Allure lured us back... April 2-9, 2023

[jbrinkm]

Going to try my hand at this blogging. Warning - this won't be one of those really fantastic blogs with all the pictures and lots of details because I don't have a laptop, just a tablet and a bluetooth keyboard. If I'm able, I'll add in some pics later. Please excuse typos! Happy to answer questions as we go...

A little background: my family (DH, me, DD 16 and DS 13) sailed Allure from Ft. Lauderdale last spring break, and we loved her so much that we are on her again for this spring break with a few changes - departing from Galveston and 7 nights instead of 6.  We came in last night and just fininshed our first dinner in the MDR. We are pretty basic when we sail - we got the refreshment package for the first time ever this cruise and also tried our first specialty dining due to a TA dining certificate. Other than that, we love what is included in the fare. I was a little nervous about the new menus, but night one went well (more on that later!). We are in 2 normal, side by side balcony rooms, portside, on deck 9. 

Quick rundown of our itinerary - boarded today then we have two sea days. Wednesday we'll be in Roatan where we have a full day with Roatan Getaway tours (ziplining, animal sanctuary, snorkeling and the chocolate factory), Thursday is Costa Maya where we have reservations at Maya Chan (first time, crossing fingers for little to no sargassum), and Friday is Cozumel where we're doing an ATV/painball outing in the morning and trying a Discover Scuba in the afternoon. Then one more sea day, one more sleep and finally, the very, very sad day that shall not be mentioned.

Allure is as fantastic as we remember her! Central Park looks ok. Lots of green, although still some gaps and places they are still working on, but not bad. The itinerary is much more robust than it was last April. We have the comedy show tonight and then probably to bed early. We had a doozy of a time getting down here and didn't get a whole lot of sleep last night. I'll post that story next, and come back to the details of today later tonight or tomorrow morning. 

[jbrinkm]

Our flight story:

Everything went smoothly until we were about to take off at 6pm Eastern, and just barely missed our departure window before the storms rolled in. We were on the runway, next to depart, and got called off. The storm rolled through - we were still on the plane on the runway, and it was bouncing up and down from the wind on the wings. Then emergency alerts start coming through on the phones - first a tornado warning, then a tornado watch (until 7:30pm). Meanwhile, we're watching the nonstop lightning out of the plane windows.

Around 7:20, the pilot (who was super funny, which helped) started making some announcements about almost ready to leave, storm almost past, just getting final clearance, etc etc, and the lady behind me starts screaming about something wrong with her husband and is there a doctor, and couldn't wake him up. A doctor comes and does vitals and pulled him out of his seat to lay him in the floor, when he comes to. Meanwhile his little daughter is sobbing hysterically and the wife/mom is trying to focus on both. So the guy is now alert and said he just fell asleep, but he hadn't been responsive, so back to the gate we go...

Paramedics came in, family gets off, we wait for their suitcase retrieval, back through safety routine again (by law), now we're at the end of the takeoff line, finally leave at 9pm, and 3.5 hours later, we are in Houston. 

By the time we got our luggage and waited for our $150 UberXL, it was almost midnight Central, which got us to our Galveston hotel at 1am Central which feels like 2am for us. We hadn't really had dinner since we ate a late lunch and were planning to grab something at the airport, but everything was closed. We just ate trail mix, apples and candy that we had brought for flight snacks. We didn't have our own car and we were exhausted, so just decided to go to bed and enjoy the hotel breakfast in the morning.

We met 2 ladies in the row in front of us who are also on our cruise - we got to talking during all of the delays.

[asquared17]

oh my gOSH what a travel story!!! literally the stuff of my nightmares.

you are all troopers, and i am glad that family was able to get medical attention before you took off. the storms were nuts here in NJ too - we also had the tornado warning; can’t imagine being in a plane during that!!

ANYWAY!! i am so glad you are safely aboard. also, have THE BEST time at maya chan!!!! 

definitely following along

please pass by/stop at the champagne bar for me!! the best

[FireFishII]

May your troubles be behind you and you have a great rest of the trip.  I have never done a live blog before so at the end, let me know if you enjoyed it or was it just a headache to do.  Following.

[jbrinkm]

Embarkation day

We stayed at the Best Western Plus, the one further down the Seawall because it had suites with 2 queens and a sofa bed, which is the best setup for us with 2 teens. It was about 20 minutes from the port. We were all a bit sluggish in the morning after our late night of travel, but managed to grab some of the free breakfast (it ended at 9:30am, isn’t that early for a hotel breakfast?). We had prearranged a minivan taxi the day before (Ready Set Go if anyone is interested in that option), loaded up at 10:30am and were pulling up to the terminal just before 11am. Easy to find a porter to take our luggage and we walked straight through all of our check in and security checks, no wait, no problems.

As soon as we were onboard, my husband went to dining to re-request a window table in the MDR (I emailed 2 weeks before but never heard back) and I went to make lunch reservations at Giovanni’s with our TA certificates. I was in a long line for the dining reservations kiosk when a staff member came to second half of the line and directed us to a second kiosk on the other side of the promenade with no line at all and three stations. So if you need dining reservations on Allure, look around for the second station! We picked up our soda cups and were sitting in the promenade with drinks in our hands at 11:40am. It was so lovely to be back on Allure! We looked through the daily schedule and went up to try to do waivers but the line was too long, so we just went down to see if we could get into our lunch a little early (spoiler - we could!). 

Our lunch was fantastic! I had the caprese salad, DD had the arugula salad, DH and DS had the calamari. The caprese wasn’t the best, but was ok. The boys loved the calamari. For our main course, DD and I had the gnocchi (YUM!!), DS had the mushroom risotto which was fine but a little bland, and DH had the Branzino which he said was good. We all got a kick out of the gigantic pepper grinder! I will try to post a picture of that. For dessert, DD and I got the cannoli - I split mine with my husband who loves pistachio, and he got ice cream, one chocolate for me and one pistachio for himself, so he had his 2 halves of cannoli with pistachio with his pistachio ice cream, and I did the same with the chocolate. DS went on and on about the tiramisu and how he had never tried it, and how excited he was to have it, but I don’t think he enjoyed it as much as he thought he would. It was good, but he is 13 and his favorite chocolate is Hersheys. The best part was avoiding the Windjammer.

Our rooms were ready by 1pm (not 2pm), even though we are on the once-a-day cleaning schedule. AND our luggage was in the hall already too. Our room attendant stopped by but was definitely not as happy and chatty as I remember our room stewards being in the past. The extra rooms to clean on turnaround day seem like they are stressful. They have a QR code now in the room where you can scan and request service, things like split the bed, bring ice, I need distilled water, open divider, etc. in 30-60 minutes from request. We were really happy to see that and have used it 3 times already!

We spent some time unpacking and getting the rooms set up, then my family wanted to be athletic so went to do running track & gym. I went to the sail away dance party and then watched for dolphins (unfortunately did not see any…) and went to guest services to get the extra key card for the kids’ room. Also kept caffeinating after our late night with the Freestyle machine. 

We have early dinner so went to eat again at 5pm. We were still a little full from lunch so it wasn’t terrible that portions are slightly smaller than they used to be. We found the dining room food to still be pretty good! We are pescatarian so I won’t be able to comment on any of the meat dishes. Appetizers - artichoke dip (good taste but runny), caesar salad (good), escargot (good) and tomato soup (quite tomato-y/acidic but fine). Main dishes - fish (good! except the yellow sauce), crab cakes (appy but we got for main). Dessert - dark chocolate custard (good even with no extra sugar, very light which was good since we were stuffed), Boston Creme pie (good taste but VERY dense cake part) and key lime pie (good). We really didn’t have complaints about ANY of the MDR food. Our waiter did tell us right off the bat that he could only bring out one dish at a time. 

After dinner, we wandered a bit and ended up in Boleros with nojitos (we don’t drink much and have only the refreshment package). They were phenomenal! Listened to some Latin music and watched some dancing. There is a large contingent of guests speaking Spanish on this cruise. AND we have a full ship - it was removed from the Royal page at least a week before we cruised as Sold Out.

We had the adult comedy show at 8pm. Really funny! It was the first time we have ever done that but it will definitely be on our list again. We decided to skip the ice show this time since we saw it last year. I have Mamma Mia reservations again this sailing but haven’t definitely decided if we’ll see it again. The younger lead voice wasn’t great last time so hoping it will be better if we go see it a second time. 

After that, I can’t remember what order, but we tried to do “finish the lyric” and it was so packed! We walked in and essentially had to walk right back out. Note to self - get to activities earlier! We got some additional snacks in the promenade and sat for a while watching the photographers. We went to the dance club for 80’s music, which I LOVE, but there were about 40 people in there just sitting and staring at the dance floor. I was NOt going to put on a dance show for them, so we walked out of that also. But no frustration, just happy to be on the boat. We were thinking about doing the big evening party with balloon drop, but we were just too tired. We sat on the little secret balcony on deck 9, watching people wandering around Central Park and looking at the schedule for the next day, and finally decided to go to bed. While we were watching Central Park, a group of teens came through in a “mood,” and started picking up the restaurant umbrellas and screwing around with them. I remember reading about the damage on a ship a few weeks ago, so I began to videotape them. One saw me and they cleared out (I then deleted the video, as they had stopped before causing damage). 

What’s funny is that our teens were in bed before us last night! 

 

[asquared17]

central park at night there’s nothing like it. a dream

glad you got your dining reservations and into your cabin early!!

i am very intrigued by the QR code - this would make things a lot easier for everyone and now i can leave my little whiteboard where i used to write notes to our cabin attendant behind!! (a whole half pound less in my suitcase!)

[jbrinkm]

Random thoughts-

Someone didn't make it onto the ship yesterday - we saw luggage in the hall last night at 10pm, then saw keycards still on a set of 2 rooms this morning down the hall.

And, my little tablet/keyboard is working out better than I thought it would so hopefully I will be able to do a better job of this than I anticipated! We sat in Central Park today drinking mocktails while my husband answered some emails and I typed yesterday's post. I'm using a Google doc so I don't lose anything. Internet has been fine but we haven't tried to stream anything. I'm trying to remember all of the concerns people have had over the past few months, watch for them, and then share what we're experiencing.

I saw some sargassum floating by in open sea today. Not a ton, but some.

It is very, very windy (but also warm and sunny). Captain called it a "spicy wind"!

[wordell1]

It looks like the Central Park foliage has made a comeback since January.  

[jbrinkm]

Yes, I'd say it is about 70% back. There are a few trees that are bare or brown, and still some patches of dirt, but the overall impression is green, which is a huge improvement over some of the pictures I saw. A crew member said they got most of it replanted about 3 weeks ago.

[JohnK6404]

Have a great time! We loved Allure too! 

[melmar02]

You are getting me even more excited! 19 days for us! I think my kids will have those same looks for the pepper grinder. 

[jbrinkm]

Day #2, a sea day and the first full day

My son and I slept in while my husband and daughter went to the gym at 8am (on vacation!! - I don’t understand this…). The kids then ate breakfast at WJ and my husband went to the MDR by himself. After all the caffeine, richer foods than I eat at home and a late night snack, my stomach was in no mood for breakfast. At 11am, we went to the Search for the Nations Scavenger Hunt introduction. I thought it was going to be a situation where we run around the ship to find flags, but instead, we have the whole week to get signatures from staff who are from different countries. This is fun! We’ve had some great interactions that I wouldn’t have had otherwise (and a few awkward situations too). I’ll share more about this experience in a bit…

After that, we met up with the kids for lunch at the WJ. Then my husband came down to Central Park while I went to the pool deck line dance class. I joined him when I finished. This is turning out to be a pattern for us - we sit in Central Park, he answers his work emails and I type up this blog while we drink coffee. After that, we walked around the ship for a bit getting signatures, then went to Where in the World Am I trivia. We got the kids to go with us - I wasn’t sure what this was exactly and my son is very good with geography, but it turned out to be more about history. They gave us clues about different places and we had to figure out where it was. We got 8 and the winners had 10, so not too bad. 

Since it was formal night, we then went back and got changed for dinner. Dinner was a bit of a disappointment tonight for us. Appetizers: butternut squash soup (sweet but also really, really salty, which was a strange combo), caesar salad (good). Main courses: salmon (ok, but my husband grew up working in his family’s Greek restaurants and does a fantastic salmon at home - this was not as good or flavorful BUT the celery root side and the sauce were both really good), risotto (my son hated this, said it tasted too much like mint. He likes risotto at home but this was vegan and didn’t have the usual parmesan also), and they were able to leave the seafood off of the pasta dish for my daughter who is picky about fish - she ate it but said it still tasted really seafood-y). Dessert: creme brulee (ok, slightly bland), cappuccino chocolate cake (fine), apple crumble (this had a slightly rancid oil taste and I couldn’t eat more than 2 bites, my family tried it and couldn’t taste it at the time, but it was also in the WJ later and my husband said he could taste it when we tried it again then), and cream puffs (good). I have pictures of everything except appetizers. 

Dinner has been averaging a little over an hour. We were there at 5:10 (our arrival window is 5-5:15pm) and we were finished at 6:15pm last night. The first night, it was maybe an hour and 20 minutes. Much faster than last year, so I hope that is helping out the MTD crowd. 

Since it was formal night and we were dressed up, we waited in line to do some formal pictures. I got the 10 picture package during the Black Friday sale, so we’ve been making more of an effort to have our pictures taken. Honestly, the poses they are putting us in are ridiculous and very few of our pictures have come out well. We also went to Central Park for some pics - and remember I mentioned the wind? Every picture has my hair blowing around in some strange way. Plus the kids were totally sick of pictures at this point, so we gave up. 

We got some beverages, hung out on the promenade listening to Big Band music, then WJ for second dinner since we didn’t finish or enjoy the first dinner very much, then we had the Aqua show (OceanAria, amazing as always). They were getting set up for the Hush party which intrigued me, but we were pretty tired so ended up retiring early. 

So back to the scavenger hunt - a good portion of the day was spent getting crew signatures. You get 1 point for each signature from people who are from fairly well represented countries, 5 points for people who are from “rare” countries (fewer than 4 crew members on board from that country, activities staff and senior officers are 50 points and the Cruise Director is 1000 points). There was one group of kids that seemed really excited about it at the intro, but I haven’t seen them doing it at all. There is another adult women who is the competition - we see her getting a lot of the same signatures at the same time as us. 

My three awkward interactions were 1. two people I forgot (I am really good at remembering practical things, but horrible with faces) and asked where they were from, then said “oh, I already have that one but thank you for offering”, and they responded - “you have me. I signed it.” (embarassing!), 2. Bartender at Boleros was from Ukraine, what do you even say? He signed it while I just mumbled something like, “so sorry about what is happening in your country, I’m sure you’re tired of being asked about it.” The resigned look on his face - Ugh. and 3. I went looking for Ivan in the comedy club because he was the MC the night before, about 45 minutes before the first show of the night. I walked in, it wasn’t really “open” but it wasn’t locked, so I just started saying loudly, “Mr. Ivan, Mr. Ivan, are you here? Mr. Ivan?” A different staff member walked in, threw me a look of pure shade, and said in a very dry tone, “He isn’t here.” Boy did I hightail it out of there!

The funniest part of this is when the staff get really into it. They rat each other out but then make me promise to not tell that person that it was them! We’ve gotten a few of the rare countries that way, and some of the senior staff for the bigger points. Sometimes there are people just sitting there bored, and they light up when we come in with our paper, then point out all of the other people we can get in the vicinity. That makes it really fun. I’m enjoying this competition immensely.

Pics from dinner:

[jbrinkm]

Some more random stuff:

Question: Do you pronounce the speed of ships (knots) like nautical (naughts) or like tying something (nots)? I know the British pronunciation is the former, but is it the same in the USA?

Some things in the room that are working really well are our super strong magnets - we’ve been hanging things from the ceiling and walls and pinning our balcony curtain down to let less light in. We are also using the ice bucket in the fridge trick and it is amazing! Definitely keeping the fridge cooler than it would have been. And finally, we are really happy we brought pump soap with us - works so much better in the bathroom space than the bar in the dish.

First story: when we were boarding, my husband, who has never really spent significant time around people with Southern USA regional dialects, overheard a father saying to a son - “You should pay attention to the asses that trigger you. Once you figure out which asses are a problem, then we can work with that.” He thought, “HUH?!? This kid is like, 8 years old. What kind of conversation is this dad having???” Then the dad said, “I think it might be tomatoes.” And DH realized that he was talking about ACIDS, as in food, LOL.

Another funny story - the first night, the family next to us came in really late, like 5:40pm. Last night, when we were just a few minutes after 5, my husband apologized to the waiter about being a few minutes late, and he waved us off, it was no problem, we weren’t late, other tables were later - at which point, I said, “like them” and pointed to the (empty) table of the family next to us. He got really conspiratorially looking, lowered his voice, and said, “the lady was talking last night like blub blub blub (he said kind of garbled words that I can’t replicate by typing) and was falling asleep at the table - but kept drinking more wine with dinner!” We kind of giggled, figured she’s on vacation and enjoying herself! But also started referring to her as wine mom, and saw her two more times over the evening. She had a wine glass in her hand every single time we saw her! Good for her - she’s getting value out of her beverage package 

And more pics:

 

[melmar02]

Sorry you had a disappointing formal night dinner. I agree 100% - I have always though Royal's creme brulee was bland. Maybe I'm just used to having it with berries on land, so the bit of acid and sweet help counter the subtle taste.  I think my kids will love the scavenger hunt! What a great way to get to know crew members.

[asquared17]

wait what is the ice bucket trick???? 

okay i’m caught up;

- knots like tying a knot here 

- tbh if we all knew what type of people triggered us early on, maybe we’d be better at avoiding them but acids does tend to make a little more sense 

- loved the pics; speaking of pics — that wind whipping through central park on formal night is NO JOKE. i almost flashed the entire world, marilyn monroe style with the slit in my skirt the last time

[Ampurp85]

1 hour ago, asquared17 said:

wait what is the ice bucket trick???? 

okay i’m caught up;

- knots like tying a knot here 

- tbh if we all knew what type of people triggered us early on, maybe we’d be better at avoiding them but acids does tend to make a little more sense 

- loved the pics; speaking of pics — that wind whipping through central park on formal night is NO JOKE. i almost flashed the entire world, marilyn monroe style with the slit in my skirt the last time

Sticking your ice bucket in the cooler makes it colder, it also makes the ice last longer.

Yes, I recall have the wind Marilyn Monroe me on Harmony and Oasis.

[jbrinkm]

Day #3

Trying to get this one out before bed tonight because we have a full day in Roatan tomorrow and won’t have internet access… I may forget some stuff and add it in tomorrow night when we get back. 

My husband and I ate all three meals in the MDR today - I actually got up and joined him for breakfast (the dining room was PACKED at 9:30am)! He and DD went to the gym again this morning. I don’t know what is wrong with these people. I don’t do gym on vacation - I’ll do ten million steps/day (including stairs) and dance and play volleyball, etc. but NOT the treadmill during a vacay.

The dining room had made to order omelets, with limited filling choices. Our waiter said that WJ had them along with the Solarium, but we have not confirmed that. Tomorrow will be my first WJ breakfast in order to be quick since we have an excursion. I got spinach and peppers with cheddar but was accidentally served a ham and cheddar. My husband got the harvest bowl (I think that was what it was called?) and had to leave, I can’t remember why - maybe to meet the kids for something? so I waited for my new omelet and then we went to Central Park again. 

We set up for our “work” time and watched all of the people trying to get in to Park Cafe between 11-11:30am when it was closed and then also watched the line form and get longer and longer - boy, people REALLY love that roast beef sandwich! Around 11:40am the sun was high enough that it was too hot and sunny too stay, so we moved to the little 9th floor balcony again where it was shady and I finished typing up the post for yesterday. 

By the way, my husband has totally gotten into the staff signatures with me! He has been keeping track of when certain high-point staff members will be in a certain place and will go find them at that time. He considers it “his” paper now. We’re doing pretty well, I think. There’s only one other person (the competition) that we still see doing it - she also has recruited her husband to help.

Around 12:30, we went to lunch in the MDR because they had some shrimp stuff that he really wanted. I was still full from breakfast, so I had caesar salad, only ate the spinach and 3 gnocci of the main course and then I had the APPLE BLOSSOM! It was so delicious and totally made up for the rancid apple crumble from yesterday. I had forgotten that this was a highly recommended dessert that could only be found on the one lunch menu until I was there and saw it. Yum!

After lunch, we FINALLY went to sign the waivers for the kids and realized that they were only for the Flowrider (we thought also for zip line), but ended up getting a few staff signatures while we were there, including a woman from Chile - the only one on the ship, and Chile wasn’t even on the paper so she just wrote it in (we also had 1 staff member from Adventure Ocean write in that he was from “Bikini Bottom” and that his name was Spongebob - we’ll see if they accept that!?!). The kids stayed on the sports court and did mini golf and the zip line. DH and went to WJ to just sit and use the Freestyle machine and watch the kids down below. 

Then we went to Schooner to do the A to Z scavenger hunt. It was hard! We got all but 3 in the time allotted but there were already winners when we returned, and we had all four of us working on it. Another loser family had a fun laugh with us while we were standing there in the loser section about all the stuff we grabbed and the process we used to do it. 

After that, DH got dressed for dinner (he brought more clothes than I did and also made our son bring dinner clothing as well) and we headed down to 70s line dancing class at Boleros. The dance floor was completely full so people were starting to fill in the seating area around the back of the dance floor. I wanted to move a chair over to make a little more room, I started to move it, my husband decided to “help” and scraped the chair over my toe which left a gouge that started bleeding profusely. I tried to keep dancing (I love dance classes on the ship) because it didn’t hurt that much, but when I saw it start to soak through the fabric of my sandal, we left and grabbed some bandaids at guest services. 

It was then dinner time. Wine mom and family were there a little earlier tonight, like 5:25, and when offered her chardonnay by our asst. waiter, she declined, saying she had overdone it the last two days and was taking a break. So I guess we can’t call her wine mom any more. (Our tables are packed really close together so we can’t avoid hearing). Dinner was pretty good! I’ll post pics of what we had. The only slight issues were the mushroom risotto was just a little bland, and my fruit oat bar was terrible - I couldn’t finish it. But DH had ordered a second dessert and I picked at that a litte, plus I had gotten vanilla ice cream on the side and I finished that. I was so happy with the lunch apple blossom that I didn’t care at all. 

After dinner, my husband wanted a few pictures with my son (remember the clothing situation?) and my daughter volunteered to take them. They wanted to do it just by a plain wooden wall, but I got them to move to some art which turned out to be weird bananas by the stairs. Then everyone got really goofy - my daughter decided to do gangster/mob-style photos, my son was doing silly poses, I kept saying bananas in a Minion voice, my husband was trying to get us to be serious, and we were all cackling in the stairwell while people looked at us strangely as they were leaving or arriving for dinner.

So when we finally calmed down, DS and I rested a bit in the rooms and DH took DD to ice skating to sign the waiver. We went to the juggling show which was actually really funny. Then the kids went off to do their own thing and DH and I went to If You Know It, Dance It! in Dazzles. I honestly didn’t even know this theater space existed during our last cruise. The game show was FUN! We were on team Tequila and ended up winning. It was rowdy!! I used one of my 50% coupons for a hard seltzer which is the first alcoholic drink I’ve had so far. Got another signature from the bar staff (Bulgaria!). After the game show and the dancing, we decided to forgo the 70s dance party and came back to the room to chill and get ready for bed. 

Oh, and we have 2000 Latino/Latina passengers on the ship, as announced by the cruise director.

I'm going to break up the pics in the next few posts to not overwhelm...

 

 

 

 

 

[jbrinkm]

Food:

(please ask if you want to know what something specifically is, what meal it was and if we liked it)

[jbrinkm]

Silly pics from tonight

[jbrinkm]

The only decent pic from Central Park last night from formal night

[jbrinkm]

Moon was out during the day, virgin Miami Vices, the sideways menu (sorry!) that says you can order vegetarian Indian on request, our A-Z scavenger paper and pile, and the kids zip lining

[asquared17]

LOVING the family and food pics!! so much fun. your son and husband looked so nice (matching!) in their ensembles for the evening. well done on the forced change of clothes

was that a fish and chips sandwich for lunch? i was trying to figure out what it was… your food pictures look excellent! 

straight up cacking over the “baNANA” in minion

little balcony on deck 9 where you guys continued working… is this on 9 but in central park??? we found this spot on oasis last time and discovered it to be non existent on symphony. we were devestato. i will be checking to see if it’s still around to step out onto while on harmony. last time we saw, there was a little cafe table and chairs and one on each side of the entrance to CP. (hopefully this makes sense.)

crossing fingers that you’ll have good weather for roatan!!!

also: you guys better win the signature hunt. i am now INVESTED. let us know if we can drop in anything, hunger-games style, to assist

[FireFishII]

Loving your live blog so far.  Thank you.  I too am interested if you win the signature hunt! 

[InmyElement]

Enjoying your Blog..Thanks for sharing..

[jbrinkm]

19 hours ago, asquared17 said:

was that a fish and chips sandwich for lunch? i was trying to figure out what it was… your food pictures look excellent! 

little balcony on deck 9 where you guys continued working… is this on 9 but in central park??? we found this spot on oasis last time and discovered it to be non existent on symphony. we were devestato. i will be checking to see if it’s still around to step out onto while on harmony. last time we saw, there was a little cafe table and chairs and one on each side of the entrance to CP. (hopefully this makes sense.)

The lunch sandwich - they called it a fried shimp sandwich but it was essentially a po'boy. That was one of the two shrimp dishes that DH really wanted for lunch that day. 

The little balconies are near the elevators on Deck 9, one in each corner, a level up but overlooking Central Park. We didn't discover them last year but we keep finding ourselves sitting there this year. It helps that our rooms are on Deck 9 - it is easy to be there when we don't quite want to be in our rooms but we might want to be soon.

We are back from Roatan and dinner. I'll try to get today typed up. I have no food pictures - we were rushing this morning (ate at WJ to be quick) and were too hungry and tired at dinner to remember. We were busy the entire day in Roatan and didn't have lunch (unless you count the one PB brownie that the 4 of us split on the way back to the ship?). 

I will put the two pictures of what you can request with that QR code for service in the rooms. Unfortunately, I somehow missed seeing regular towels on there. I accidentally overflowed the sink (just a little, don't ask & at least it wasn't a toilet) this morning and had to quick throw a shower towel on the floor. We knew we would need to shower quickly to get to our dinner when we got back, so I ended up asking our room attendant in person. When I just posted, I see the towels now.

Did NOT see an omlet station at WJ this morning. Just a fried egg station.

And our head waiter is a total gossip. I'm not going to name him, but he is hilarious. 

 

[asquared17]

18 minutes ago, jbrinkm said:

The little balconies are near the elevators on Deck 9, one in each corner, a level up but overlooking Central Park. We didn't discover them last year but we keep finding ourselves sitting there this year. It helps that our rooms are on Deck 9 - it is easy to be there when we don't quite want to be in our rooms but we might want to be soon.

YES!!!!!!!!!! THIS IS THE PLACE!!!!!!! so bummed it was eliminated on symphony

thank you so much also for adding the screenshots of what you can select with the QR code. this is a game changer! (and hopefully not too annoying to the crew.)

18 minutes ago, jbrinkm said:

And our head waiter is a total gossip. I'm not going to name him, but he is hilarious. 

BLESS. the crewmembers WE NEED!!

now i just need the gif of matthew hussey going 'LOVE DRAMA' -- i'll post a link to the video (sorry it blew up the whole post, i can't figure out how to make it just a link, it keeps defying my request to post as plain text.)

it's at the 2:01 mark, but the entire video is hysterical. (please note there is a spot or two of language if you watching it at work/with family/etc.

[jbrinkm]

3 hours ago, asquared17 said:

thank you so much also for adding the screenshots of what you can select with the QR code. this is a game changer! (and hopefully not too annoying to the crew.)

They may have some other people helping out with these requests - twice, the person who responded to a request was NOT our cabin attendant. So perhaps they have some "floaters"?

Sitting in WJ now so can't watch your video but will def check it out later!

There has been a salad bar in WJ every time we've come in here - I know some people were complaining that they only had premade salads on some ships or during some time period. Also there is a hard ice cream station. I don't know if it is here every night.

I don't know if I've mentioned, but Allure has been rocking and rolling this whole trip. Is this a sailing from Galveston thing or a weather thing (wind)? We didn't notice much motion at all last year, so I'm pretty sure it isn't the ship.

Also, our bathroom has a wall sliver of mold spots in the space by the door hinges. Because the shower is round, there is a little space there that they put another little piece of wall in front of to create an enclosed triangle. It isn't something our room attendant can easily clean - you'd need a ladder and a long cleaning tool of some sort to go in from the top to scrub it. Has anyone else ever seen this? It isn't from a lack of cleaning, but rather a design flaw (I'm sure moisture is getting trapped back in there). I'm torn about whether to mention it to him vs. going to guest services. And if they have to bleach it, I really don't want it to be while we're still inhabiting the room. Thoughts/suggestions from more experienced cruisers?

[jbrinkm]

Day #4: Roatan

The weirdos in my family got up early again for the gym. I had trouble falling asleep last night and then docking woke me up way before my alarm this morning, so I didn’t get nearly enough sleep. Luckily, our day was so much fun that the adrenaline kept me going. The Captain and the app both said that the gangway would be open at 9:30 but they announced it was open at 9am. WJ was packed and we were trying to hurry because we had such a big agenda for the day, but we didn’t get out until 10am.

Last year, we did the easy snorkeling and sloth sanctuary tour from Roatan Getaway Tours that we found on Viator. We had such a great time that I booked them for a private excursion this year, for a full day. We met our guide for the day, Monique, and started out walking over to Jungle Top zip lines, our first activity of the day and where she was parked. We put our day packs in the car and did the zip line activity. This was really fun! Normally, I’m pretty uncomfortable with heights, but this one weaved in and out of the tree canopy. I only really noticed the height right at the beginning (I was hesitant to really jump out like they told me to and bumped my rear on the first platform - not badly but I’ll have a bruise) and on one other specific segment. There were 16 total ziplines. 

They drive you up at the beginning in a pickup truck, up a steep, steep hill. And he backs up for part of it, to make it easier to come back down. The people in the back thought they were going to fall out (they weren’t actually in danger of falling out, but it seemed scary). The whole zip line experience was fun. I did get my first of two animal bites while we were doing it, by a fire ant. There was one platform that was wobbly, and I grabbed the whole tree in the middle because it made me nervous (again, it was fine, I’m just not the best with heights), and it turns out that it was covered with fire ants - which I discovered for myself at the same time as the guide was pointing it out to me. 

After the zip lines, we drove to AJs sanctuary but Monique suggested we go do our snorkeling and come back because there were a gazillion buses and vans there when we arrived. So we caught up with the group doing the tour that we did last year and did our first snorkel location with the big group of them. Then back to the dock where everyone else got out and we stayed on for the other 2 stops we had requested. They cautioned us that the waves were rough (although it was sunny and warm, this darn spicy wind keeps following us) and they wanted to make sure we were ok with it. I have enough “padding” that I float easily and my husband and the kids grew up swimming in the ocean so we were fine. The 2nd stop was fantastic (the first was really good also, better than last year). It was rough, but the payout was worth it. HUGE angelfish, all colors and variety of fish and coral. Snorkeling is totally my happy place so I was in heaven. The third stop was even rougher and snorkeling wasn’t as great, but we did boat by the tiger cage on one of the French Keys. What is up with that? We saw some fish but nothing new, not as many, and the water was really cloudy with sediment so it was difficult to see at times. We did see a cool shipwreck. 

We finished up, got changed and headed back to AJs. Where we found the gate locked and everyone gone. BUT Monique got on the phone - apparently everyone on that part of the island is her family - and before long, we were getting a private tour with the animals. I could literally write pages about how much I love animals but I will keep it short-ish for this blog… I was again surprised by how much I enjoyed holding the guinea pigs. They seem so basic, but my little one was curious and cute and soft and was LICKING ME! I think it liked the salt from the ocean on my skin. Apparently from the story the staff told us, they are all inbred siblings and cousins (my interpretation) from an original guinea pig threesome that was abandoned after the original owners discovered that they did NOT in fact have three males when one had babies.

Next we held the sloths who all have their own personalities and preferences (Turbo doesn’t like to be held by women!). So cute. Then the Macaws - two of whom were little stinkers. The young ones were so mischievous. They had to be continually fed sunflower seeds, and when the guy stopped, they didn’t stop “eating.” So my second animal bite of the day was one of the Macaws who maybe thought one of my freckles was a seed? While my daughter and I took turns holding one of the young ones, the other young one kept biting the guide’s crocs and sometimes missing and biting his ankles (on purpose? she wasn’t saying). Then when he put the other young one on my son’s head, it kept biting the little metal air holes on his hat. Finally for my husband, he got the older mature one over and we had no more biting. Then off we went to the capuchin monkeys enclosure. We find them hilarious. They were running all over us, trying to pick the lock to get out, spitting out the part of the grapes they didn’t like, trying to steal the keys from the guy, etc. 

We washed up and our last stop was the chocolate factory. Love that their chocolate is organic and they don’t use palm oil. We bought a few bars, some cocoa powder and the aforementioned peanut butter brownie, which we split in 4 pieces for each of us. 

We got back on the ship around 4:15 and to our rooms by 4:30, showered and made it to dinner by 5:10pm. Appetizers: caesar salad, tofu & avocado salad, coconut shrimp. Main courses: veggie pesto pasta and tiger shrimp. Desserts: Got one of each for the table to share and did a decent job of finishing it all. There was a light pineapple cake, a carrot cake, a blueberry cobbler, a rich chocolate cake and a brownie (plus vanilla ice cream). It was the night of the napkin waving and staff dancing. Our assistant waiter can DANCE! My family popped out while waiting for food to watch for pier runners and saw a few screaming and booking it around 5:35pm (all aboard was supposed to be 5:30).

We hung out in the room a little, getting a drying line strung from the magnet hooks we put on the ceiling to dry our towels (we have those microfiber beach towels because I didn’t want to deal with Royal towels on excursions) and our swim stuff from today. Then my daughter was still hungry (no lunch! and lots of snorkel-swimming in rough water) so we went with her to WJ after my husband and I both did our respective typing after she left. I ambushed an ice skater from Scotland for her signature (the only person from Scotland on the ship!). 

We popped down to Majority Rules but arrived a few minutes late so couldn’t play but watched a bit. We were late because we tried to get out to the deck on 16 to cross to front (we don’t like to go through the Casino on 4) and couldn’t get out - the glass doors were closed and had no button. So we walked to 15 and went across but couldn’t get into the elevator area. There was a sign, closed for weather. So we tried to go down another outdoor set of stairs and had to duck under a closed rope at the bottom stopping people from walking up those steps. FINALLY, we were able to get to the front elevators on 14. 

After Majority Rules, we just came back to the room and are planning to get to bed a little earlier than usual. The boat has so much movement tonight that I’m feeling a little seasick which is not typical for me.

I’ll try to post a few pics from today.

P.S. I’ve been reading some of the other blogs and cannot wait to discuss Kindles and packing lists when I get home and have my laptop!!

[jbrinkm]

Our port stop in Costa Maya was cancelled. Captain said even the port didn't want us coming in because it was so unsafe.

I am really bummed. No Maya Chan...

[Ampurp85]

14 minutes ago, jbrinkm said:

Our port stop in Costa Maya was cancelled. Captain said even the port didn't want us coming in because it was so unsafe.

I am really bummed. No Maya Chan...

Wow, really. Will there be an alternative or will it turn into another sea day?

[WAAAYTOOO]

57 minutes ago, jbrinkm said:

Our port stop in Costa Maya was cancelled. Captain said even the port didn't want us coming in because it was so unsafe.

I am really bummed. No Maya Chan...

We missed Costa Maya few weeks ago b/c of wind.  A real shame as CM is one of my favorite ports.  They just gave us an extra sea day...which is fine with me !

[asquared17]

55 minutes ago, jbrinkm said:

Our port stop in Costa Maya was cancelled. Captain said even the port didn't want us coming in because it was so unsafe.

I am really bummed. No Maya Chan...

oh my gosh!! unsafe because of weather or other conditions?

[jbrinkm]

We have a sea day. The water conditions were rough, probably due to this wind we've been traveling with. The other two ships scheduled to port didn't even try to come in, but we did - the Captain said he tried but it wasn't going to be safe (they keep stressing this over the announcements). The only upside to this is that we are traveling much more slowly to Cozumel which has reduced the feeling of ship movement onboard (there is still some, but not as much as last night). When we were snorkeling yesterday in the rough water, the boat guides were saying that the winds were going to be really bad in the evening. 

My husband and I have been in a subtle argument since day 2 about the placement of the little coffee table in the "living room" space of our cabin. He sits on the couch and pushes it next to the tv desk/table/drawers space. I try to go use the tv desk/table/drawers space for one of the gazillion things I use it for and push it back. He walks over to go on the balcony and pushes it to the desk. I get irritated and tell him to stop pushing it there and shove it back. I tell him to just push it to the other end of the couch when he wants to sit, but he forgets, and on, and on, and on.

[asquared17]

20 minutes ago, jbrinkm said:

My husband and I have been in a subtle argument since day 2 about the placement of the little coffee table in the "living room" space of our cabin. He sits on the couch and pushes it next to the tv desk/table/drawers space. I try to go use the tv desk/table/drawers space for one of the gazillion things I use it for and push it back. He walks over to go on the balcony and pushes it to the desk. I get irritated and tell him to stop pushing it there and shove it back. I tell him to just push it to the other end of the couch when he wants to sit, but he forgets, and on, and on, and on.

cabin wars, coming to a cruise near you!!!

i know it all too well

[jbrinkm]

Per our usual, we're sitting in Central Park, at a Vintages outdoor table since they don't open until 3pm and it is one space that has shade. Since I hurried to type up yesterday, thinking we'd be gone all day again today, I have some time to add pictures. I'll start with the least pleasant - the shower mold. The water is beaded up on the inside of the shower, and then behind that you can see the wall space that I'm talking about:

[jbrinkm]

Our makeshift drying line (it is saggier than it was because we had to move one magnet over for sleeping - the towel would have been in my husband's face):

[jbrinkm]

[jbrinkm]

zipline & views from top

[jbrinkm]

animals at AJs

[jbrinkm]

dinner and post dinner mob boss style pics