ARandomTraveler

Would agree about the tipping. Most places don't even provide an opportunity to tip (for example, if they do take credit cards, they'll give you a receipt that doesn't include a line for tipping), and leaving cash as a tip can often be seen as kind of weird. You'll get used to it, it's kind of nice.

You might check your credit card to see if you have "trip delay" insurance, just in case you're delayed more than 3-6 hours. I doubt you'll have a problem, but if you're really super worried about it, buy another ticket on a different airline and make sure it's refundable to the same payment method (not just a flight credit), and that way if delta cancels or delays your flight, you can get a refund from delta and hop on the other airline.

I haven't had a problem with flatirons but I've had an issue with blow dryers due to the amount of watts required to produce the heat (not on icon, but on other ships and in hotels). I don't think any curling irons require an abnormal amount of heat, but if your curling iron is one of those interchangeable units from Dyson, they require a lot of power and that may be the issue. Might have tripped a breaker or something.

Not sure about Rome, but when I was in Florence I actually found that I needed euros more than I expected, as a lot of cafes and shops and taxis only took cash. I was able to buy tickets to museums and tours online using a credit card, but some of the daily shopping and spending I needed cash for.

If you think $1200 for 2 people is too much, then don't bother considering it, as that's your most likely cheapest price ($72.99/day + 18% times 7 days times 2 people)

I've never tried it, but I do have a very fancy fully automatic Delonghi espresso machine at home which has kept me away from coffee shops for almost 2 years now. I've heard good things from other Nespresso people though. That being said - I drank the ship's free coffee on Allure last week and I lived.

Longer cruise, better ship and/or better itinerary all come before the room for me. There's so many factors that come into play when narrowing down my cruise choices though. I did just take a 3-day cruise which I never thought I'd do (not enough time to enjoy everything and they go to the worst ports), but it was on a big ship (Allure) and it was a last-minute way to just go to a beach and relax. In this case, the sail date came first, then the ship (I picked Allure over the smaller ships doing 3/4 day cruises despite it costing more because the bigger ship was more important than the lower price of say, grandeur or enchantment, or even Independence, which is a perfectly good ship, but not as fun, and since I only had 3 days, ship wins). My absolute favorite Caribbean route is the southern one leaving from San Juan that goes to Barbados and St Lucia, but because they have rhapsody sailing from there, I won't even consider it. I'd rather do the eastern/western route for the umpteenth time on Wonder (better ship) than go on a great route on rhapsody. But if they put a voyager class or a freedom class down there, the itinerary would win, and I'd pick that instead of a cruise on Wonder doing eastern/western.

The tour guide said they lease it from the Bahamian government, but who really knows. He also took us all the way to NCL's private island just to tell us a story about Pablo Escobar and his downed cocaine plane, and then told us to look around and turn in anything we found to him. So he might not be all that trustworthy 😂

On my kayak tour on Thursday, the guide said they lease the island for 99 years at a time. He also said the staff lives on the island. They do 4 months on, 2 months off, unless they're Bahamian, in which case they do 2 months on, 1 month off. I always assumed the staff came from the ship, but I guess they don't.

If you're worried about floating mats not being available, you can buy one of these. They pack up really flat and are very easy to travel with. You just blow up the pillows when you're ready to float, and they can be used at your other beach stops. Aqua Original 4-in-1 Monterey Hammock Pool Float & Water Hammock – Multi-Purpose, Inflatable Pool Floats for Adults – Patented Thick, Non-Stick PVC Material https://a.co/d/bETfrY1

I just got off Allure yesterday and didn't think it looked old at all. I really enjoyed the ship. Sure, she's missing some of the restaurants that you're used to seeing on newer Oasis class ships (Wonderland, Hooked, Playmakers), but at the same time it was kind of nice to see some different stuff (Sabor and the Brazilian steakhouse, even though I didn't eat at either of them). She doesn't have the musical stairs leading up to the windjammer (but that may be a relief to some people who find the noise annoying). And the internet signal isn't as good as the newer ships. But the wide open view without the slides on the Boardwalk was neat to see. I don't care either way if they add slides, but it wouldn't be a bad thing to leave 1 ship with the open view (and leave the Tequila bar in its place). She still has a champagne bar instead of the bionic robot bar, that was a refreshing change. It's just not exactly the same as the newer Oasis class ships, that's all. I'd sail her again in a heartbeat (in fact I have a September cruise in my shopping cart, I just haven't pulled the trigger because I need to look at my work calendar).

I just got off Allure today and booked the comedy show twice (both reservations active at the same time). I booked the first one before boarding because it was all that was available, but preferred a different date, so once on the ship I looked in the app and there was availability on the date I wanted, so I booked that as well. I didn't cancel the original reservation because I wanted to see if the comedians were going to be different at each show. I went to the first show and realized both comedians perform at each show, so there was no reason to go see it a second time, but the app wouldn't let me cancel it within 24 hours so I just no-showed. Even though I had reservations I showed up after they let any stand-by guests in, and there was still plenty of room despite it being a small venue. I don't know if that's unique to short cruises (people being occupied socializing and don't tend to go to as many shows maybe?) or if it was because there were a lot of large groups on board (I'm wondering if this is also typical of short cruises - having lots of big groups on board because it's easier to coordinate a lot of people for a 3 day trip than it is for a 7-day).

Even more annoying since they've reduced balcony cleanings to once per sailing.

Just chiming in to say that my wifi signal on Allure these past 3 days was AWFUL!!! It's only been worse when I was on Spectrum and the Chinese government shut down all access to the ship's wifi for several days while passing mainland China. I was able to get wifi on some areas of the ship, but couldn't get it on deck 16 (above the pool deck outside), in my room on deck 12, or on my Central Park balcony. When I could access it (in the windjammer for example), it was extremely slow. Was thankful I didn't need to check into work this week.

Picture from the naughty table on my Asia cruise. There are 2 rice cookers in this photo (but there were a lot more on the table) 😂.

Now I've heard everything 👀

I got an email saying cruise planner would close at midnight on Saturday for a Tuesday cruise, so I think 3 days.

Just wanted to contribute my experience from boarding Allure in Miami today. I reserved this cruise only a week or so in advance, so my earliest boarding time option was 1.30pm, which I selected. I showed up to the port around 11:15am. There were designated lines set up with boarding times, but they were empty, so I walked through to see if they'd let me on. They scanned my boarding pass and didn't say a word, and let me inside. Went upstairs (where there were some short lines to go through the passport check and the baggage security), stood in line, showed my boarding pass again and passport, they let me move on to baggage security without a word about my boarding time. Went through baggage security and got through with 2 bottles of wine as a solo passenger. They didn't even open my bags to see if they were actually wine or something else. Same experience with the wine when I went through during a Thanksgiving sailing on symphony out of Miami in 2022 (although at that time there were 2 of us over 21 sailing so I was allowed to bring both bottles, but they didn't check them). I think that as long as there's not a huge crowd outside waiting in line, they'd rather let people on the ship rather then force them to wait until another line forms. Just my experience though.

Deleted. For some reason I completely forgot this was one of RC's ships.

Not sure about Oasis in Europe, but I was on Symphony out of Miami when the World Cup was playing and they had it on in the aqua theater, as well as in playmakers. It was a huge watch-party on the Boardwalk which was so much fun! People had drums and flags and were dressed in their team jerseys. It was a blast.

Last summer we went to Hong Kong and Taiwan (I know this isn't a Chinese port) on Spectrum (from Singapore to Japan). It was a great itinerary! Many of the Chinese passengers did an overnight trip to a Macau when we were in Hong Kong. US passengers have to get an additional visa of some sort to go there so we didn't check it out. It's a popular Chinese gambling island from what I hear. Others visited the Shenzhen zone. It might have been a temporary itinerary change that summer due to the fact that ships weren't able to sail from China for a while after the pandemic (or if they could sail from there, maybe they chose not to because of the hassle).

I'm constantly checking

Sorry, Allure

Hideaway beach for next Thursday is $26.99 on Allure.

I don't know about that specific port but I've boarded a ship in Miami and then disembarked. It wasn't easy though, as the flow of traffic is all set up to go one direction (onto the ship) and it was quite a pain to squeeze along the edges to get out, and I'm a very small person. The only reason I had to disembark was because my daughter arrived to the ship late because her flight arrived at a different time, and I had her passport. I checked before boarding the ship to make sure they'd allow me to get off when she arrived though, because if they'd told me I couldn't disembark, I would have waited for her outside. It turned out not to be as easy to do as they made it seem though, so I would just drop your bags and not get on the ship.