Sailing12Away

Shades of blue was what I had last night, so I'm not always high brow. That was free with the basic drink plan and just fine. The tide is going out so now you can see the rocks and such we were walking on earlier. Sitting in the sun to dry off before heading to the tender. Couple people from our group are headed to the pool, but I'm getting a few more shades of pink.

Looks to only be about 3 villas in use on silver cove, we have the whole lagoon to ourselves. Very quiet and peaceful, just wondering where everyone else is. Golf carts to get you from the front to reception, then to your villa and back over to the buffet. Servers coming around to bring drinks as we need, endless flow water. Buffet was ok, but nothing fancy. So I'm curious what was being served on the non silver cove side.

Good morning from GSC! Don't remember if I mentioned it yesterday but they are no longer doing the coupon vouchers for latitudes. Just a simple two sided paper in the room saying what you get. So we'll see how that works tonight when we go to moderno for dinner. Some photos of the mountains of papers in the cabin when we got here, including the price list for the villa food.

Once the sun went down it got a bit chilly so we all headed inside to sort out dinner. Our plan was to see what was in the MDR, then check the wait at Osheehans, and last resort was up to the Haven restaurant. Couldn't pull the MDR menu on the app which still annoys me, so down to deck 5 it was. We didn't see anything special that jumped out, so continued on our quest. Stopped in the shops so Lando could buy a ship replica. Funny thing... the original $59.99 price was crossed out with a sharpie and it rings up at $79.99. With the latitude discount it came back down to that original price, but man that's some shady stuff there. He was saying most other ships cost him $25-50, so that's on the rise. Osheehans was a 40 min wait, so back up to the Haven. If we're waiting and drinking may as well be with a lot less people. Haven was a 20+ min wait that felt more like 30, but saw some of our friends and got lost in chatter. They ended up being seated next to us so it was almost like we had a table for 7 which was nice. Haven food is Haven food, it never changes. My biggest complaint after having sailed Celebrity recently. Apps came fairly quickly, then we waited a very long time for dinner to arrive. I could have sworn you could get the filet by itself previously, but I may be mistaken. So I got the S&T and gave hubby an extra surf. They didn't come around with the fixings for the potato though. Every table except ours. So by the time they did it was the only thing left on my plate, a naked spud yearning for some bacon and chives. They also didn't give me any butter, put 2 of the same cups of that other stuff so I had to steal hubby's. So service was off a bit, but the first day tends to be crazy. We ordered glasses of wine, but the waitress insisted on putting the food order in first before taking the drink order. That was the first clue there may be issues in the back. With the wine it was very confusing. I opted for a simple white, hubby wanted the Silverado that HBC always talks about. Waitress brought a taste over and said the bottle had been open 3 days already. If you know it's not great, why bother bringing it? Then she said she has a different but similar wine that smelled much better, but then said she has to open a fresh bottle for his full glass. Wait, what? If you need to open a new bottle of that one how is it different from opening a new bottle of the Silverado? Then as she poured the glass went on to say it was the last bottle on the ship. So that whole exchange was very confusing, we'll see what we can actually get on day two. Dinner took 2+ hours (past 10pm when we finished), then in normal form closed out the bar before crashing. Breakfast has been ordered to come around 8am and the general plan is to start making our way over to the villas around 9 or so. I'm just looking forward to a nap in the sun.

Ahh, will have to take a pass through the buffet and peak. So bizarre that they would still offer cookies for Haven only. They're nice, but not a big enough feature to convince non Haven folks to come join the dark side. Lots of kids on this trip in Haven which is odd to all of us. Have seen at least 10-20, hard to count the little buggers when they're running like crazy loons. Our neighbor friend said there's some above them who are pounding on the floor like fe-fi-fo giants. Said he'll wait to see if it's just first day energy or if a chat is needed via the concierge about how sounds travels. Saw the butler quickly when I ran back to the room to get my paper for GSC. Our large group has one of the 2br villas so we weren't sure how that worked if we were all taking different tenders in the morning. Paper had our villa number and I just had to fill out how many people they should expect. There was a second form with food options and price tags, so we all said we'd wait until we get there to see if we need food in the villa for a charge or will just walk ourselves to get it. Butler mentioned she has 13 cabins to look after this trip which seemed high to me. Plus our neighbor has a different one. So either our rooms are the cut over, or there's no rhyme reason to how their cabins are assigned. free-style-daily.pdf

Turn your head sideways... VID_20240225_170613.mp4

MSC Sea something or other just pulled out. We're the last ship left at terminal 3. Got to see the SpaceX launch which was really neat. Phone was turned the wrong way on the video because we were chatting and late to capture it, but that was neat to see.

They have cookies. So whoever started the rumor that there's no more cookies was wrong. Embarkation was empty, lounge was empty, on the ship as fast as I could walk to it. Checked in at the muster station then up to the room to see friends. No need to go to cruise next to sign up for the latitude rewards, concierge took care of all that for us. No dinner with the officers on this ship. Pre embarkation desk screwed up my dinner reservations, so concierge is trying to fix it. 2nd time in a row so I'm not doing that ever again. Up on the posh deck waiting for the SpaceX launch as we sail away. RCC wonder of the seas just passed us by. That ship is huge. Definitely give them props for that side see through pool, looks nice, but way too many people for my liking. 3 drinks in, but left my phone charging so hubby has those photos. Let the fun begin! VID_20240225_164605.mp4

Hubby had room for dessert, but I was stuffed so took the last few bites of potato to go. In the Uber on our way, but the driver wanted to avoid tolls so it's taking the long way. I didn't realize the hour drive would now become 90+ mins. Grumble grumble. Should be at the port around 2 and hopefully on board by 2:30.

Snuck a taste of some of the cookies from yesterday, then headed to Mrs Potato for a quick lunch. Where are all my hash brown lovers at? Crispy hockey puck, shredded... We sampled the cheese balls and chicken drops, then split a bacon baked potato and carne seca rosti. Amazing. Had to get my potato fix in before hopping on the ship. Have a small container of leftovers that we'll bring with us, ran out of room.

Absolutely! We'll go hunt them down and sneak attack hug them.

Oh, and of course a stop in the Star Wars store to play with light sabers. He already has one at home, so no way I was letting him spend $250 on a second one after that expensive wine earlier. But he can play and nerd out. 🤓 VID_20240224_163525.mp4

Cirque show was just ok. I like more acrobatic stuff, hubby liked the story line more, but it was ok overall. We walked around and grabbed a bunch of snacks, debated about dinner, then just walked back over to the hotel. 12k steps today (my normal is only around half that much), and we were up since 4:45am so we were toast. 5+ hr wait for Gideons, so we went on the virtual queue before the show then were able to get in the smaller 15 min line by the time we got out. The peanut butter iced coffee was with the wait alone, will try a cookie for breakfast tomorrow. Had wanted to grab an Uber and eat somewhere away from Disney but didn't feel like a $25 ride each way. Looked into delivery but the options were somewhat limited. Settled for just a kid chicken tenders and hot dog from the hotel Cafe, we were still stuffed from lunch anyway. Calling it an early night then off to the port tomorrow.

Yup, the mouton-rothschild was my favorite. Guess I have expensive taste after all. Moved on to a more reasonably priced syrah.

@HBCcruiser I think you'll appreciate the wines here. We splurged for the first growth experience. I know they carry the lafite Rothschild on board.

Room was ready so we relaxed a bit before heading out. Wandering through Disney springs and grabbed a quick lunch at the Polite Pig. Great bourbon flights, food was decent. Going to walk and wander and find another bar to top off at before our 5pm show tonight over here. Good bourbon certainly makes dealing with the excessive Disney lovers easier. Going to have to have some of that Blanton's when we get on board. The Stagg was really good too.

Was there anything special happening in the circus tent on board? Years ago they had a dinner show.

Thanks, it was on the list of possible. We saw an Asian place Hawkers that we were considering too. Trying to get something we can't get on the ship for 7 days if possible to mix it up.

Off the plane and in the Uber to the hotel by 10:15. Lines at MCO to fly out of there were insane. Quick stop in the Harry Potter store for a new headband (the one I bought nearly 8 yrs ago is finally wearing down) and on our way to the hotel. NCL reps were there with signs, not sure if there's another ship leaving today.

From the front door of our house to the gate of the plane in 45 mins, and that includes waiting 5 mins to get a spot to hop out of the Uber. JFK was packed, but once you got inside it was fine. Plane is empty, so we have a row of 3 in comfort plus for just the 2 of us. Yeah!

Feel free to chime in as much as you want @CWMixer. All thoughts, opinions, and photos of cute pups are allowed. Finally all packed up (almost forgot the luggage tags that were hanging on the fridge). Hubby waits until the last minute, so had to do some finagling with his gadgets to get the latest software updates installed, games loaded up, and batteries all charged. In the process though of him packing up his messenger bag for the plane he found an envelope from the last trip. Inside was about $400 cash from when we got a refund for unused OBC the last trip. So I'll give you all one guess as to who is holding onto any leftover money after this trip.... Minor setback tonight as we'll be short one companion on our journey Sunday. Between the port fees, drink package, and prepaid gratuities it was over $500 coming back our way, so that's a plus considering we thought there was a chance the refund would be 0. Would still much rather have the full gang, but well life isn't always easy or predictable. Flight is boarding at 6:20am from terminal 4 at JFK, which means a nearly mile long walk to the gate. So definitely getting up earlier than originally planned... need to stop booking Delta if they're going to keep flying out of terminal 4.

Our first NCL trip was on the Epic in a club balcony suite. It was hubby, myself, and my MIL sharing the cabin together. The bathroom situation is a bit unique, but we made it work. If it was just hubby & I there wouldn't be any issue, he's seen my bits and pieces so a shadow of them behind the frosted glass wouldn't be a big deal. With MIL we all wanted to be a bit more modest. But there's a curtain you can draw to separate the bathroom area from the living area. So at night we would pull that curtain and leave the potty light on as a night light, and if anyone needed a tinkle during the night it wouldn't both anyone else. For showering, we just coordinated when we would each shower. So she typically would wait until we were done first, then we would head to the bar while she showered in the room alone. The only concern was if someone wanted a mid day shower, if you come into the room while someone is in the shower you would need to walk past them. Again - it was no big deal, just more of coordinating schedules and such.

We normally don't fly in a day early for same coast trips, but haven't been to Orlando in some time so figured we would take a day or two to ourselves first. Flight prices were insane (or I'm out of touch with reality), so we ended up using credits from my Delta Amex for a one way trip down, and points from my Capital One card for a one way flight back home. We're used to being able to get down to Florida for around $200/pp, but these flights were double-triple that. Looked into heading to Universal for just 1-2 days as we've never been there before. But unless you go for 5+ days, the pricing is insane (I'll just own up to it now I suppose, I've become an old curmudgeon I suppose). $150/pp/day just to get into the park, extra if you wanted to visit more than one park per day (not sure how that would work if you didn't have it as one of the Harry Potter rides takes you from one park to the other), extra if you don't want to spend hours waiting in line, extra extra extra. Worse than the NCL nickel & diming complaints. So if we stayed at a property close to the park and did 2 days with their park hopper thing, it would have cost us over 1K. For 2 days visiting Harry Potter and friends. Pass, I'll go back to England and visit the real Harry Potter studios first at that price. So we peeked at Disney, figuring we could just go visit the new Star Wars stuff. Nope - just as bad. We're not really Disney folks. Love the food & wine festival, and dig the Star Wars stuff... but I'm not dropping a thousand bucks on 2 days there. So we opted for just one day pre cruise, staying at a modest hotel near Disney Springs, and booked tickets for the Disney version of Cirque for the night. https://www.cirquedusoleil.com/drawn-to-life Have a few places in mind for dinner afterwards, but just planning on walking around and vegging most of the day. If all goes well tomorrow we'll be from our front door at home to the gate of the plane in ~40 mins thanks to TSA pre check, and sitting near the hotel pool by 10:30am. Dog is fresh and clean, so time to finish that last minute packing checks and go walk her over to the sitter.

Yup, our cruise was booked the day after bookings opened for the ship, but we didn't sail until a year later. We knew we were paying a premium for the newness and for the specific room we chose. But the value was just not there at all for us. It was more than double what we normally pay for a typical Haven cabin. If we had paid what we normally pay for Haven, it might not have stung so much. But all things combined, it just wasn't a trip we look back at and want to repeat. We want to return to those ports of call - just not on Prima/Viva in September.

All checked in for our flights, packing is mostly done (just need to pack the champagne), and planning on running to the bank for cash for the dog sitter & butler/bartender tips while the dog is getting a last minute bath. She's a beefy 85lb couch potato, hound/pit mix. For GSC we booked the 2br villa at Silver Cove. We've got 14 people so far sharing it, so that certainly helps with the cost. For now we haven't booked an excursion anywhere else, figure we're going to wing it at most places. Amber Cove will be new for us as is GSC, so we may book a last minute something or other there to get away from the port a bit. San Juan we just want to get to Old Town (still not sure which port we're coming in at) and walk around, eating and drinking our way through town. Have a few places that we've bookmarked, so we'll see if that pans out for new snacks to munch on (alcoholic milkshakes with a cookie cup anyone? Drunken Cookies https://www.instagram.com/getdrunken/?hl=en). Upcoming weather: Cape Canaveral GSC Bahamas San Juan (we have an umbrella, and despite being evil at times we will not melt in the rain) St. Thomas Amber Cove DR Sure beats what is expected back home...