bcarney

I just got back from a week at Disney. Nothing, and I mean nothing, will top the lines I saw… I think I'm now adequately prepared for any sort of lines on my April Oasis cruise. :)

My kids (aged 3 and 5 at the time) loved it. On port days they can stay the entire time the ship is in port, and on non-port days they were closed from 12-2pm. We generally picked them up in the afternoon so I don't recall what the evening hours were like.

I don't know, we have a Johnny Rockets in the town that I'm currently living in, and frankly it's just a plain old burger and fries. Nothing for me to get worked up over. My wife and I did it once on board one of the cruises we were on, I can't recall which one, it was that unmpressive.

I love the MDR; in fact, I prefer the traditional dining over "My Time" (and I've actually only done the Windjammer once at dinner time, and only because my brother in law who was on the cruise insisted). It's having to schlep a garment bag half way across the continent (so I can wear a suit for a few hours just like I do at the office) that I dislike. And the obligatory photographs of me in that suit that my wife insists on purchasing, of course. :) Actually, I've also not done any specialty restaurants on board. I'm fine with the main dining room, but on our next cruise I may try to persuade my wife to do one of them with the special chef (Chef's Table, can't recall the name offhand). I think she would enjoy that and I'm hoping for extra bonus points with her for suggesting it, LOL.

I wish my wife would let me get away with that. :)

Voyager class, because we love Adventure so much. We haven't been on anything bigger, yet, so that may change. The smaller ships have their appeal, though; we were on Empress 'back in the day' and liked it very much - you get more intimate with the staff and passengers, and can stop at more exotic ports that can't handle the big ships. 164 Days till Oasis. :)

We used to just fly down the day of (on our first cruise we got to the ship at 7:45pm - and the ship sailed at 8…that was cutting it close). Now that we bring along The Kids (2) we've been flying (or driving) down the day before and getting a hotel near the port. Less travel induced stress that way.

Itinerary, itinerary, itinerary. Then departure port. No, let me rephrase that - bank account balance, then itinerary, itinerary, itinerary, departure port. :)

That sure beats my last visit to San Juan, we docked at 3pm and stayed to 11pm - on a Sunday. Pretty much all we did was hit the pharmacy for some meds and then dinner at Parrot Club (highly recommended!). Beyond that, there was not much to do since it got dark so early. But that said, we'd been there several times on previous pre- and post-cruises, so it's not like we didn't know what to expect.

Whoops - need to edit my signature; I thought I was on Adventure in Nov 2001, but it debuted on Nov 18th. The timestamps on my photos are from 2002 so it was just after it's 1st Anniversary.

Go to the RC Investor Site for details on the credit: http://www.rclinvestor.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=103045&p=irol-shareholderbenefit_pf Note that the credit is not combinable with other credits - when I was a shareholder, I never used it as I had Crown and Anchor discounts, etc.

Cruising must be a mid-Michigan thing... I too live around the corner from Tyler over in Grand Ledge. We should probably form some sort of support group.... :)

"Slightly bigger" as in the 5 inch difference between Oasis and Allure? On a ship that big that's just a rounding error. :)

Right now at this point in my life definitely 7 day cruises. Maybe a 6 day with a great itinerary I suppose. But after retirement, assuming we live within driving distance of a port, I could see short 3-4-5 day getaways, especially on ships we've been on previously and already know the ship layout. Heck, we'd probably do that now if we didn't have to deal with the cost of airfare.

My next cruise is in early April '14 on Oasis. We've been on Adventure a number of times, but that's the biggest ship Ive been on.

I must confess to having a bad breakfast habit on board. Take a small pile of corned beef hash, and smother it in country gravy. Yes, it looks as terrible as it sounds, but tastes great to me! Sometimes I include a side of smoked salmon. Gosh I'm glad I got that off my chest. :) Looking forward to having this breakfast again in just under 200 days!

At $170/pp I'd have to have at least 10 seconds "at the wheel", with a free photo to prove it happened. :)

My wife played blackjack and was $100 up when she (surprisingly) quit. That's a win in my book. :)

Oasis on 5 April 2014. 209 days from today, but who's counting...

As would my bar tab after a 'round the world. Hmm.... how would I get all the T-Shirts I bought back home? :)

Seven of our ten cruises have been in late November (Thanksgiving week) - don't know if it counts as hurricane season, but the worst weather we ever had was some showers. Oh, and some cold air when sailing from Baltimore.

@Tyler80 - my family (wife and two young kids) drove from Lansing to Baltimore in Nov 2011 for a cruise on Enchantment. The drive there was great. The drive back... well, all I can say is that I believe some laws of physics were violated as the trip back seemed MUCH longer than the drive down. :) Back on topic, boarding at Baltimore was OK, but disembarkation was the easiest I've ever had. They should pack up the staff and fly them down to San Juan to train them on how it should be run. We were off the ship and into the car in 10 minutes - if that. Amazing.

Better, in my humble opinion. More ships, with more things to do on board. Yeah, the up-sell to the specialty restaurants rub me the wrong way, but I've not eaten in one yet. I first started cruising in 1999. I do think in the middle/late last decade the MDR food quality dipped, but they listened to the customers and made it better.