Kellie in Texas

It is perfectly possible to go on a cruise and not spend another dime from what you've already paid for the fare and the daily gratuities (the tips for the ship staff) which are $16-18 per person per day. They are added to your account while on the cruise and will be billed to the credit card you have used. The upcharges are for any of the drinks packages (alcoholic or otherwise). We've never purchased one of those. You usually have to drink 4-5 alcoholic drinks per day to get your money's worth and there's plenty of "free" drinks onboard -- coffee, water, lemonade, some flavored waters, tea, etc. You can always get a drink (or a soda) and have it charged to your account. There is often a Starbucks onboard and that costs extra. If you purchase wi-fi, it is possible to purchase it for one device and share between multiple devices; person 1 just has to log out before anybody else can log in. Excursions definitely cost extra. Go to the Ports of Call forum on CC and look at your ports to do some research. The kids' activities (kid/teen club, Flowrider, water slides, etc.) are all included in the fare. Specialty restaurants cost extra; we've never done those either. We're fortunate to live in an area that has every kind of food you can imagine and much cheaper than a $64 steak at Chops on the ship. Definitely download the Royal app on your phone. You can set it up for your specific cruise but you can also change the date to some other Mariner cruise and see what the dining room menus are, when/what the shows are, etc.

@changinlat we could have seen into 11606 if we'd really leaned pretty far out over the railing, so I'd say no. But I highly recommend one of the pink (on the deck plans) 2C balconies because they are a lot bigger. @Cruzingal#9 I booked the Fine Line and 1887 on Dec. 5 for our Jan. 14 cruise. If your cruise is in March, it will be awhile. After we were on the ship, I reserved Grease and Columbus on the app.

@MRVLV yes, there was a 70's night on day 5. We didn't attend but we saw some groovy outfits that evening! 😄There was a white night on the last night and I think a Caribbean night, maybe on day 2.

We just got off Harmony last week. There was a blow dryer but it was in a drawer, so you may have to search for it.

Just got off Harmony yesterday. This was our 9th cruise (one on Carnival, two on Princess, the rest on Royal -- two of those on Serenade, two on Liberty, one on Adventure, and this one on Harmony), so this was our first Oasis class ship. We probably won't do another Oasis class again; it just seemed really crowded. This was the first time we needed to make reservations for the shows; we saw The Fine Line, Grease, 1887 and Columbus. Do not miss The Fine Line! It was amazing. Grease was super-fun, especially those of us who remember the movie and know all the songs. 1887 was the ice show; we've seen two other ice shows on Liberty and Adventure; this one wasn't my favorite although the costumes were stunning. Columbus was a fun surprise; it's the same cast members as in Grease but it's a shorter musical show about Christopher Columbus' lesser-known cousin Marvin. It was kind of silly but the ship that's the main set for the show is incredible. I'd love to know more about how it was engineered. Note for The Fine Line: make your reservations for the earliest show time in the week. We saw it on Monday, the first full day of the cruise. The Tuesday shows were canceled due to a leak in the pool which made the water too cloudy for the divers. It was canceled again later in the week due to cold and high winds. The cruise director announced that they were going to try and reschedule but I don't know if that happened. One other thing about the shows was the volume was LOUD, especially The Fine Line and the ice show. We were in cabin 11604 which had the larger 80 sq ft balcony. The room was very nice but the bed was hard and we actually like a very firm bed. This one was flat-out hard. We didn't go to the main dining room and didn't go to any specialty restaurants although we did have the Taste of Royal lunch on the last day. It was a lot of food and it was all very good, but it didn't sway us into paying yet more money for a specialty restaurant. One thing we didn't realize was you get a short tour of the kitchen in 150 Central Park and the chef explains how the kitchens operate. Fun fact: he said they use 6,000 dozen eggs per week. No typo. He also said the week before us, there were 2,000 kids on the ship and they used a lot more flour making the pizzas. 😄

We just got off Harmony yesterday (Jan. 21) and it was very crowded. I expect the end of May and June will be even more so and probably tons more little kids. This was our first time on this big of a ship (Liberty and Adventure were the biggest previously, but Radiance class is our favorite). We won't go back on an Oasis class. Just too many people everywhere. Regardless of when you go, make reservations in the app for any shows you want to see, especially the Fine Line aqua show (highly recommend this one) and Grease (lots of fun). We also saw 1887 which is the ice show; the costumes were great but the storyline of the show was fairly contrived. We also saw Columbus, which is the shorter musical show. It's kind of silly and goofy but it's worth seeing because of the AMAZING ship they use as a set. It's a cool piece of engineering.

The app says they're required but are they really?? Or if you have one, you get to go in first and others have to wait?

@printingchick the Daily Planner is the app is going to show everything on tap for that day, starting with 7:00 am sunrise stretches (no, thanks!) on down to the various shows, activities, and dance parties at midnight (again, no thanks). You can tap through to see each day. Agree with @smokeybandit. If there are any theme nights, they seem pretty low-key.

@printingchick the app does show this information before you board, but maybe not until 30 days or so. We board on Jan. 14 and this info has been in the app for awhile.

Look in the app in the daily planner for each day. Scroll down through all the morning exercise, spa and other things. There should be a note to indicate if it's a theme night, as well as whether it's formal or casual or other in the main dining room. So, there's a theme for the dining room and (sometimes) a theme for special dress-up nights.

The Cowboys play the Packers next Sunday at 3:25 in the first playoff game. The app says that "the Patriots vs. the Cowboys" will be shown in the aquatheater at that time. That's nonsense since the Cowboys wouldn't play an AFC team in the first-round of the playoffs and also because the Patriots didn't even make the playoffs. I'm assuming it will be Dallas vs. Green Bay at that time. Has anybody watched a football game in the aquatheater? I guess we'll run to the side to watch sailaway during the commercials. 😄

@dwHokieand @glamourpup we're between both of y'all, in Pflugerville. 😁 We're on Harmony in a couple of weeks.

We were on Adventure last NYE from Galveston. This year, we're on Harmony in January. Following along with your week.

Question for you recent Harmony cruisers ... is the Solarium Bistro open for lunch on embarkation day? This is our first time on a ship in the HUGE class 😄 (previously, we've just been on Radiance and Freedom class ships) so we're thinking we'll let our thousands of other friends hit the Windjammer that first day and we'll try the less well known, quieter spot.

I take Bonine at night 2-3 days before the cruise starts. Then I usually only need it 2-3 more nights on the ship and then I'm acclimated. The key I think is to start taking it a couple of days ahead of time. I have fairly annoying motion sickness -- I can't even look through binoculars!

Wow @link99 that's amazing. We're cruising in a month. Our passports don't expire until August 2025 but I'm going to send in the renewals as soon as we get back.

We're doing it on our cruise in January. We've been to all the ports before and aren't planning to get off the ship, so we're considering this an "excursion".

Since Harmony has arrived in Galveston, what's the earliest check-in time people have seen? We've had 10:30 times on Adventure and Liberty in the past, but Harmony's so much bigger, I wondered if the earliest might be 11:00.

@WhitePastyGingers go to the Roll Calls for Indy and look for one that's coming up in the next couple of weeks and ask there. You might get lucky.

@LooneyCruzer we had an aft junior suite on Serenade in June 2022 in Alaska and it was definitely amazing and something I will "aspire to" on every future cruise, as long as we can afford it. 😄 To all who have taken time to respond, thank you. I have very flexible leave time from my job but DH is more limited, so we're going to have to wait another year or two until he, at least, retires. We were looking at a 16-day from Amsterdam to Boston, which would end up being a few more days with pre- and post-cruise activities. Oh well, it's something to dream and plan for.

Agree with @uvadover ... if you've never done one before, it's definitely worth it. We took the tour on Adventure in January 2023 and saw all those same places that uvadover mentioned. It was super interesting.

Looking at a westbound TA from Europe to the U.S. We haven't done a TA before, but I'm assuming -- based on my middle school science, LOL -- that balcony cabins on the starboard side wouldn't get as much (or any??) sun and the port side balconies would be in the sun most of the time. Is that correct? There are available cabins on both sides, so I'm just trying to figure out my options.

from the RCCL website: Guests are welcome to bring drones on their cruise for use on land only and outside of the port area. However, drones are not to be operated onboard the ship at any time, nor on Royal Caribbean’s private destinations: Perfect Day at CocoCay, Bahamas or Labadee®, Haiti. While onboard, drones must be stored safely in the stateroom. Drones used on the ship will be confiscated until the end of the cruise. A Guest Conduct Policy warning will be issued and guests may be subject to disembarkation at their own expense for onboard drone usage. Guests assume full responsibility for understanding all local authority rules related to drone usage and for obtaining any required permissions for drone operations. Different countries may have different rules. Any liability, including environmental damage from drone usage is the guest’s responsibility. Royal Caribbean assumes no liability for guest drones that may be confiscated by local authorities for violating local laws or for any accident or injury resulting from a guest drone flight.

@LuCruise from what I've seen with various excursions, they are marked as strenuous if there's something like snorkeling or diving involved. In other words, if there is some activity that could be considered strenuous, they mark that excursion as strenuous even if all you plan to do is sit in a chair with an umbrella drink. 🙂 I haven't been there, but I've looked at the website which the previous poster listed. It answers a lot of your questions.

@Mum2Mercurywe did the RCCL excursion to Tulum in June 2017 on Liberty OTS. I realize that's a long time ago (pre-Covid) but that doesn't change the distance and time it takes from the ship to Tulum. I'd definitely do the ship's excursion. In our case, there was a fairly torrential rainstorm while we were on the bus back to the ferry. We got soaked and I'm almost positive were among the last passengers back on board. We did the bus to Tulum with the beach break and it was lovely. The ruins are incredible, especially being right there on the water. There was a shopping area with restrooms as you entered with your tour guide; however, the restrooms didn't have flush toilets. It had toilets you could sit down on but you had to put the TP in a trash can (as I recall). The beach break included lunch which was really good. Not the biggest amount of food but it was very tasty. Our teenage son got in the water, but we were only there maybe an hour to an hour and a half, and I didn't necessarily want to get wet and sandy. Some of the details may have changed by now, but the main thing I can offer is to definitely do the ship's tour, just because of the length of time the day takes.