JLMoran

Yes, the Refreshment Package includes all espresso-based coffee drinks: lattes, cappuccinos, Frappuccino-style beverages, etc. However, the ship’s are not consistent in how they will punch the card. Some just do one punch per drink, regardless of size, where others do one punch per espresso shot IN the drink. So a grande or venti size, which is typically two shots, will mean two punches. Since the Refreshment Package also includes bottled water and fresh-squeezed OJ, it’s not a bad purchase if you expect to be drinking a lot of medium or large espresso beverages every day and also get a couple bottles of water, maybe that OJ with breakfast.

Pinging @Traveler, as he just had a nice win on the ship slots and can speak to what they had on his sailing. Also pinging @firegal2539, as I recall that she’s a regular slots player on board. I noticed a couple of classic slots like Wheel of Fortune and Double Double Diamond on Freedom last April, which happen to be the ones I usually prefer. But they mostly had a lot of video slots and other newer machines. Bet values ranged from quarters to $5, I don’t recall seeing anything higher. For my money, the slots on Freedom were ridiculously tight. I played the $1 Double Double Diamond for about 20-30 minutes, loading it up with $50 to start, and I got maybe 5 little wins on that (<$10 each). Walked away when what I put in ran out. Others here have also found the slots on board to be quite tight; they definitely don’t adhere to Vegas or AC standards on payout percentages.

I second this. The complimentary ship coffee is only so-so; I could drink the stuff when it was freshly poured, but once it went lukewarm it was only barely drinkable, and I'd often as not just leave it. Plus, it's not very strong. Maybe I'm too used to the Starbucks at this point, but I only drink their mildest blonde roast and even that has more caffeine than the ship stuff.

And note that in this case "cheap" is very relative. A lot of those $30-40 bottles on the ship are ones I can get on land for $8-9. So if it's a variety of wine you know and have bought before, you may want to do the mental math to see how the price works out after the discount compared to land price, and decide if that price is OK relative to your opinion of that wine.

Not only this, but if you need access to your cloud-based system for work, that will also perform much better on Surf & Stream. As a rule, unless you only plan to use the internet for messaging apps like WhatsApp / iMessage / Facebook Messenger / etc., basic email, and maybe some VOIP calling, you'll want to spend the little extra money for Surf & Stream. At a more technical level -- on the newer ships with better VOOM service through O3b satellite networking, you'll see between 2 and 4 Mbit download speeds on Surf & Stream, and around 0.5 to 1 Mbit upload. Older ships not using O3b, or ships in areas further from the equator that already get poorer satellite signal, will be noticeably slower. Surf-only is throttled to around 1/4 those speeds.

Thanks for yet another amazing blog, @twangster! I’m actually glad that you took the time this go-round to just enjoy the trip, take the pics, then decide how you wanted to tell the story afterward. You’ve done plenty of times where you pulled from your time off to keep us up to date and virtually cruising along with you, you more than deserve a chance to tune out, seize that trip to the fullest, and enjoy it to the max! I know you have your editing tools down pat, but I still can’t imagine the time post-cruise needed to cull down the photos to the best ones, edit them, come up with a narrative, and put it all online for us to enjoy. No wonder you have 11 more cruises booked, we’re wearing you down with the blog posts and leaving you desperate for new vacation times! ?

If I'm understanding the way the wi-fi sharing on the S9+ is working, then the S9+ is essentially becoming a portable travel router and would behave no differently than any other travel router used per @twangster's earlier instructions on that thread. So the only risk at that point would be if Royal is starting to crack down on travel routers in general and taking active steps to block them or detect their use. I do think that trying to use it in that way for large photo uploads is going to be problematic, even on a ship with the faster VOOM. I can't tell you the number of times I tried posting to my live blog from the ship, just with a bunch of reduced-size photos, and the connection died on me and my entire post ended up lost. If you can bring a laptop, I'd seriously advise just doing that, putting the photos on there and making your edits (including copies at smaller size for easier transmission), then logging onto VOOM with the laptop and uploading from there. At least then if something goes wrong, you have an easier time re-doing the upload from the laptop than from the camera's controls.

Hoping that everyone is fully prepped and safe. Heard comparison of this storm last night to Hurricane Hugo (last Cat 4 to hit the Carolinas), sending what vibes I can for the storm to weaken down to a 3 or 2 as it leaves the pocket of warm water that strengthened it, so that it doesn't pack as big a wallop to everyone in its path!

Nope, I just open up my print dialog and tell it to print whatever page #(s) has the luggage tag(s). That's the only page from eDoc that matters, honestly, since your SetSail Pass isn't in there.

You would need a smartphone that allows simultaneously being logged in to a wifi network and sharing its wifi as a hotspot. There are only a very few varieties of Android phone that support this, and no iPhones can do this. It was discussed here a while back, but I haven't been able to find the thread.

You can change your booking to another date, but because the original booking was NRD you'll be assessed a per-person change fee against the original deposit, which will be held as future cruise credit to use within a year and which IIRC can't be applied to the new booking. I want to say it's $100 pp, but @Lovetocruise2002 or @twangster, with their encylopedic knowledge of all things NRD, can confirm that along with the rest.

@CGTLH, thanks so much for that! I've PM'ed you with my address. Just double-check that you don't need any of those spares from the ones you already used getting worn / torn where the lanyard hook goes. This is why I love this community and I'm so glad I found it. The willingness of folks to help out in a multitude of ways never ceases to "surprise and delight" (to borrow an Apple marketing phrase). ?

Can you give us a bit more info to help guide our recommendations? Nothing too personal, just some general ideas like: What kind of activities do you and your kids like? Beach lounging, lots of time in the ocean, shopping, cultural / historical activities,...? What ship had you originally booked, and what drew you to it besides the itinerary stop at Coco Cay? Do you think you’d be OK with another class of ship that was smaller / larger, or would you want to stay in the same general class? That is, if you had booked Allure or Harmony originally, would you need to stay on an Oasis class ship, or would a smaller ship be ok if the itinerary worked? Anything else you think would help guide us with our recommendations is also welcome, but that should be enough to h lot us narrow down the possibilities a bit. ?

Wow, you and @twangster are way in the lead on that race, I think!

Btw, @Sweety, if you ever want to "sneak" in a B2B in a more covert manner, check out HAL's itineraries. I found after looking through a bunch of their Norway / Iceland offerings that they have listings for longer (14-28 night) sailings that, when you dig into the itineraries, are really B2B or B2B2B combinations of various shorter itineraries. Those would show up as a single booking / invoice, and honestly the ones I looked at were really nice for port stops, days spent in the fjords, etc. I'd imagine they may well have similar offerings here in the states for combined eastern/western Caribbean or other options that are easily combined from a common port.

Loving the pictures, as always! Since I couldn't catch your scopes when originally broadcast, I've been watching them in sync with your postings. That train ride looked absolutely stunning! I am so adding this itinerary to my future cruise bucket list.

@rjac, you are taking this FAR too literally! Can't you see that @Sweety doesn't want cold reality, and is looking for a loophole to sneak in a fourth cruise without her husband realizing? Help a gal out with feeding her cruise addiction, already! ?

I haven't yet done a Mediterranean or other European cruise yet (one day!!), but I think they typically give longer in those ports compared to the Caribbean because of the distances to reach many of the cultural or other popular tourist sites from the port.

If your husband is going by the number of invoices you're paying off, and he sees the bills / emails / statements, then B2B counts as two cruises (separate bookings and reservations). But if you're the master of the treasury and all he does at the end of the day is hand his paycheck to you for bill payments, and he never so much as sees a statement... well, then you just have one unusually long itinerary and he can find out the realities of the B2B disemarkation / re-embarkation when the day comes. ?

Add me to the "looks normal" list.

btw, if you haven't yet figured it out -- I'm a huge pop culture and trivia nerd, and often lace my conversations with side references and such that I hope folks will get and find amusing. ?

Was making a silly reference to Ivan Pavlov, who gained notoriety for his experiments with conditioned response training. He mainly worked with dogs, and would train them to salivate whenever he would ring a bell by first associating the bell in their minds with being given food (positive conditioning), so that eventually any time a bell was rung they'd expect food and start salivating in response. Basically, was asking if Dru would be such a great cruise director that by the end of my cruise I'd be "salivating" in expectation of a good time if I simply heard his name (metaphorical ringing of the bell).

Arrival time is when the ship docks; there will typically be around a 30-minute wait after that while the ship is cleared by the port before passengers can disembark. Given the early hour of all your arrivals, you'll probably want to also factor in time to have breakfast at the Windjammer (if you're in a hurry to get off) or main dining room (if you don't mind taking about an hour for sit-down breakfast with a menu and made-to-order dishes). All passengers must be back onboard 30 minutes before departure time; the actual all-aboard time will be posted in your daily Cruise Compass newsletter. Do note that the times posted there are ship's time, which may or may not correspond to local time; be sure to check the time on a ship's clock or your stateroom TV, and make sure your watch / smart phone / whatever timekeeping device you use is synced up so you don't accidentally return too early / late. Several here make a point of carrying an analog watch that doesn't auto-update based on the current location, just to avoid potential issues like that.

Just checked and I see that I'll be just missing Dennis Charles for CD on Anthem (departs the day I embark), and instead I'll have Dru Pavlov. Will Mr. Pavlov leave me salivating every time he rings a bell? ?

TD 9 is still very far away and not even to the level of a TS or hurricane. Any kind of forecast on its path is nothing more than a proverbial finger to the wind and can change a million different ways between now and the time it's actually in striking distance of the US. I know it's difficult to do with your vacation so close, but it's best for now to just follow the information on Florence only, and ignore any updates on TD 9 until it's on this side of the Atlantic.