JLMoran

That's apparently the signature item on most current MSC ships -- the steps are filled with Swarovski crystal. I'm thinking, given the consistent comments I've read about food quality / prep, that maybe they should have used half as much and put the savings into the galleys and cooking/wait staff. ?

That said, there are a couple of activities you could book if your kids want some adventure. They could try out the Dragon's Tail alpine coaster; can purchase tickets once you're in Labadee, no need to pre-purchase on the cruise planner (although you can get some decent sales that way). They sell single-ride and all-day access passes. You can find plenty of videos of it on YouTube, looks quite fun. There's also the Dragon's Breath zip line, but that's very overpriced unless you catch a good sale on the Cruise Planner. And Labadee has an aqua park area as well, although I think that's geared more towards younger children.

Is that the same brand as Little Caesar's Pizza here in the US? Their tag line is, "Pizza Pizza", and they're another truly awful chain line.

Big congratulations! That is a heck of an upgrade!

I live 40 minutes from EWR, so that's my home base. Won't even consider JFK or LGA since they are a lot harder to get to and don't save me any money. I envy those of you with the disposable income (or rewards points) to regularly fly Business/First Class. The only time I tried to get an upgrade to First was my honeymoon flight to Oahu with my new bride. Asked at the counter while getting our boarding passes. They wanted over $20,000 more! In 1998!! And I hear the comments about readily driving 10-12 hours to a port if that were an option. I do have Bayonne / NYC ports as VERY local options, along with Baltimore and Boston. But would love to be further south with ready access by car to the Florida ports.

Hey, I find the episodes with @monorailmedic to be among the best ones! Cue Scrooge MacDuck: "Aye, he always was a little peculiar!"

Given all the discussion recently around timing of airfare purchase, watching airfares daily, sweating about getting the best deal, I have to ask -- is it just the control freaks among us, or does pretty much everyone buy their own airfare? Does anyone actually have their TA take care of airfare as well as cruise purchase, and if you do are you still in the driver's seat as far as what airline, what day, and when to purchase? Sound off, and feel free to comment below!

The only firm / unquestionable thing you can bring on board is two bottles of wine per stateroom. You can be traveling solo and still bring two bottles. If you happen to be a family split across two cabins, you can bring four bottles on board (two for each cabin you have booked), even if there are no adults in that second cabin. The rest of your question is more of a gray area, unfortunately. The consensus seems to be that you can put a 12-pack or 24-pack of bottled water in your carry-on, and 99% of the time the security guards who check your carry-on during boarding will not bat an eye. But you need to be prepared to get that one guard who lives by the book and won't allow you to bring it on board. Soda or flavored water seems to be the same as bottled water, as people have reported bringing on 12-packs or even cases of soda with no more issue than bringing water. Again, just be ready to get that one guard who says "the book" is the only thing that matters. The key with any of these is to bring them in your carry-on bag, not any of your checked luggage. If you put it in the checked luggage, it will be confiscated 100% of the time, and you'll have to go to the security area to get your luggage.

Article has one factual error. It says you have to pre-pay before Jan 2 to lock in the old rate; the official email from Royal Caribbean specifically stated that you pre-pay any time until 3 days prior to sailing date for any cruise booked prior to Jan 2 and still get the old rate. Only cruises booked after Jan 2, or before then but not pre-paid, will be subject to the new rate.

I think flights don't start showing for most airlines until about 6 months before your sailing date, maybe as far out as 9 months. That's based on my experience looking for flights to Fort Lauderdale. So I'd check again in another month or two, and if you're still not seeing much offered, check again in May. Make a note of whatever prices you see and then start comparing them weekly or even daily As for the best time, based on some comments in an earlier thread and my own analysis above, it seems like right around 90 days before your flight date is when US airlines drop the prices on their domestic flights. It may not be the absolute lowest rate at that point; you may want to leverage an app like Hopper to track flights and alert you when it's the optimal time to buy.

Another option that would help keep the kids entertained: You can book an excursion for disembarkation day in the Cruise Planner, and IIRC the ship will send your luggage directly to the airport or, if part of the excursion is to take you back to the airport at the end, load it on the excursion bus. Maybe an Everglades airboat tour? I've heard that's a big hit with kids.

SO glad to know I'm not the only one! Did all but a couple of the challenges and still got bupkis!

So thanks to the heads-up from @Sabrinaklai, I've been tracking the flight prices on United and JetBlue for the last few weeks. It's been interesting, not leastwise because yesterday was the 90-day mark before my cruise, and today United's fares dropped like a rock to just barely more than the best price I'd seen when I'd started. Flight itinerary -- EWR to FLL on Wednesday, March 29; returning April 9 JetBlue "Blue Plus" fare selected for all price checks, since it includes one checked bag for $2 less than checking it at the terminal United regular Economy fare for all price checks, since I need the freedom to choose our seats at booking and be sure the family is grouped together as much as possible JetBlue was holding absolutely steady at $494.40 per person ($1,977.60 total; taxes included) for the entire time I had been checking, going back to mid-December. But on Friday, they suddenly jumped up $40 per person for the departure flight ($2,138.40 total), and for no visible reason (apart from maybe that it's a holiday weekend right now); almost all regular seats still available, nothing else to account for it. Meanwhile, United had started at $408.40 per person ($1,633.60 total; again taxes included). It very quickly jumped by a lot, to just shy of $600 per person at one point. It started coming back down a bit going into this weekend, and then this morning it dropped to $423.60 per person ($1,694.40 total), just a little more than the lowest I'd seen when I'd started tracking. For those who want to stop reading here, the key takeaway is that this "90-day flight pricing rule" that Sabrina mentioned really does seem to be a real thing. So a big thanks to her for letting us all know about it, and to watch the flight prices like a hawk both decently ahead of this window, and also going into it. For those who care what happened next with me, go ahead and continue reading. For everyone else... I've gone ahead purchased my tickets on United, contrary to my original plan to fly JetBlue. The main driver was the opposite swings in the two prices. The gap went from just under $300 more for JetBlue to just under $500 more. Between that, and the fact that United allowed me to upgrade just my own seat to Economy Plus (for the extra leg room I need) for what I considered a reasonable $150 roundtrip, it was really a no-brainer. Even after tacking on trip insurance for $110, the final price was $1,952.96 -- less than JetBlue at their lowest price I could find, and $340 less using JetBlue's current rate and adding their $160 trip insurance option. If I had upgraded my own seat on JetBlue like I did on United, the difference would bump up to $454. Now, what's missing here is the checked luggage costs. With United I'll still have to pay $25 per bag when I check in each way, so there's another $200 out of pocket, putting me within $150 of the current JetBlue fare after their trip insurance is tacked on, but I'm still coming out ahead. All that said, I'm going to take advantage of United's 24-hour no questions asked cancellation policy and re-check the fare tomorrow morning to see if it's gone down again (following a tip I'd read about many lower rates coming out on a Monday night going into Tuesday), and also to see if JetBlue comes back down after we're outside the holiday weekend. But given the daily fluctuations in the United prices, I figured I'd better lock this in while it seems to have come back down. If JetBlue drops and United stays the same, I'll cancel the United flight and switch over to JetBlue. And if I do stay with United, I'll just have to hope they don't come on board and demand I give up my seat because of overbooking.

Well, we do have the Celebrity & Azamara board here now, so I'd argue that we could live blog / review blog any trips on those lines there. Maybe we should also add one more board and call it something like "For Research Purposes Only" (or maybe "Heresy" ?), for those who want detailed info on any other non-RCCL-owned cruise lines? ? Honestly, cruisehabit.com or CC or ShipMate would all be fine, and then we could just post links here so the members are aware "one of our own" recently put up a review. @twangster, I actually found your review of your Freedom sailing on ShipMate not long ago. Knew it was yours even before I saw the name of the poster, just from the description that was written in the beginning. ?

All I can say regarding the internet reviews is that I see the same themes over and over again, across the entire lineup of ships. I agree that often the 'net is just a sounding board for those who are perpetually pissed off, but this is one case where I feel like if it sounds like a duck, walks like a duck, and looks like a duck, it's most likely a duck. I really want to be proved wrong, because they're so cost competitive and the ships look gorgeous, but I'm dubious about their chances. There are plenty of folks here with sailings on various MSC ships lined up for the coming year, and I'm going to be looking for those liveblogs or after-sailing reports with bated breath.

Yeah, no one gets to tease me about my levels of detail diving any more. That’s WAY more effort than I’m willing to put in. ??

Congratulations!!

Thanks for this! Now I’ll be sure to reserve CK on night one of our Anthem cruise in October, as my wife really loves a good steak and I’m also partial to a good filet. Only specialty dining we’re considering is Wonderland, I think all other nights will be CK.

I’m a born and bred New Jerseyan, enjoying good pizza is in my blood. I want to thank everyone here for the multiple warnings about Sorrentos. I’ll be sure to avoid it, as having it might lead me to swear off ever cruising again, and that would be a Bad Thing.

Happy new year, @F1guynz! Still have just under 16 hours to go here in NJ, but no problem with saying it a bit early.

I got one as well, plus an email from my TA earlier in the morning. RCI email does confirm that it can be prepaid up until sail date, not by Jan 2.

As long as your cruise was booked before Jan 2, 2018, you can pre-pay the gratuities at any time between now and your sail date and still get the old rate. That's at least what Matt's blog post is saying, and is apparently corroborated by some of his TA contacts.

@DocLC, I don't know what voodoo you used to get a car rental rate of only $20, but I'm not seeing anything remotely near that. I just checked Avis, Hertz, Budget, and Enterprise; and they're all charging about the same rate: For our pre-cruise time, where we'd pick up the car at 7 PM on Mar 28 and return it at 9:30 AM on Mar 31, they all want about $65 per day for a Standard sedan, and about $70 for a Full Size. And that's with the AARP discount that Avis and Budget offer. At that rate, going with Lyft or even the hotel shuttle is going to be far less expensive overall.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, everyone!

I'll still have my 6s Plus for this trip, too many medical bills and other things this year to allow an upgrade. But a Moment tele lens will hopefully let me approximate shots like that!