DukeASUGirl

That's probably the difference. We've sailed out of Long Beach a few times, and it's like night and day. Long Beach is a much better terminal - much more streamlined and organized. Almost to the point where my husband wants to sail on Carnival again next time, despite liking the food and entertainment better on Royal. I wouldn't go that far, but it was noticeably more chaotic and disorganized.

Medical clinic: Wish we didn't need to utilize this area of the ship, but we did. Daughter ended up having an allergic reaction to a package of cookies she bought at OXXO in Cabo. She bought 2 flavors, and of course the ingredients were in Spanish. One package clearly read safe, but for the other, it seems that the actual "contains" warning (the "may contain" read safe) was sort of hidden under the flap. You had to actually break the seal to be able to fully read it, which you can't do until you've bought it. So that's why I missed the "CONTIENE: nuez" portion of the label. That was entirely my fault for not catching it in the store, but she still shouldn't have just ripped into the package in the cabin without rechecking the label. But she'd already consumed two packages of the orange flavor safely, so I guess she assumed the strawberry one was also safe. Within moments of eating the first cookie, she complained that her lips and tongue felt weird, which is always an early warning sign. My husband just wanted to give Benadryl and watch, but I grabbed the package and then clearly saw "contiene nuez" and my heart sunk. So we epi'ed. I dialed 911 on the house phone as he was injecting her, but he told me to hang up. Within 10 seconds, we got a call back from the bridge asking if everything was okay. They told me to bring her to the medical clinic and asked if we could walk her or if we needed a wheelchair. I didn't want to wait for the wheelchair, so we walked, but of course the elevators were the slowest they ever were the entire trip. She was quite pale when we arrived on Deck 1, but her color returned within the next 20 minutes. Her oxygen was always good, which doctor and nurses attribute to the quick injection of epi. They observed her for about 90 minutes, then discharged us with Benadryl and prednisone. They were all concerned that it had been the ship's food, but we assured them it was not. We made the mistake of buying packaged food in Mexico. About an hour later we all went to see the final showing of iSkate: Reach for the Stars. Real fun final day at sea. But the doctors and nurses were very nice and helpful. They didn't have a Spanish speaker in the clinic at the time to translate the package label, but a stop at Guest Services confirmed that "nuez" is walnut, which is actually the last nut she reacted to (again with the stupid cookies - she was SO much better about reading labels and avoiding baked goods when she was younger, but now that she's a teenager she seems to have lost her brain). We went to lunch after the skating show, and when she sat down at the table in the Windjammer, she had a plate full of cookies. Seriously?!

Not that I recommend doing this, but actually nobody was checking the tender tickets. We easily could have walked onto an earlier tender if we'd wanted. I thought maybe it was just the later groups that they didn't check, but folks who had early numbers said the same. So in reality, we probably could have been ashore an hour earlier if we'd cheated.

Cabo: We loved this port, and wish we'd had more time there. Ship arrives at 12:30 and by the time they were cleared by customs, began the tendering process about 12:50-ish. Tickets were being distributed on Deck 4 dining room from 10-noon. I dined with my parents in Deck 3 dining room for breakfast and figured I'd just run upstairs at the time. Got to desk where they were handing out the tickets at 10:03 and was already up to Tender #23. In retrospect, I realize now that the people lined up outside the dining room at 7:45 were lining up for tender tickets. I'd just assumed they were waiting for the breakfast to open (which would be weird since breakfast was on Deck 3, not 4). We got ashore about 2:15, and were supposed to check in for our private shore excursion (arch and snorkeling with Roger's Glass Bottom Boats) at 2:45, but we didn't get there until 3 because people (translation: dad, mom, kids) needed to use the restroom before we managed to get a pedicab. So we didn't get into the pedicab until 2:42. We should have gotten to the meeting spot about 8 minutes earlier than we did, except that the driver of the cab I was in with the kids (husband was with my parents in the other one) decided to take us to his friend's silver store instead. I kept telling him no, but he told us it wouldn't be an extra charge and he would wait for us to shop. I said no, we have a tour, and finally after much argument he agreed to bring us to where we'd asked. I'm fairly confident we circled back at least once, which means he brought us WAY out of our way, making us even later than we would have been. We arrived at 3, only to discover that this was only one of 3 potential check-in kiosks, but that the tour folks who needed to check us in weren't there. So they walked us through the entire mall to find the actual one, outside the mall on the harbor side - not sure why the pedicab driver didn't just take us there in the first place. (I showed him the print-out with instructions.) My mom left the scooter on the ship, so she was walking with a cane through the mall and almost gave up several times. We finally got to the correct kiosk at 3:15, and since it was a private tour booked just for us, they decided to use the time to refuel the boat and just begin at 3:30 instead. We still got 2 hours, which was really nice and unexpected. I really assumed we would just lose a portion of the time and would have been okay with that. The tour itself was fantastic. Flat price for 6 passengers, and included snorkeling and then a sightseeing cruise. My parents stayed on the boat while the rest of us snorkeled, or at least tried to. 11-yr-old wimped out about 2 minutes in. 13-yr-old swam out to the rocks with me but was a little freaked out because when she adjusted her mask she got salt water in her eyes, so she mostly just swam and didn't actually snorkel. Husband and I actually snorkeled. It wasn't as vibrant or colorful as snorkeling in the Caribbean, but there were a lot of fish over by the rocks. Water was surprisingly warm. After about 30-45 minutes or so, we got back into the boat and dried off while the captain drove us over to El Arco. The interpreter explained what we were seeing, while he took over 80 photos of us and the rocks. When it was over, they took us right back to the cruise port when we told them that's where were would ultimately be going. We had just enough time to wander around a little bit and shop before heading back to the tender line. One was right there, and we didn't have to wait at all. In all, the ship was "in port" for 7 1/2 hours, but our group was only ashore for about 4 hours, of which a big part of that time was spent trying to get to where our tour left. I loved the service, but if we did it again, we would just book one right off the pier when we got off the tender. I thought I was being smart by booking ahead of time with a company I found online, but the hassle in getting to their launch spot wasn't worth it. It would have been fine if it was just me, husband, and the kids, but we couldn't exactly ask my almost 80-yr-old parents to walk that. Maybe my dad, but definitely not my mom, who had to leave her scooter on the ship. El Arco rock formation was beautiful, and we loved the snorkeling/swimming. Definitely a fun afternoon. Just wish we had more time in port.

About what time did this happen? We didn't even know about it until we got the letter on our door later that evening, but I guess the people who were onboard and heard the announcements were freaked out.

Teen Club: After eating lunch at Windjammer on embarkation day, the kids started itching to meet other kids their age, and asked to head to the clubs, so I told them I'd take them over. We began at Adventure Ocean, where I assumed my 11-yr-old would have to stay. It's a smaller ship, so Adventure Ocean is just one big facility, without separate areas by age group, so when the brand-new elementary school graduate went inside, he immediately said "This is for babies." He found the video game corner while I spoke with a counselor, and was disappointed to discover that there was no controller - apparently they take away the controllers most of the time except for the first 30 minutes of the morning. Oh, heck no. There was no way a kid who had just had his "clap out" the day before and who will be starting middle school in the fall was going to stand for that. When I spoke to the counselor to sign him up, she asked how old the kids were. I explained that I was only there for my 11-yr-old because the 13-yr-old would be in Teen Club, and she then told me we had a choice - we could put our son in Adventure Ocean's 9-11 age group (which is actually in the same large room as the littles), or put him in the Teen Club. Apparently they let 11-yr-olds choose on ships that don't have a dedicated space for tweens. She recommended we start with Adventure Ocean and give it a try, and if he decided it was too babyish, then move him to The Living Room, but he wasn't having it. So off to the Living Room we go! Got them both signed up with bracelets, and learned that this would be the one and only time I could come inside. LOL Both kids went on the first night after dinner at 8 pm for the 411 session and to meet people. After the intro, all the girls left, so my daughter felt awkward. But that didn't last long when a 15-yr-old boy asked her to hang with him and his brother. He asked how old she was, and the 13-yr-old said "Yes!" and fist-pumped when she answered she was 13. I came across them later on the ship, and wondered where her brother was. I guess I needn't have asked, because he quickly became one of the "video game kids" who literally would hang out in that same corner for hours at a time. When they weren't playing, they were watching other kids. Son loved The Living Room. Daughter thought it was kinda boring.

I carried both bottles of wine in my beach bag - husband didn't have any. I was never questioned as to why I had 2, nor did anyone ask me who I was sailing with. To be honest, I probably could have had 2 in my beach bag and 2 in my backpack, and husband also have 2 and nobody would have questioned it. This was San Pedro.

No, I definitely agree with you on that, and wasn't intending to go early but my parents/kids were all complaining that they were hungry so we decided to just swing by the dining room to see if there was any way to get in. And I flat out told the reservation desk I knew we were early so if it wasn't possible I totally understood, and we could just go sit on deck and listen to music for a little bit. But they said they had an empty table just sitting there, so we decided to take it. However, I'm not sure how much earlier we ended up eating anyway, due to the search for the special order ticket on the wrong deck. So I let the complaining people (in my family) know the next day that we needed to stick to 6:45.

I have a bit of a headache, so will continue tomorrow.

Entertainment: This is where Royal positively sparkles. Go see iSkate on the first night and at least 1 or 2 more times. They had 2 shows on Night 1, 2 shows on Night 4, and 1 show on the afternoon of Day 7. We missed the first seating on Night 1 because of dinner, but made it to the 9:15 seating. We skipped it on Night 4 because dinner was running late and the later seating wouldn't get out until 11 pm - but we had a very early shore excursion (and were also losing an hour of sleep anyway due to a time change), so we decided to just go see it on the last afternoon instead. SO good. It really is a fantastic production! (We were originally supposed to sail on Harmony last fall because my daughter's coach was taking a hiatus from the rink to skate in the Harmony of the Seas shows, but we had to cancel our cruise because the hurricane made it impossible for us to get to Port Canaveral - Delta canceled our flight and couldn't reschedule us in time. Royal gave us Future Cruise Credit, but we wouldn't be able to use it before Jaclyn's skating contract ended, so we decided to just go on a ship closer to home instead of flying.) Her coach told us that Navigator's iSkate is her favorite show of the entire fleet, so we knew it would be good. But it really did blow us away. And we're a skating family, so we watch competitions and skating shows all the time! As for the Royal Theatre, our favorite production show was Showgirl. I watched it twice (due to a miscommunication, my daughter didn't end up going with us to the 8 pm, so I insisted she come with me at 10:15) because it was that good. On the whole, the men are stronger dancers than the women, but that's a bit of an unfair comparison because a portion of the time the women are reduced to just walking in a straight line with showgirl feathers on her head/back. The can-can number was amazing! I also really liked Ballroom Fever, especially Nastya and Dima (the professional ballroom couple from Ukraine). I'd taken a master class with them many years ago, back when I competed on the collegiate level, so it was fun to see them perform again. Take their cha-cha class! It was at 11 am on the Cabo day, before we got to port. I also enjoyed Oh What a Night (the Franke Valli tribute show), which was flown in from Vegas the morning before (met the ship in Puerto Vallarta). But my dad thought it needed less "humor" and more songs. I heard that same complaint from several other people. The main comedian Angelo Tsoukalis was funny, but the "physical comedy" unicycle guy was kinda meh.

Dining: We had My Time Dining, and due to food allergies, we made a standing 6:45 pm reservation for our party of 6. We loved our waiter Meckinson and assistant waiter Clive. They were absolutely wonderful. Meckinson heads home to India on July 7 for 2 months for a well-deserved break. Our daughter's food allergies were much more standard (peanuts/tree nuts) than mine (parsley, cilantro, sesame, chickpea). She's not an adventurous eater, so she stuck with chicken fingers off the kids menu every night except Night 7 when she went crazy and ordered a grilled cheese. Thankfully our son likes to try new things. He's our kid who actually qualified for Kids Sail Free (she missed it by 5 months), but he ordered off the adult menu every night - usually steak. Because of my food allergies, the supervisory waiter for the section would stop by every night and take my order for the next night, so they would be able to alert the kitchen ahead of time to prepare something special without my allergens - usually the biggest issue was parsley, but sometimes cilantro. They would bring me the menu for the next day (or I could look on the app), and they would also let me know if they didn't think I'd enjoy that selection once it was altered to be safe, so I could choose something else as needed. We had the same table every night except for Night 4, after Mazatlan. We didn't enjoy that port, so returned to the ship early, and as a result we were ready to eat earlier than 6:45, so we decided to just go early and see if they could seat us. We got there at 6, and there actually was a table available for us because a different party of 6 decided to skip the main dining room that night. It meant we didn't sit in our normal section, though, so the supervisor on that floor had to hunt down my special order ticket. So we stuck to 6:45 after that. We enjoyed everything we tried in main dining room. I know there have been a number of complaints about the current menu, but we liked it. We brought our carry-on bottle of wine to dinner 4 nights, and never got a corkage fee. We ate in Windjammer most mornings (although I did have breakfast in dining room one morning), and some lunches. I ate at El Loco Fresh for lunch a couple of times when I didn't want to leave the pool area. Never tried the pizza in the Cafe Promenade. I snuck peeks at it in the glass display case and on people's trays as they went back to their cabin with a late night snack, and never found it appealing. the crust looked like Peter Piper Pizza or a prebaked shell from the grocery store. We got room service continental breakfast for the kids on the morning of our early shore excursion so they could sleep a little later while my husband and I braved the Windjammer.

I'm going to do this in sections. __________________________________ Embarkation/disembarkation: Port of Los Angeles - San Pedro has to be the worst cruise terminal I've ever sailed out of in the US. The entire process was just so chaotic compared to other terminals I've been to. Probably the smoothest I've ever experienced was Port of Long Beach (Carnival), but have also enjoyed the process in Seattle, Port Canaveral, and Miami. Houston was okay, but still better than San Pedro. We had the 10:30-11 check-in time, and our entry to the terminal kept being blocked by people trying to enter early for their 1 pm check-in. We literally stood for 20 minutes at the curb trying to flag down a porter while people who just arrived would get one immediately. Porter after porter kept skipping us. My mom was in a scooter, so we did get taken out of the long lines inside the terminal once we got to the front to be able to enter the building, but even getting to the entrance of the terminal was a process with rude people who kept trying to enter 2 hours early. But once we got on the ship, it was much better. We skipped the safety briefing until closer to sail time and headed straight for the Windjammer because our hotel didn't include breakfast.

It will depend on the ship, but the app should tell you what time it opens on your ship. I just got off Navigator, where MTD officially opens at 6:45, but we got seated as early as 6 one night by showing up and apologizing, but asking nicely. They happened to have a table ready for us - a group who decided to skip their early seating due to a port day. We made a standing reservation for 6:45 every night, but if our regular table was ready when we showed up, they would seat us. We got in as early as 6:35 that way. (The night we asked to be seated at 6, we didn't get our regular table/waiters.) We did not miss any shows.

Just got home after sticking around LA for a couple of days after our cruise on Navigator of the Seas. Will write an in-depth review once I've had a chance to decompress from the drive, but in the meantime, feel free to ask any questions!

THIS! 100% this. We have an amazing backyard. Seriously, people see photos and assume it's a pool at a resort (the backyard backs up to a desert mountain preserve, so the views are phenomenal), and do we use it? I went into the pool for about an hour today, but it was the first time October and I was the only one in my family who got in. We just don't use it - we'd rather be DOING something. Same thing with a balcony on a cruise ship. We've had them and just end up not even using it because we prefer to be out and about.

Honestly, we didn't use the balcony anywhere near enough to justify the additional expense, and I didn't sleep as well as I do in the cave (aka interior). I'm the girl who doesn't turn on lights when getting up in the middle of the night to go pee. I'm incredibly sensitive to light. Like I said, even a nightlight is too bright for me. LOL Interior is perfect.

Nope. Honestly, the lack of natural light is the biggest draw for me. I sleep AMAZINGLY on cruise ships specifically because I always choose interiors. I've done an outside once, and a balcony once, and will never do that again. Way too much light with either of them - I LOVE having it pitch black in there! It's the best sleep ever, but then again I'm one of those people who has blackout curtains in my bedroom at home because otherwise when the sunlight starts streaming in before 5 am in the summer I'm absolutely miserable. I detest nightlights, and can't sleep if there's one in my room. Literally. It's way too much light and keeps me awake. My parents refuse to cruise in anything less than a balcony, so for me it's the best of both worlds. I can hang out on theirs if I really feel compelled, but personally I'd rather just be out and about around the ship rather than hiding away in my room.

Do they still have printed Cruise Compasses?

That's super frustrating for people like my mother who don't have a smart phone and thus would prefer print. Thank you for asking!

Maybe you could rent a car at San Pedro and return it to LAX, and then that way you could create your own tour. If you got off on the early side, you could conceivably already have gotten bags, gone through customs, and rented the car by 9, and then would have almost 6 hours to explore.

We stayed there the night before a Carnival cruise in 2018, and it was a lot of fun! We loved exploring the exhibits and all the history. And it was SO easy to get to the ship the next morning!

Exactly - San Pedro isn't a destination in itself. It's really just a place to stay the night before the cruise.

It's not in Gifts and Gear for the Navigator 7-day to Mexican Riviera. 😞

Wish this was offered for my cruise! I just looked in Gifts and Gear, and it isn't listed at all.

I absolutely LOVE interior cabins. I know people call them broom closets, but to me it's literally just a place to shower and sleep, nothing more. We're always out and about all over the ship and really only return to change and go to bed. Speaking of sleep, I sleep SO amazingly in those interior cabins! It's SO dark, which is fantastic for me. I'm one of those people for whom a nightlight is too bright and I can't fall asleep, so the whole idea of natural light for the cabin really doesn't appeal to me at all. My parents will never cruise in anything less than an Oceanview Balcony, so if we're really want to escape for the crowds of the upper decks, we could just go hang out with them. But really we don't do much in the way of just lounging around. When we've had our own balconies we literally never went out there.