reallyitsmema

If RCI abandons traditional seating and large tables in the MDR, I will move on to a line that still has them, just as I left NCL when it went Freestyle.

 

I've made many good friends at dinner over the years who still keep in touch.

 

When I sail alone, I don't mind doing my own thing during the day, but prefer companionship at dinner, the more the better. It was terrible to be seated alone nights in the middle of the dining room on Norwegian Majesty (or worse, at some ratty little table right in front of the swinging galley door that they seem to reserve for "strays"), getting glances from people in groups at the tables around me. Couldn't tell if they were conveying pity, disgust, or what.

 

If you think talking to strangers is uncomfortable, just trying eating a meal while they silently give you the stink-eye.

 

If the day comes where I can find no adult on a ship who can bring themselves to share some pleasant chit-chat over a meal without feeling totally stressed out and put-upon, I guess it's time to stay home.

Wow.:eek:

Wow, sure looks like I'm in a minority with my opinion. I didn't mean to offend anyone. I was just stating my thoughts. You all have valid thoughts. I guess I should take a refresher course in english too :p:D.

I don't think anyone who has responded is offended by your opinions. Everyone just doesn't feel the same way you do. We just experienced the new menus in August and there were days we didn't bother going to the MDR since nothing thrilled us. Had we seen something that we knew was only going to be in the MDR, we would have gone, but we knew what we wanted would be in the WJ too.

I think the whole "Loyal to Royal" thing is nothing more than a marketing campaign that some people have adopted as their motto. There is absolutely nothing wrong with trying another cruiseline. If you aren't happy with what one cruiseline is offering, branch out and try something new. You might be back, you might find that Celebrity or Princess suits your needs better.

Be loyal to yourself and your family.

Good first draft, I would just clean it up a bit before you send it if you want to be taken seriously.

They have really, good oatmeal in the WJ at breakfast. There is cinamon, brown sugar, raisins and apricots that you can put in it too.

If you do dinner in the WJ, they have make your own pizza some nights, other nights we have seen mongolian barbeque and make your own pasta.

Sorry. I meant does the shuttle leave only at 815 or do they leave for example at 900?

Ahhh, I misunderstood. Yes, you can get a later pick up time.

Do you have to leave at 815. Our flight is later so I didn't want to rush off the ship?

No, you don't have to leave by 8:15 but you will need to be off the ship by 10 at the latest, usually. People will be waiting to board the next cruise. When we sailed on the Freedom in late August, we were at the port just after 10:30am and were on the ship at 11:02.

If you have a late flight, you should look into an excursion or rent a car so you can do something yourself.

Haha, and I'm in your pool pictures 3-4 times with my DH and DD :) It is amazing how you seem to see the same people every day on such a huge ship!

One of the videos is also of you. Do you know the OP or did you just give them permission to post all these pictures of you?

Be careful at breakfast in Windjammers. Sometimes you will be asked by staff if you want juice. They may return with the "upgraded" juice at about $3.95 a pop. Standard juice will be available at the self-serve machines.

We always have the waiters in the WJ get us coffee and orange juice and they have never brought us fresh sqeezed OJ. Anyone that we saw ask for the fresh squeezed OJ was asked by the waiter for their seapass card.

Just got this email(a pleasant surprise they did this) regarding my chat that I posted on here earlier:

 

There is hope after all. Nice to see that the rep took the time to look into the information and follow up with a correction.

Hi,

Do you happen to have any other pics for the 7172 balcony or of the room? I have been tring to look everywhere for pics from this room, but no luck Thank you very much :)

Yes, I do have other pictures but they are on my DH laptop which is with him at work. I will check what he has later on tonight when he gets home. I know he took more with his camera than I did with mine. The only others I have of the balcony have him in them and we don't post pictures on the internet. I will get him to transfer them to my laptop and port them later tonight.

You were on Jewel OTS? Thank you for the pic. I hear so much contradicting info about these cabins and if there are loungers of not. I will make sure to post some pics when we come back in December. Thanks again.

Yes, it was Jewel. Jewel used to do NE/Canada cruises in September and October and then reposition down to Florida. Brilliance is now doing that route.

We all seem to have different opinions of aft cabins. You will hear the ones that say the walk all the way aft is very, very long. Others have had soot issues (we didn't on Jewel, we did on Mariner). Some heard loud noise all the time, others heard nothing. Then if you start talking about Voyager class and Freedom class, the posts get even more conflicting.

Try it out for yourself and see if you like it. We just tried a JS that was more forward than we usually book. We liked the cabin and will likely book JS from now on but we did not like the location at all. We were about 10 cabins back from the forward elevators and found we were always walking aft to go anywhere. We didn't mind the exercise but just didn't find the location convenient. If we don't get an aft facing cabin on our next cruise, we will at least book closer to the aft elevators.

I can tell you........it was cheaper(than one cabin).....there was a savings certificate for that cruise so both of them used it.....I would do the same....connecting cabins with 2 bathrooms!:)

1. 2 bathrooms

 

2. DH stays up later than I do and could go into another room to watch

TV

 

3. We got 2 D+ discounts so 2 cabins ended up being $100 less than 1

cabin that we had originally booked

Ooooh very nice! I hadn't even considered booking connecting cabins and having access to the two bathrooms:o I was thinking the two bathrooms would be nice but a pain to go back and forth if you forgot something.

Now, I might actually consider that too. Thanks for answering.:)

And I called and was told that the double points applied to my 9/22 sailing. Go figure:rolleyes:

I have a question, tell me to MYOB if you want. Why would you book a separate cabin from your spouse? I know it was only 10% more so not that much but I wouldn't spend the extra if I was cruising with my spouse. Now, if I sailed with my Mom again, I would probably spend 50% more for the extra cabin but that is a completely different story.;)

Just wondering, if I am being too nosey, just say so.:)

Thank you for the replay.

So there is space for only one lounge chair not two? can you slide the lounge chair in that tapering off area to use the space, or it is too narrow?

 

Its our first AFT and is only 40 $/pp to upgrade..so we might do it :) Sounds like a good deal.

There should be room for two lounge chairs. We were on a NE/Canada cruise so we really weren't laying out in the sun too much.:D This picture was taken with me all the way over in the narrow part of the balcony. The lounge chairs are actually on their side against the balcony divider. They were that way when we boarded and just left them there.

Thank you for your replay. We are in our early 30s so music noise would not be a big problem I guess.

 

That being said is the extra space in 7172 ( corner AFT) a plus over the neighbor cabins 7174 or 7176? Or is not used because is narrow and I should better go towards the middle? Any thoughts?

 

Thank you for the pic.

 

Thank you very much.

The cabin itself is the same size as the other cabins on deck 7 aft so if you are booking it because you think the cabin is bigger, it isn't. Deck 10 corner aft cabins on Voyager and Freedom class ships are bigger but they are the exception.

The balcony is narrow but was as deep as a lounge chair. It does taper off to just enough room to stand at the railing as you get into the corner but there is ample room for two people to comfortably sit and enjoy a drink or three.:p

Your information about 7172 is exactly right. We sailed in that cabin and heard the bass of the music every night until around midnight. It wasn't terrible but I would pick a different cabin if one is available. We did have 2 chairs and 2 lounges.

Given that we love aft cabins, we would choose that deck again if that was all that was available. From what I have read, the other cabins do not have noise issues.

What if I try to negotiate with the hawker to give me the cup in advance by showing the coke logo on the seapass, then relay the info to the room steward not to bring a cup to my stateroom anymore. Not sure if this arrangement can be made. It would be nice to have the first traditional meal of weck at the park cafe with a unique coca cola product of my choice not found anywhere else besides the freestyle machine.

 

The port is Fort Lauderdale, do you mean that if you bought the unlimited soda package while the ship is docked in the embarkation port, you will pay additional taxes, compared to if you bought it online or after the ship has left port?

 

If so, this this applies to other ship purchases while still in the port as well? Like if you buy the unlimited internet package while the ship is still on the US port, you pay additional taxes?

If using the freestyle machine immediately is that important to you, then buy the package when you get on the ship. Anytime we have bought the package on the ship, they write up the charge slip by hand and it is processed after we have left port so there is no tax applied.

They will not let you take a cup from the table is you have purchased the package in advance. They have no way of knowing you are going to return the cup that is waiting for you in your cabin.

Because we travel as a family, and always purchase a soda card for everyone, we wait until we board. The tables are always set up all over the ship and they always have one outside the Windjammer. Waiting gives us the ability to choose from the variety of colors and designs so that everyone is able to tell their cups apart. Turns out better for us.

There is only one cup to choose from if the ship has the freestyle machines. Maybe in the future they will add different designs like they did with the other cups but right now, it is a cup that looks like an old fashioned coke glass with a white design and a clear, screw-on top. The cups now say they are only good for cold beverages, which stinks since we liked to use them at home for our coffee to go.

With all the talk about soda packages, I was wondering this:

 

I have read that if I pre-purchase online, the cup will be waiting in the room for me when we get on the ship. This is the only thing holding me back from pre-purchase as we plan on boarding early and eating lunch with which I would like to have a lovely Diet Coke and I have read that the room might not be ready until 5:00 or sometimes later.

 

So is there a way to get your cup when you board rather than waiting for the room to be ready if you pre-purchase?

Cabins are ready between 1pm and 1:30pm, not sure where you are reading 5pm, that would be after the ship has already sailed, that information is not accurate.

If you prepurchase the soda package, the cup will be waiting for you in your cabin , but the coke symbol will be embossed on your sea pass. You can just go to any bar, show them your sea pass and get a diet coke. You will not be able to access the freestyle machines until you get your cup which activates them. It is really just a personal preference, we pay in advance so the symbol is embossed on our sea pass card. If you buy on the ship, they put a sticker on your sea pass, we have had those fall off when the sea pass card got wet. You can get it replaced but have to wait in line at guest relations.

The coke coming out of the freestyle machine is made with ships water so I am not sure why you would have an issue with the seltzer. They aren't hiding anything from us, that is how fountain soda is made. When you go to a restaurant at home, the soda is made with the local water, that is why fountain soda doesn't have a consistant flavor to it.

I read a post on the private islands board that when you book the Cabana at Labadee you no longer get the upgraded buffet or bottled water. Does anyone know if this is true? We paid $250 for a cabana on the Indy for next February because we enjoyed the cabana last year. If this is true they can stick the cabana where the sun don't shine. Ain't no way I'm paying $250 for a seat in the shade and then have to tip the guy afterwards. Nope. Not gonna happen.

The post you are referring to says the description for the excursion no longer says there is an upgraded buffet. They said they were trying to get information about whether the buffet was discontinued, they haven't sailed yet so I wouldn't take any of what they assume as fact.

I know in the Coca-Cola Freestyle machines, there is a Dasani still water plain option as well as a sparkling plain. I hope those options are available on the ship as well!

I did not look for Dasani still water but I did try to find a plain sparkling water and did not see one. Is Dasani Sensations their sparkling line? If it is, there was no plain option on the Freedom. It did have Seagrams sparkling seltzer water which is what I was drinking. I did try the Dasani Sensations grape but it was like a weak, Fanta Zero grape so I stayed with the Fanta Zero.

I don't usually drink Dasani anyway since it is just a filtered water from a public water source. I usually stick to spring water. Since the ship sells Evian, which I hate, we went with the freestyle machines. I did feel that the taste of the sparkling seltzer from the freestyle machines was better than from the soda from the bars due to the additional filtration of freestyle machine.

I would definitely look at the actual machine and see if you see the options you are looking for, do not depend on the crew member selling the cups because they don't always understand what you are asking. We even encountered two servers in the WJ telling anyone who went near the machines that they didn't work. She pushed buttons and said see, broken, no soda. Someone stuck a cup on one of the machines and showed her that it actually worked.:rolleyes:

Just had a thought...if Mom can't get off the ship in Bar Harbor, will they let me bring lobster rolls back onto the ship?

 

If so, I'll catch a tender and bring back lunch for the family!

Not sure if you will be allowed to bring food back. Usually you can't, but rules could be different since you are in a US port.

There is a restaurant right at the dock, so if she can make it onto the tender, you could just eat right there and not worry about the hill or taxis.

We went on that cruise, the same week that you are sailing, in 2010. My DH was in shorts the whole week since we had such nice weather. Granted, we are from just outside Boston so we are used to the weather.

I meant to give you this link too.

http://www.novascotiawebcams.com/special/lobster-cam.html

There are a ton of Halifax cams to look at. The lobster pot cam had a lobster in it the other day. You should be able to see the ships docked on the Pier 21 cam later this week. When we went, there were 3 ships in port so we didn't dock at Pier 21. We docked at a shipyard nearby and were bused to Pier 21. Was only just around the corner but was a secured area so you weren't allowed to walk there.

GREAT news! Thanks so much. This will make my mom's day! (And mine too:) )

The tenders are the ship lifeboats that she will have to step down into. There will be someone to hold her hand on either side as she gets in and out but it is a good sized step.

Not sure what you have planned for Bar Harbor but you get off the tender at the base of a hill and most all shops are up the hill. Many of the little stores have multiple stairs to get into them.

There is a pretty park right right near the tender dock but is also uphill.

Here is a link to a webcam. Check it out tomorrow in the light of day and you will see the hill I mean.

http://www.maineharbors.com/camindex.htm

Bar Harbor is beautiful. Hopefully, you will have gorgeous weather while you are there.