Orange Crush

Quick update--Captain said we had 20ft swells in San Juan, we're losing that stop unfortunately. We're still heading to St. Thomas tomorrow morning but we'll see how it goes.

Any good beaches near the port in San Juan? Our itinerary change scuttled our snorkeling plans in St. Maarten and seeing if we can make use of the masks and snorkels we brought along.

I honestly thought the cabin next to us left their balcony door unlocked and it kept waking us up as it slid open and closed as the ship lurched back and forth this morning. Swoooosh - clunk - swoooosh - clang - swoooosh - clunk . . . After meeting the neighbors I am now 99% sure it was actually their small children running back and forth.

Nassau is fine, but we've just been there a lot. Our biggest disappointment over missing it was we were hoping to thin out the crowds on the ship for a while. At most, we were going to twirl up to Senior Frogs for a slushy rum thing, as is tradition, and then go back to the boat to enjoy the lack of crowds. I still haven't checked the TV for the official new itinerary, but scuttlebutt on the pool deck is that we are skipping St. Maarten and heading back to Nassau on Friday, so maybe we'll get an opportunity to enjoy OUR boat without all these OTHER people!

As you can clearly see, I am suffering horribly

I sailed out of Port Everglades. I'm not aware of any ride share restrictions at Canaveral, though I've never tried to use one there. But the folks at Port Everglades sure seemed touchy about the subject!

Not bad while the ship is moving. But we were rocking and rolling this morning while they were waiting to assess the situation at Nassau. Kinda impressive for a ship this huge! It's nice now, but pretty windy.

1. Matter of preference. I'm sure Port Everglades is indeed much busier than Port Canaveral and that's probably why my experience at Canaveral was nicer. 2. Getting in to the port wasn't a problem, it was the terminal. I can't do a Google search or review this forum while driving, but thanks for the suggestion. Although, I had already read that the process was to drop of luggage curbside and then go park. The issue was they had signs for Terminal 18 Parking with "lot full" in front of them and guards standing watch. When we got there at 10:45, the main terminal entrance was a traffic jam of many cabs, hotel shuttles and other vehicles so my thought was to find out if I could park first and check bags second, not realizing the main entrance was the only allowed way in to that lot. 3. Asked two separate ones, actually. And if they get asked that question 8,000 times a day, one would think they'd know the correct answer. They directed me to random garages. It was a garage attendant that actually told me to just head back to the main terminal entrance and the parking lot was one and the same. 4. I'm well aware of the sweet spot time, See 2, or my original post at the top of the thread where I said I was aiming for 10:30. Got there at 10:45. Seems they were a bit later with disembarking. Maybe there was a customs delay. By 11:15, it had cleared out and the rest was easy breezy post-wild-goose-chase. 5. It's best to get out of the way of people trying to leave. Lining up at the entrance just adds to the jam. People seem to do this a lot at elevators too. 6. Floridian, drove from Orlando. Got asked three times if I was an Uber driver. I figure they are trying to crack down on Uber as some sort of fee/revenue situation versus the taxi companies. @rjac is probably right and they were suspicious of my local license plate.

Hey all, I'm on the Allure and they just announced an itinerary change for this sailing. Winds were too high to make port in Nassau so they diverted North while (I assume) they made alternate arrangements, and now we're heading to San Juan which was not previously on the itinerary. I couldn't quite make out what all the captain said over the intercom, so I'm not sure what the rest of the itinerary is going to be. We were supposed to be in St. Thomas Wednesday and then St. Maarten Thursday, but not sure what the plan is now. I'll be bummed if we skip St. Maarten since I was looking forward to Captain Bob's tour, but the weather does what it does. Safety first. I'll update once I get confirmation on the rest of the agenda. Update: Here's the new itinerary. St. Maarten is skipped. =( *sad trombone*

We tried Sorrento's again on the Allure (for science). I have to say, it wasn't gluey at all. I mean, it still wasn't good, but at least it was on par with frozen pizza. It reminded me slightly of Totinos party pizza (not the rolls, the little kids pizzas). It had a somewhat flakey quality to it. At this point, I think something was just plain wrong with the Majesty's pizza. It literally tasted like they used Elmer's school glue as the sauce. The Allure's pizza was actually edible.

Oh yeah, if you only have a fitbit and a kindle, the kindle plug will work fine. You only need those hubs and chargers if you want to charge multiple phones, tablets, fitbits, kindles, smart watches, GoPros, and digital propeller hats at the same time.

I literally just checked in a few hours ago on the Allure. They leave the code in an envelope in your stateroom. Don't try creating a login with your stateroom, it'll try to make you buy a package you already have. Click the access code button and use only that.

I'm in a D5 and there's a triple-outlet on the vanity. It's actually just a splitter plugged in to a single outlet down below. I couldn't find anything by the bed, but I'll look again to be sure. Seconding the recommendation for a multiple USB charger. I've had so many cheap plugs die on me, I only buy Anker now. This is a good one: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00VH8ZW02/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_ZEeNAbFZ2T005

They let me on just fine, not a word was said about the assigned time. However, I learned a few important lessons this morning: 1. Port Canaveral is better than Port Everglades 2. Port Everglades has terrible signage 3. Don't ask the guards where to go to park. They don't know and will lie to you. 4. It is possible to be too early to the port 5. If you're early and there is a ridiculous traffic jam at the terminal entrance, you are too early. This is the mass exodus from the last group of people going home. Go away and waste some time. You don't want to be in this line. 6. Everyone seemed really concerned that I might be an Uber driver for some reason

Hi all, I'm sailing out on the Allure in two days! When I did the online checkin however, it only offered me arrival appointment time slots waaaaaay late in the afternoon (2:30 or 3:30!). I was planning to get to the port early, what happens if I show up at 10:30am? Are they going to let me on, or make me wait? Thanks! -Nick

We leave Sunday and will be in St. Maarten on the 8th, but I wouldn't have even thought about daylight savings! Either way, we're there before the change, so I'll still keep a close eye out for "ship time" vs "local time" and make sure I'm absolutely clear on when the big ship leaves!

Per the recommendation of the fine folks here, we're doing the Captain Bob trip when we're down there next week too. The Allure's itinerary says it's there 8am - 5pm, all aboard at 4:30. Getting back to the dock at 4pm makes me nervous beyond all belief, but it's not all clear to me which time zone the Allure's sticking too. I'm hoping the Allure is 8 - 5 eastern, which would be 9-6 local time which makes me infinitely more comfortable. I will let you know how it really shakes out though. One way or another, Bob's email clearly states it's 10 to 4 Atlantic time, show up by 9:30 at the dock. So whichever time zone the Allure is using means there will be a tiny bit of time to walk around the port area either before or after the trip. I figure we'll grab a coffee or a cocktail, whichever it is.

At one of the ports of call? I suppose you could if you really wanted to, but it seems like that would be a lot of hassle. The ship has facilities to do it for you and the pricing isn't outrageous, so I'm not sure how much you'd potentially save. And then you've gotta find a reputable dry cleaner, arrange to get the articles over to them, and make sure they (or you) can get it back to the ship before departing, and you've got to contend with the roundtrip through security, maybe a customs checkpoint...

Hang clothes *in the bathroom* (but not in the shower where they will get wet). It doesn't work if the clothes are in the closet, hallway, balcony, etc.

If they happen to find it and take it away (or it gets dirty), just order room service again. There's a complimentary section on the room service door tag (juice, coffee, yogurt, etc.) and you'll get a new tray.

Another benefit of checking out your table as soon as you get on the ship--there can sometimes be a bit of a wait to get in the MDR as people line up to be shown to their table--especially on the first night. You will already know where yours is and can walk right to it.

I'm totally going to do that on my next cruise.

Well, you can get the Limited Express Pass for $70, which works the same except you can only use it on each ride once. But to be honest, the Single Rider lines are usually shorter and I've never once felt it worthwhile to pay extra. Even if I want to ride with others, the Express lines were never all that much shorter and we always did fine just using an app to watch the wait times and hit what we wanted once the time dropped to something reasonable. Standard park strategies apply (go early, go to the back of park and work your way forward, ride lines thin out during lunch and popular shows, etc.) Disney's fast passes are really just a reservation system. They don't cost extra, but if you didn't book them weeks in advance, forget about getting a popular ride unless you luck out and somebody cancels. Also 3 max per day.

Yeah, there's no one size fits all answer for all situations. I think we're also going to prefer MTD when it's just the two of us (which is what we're doing for this next cruise), but we really liked the traditional experience when we sailed with family. We did it the wrong way when we went with a large group of friends for a bachelor/bachelorette thing. Everyone was mostly doing their own thing so everybody booked MTD intending to keep the scheduling more relaxed and flexible, but the bride-to-be who orchestrated the trip was stressing herself out to try and get most of the group together for dinner at the same time. I think traditional would've worked better and people would just have to manage their own time to be in the same time and place together. Nobody needs to be trying to corral kittens on their vacation.

Rats. I did want to try the hot stones, but sushi alone is not worth it for me to visit Izumi otherwise. At least not on the package plan. :(