? I broke a finger. Serious break, surgery is tomorrow. Other than my finger, I'm fine.
 
We won a lot at trivia. (hehe) Finally scored something better than the ubiquitous highliters and keychains. A baseball hat!! :D
 
What was the deal with the bacon? A couple mornings they kept running out. They'd put out a fresh batch, 'twould be gone in 7 nanoseconds. I took to standing in line with the other hopefuls. The first time some 10-12 year old kid cut in front of me, proceeded to take 2 huge  tongs full of bacon. At that point I snapped at him to leave some but he had taken approx half the bacon (not exaggerating). Another time a woman again cut right in front of me. "There's a line for the bacon."  She ignored me. "Ma'am see the people behind me? That's the line for the bacon." She made some non-committal remark about the line coming from the other side but from the way she refused to look at me or speak I knew she knew she was in the wrong.
 
People are getting so rude. We tried to sit in some "saved" seats (2 guys holding half of row 2 - about 8 seats) but the 2 guys got belligerent with us, one of them going so far as to shove my bf. My boyfriend has Bipolar Disorder and it took all his restraint not to slug the jerk back. All around us people were commenting how *we* were the rude ones to try to steal these people's seats. What happened to Royal's policy of no saving seats?
 
At the cashier redeeming a paltry 75 cent voucher, was behind a woman redeeming a handful of vouchers. One got rejected as already redeemed, I snuck a peek it, was for $80. Whoa, I'd like to know the story behind that.
 
Missed Grand Cayman due to bad weather, our second cruise in a row to do so.
 
In Jamaica we did the Red Stripe Beach excursion. I wasn't expecting much but it was better than anticipated. It was obvious they had trucked in a lot of sand as the surrounding area was swampy. However, the beach was nice, the water pleasant, a DJ providing music. They had all the usual accoutrements for a fee - food, beer, lawn chairs. The only glitch was not enough buses going back. The bus would fill up leaving a whole bunch of grumpy people to wait 20 to 40 minutes for the next one.
 
At the embarkation point was a guy soliciting for Sabor. Arizona his name was. Against my better judgement I said okay. (I live in Houston where there's great authentic Mexican food {street taco trucks to higher end fare}) as well as Tex-Mex.  Oh man, it sucked. We hated it. And we didn't hide our displeasure so the waiters picked up on it and got edgy around us. Waiter brings the bill gives it to my bf. "Why not me? I protested. "Because he is the gentleman," was the response as I pulled out my Seapass card and handed it to him. He brings back the bill and again hands it to my BF. I was offended at this crass display of sexism.
 
First cultural crossup: In Cozumel in a shop, there were some wooden snakes. My bf (I wish he wouldn't) told the shop ladies I have snakes as pets. "Oh?" they say. They were more curious than repulsed. "What do you feed them? "Mice," I said. "oooooh, maize", she responded. No, no, no not corn. (amused and chuckling facepalm) They did understand rat and mouse.
 
Second cultural crossup: They had congee at breakfast!! I love congee! (major Chinatown near to where I live)  But. The congee in the Windjammer is not exactly what I'm used to. I asked a Chinese waitress about it, she said she didn't eat rice. Where she came from they ate noodles. Strike one. 
Another time there was a blond lady with an accent I couldn't place dishing some up. "Oh, it's chicken soup," she said. She tried it first day and really liked it. Chicken soup. Strike two.
 
Saturday night 2:20 am they made an announcement so-and-so please come to Guest Services deck 5. Twice they announced! WTF? If you wake me up at 2am I'm going to have trouble getting back to sleep and I'll likely oversleep the following morning. 
 
We were debarking and right behind us they refused debarkation to some woman, turning her back. We were like, hmmmm, someone trying to skip out on their gambling debt.....
 
And finally in the car trying to leave and a man and a woman greeted each other with great fanfare, then began smooching. Standing in the middle of the road, right in front of us, blocking egress. I tried to honk but my bf kept knocking my hand away. We rolled down the window and yelled at them; they were oblivious. Finally I got in a honk. They turned around with an indignant EXCUUUUUUSE-ME!!!!! look, but moved to the sidewalk where they continued smooching. A true (facepalm) moment.
 

You could always load Teamviewer onto a machine at home and leave it running in server mode.  Then you can access that one from your machine on the cruise, and remotely use the one at home to RDC or VPN into your work boxes.  I've used Teamviewer in all sorts of places where everything except ports 80/443 were blocked.

Do I have to pay automatic gratuities in US currency? Can I visit guest services and ask to be charged in Canadian or would I have to do the conversion math and then ask for an adjustment? I'm a firm believer in tipping and realize that to the staff it may seem I'm short-changing them but I have a hard time paying 30% more than other passengers just because I live in a country with a weaker dollar.
 
Thank goodness Royal quoted in Canadian when I booked or I might have cried!

Thanks loads for the addition of the dining recommendations and for letting me know they were there! Have printed these out for review and saved them to my iPhone with links ;-) On a separate note, for anyone who is asking about transfers, we actually ended up hiring a car from IAH, as we have two nights before the cruise and most of a day after. It was only a little more expensive than the transfers - unless we went for pre-set times which wouldn't have worked for us anyway, so it seemed like the best option, to give us maximum flexibility. We're staying at the Galvez, so have parking booked there, and their shuttle will take us to the cruise port and back. So, given we have a car,and will be out and about in the Strand area mostly on the two evenings I imagine, what should we plan to do with our one full day in Galveston, so we see the most of it?! All suggestions welcome - we're more outdoors and photography people than museum people, but other than that, open to any ideas. Thank you :-)

So I read someone's comment that perhaps Oasis 4 will be going to China. You really think so ? I'm betting on Europe.
 
What do you think ?

So I'm curious who else is going on any of the Thanksgiving weekend cruises on Indy, Navigator and Brilliance?  A Royal Caribbean Blog role call of sorts for these 3 cruises!  I'll be traveling with my wife and two kids (6 & 4).
 
I was booked on Indy, cancelled it about 45 days ago and rebooked today.  I paid about $1000 less than my original reservation but I did go from 2 rooms to 1 room with a family of 4.  Apples to apples savings was about $500-600.
 
I've never been on a cruise ship on an actual holiday so I was curious if anyone has any memorable experiences from cruises in their past that sailed on Thanksgiving or any other actual major holidays.

I am cruising on Freedom of the Seas March 12, 2017 out of Ft. Lauderdale. It says the ship leaves at 5:30pm. How early can I embark? Also, how late is too late? I am booking transportation and need to know best times to book!