bonvoyagebites

Greetings. We just got to Vancouver this morning, and I know many were waiting to know what happened during drydock. It is my feeling that the major things that took place were as mentioned by a previous poster. The carpets all looked new, there were no ceiling leaks, and the mattresses (at least in our two cabins) were brand new. (they were dated April or May 2015, as I recall). The mattress was quite firm. DH enjoyed, DW did not.

Beyond those changes, there was nothing notable. The explorer's lounge did not receive the overhaul that some people had been concerned with from previous ships' drydocks. I still intend to get a review out there on here and / or on our blog, but we are still on vacation for a few days, hanging in Vancouver. I promise there are reviews, photos, and videos forthcoming as soon as there is suitable downtime. :)

I will try to ask crew members what was changed, and check for buckets :). I will have a review of my 27-30MAY cruise from San Diego to Vancouver to post either here or on my blog after I get back (may not be straightaway because we will be in Canada for almost a week after arriving)...

Jeff,

Thank you for the kind words. The blog is new within the last month or so. Keep an eye on it, as hopefully there will be more to come. It has been a lot of work and we are having fun with it. The video and the reviews were an afterthought, so future ones will be better (leaving tomorrow for San Diego, followed on Wednesday by a short jaunt to Vancouver on HAL MS Amsterdam)

Anyway, enjoy MSC if you choose to go.

We fall into the "tip extra for room service" category. I cannot recall at the moment who actually delivered the room service food on our cruises, but a little extra is always nice.

We went on the Divina in October 2014 (Review on our blog site shown below).

We honestly quite enjoyed the buffet, and thought the MDR was good, but not amazing. I LOVE eggs benedict, but theirs was AWFUL (IMHO, not trying to start a whole new thread about their eggs bene:) ) The pizza is amazing, and you can pretty much just live on that if you are a pizza fan.

The stateroom was an interior, and honestly I thought it was nicely sized and quite comfortable.

In regard to customer service, I rather enjoyed it, and had good experiences, other than maybe the rude maitre d' in the MDR (was rude to his workers, especially).

Take a peek at our review on the blog. there are a few more pics on there as well. Have a great trip, and give it a shot.

Following along also. We have a cruise scheduled for October, and are looking forward to our first RCI cruise on the Navigator. We will most definitely have a review on our blog after that. .. .

Great photos. I am on a cruise in October and am looking forward to it. I also went to your homepage and was creeping around there a little bit. Very nice work. Thanks for sharing.

I vote extra day + balcony. One more day of vacation at the same price, with a place to escape the chaos and still have an ocean view? Sign me up :)

You could maybe check out Tivoli gardens... If I recall properly, Disneyland was largely inspired by it. Also, you could check out Christiania... When we were in Copenhagen, we didn't have a lot of time to spend, but enjoyed just seeing things around there.

Have fun, and I hope you get some more good ideas on here.

Not sure which ship you are on, but we have some pics of the Divina on our Blog.

If it were up to me, I would take the Southern, but that is based on where I have and have not been, and the ones I still want to go to. BUT... St. Maarten is super awesome if you like planes...

See my video below for an example. That was just a few of the planes in the few short hours I was there.

There is a short review on our blog about stingray city. I believe that we used Captain Marvin, but it sounds like perhaps one of the others may be a better fit for you. If nothing else, you can go check out the photos and get excited for your trip. (that's what I like to do before a trip... just overload on info).

Either way, stingray city is a DON'T MISS. Take an underwater camera and snap a few shots and enjoy.

Personally not familiar with the Stingray City United tour, but I will look into it. We spent a week on Cayman once and while there went with Captain Marvin. It involved two snorkel stops outside of Stingray city, and was enjoyable. We have a short review on our blog (below)

Good times on Cayman... if you go there longer than a day trip on a cruise, prepare to just relax and enjoy... not a lot going on there, IMHO. But we loved it.

When we went, we rented a car and just explored. This took us to Orient Beach, Marigot, and of course Maho Beach (as seen below). We like to explore on our own when we go places and just freestyle our day (unless there is something specific we just HAVE to do). We rent a car ahead of time, gather snorkel gear, and set off on our adventure.

Marigot had a nice area to walk around with little shops on the waterfront, and little bakeries and such to grab a pain au chocolate and coffee.

Just an opinion, of course, but we found it to be an awesome day. Either way, ENJOY!

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=280662

Apparently we are late to this game. Haha

Pero mas vale tarde que nunca, no?

Geocaching is available in most places year-round. Not just while cruising. There are websites that will give you puzzles to solve or just flat out give the coordinates, and you use your GPS to find the hidden item. I didn't actually mean to combine it with a cruise, but.... that could be interesting... I will have to check the websites and see if it is already being done... if not, I think we are on to something :-D

We spent an entire week in Grand Cayman once (our first Caribbean experience)... Definitely a +1 for Stingray City. I believe we also used Captain Marvin, but cannot compare nor contrast to other operators ...

In Cozumel we did an "X-Rails" tour where you drive through the jungle and snorkel in a Cenote. Pretty cool, but exhausting.

Both of those excursions are reviewed on our personal travel blog ... shown below, without specific recommendations for tour operators.

Either way... ENJOY!

Call me goofy, but that sounds pretty fun. Sadly, I am not sailing on that ship anytime soon. If you have never tried geocaching, it is (kinda) similar... fun to do on land.

We did not see the MJ show, but in our opinion, the other shows that we DID see were enjoyable. They had a "Theme", but it largely felt like that "theme" was limited to the costumes, and sometimes the music. BUT, in our opinion they were enjoyable. There is a short Divina review on our blog that may be worth taking a quick peek. Enjoy.

Stellar review. I read several parts out loud and found it difficult because I was laughing too hard. You definitely inspire me to step up my review game. I am on (almost) the same itinerary in a few days on the MS Amsterdam, and planned on a review when we return. I will strive to reach the level of this review, and make it (nearly) as entertaining.

Thanks so much!

Hanging out with that many monkeys pretty much has the potential to be the BEST.DAY.EVER!

I have a trip coming up in October that will take me to Roatan.... time to research on the net and get booked with Daniel, eh?

Thanks so much for the bonvoyage to all of us. We look forward to it, and will hopefully have a decent review when we return ...

Thanks for all the answers, everyone. We will probably just get the cards on the ship while onboard... that way we can get a feel for how cruising with the teenagers is going to go and if we are going to be anywhere near them during the days, etc...

This is an excellent review. I am very much looking forward to upcoming chapters... and I will not "let it go".

I hope to write reviews as well as you for my blog. I need to polish up my chops. My reviews thus far have been an afterthought, more than 2-3 years after the fact...

Time to start doing stretches and hydrating, so I will be ready.

Keep up the awesome review!

I have our first trip on RCI scheduled on the NOS in October. I cannot wait. I am enjoying reading these reviews, and will be sure to post reviews when we return. Next up, though, is a 3 day HAL cruise from San Diego to Vancouver, to help hold us over until October.

You can check arrivals using sites similar to flightaware or maybe flightradar24 ... a google search may get you more results (not intended to be a snarky comment). One of the sites I use I have a "premium" account because I host a receiver for them, so your mileage may vary.

Look for flights by Insel Air, as they intentionally put on a show, as you can tell by the video... they come in low and fast and get as close to the fence and hold their brakes before giving full power for takeoff (after waving out their window)