Odyssey Inaugural....3 years later....8 night Southern Caribbean Nov 25 - Dec 3 2023

[LandstromCruise]

So going to give this live blog thing 1 more try.  Did it once and would say I was sub par at it.  But I feel like I learn so much reading them and enjoy them that I should give back.  I'm not creative enough like some to come up with a great title, but the meaning behind this one is that we were booked to go on our first ever Inaugural cruise and that thing that happened that we don't talk about obviously delayed the construction of Odyssey and we weren't able to end up on the Inaugural cruise.  Some day maybe I will get on one.  

Anyways, who's going:

Wife and I (no kids this one, need a break from them every once in awhile )  We are kind of like the kids on this cruise as we are about 20-25 years younger than everyone going with us. 

My Aunt and Crazy Uncle - You know every family has a crazy Uncle(he married in).  This is mine.  We have cruised with them once before and traveled to Hawaii with them twice and have had a ton of fun each time.  

My Crazy Aunt and Uncle - We have a big family so I also have a Crazy Aunt.  She likes to walk EVERYWHERE!!!  We have traveled with them once before on their yacht along with the other Aunt and Uncle to a few Florida towns and had fun.  Probably would have been more fun if I didn't have to walk 2-3 miles every night to dinner and back 

Wife's Mom and her Husband - This will be first trip like this with them.  They are less active than the rest of us, but hopefully with the plans we have that won't be an issue.  

Itinerary:

Nov 25 - Port Everglades

Nov 26 - Sea Day

Nov 27 - Sea Day

Nov 28 - Curacao

Nov 29 - Aruba

Nov 30 - Sea Day

Dec 1 - Sea Day

Dec 2 - PDCC

Dec 3 - I'm crying as we are back at Port Everglades

Flight: 

Wife and I and Aunt and Crazy Uncle are on same flight from Chicago to FLL day before the cruise.  Flight is at 1:50pm gets in around 6pm.  A little nervous as this is day after Thanksgiving, but there are several more flights after ours that day.  Emergency plan if flights seem questionable we hit the road ASAP and high tail it down to Florida driving through the night.  Really want to avoid that.  MIL and her husband flying from Myrtle Beach to FLL and get in around 6pm as well.  Crazy Aunt and Uncle live in Punta Gorda, FL so they will drive over to FLL sometime during the day on Friday.  

Pre-Cruise Stay:

Hotel prices were absurd!!  Guessing the holiday didn't help.  I can typically get a discount from my sister who works for a hotel chain and even with that the prices I felt were outrageous.  So instead rented an AirBnB about 15-20 minutes for the port.  

Cabin:

All of us are in Balcony staterooms.  Many times I am fine just doing an interior to save some $, but with 4 sea days felt a balcony would definitely be worth it.  Maybe some day I can be a suite snob, just not there yet.  

Excursions:

Curacao - Booked a private tour.  With 4 couples this became a cost effective option.  Have a few spots we know we want to hit, but also have let the guide know looking for some unique spots that aren't just touristy.  

Aruba- Rented (2) 4 seat UTV's for the day that we can drive around and tour the island.  Will see what kind of trouble we get into.  

PDCC - nothing planned.  with no kids the water park wasn't really an option for this group.  We aren't big just sit on the beach people, typically like to be more active, so might check it out and walk the beach for a little bit or something, grab a bite, and then enjoy the ship with less people on it.  

Pre-Cruise Planning:

Booked a 3 night dining package.  There are a few birthdays for this group either when we are on the cruise or shortly before or after, so decided to have a couple nice dinner options.  For sure going to do Chops 1 night, and Teppanyaki 1 night(thought with a group of 8 this could be fun).  3rd night still deciding.  

No drink package.  None of us are real big drinkers.  I like to have a Malibu & Pineapple and Lava Flow every once in awhile, but not near enough to require a drink package.  

Booked the IFly Extended Flight for 5 of us.  The other 3 were party poopers and didn't want to do that.  

Did book a North Star Extended Experience because I didn't want to miss out, but hoping to be able to book a free spot when get on the ship and cancel the paid version. 

Booked a flowrider surf lesson for 3 of us.  Wife, Myself, and non-crazy Uncle.  Uncle has been a water person all his life, skiing, etc so my guess is he will get it right away.  Wife isn't very coordinated.  She attempted the stand up on our first cruise in 2018 on Harmony and about took the employee trying to help her down.  So that could be interesting.  And I decided, why not. I'm usually up to give anything a try once.  

I've been  the planner of everything for the trip.  Luckily for me, unlike @Ampurp85 my group has been very responsive to texts or emails, and sends me money for anything I book right away.  I ask what they want to do and pretty much they just say whatever you book it and tell us where and when to be there.  

I will try and keep up on the blog as best I can and try to remember to take pictures.  I am really bad usually at remembering to do that.  Any questions or things you want me to check out just let me know.  

 

 

[asquared17]

1 hour ago, LandstromCruise said:

Dec 3 - I'm crying as we are back at Port Everglades

if this isn’t the REALEST thing ever!!

[Ampurp85]

You are lucky,  mainly because you are cruising soon but also because your group listened and responded .

[OCSC Mike]

11 hours ago, asquared17 said:

if this isn’t the REALEST thing ever!!

Depends how soon your next cruise is… but yes.

Booking more cruises does ease the pain though. Obviously everyone has to deal with budget & schedule constraints but I do feel less sad on that last day now that I’m trying to cruise a bit more often… but getting off the ship is never a good day.

[JohnK6404]

Have a great time! We sailed a similar 8-night itinerary (Aruba, Curacao, Nassau subbed for Grand Cayman ) on Odyssey back in 2022 (link to our blog at bottom if you have any interest).

Awesome itinerary (Aruba & Curacao) and definitely plan on booking another Southern Caribbean sailing down the road with those ports!

We went up in the North Star while in port in Aruba (complimentary) and enjoyed the views of the harbor and surrounding area.

Also, if your group has any interest, we highly recommend booking Chef's Table on Odyssey as it's somewhat nicer than on many of the other ships as they host the experience in a private room in the back of Chops Grille (unless they changed the location)...

 

[Lovetocruise2002]

15 hours ago, LandstromCruise said:

but the meaning behind this one is that we were booked to go on our first ever Inaugural cruise and that thing that happened that we don't talk about obviously delayed the construction of Odyssey and we weren't able to end up on the Inaugural cruise.

We were supposed to be on that inaugural Odyssey sailing too! 

15 hours ago, LandstromCruise said:

Wife and I (no kids this one, need a break from them every once in awhile

I totally support this! lol

15 hours ago, LandstromCruise said:

Hotel prices were absurd!! 

This was the case for our sailing a month after you as well. I grabbed a few places the day they released but none of them were good deals, and nothing has dropped. Even the Holiday Inn Express on 17th St. was way more than usual.

15 hours ago, LandstromCruise said:

3rd night still deciding.  

Do Giovanni's Kitchen! We love it there. The pizza is thin and there are some really interesting flavours.

[LandstromCruise]

6 minutes ago, Lovetocruise2002 said:

We were supposed to be on that inaugural Odyssey sailing too! 

 

Well now I am even more devastated.  I was going to be cruising with the one and only @Lovetocruise2002 

[Lovetocruise2002]

19 minutes ago, LandstromCruise said:

Well now I am even more devastated.  I was going to be cruising with the one and only @Lovetocruise2002 

Trust me, over the pandemic, that was one of the sailings that was the hardest to lose. There were so many from the cruise family here who were supposed to be on that one. Never mind the fact that it is super hard for me to go on inaugurals because they don’t fall on school holiday weeks, but I happened to be off that school year. I was beyond sad to lose that one. Funny how it took both of us 3 years to finally get to Odyssey lol

[Pamp]

Following as we are sailing on Odyssey 12/23-31.  Itinerary is a tad different - going to Labadee instead of PDCC.

12/23 - Port Everglades

12/24  - At Sea

12/25 - At Sea

12/26 - Curacao

12/27 - Aruba

12/28 - At Sea

12/29  - Labadee

12/30 - At Sea

12/31 - Port Everglades

[ScottD]

Looking forward to this, as we haven't done this ship OR most of this itinerary. So definitely gonna be taking notes because a Quantum class is the one I really want to try next.  We keep talking about a kid free cruise, but we only have one and he's already past the age where we can leave him behind and he won't really notice, or care, so we take him along and hope that he finds a friend or two. So far that hasn't worked out and I've gotten stuck playing more mini golf than I ever plan on playing again.  

[FireFishII]

19 hours ago, LandstromCruise said:

I will try and keep up on the blog as best I can and try to remember to take pictures.  I am really bad usually at remembering to do that.  Any questions or things you want me to check out just let me know.  

Get your family involved.  They can remind you to take the pictures or provide you with their pictures.  They could also do a write up of a meal or activity for you. I bet a few of them would get a kick out of it. 

[LandstromCruise]

So they have the Evian water package for $18.99 on sale so I bought it. My wife drinks a lot of water and while the water on the ship is fine I think having the bottles will be good for in ports and just to have in the room at night. It says 12 or 24 bottles but it doesn’t have you select what you want. Do they just decide based on the size they have what you get?  

[asquared17]

41 minutes ago, LandstromCruise said:

So they have the Evian water package for $18.99 on sale so I bought it. My wife drinks a lot of water and while the water on the ship is fine I think having the bottles will be good for in ports and just to have in the room at night. It says 12 or 24 bottles but it doesn’t have you select what you want. Do they just decide based on the size they have what you get?  

it will be one liter bottles. you’ll either get 12 or 24 one liter bottles, depending on your selection

[LandstromCruise]

My countdown is down to 9 days and about 17 hours before I board the ship!  That's when the real vacation starts.  Starting to get things put together to think about packing probably this weekend.  Since we live in IL, won't be wearing much of the same clothes on the cruise that I wear now so can get started on the packing a little early.  

The app still doesn't have the MDR menus available or many of the activities listed yet.  Trying to decide for sure which nights we will use our 3 night dining package and which nights go to MDR so hoping they get that added soon.  I am beyond ready for this vacation to get started!  

[Lovetocruise2002]

13 minutes ago, LandstromCruise said:

Since we live in IL, won't be wearing much of the same clothes on the cruise that I wear now so can get started on the packing a little early

Coming from the Detroit area, I know you will get me. Don’t you hate when your options for boarding the plane are in your winter gear and look super out of place when you arrive in Florida, or board the plane in your Florida gear and freeze en route to the airport? Lol

Also, another pet peeve is having to leave my winter coat and gloves in the car for when I return

[jbrinkm]

On 11/5/2023 at 5:49 PM, LandstromCruise said:

So going to give this live blog thing 1 more try.  Did it once and would say I was sub par at it. 

Emergency plan if flights seem questionable we hit the road ASAP and high tail it down to Florida driving through the night.  

Hotel prices were absurd!! 

1. You are doing great! 2. We met a family that had to do this from the East Coast, on our spring cruise 2 years ago. They were NOT thrilled. 3. Yes! That was a huge surprise to me when our booked our hotel for our upcoming March cruise.

On 11/9/2023 at 9:53 AM, LandstromCruise said:

So they have the Evian water package for $18.99 on sale so I bought it. My wife drinks a lot of water and while the water on the ship is fine I think having the bottles will be good for in ports and just to have in the room at night. It says 12 or 24 bottles but it doesn’t have you select what you want. Do they just decide based on the size they have what you get?  

Once I clicked "reserve," I was able to then choose 24 bottles down further on the page. I think I saved a dollar or two by getting 24 vs two x 12 bottles. If you didn't see this option, try scrolling down just a bit?

32 minutes ago, LandstromCruise said:

The app still doesn't have the MDR menus available or many of the activities listed yet. 

Is Odyssey alternating 6 day and 8 day cruises? I'm surprised that you don't have menus yet (although not surprised about activities (those sometimes don't populate until you are on the ship.) We're doing an 8 day Southern Caribbean on Symphony in March and I can look at the upcoming November sailing to get a sense of what our schedules & menus might look like, but you could only do that if Odyssey was on an 8 night right now...

[LandstromCruise]

1 hour ago, jbrinkm said:

1. You are doing great! 2. We met a family that had to do this from the East Coast, on our spring cruise 2 years ago. They were NOT thrilled. 3. Yes! That was a huge surprise to me when our booked our hotel for our upcoming March cruise.

 

Thank You! 

 

1 hour ago, jbrinkm said:

Once I clicked "reserve," I was able to then choose 24 bottles down further on the page. I think I saved a dollar or two by getting 24 vs two x 12 bottles. If you didn't see this option, try scrolling down just a bit?

 

OMG...Thank you.  Guess I shouldn't have tried to do it on my phone.  In looking at computer I see where you can select it.  

 

1 hour ago, jbrinkm said:

Is Odyssey alternating 6 day and 8 day cruises? I'm surprised that you don't have menus yet (although not surprised about activities (those sometimes don't populate until you are on the ship.) We're doing an 8 day Southern Caribbean on Symphony in March and I can look at the upcoming November sailing to get a sense of what our schedules & menus might look like, but you could only do that if Odyssey was on an 8 night right now...

It is alternating 6 and 8.  It is currently on it's first 8 night now, but it went to PDCC on day 2 and it is day 8 for us so presuming the dinners won't be the same.  

[LandstromCruise]

RUB Offers.  A few weeks ago I got the RUB email.  We have a balcony and the offers that were sent were upgrade to a 1 Bedroom Grand Suite(minimum bid $115), 2 Bedroom Grand Suite(minimum bid $170), or Owner's Suite(minimum bid $200).  I may have bid more, but since traveling with a large group and wanting to do dinners with them I didn't feel I would have been able to take full advantage of the Suite if I won the bid, so I just placed the minimum on each.  Figured that money would be worth it just for the extra space if somehow I got lucky like @Lovetocruise2002.  Many people in the Facebook group have said they won their bids, I haven't heard anything so presuming I didn't win.  Didn't really expect to.  

[asquared17]

i hope you win your bid!!!!

[Ampurp85]

As a person who lives in Chicago, I get you on the travel. The last few years I have been putting shorts in my carry-on/personal item. I also purchased a packable short Land's End puffer for travel. It is super warm but folds up small, so I don't suffer when I get to Florida during the winter months. 

I also hope you win your RUB. If the options were that cheap for my last sailing with a group, I would have bid for all of us. 

[FireFishII]

I too am an northerner (New Englander), who just does not know what to do with my winter coat/gloves/hat.  We once traveled to FL from PA (after visiting my sister).  We had left all of our winter gear in the car.  The plan was for my husband to get the car from the parking lot while I watched our three very young kids.  

Go figure - Philly got dumped with snow.  Over 12 inches.  Poor hubby had to clear off the now with his bare hands to get the car door open.  While the car was warming up, he bundled up in his VERY COLD winter gear and got busy clearing the rest of the snow.  45 minutes later, he was driving up in a warm car to pick us up.

Moral of the story - bring along 1 set of warm weather gear for the person who is responsible for getting the car.  LOL  

[FionaMG]

On 11/9/2023 at 2:53 PM, LandstromCruise said:

So they have the Evian water package for $18.99 on sale so I bought it. My wife drinks a lot of water and while the water on the ship is fine I think having the bottles will be good for in ports and just to have in the room at night. It says 12 or 24 bottles but it doesn’t have you select what you want. Do they just decide based on the size they have what you get?  

If you think you could use a bit more water and it doesn't have to be branded (or coke or beer), take a look at the cooler bags in the gifts and gear section of the cruise planner. The bags are great and the drinks in them come out pretty cheap.

[LandstromCruise]

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  

I am mostly packed.  Have some of the last minute things to finish up later tonight.  Underwear is in the suitcase, so no "batman" issue for me this coming week .  Wife on the other hand hasn't started yet .  

Today we will be driving about 30 miles north to my sisters house to celebrate the holiday.  This is the first year in my 43 years of living that it won't be at my Grandma's house as she passed away a couple months ago .  But my sister is taking over the tradition so off to her place we go.  Will then get home early evening so that we can finish packing up.  Will need to leave around 9:30am tomorrow to head to the airport.  

[OCSC Mike]

1 minute ago, LandstromCruise said:

Underwear is in the suitcase, so no "batman" issue for me this coming week 

But what algebraic formula did you use to determine how many pairs to bring?

[LandstromCruise]

2 minutes ago, OCSC Mike said:

But what algebraic formula did you use to determine how many pairs to bring?

Just throw in as many pair as I have clean at home and hope it's enough 

[Lovetocruise2002]

9 minutes ago, LandstromCruise said:

Wife on the other hand hasn't started yet .  

What?! How did that happen? lol

[asquared17]

28 minutes ago, LandstromCruise said:

Underwear is in the suitcase, so no "batman" issue for me this coming week 

poor batman has no idea he's garnered this kind of notoriety... @SweetPea will be dying laughing when they return from their cruise

[LandstromCruise]

32 minutes ago, Lovetocruise2002 said:

What?! How did that happen? lol

I've been telling her for days she needed to get started.  She isn't the planner in this duo 

[LandstromCruise]

The wife has started packing!!! She just asked me, "so how many days are we on the ship"?  

[Lovetocruise2002]

4 hours ago, asquared17 said:

poor batman has no idea he's garnered this kind of notoriety... @SweetPea will be dying laughing when they return from their cruise

And he can never find out! Or we will never hear from @SweetPea again 

[jbrinkm]

4 hours ago, LandstromCruise said:

I've been telling her for days she needed to get started.  She isn't the planner in this duo 

I'm sure telling her is making her hurry up.

[LandstromCruise]

It’s travel day!!!  We will head to breakfast in about an hour and then to Chicago to the airport. I of course have been up for an hour packing the car and getting last minute details done. Wife….still in bed   This trip might end up 1 person short 

[LandstromCruise]

I know many of you like the animal picks, so here’s a picture of the 3 pups that are less than happy we are leaving. They can tell as soon as we start packing and they don’t like it!!  

[Lovetocruise2002]

1 hour ago, LandstromCruise said:

It’s travel day!!!  We will head to breakfast in about an hour and then to Chicago to the airport. I of course have been up for an hour packing the car and getting last minute details done. Wife….still in bed   This trip might end up 1 person short 

Wow! We are so the opposite of this in our house! Safe and smooth travels today!!

[Ampurp85]

That one little plump pup looks the maddest about you leaving,

[WAAAYTOOO]

8 minutes ago, Ampurp85 said:

That one little plump pup looks the maddest about you leaving,

Plumpy on the left or plumpy on the right ?  Plumpy on the right won't even look at whoever is taking the picture.  At least plumpy on the left is looking at the photographer !

[Ampurp85]

1 minute ago, WAAAYTOOO said:

Plumpy on the left or plumpy on the right ?  Plumpy on the right won't even look at whoever is taking the picture.  At least plumpy on the left is looking at the photographer !

Plumpy on the left, I noticed plump on the right was too mad for anything. 

[LandstromCruise]

8 minutes ago, Ampurp85 said:

That one little plump pup looks the maddest about you leaving,

Yeah he’s the special one. He loves his mommy. Follows her to the bathroom and everywhere. 

[SweetPea]

Hehe, sorry, still on our own cruise where Batman told me he packed 11 pairs but in reality brought 7 and is now running out because he sent out laundry on Day 2 ... who does that when driving from home??

 

Anyway, safe travels and Bon Voyage!!!!

 

[LandstromCruise]

33 minutes ago, SweetPea said:

Hehe, sorry, still on our own cruise where Batman told me he packed 11 pairs but in reality brought 7 and is now running out because he sent out laundry on Day 2 ... who does that when driving from home??

 

Anyway, safe travels and Bon Voyage!!!!

 

I thought he used the algorithm. Guess his math skills aren’t up to par