JLMoran

Oh, yep. You did indeed have that in the screen shot you posted! I once again have proved why I am not working with Tom Cruise in the pre-crime department's observational unit. ?

Financially or morally? The latter is arguably less bad if it means you get to keep cruising. ?

@Rebecca Ann, did you book using a refundable or non-refundable deposit (NRD)? Sometimes the promotions only include OBC when you book with NRD. Sometimes the OBC will be offered for both refundable and NRD, but the amount is higher for NRD.

No, you actually won't be able to disembark earlier than about 7 AM, maybe as early as 6:30 if the ship clears customs very quickly. Guests who chose self-disembarkation will get off first, in that very earliest time slot. If you don't plan to do that, and instead leave your bags out on the final night for the ship's crew to take out to the terminal, then you'll get off at a time designated by the numbered luggage tag you'll get on your next-to-last night. The times range from around 7:30 to no later than 8:45 or 9:00 AM, so the crew has time to clean the rooms and the prep the ship for the next batch of passengers. On a related note -- be sure to note down that number on your luggage tags! Your bags will be put in a section of the terminal that will have the same number mounted the wall. Once you disembark, grab a porter and let him know the number; he'll help you find the area, and then you can pick out your bags from the bunch that will be there. The porter will load them up onto a dolly and should also be able to get you on a porters-only customs line for faster exit to the parking area. I've heard the porters in Cape Liberty will even bring your bags to the car if you parked in the on-site garage, which is definitely a big help if you have a lot of luggage to haul (and worth a few extra bucks in the final tip).

Have a great trip, @Rimmit! So sorry to read about your wife’s phone, that really stinks! I hope you get a chance to file an insurance claim or something.

One more for you from JimZim:

You and @lincoln81 may also want to take a look at JimZim's YouTube video about Anthem. Hat tip to @Lovetocruise2002 for first pointing me to him! And I just found this video last night, while the wife and were looking up videos about the ship and Bermuda. Very basic overview of the ship that lists all venues, starting on deck 3 and working up from there. Gives a nice glimpse of each place and gives a good for how much there is to do and see on board.

It's not limited to OS rooms or older ships. On Freedom class and I think Quantum Class as well, you can get either a "Deluxe Ocean View with Balcony", or a "Spacious Deluxe Ocean View with Balcony", where the latter has a larger cabin space but smaller balcony space. From what I recall, those "spacious" rooms are the ones designed to sleep 4 rather than 3, so maybe they needed to sacrifice some balcony space in order to have enough room for a sofa bed and pullman. It definitely drives home the importance of doing your homework about the ship before you book, or accept any upgrade offer!

Anthem of the Seas doesn't yet use the new Royal Caribbean app, it's still on the older Royal IQ app. And unfortunately, that app only works on board the ship while in range of the Royal Wifi network, not elsewhere. So you'll want to go to any specialty dining reservation desk when you board and speak with the rep there to get everything set up. You don't have to go to each specific restaurant; any restaurant that is open, or the general specialty dining booking booths that you should find on embarkation day, can handle every reservation for every restaurant that you want to make. As far as the initial booking you get for day 1, that's not set in stone. You can change the time and the even the specific restaurant, as long as seating is available at the time slot you want. I will say, just based on my observations while checking the Cruise Planner regularly, that the most-preferred dining slots between about 6 and 7:30 PM tend to get "sold out" from people reserving online, at least on the first couple of days. If you're OK with an earlier or later time, you shouldn't have any issues. And after day two or three, especially on port days, I've been seeing better availability compared to embarkation and sea day 1.

@lincoln81, welcome aboard! In addition to the links that @Lovetocruise2002 already posted, here is one documenting the best "secrets" about Anthem: https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2017/04/05/top-10-royal-caribbean-anthem-of-the-seas-hidden-secrets And one more that covers North Star; a few years old now but still relevant: https://www.royalcaribbeanblog.com/2015/11/19/5-secrets-royal-caribbeans-north-star The one thing from that North Star article that's out of date is the mention of it not going over the side of the ship while in port. In actuality, North Star on Anthem never goes over the side of the ship, even on sea days. I've never been 100% clear what the reasoning was.

Be aware that when saving that small amount for the end, you can't just keep $100 of the cruise fare, you also have to keep the entire port fees and taxes portion withheld as well. Learned this from my TA, when I had tried to pay off all but $200 of each of the two rooms I'd booked (one reservation for me and wife, one for the kids' room). Turns out I had paid both rooms down to where each had only the fees/taxes and maybe $50 of base fare left, and making that payment I'd wanted would have left about half of the taxes unpaid on each room, which my TA explained isn't allowed. All taxes and fees for a given reservation have to paid fully in a single transaction.

If you know you'll be having a decent number of sodas / specialty coffee drinks / non-alcoholic cocktails, buy the Refreshment Package in advance, especially if you can get it on sale for just $18 a day. No money spent on board for drinks, and you can quickly break even or get ahead on the cost. If you drink alcohol, same rule applies for the Deluxe Package. If you know you want a t-shirt, cap, towel, whatever, wait for the sales that will be advertised in the Cruise Compass each night. And then be ready to line up outside the store before they open, so you can get in earlier and have a better selection. Might mean losing out on some sea day time, but if you want that thing and want to save a few bucks while getting it, that's the price you gotta pay. All of the staff on board are very friendly and helpful, so don't be afraid to ask them if they know if some special is coming up for something you might want to buy (specialty dining, a spa treatment, arcade tokens, whatever).

OK, so between that and Adventure also allowing upload, they must be expanding that feature. Function of the port of embarkation, or just part of Royal's IT changes I wonder?

Congratulations, @arebee! Hope you have lot of relaxing plans (and cruises! ?) lined up.

Not showing for me on my Cruise Planner. Must be limited to your sailing.

That's being AMPED as well, no? Just Oasis and Allure, as the oldest two, but thought I'd read that when the AMPED program was announced? So much for wine getting better (and thereby more expensive) with age... ?

Thanks for the recap and (as always) awesome photos! I'm sad to see that the Tiki Bar completely replaced Vintages. I can see why on a ship like this, since it's all short cruises and likely to draw a younger crowd. Plus it seems Vintages just has never been a spot one would describe as "lively". But if every ship in the AMPED program, Voyager and Freedom and Oasis class alike, is going to lose Vintages and get a Tiki Bar in its place, I have to ask: Where am I supposed to go for a nice glass of wine not on the regular MDR list when I'm on one of these ships? I don't really drink cocktails (well, outside of margaritas and mojitos), and wine / beer are my go-to beverages at dinner or lunch. Oh, wait... wine isn't a drink Millennials have. Yeah, never mind. ?

Sorry, Anthem's as big as I'm going for the foreseeable future. ?

Holy cow! Two big wins on two consecutive cruises of the same ship! Congratulations! I'm assuming you repeated your example from the last time this happened, and left the casino as soon as you hit that jackpot. ?

Huh, color me surprised! I think this is the first case I've seen where even if you use the SBUX app, you still have to pay on your SeaPass.

Thanks for sharing your experience, @joshvc. Sorry to hear your trip ended on such a sour note for you, being sick at the end of a trip is no fun. Hopefully the upcoming trip will have no such bumps at any point along the way. ?

That dive looked amazing! Loved the video highlights. Why did your dive leader have what looked like a tether line hooked to her wrist? Is that just standard protocol so it's easier to make your way back to the starting point for pickup, or special to this excursion since there wasn't really a boat to go back to? And what was under that last rock towards the end of the video? I could make out the head of something poking out as you swam up and around, but not quite what it belonged to.

Thanks for sharing this, I'll be considering this if we do a group cruise in 2020 to CA/NE, or any future CA/NE sailing. Re-read your main blog entry for that day, saw you were up at 6 and even then didn't get tendered over until 8:30. Is that simply because of time needed to get breakfast with your kids, or was there also a delay while waiting for Royal-hosted excursions and suite passengers to get tendered first? Did you find yourself waiting in line for the tender a long time, or having to get on that line as fast as possible after breakfast? Or was it a little more laid back than all that, since Adventure is a "smaller" ship (at least compared to Anthem)? That's about the only concern I have with booking a third-party excursion at a tender port; if there's any delay getting off the ship due to those priority passengers, there goes the excursion I booked. My kids are teens and we can scarf down a quick breakfast when needed, but the variable about how early to get in line for the tender and worrying about how rapidly they're shuttling back and forth would drive the control freak in me kind of nuts. ?

That number is the one I see when I look up the Crown & Anchor number for Royal. Thanks for pointing that out, I've added that number along with the excursions desk to my contacts so that my RoboKiller app won't block any calls from them. And now I'll clearly see it's Royal calling, should that magical day ever come! ?

@Mattwrote about this last year, as Royal had just reinstated it. The fee is $15 per bottle of wine consumed in a public area (not your stateroom). Note that not only will they hold the bottle for another meal in the MDR if you don't finish it, you can request it in any of the on-board restaurants, even specialty venues. Just give them your stateroom number and they'll be able to retrieve it.