Teeara

Yeah, Mason Jar was less than impressive. Give me a Portside BBQ. Yum!

You get wet going to the specialty dining in Central Park, too. We had pouring rain during the TA the night we dined at Giovanni's. But they had umbrellas just outside as you entered CP and they had umbrellas in the restaurant, too.

The Suite Sun Deck is on Deck 18 and overlooks the back of the ship down into the Boardwalk and a partial view of the Aquatheater, but mainly of the Sports Deck.

You can bring them up. It's not like they have people standing guard at the doors, although they will have to come with you in order to access Deck 18. We "snuck" people up there for our Cabin Crawl on the TA last year (meaning that I held the door open for our groups and no one tried to stop me).

You're going to be blown away by Wonder compared to Navigator. Food options will be the same and different since there is so much more space in the WJ on Wonder compared to Navigator. Yes, they offer specialty dining on day 1 for lunch, but be aware that those areas will get crowded on day 1 as people rush to them to book their specialty dining for the remainder of the cruise. If you're looking for a relaxing lunch after boarding the ship you might want to wait until day 2 for your specialty dining. The specialty dining menu is always the same every day at each venue, so you might want to do WJ for lunch on day 1. If you're interested, I have a playlist of videos from our Wonder TA last year and I go deck by deck (although I can't believe I forgot to shoot Central Park). It might help you to get an idea as to what to expect when you're onboard. You can find the playlist here: Wonder of the Seas Have a fantastic cruise!

Sorry, I was going off of the morning temps, not the daily high. The morning was mid 40s and it was forecast for upper 50s or so. Once onboard the ship I didn't check the weather. All I can tell you is when we sailed away it was freaking freezing on the top deck. I would rather have a "cold" SF spring any day compared to a "cold" Boston spring ;o)

We walked across the GGB back when I was in high school in the 80s. What a fantastic experience it was. I would do it again if I was still living in the Bay Area. Back to the OP, I would do the ferry to Sausalito. It's right there just a few piers away from where the ship will dock. Spend a few hours shopping and walking around the area, have a nice lunch and then hop the ferry back to SF. Have a leisurely dinner in SF.

We loved the location of Hotel Riu. Very nice, reasonably priced, huge breakfast selection, excellent location and if you wanted to walk to the terminal you could. I just posted a video of the ride from the hotel to the pier on my YT channel showing how close it is. There's also a few pix from our Hotel Riu 2Q room at the beginning.

We left March 27th this year from SF on Royal Princess to Hawaii. It was mid 40s on embarkation day. It was in the 50s at sea for the first 3 days and windy. We didn't really warm up until we arrived in Hawaii. Then on the way back the temps dropped back down in the low 60s / upper 50s. I didn't see many folks at the pools since it was so windy and cool. I've started posting my videos of this Hawaii cruise on my YouTube channel if you're interested in what to expect on this cruise. You can find the embarkation day video here:

I live south of Boston and work in Boston. Best color for this area is usually 2nd-3rd week of October for full color. But, as mentioned before, the weather is crucial for fall foliage. Mom and I did Canada/NE the 2nd week of October once and even Maine was still relatively green. Not much color that year. And if we get any hurricanes or tropical storms during that time it can strip all those pretty leaves off the trees. So for Quebec and Maine the best color should be early October. Not sure how this year will turn out with the incredible rainfall we've had this summer.

I can tell you we booked an extended balcony about 2 weeks after the 2024 PC opened for booking (it opened a lot earlier than we had expected) and we are paying about $4600 total for 2 people. Might have gotten it for less had we booked it when it originally opened for booking.

Our top tier event on Wonder during the WB TA was extremely casual since it was at noon and during the crossing. We got treated to drinks AND a high wire act.

We'll be doing the WB TA in 2025 if they offer it on Allure again!

I'm thrilled to see Allure in dry dock in 2025, amplification or no amplification. Can't wait for that WB TA in the fall.

Maybe they are splitting the work in two. Two weeks for one set of projects and two weeks for the second set of projects. Wasn't she supposed to be in drydock with the amplification work for a total of 4 weeks originally in 2020?

Allure is what we're hoping for. Was really bummed when the Fall 2020 WB TA was canceled. Then they had her scheduled for a WB TA last year and we booked that and ended up getting switched to Wonder. No complaints about Wonder since we had never sailed on an Oasis class before, although with Covid we didn't leave our cabin much. Again, no complaints since we had an Owner's Suite. We certainly got our money's worth on that cabin. Maybe third time will be the charm for Allure WB TA in 2025, although I'm not booking an Owner's Suite again. 😊

Can't wait!

So happy to hear this for all of you! It was a real pain having to deal with this last year prior to boarding Wonder in Barcelona. Very stressful worrying about testing positive after flying over to Spain and then spending a few days there. Ended up catching Covid on the ship (along with a bunch of other people) and bringing it home with us.

Usually they'll start posting ships being in Europe. That's the time you want to start checking out the deck plans and finalizing your cabin choices (I like to have 2 or 3 cabins lined up). But since I usually book the same day they open for booking, I usually get my first choice cabin. Something to think about!

Our Alaska cruise was canceled in 2021 so mom and I just booked a week's road trip through AAA and had a great time in Anchorage, Talkeetna, Denali and Fairbanks. Wish we had booked longer than a week! It was great. Pam and I hope to do a very lengthy Alaska road trip once we retire. We loved it there. Right now I think we're leaning on doing another TA (hopefully Allure). We missed so much last year with Pam's knee issues and our Covid fears onboard Wonder. But we LOVED our Owner's Suite! That thing was the best. Just wish it had been on the starboard rather than the port side of the ship. Too sunny for us to enjoy much.

I totally agree. We used them 20 years ago when they were David and Ivan and they were absolutely fantastic. So glad to see that they're still going strong.

Sorry to hear about losing your fur babies. Have you done Alaska before? We loved sailing out of Vancouver. Fantastic port, but don't book early May! Way too cold ;o) I'm waffling on 2025. It's either going to be another fall TA, a Japan cruise on Princess, an RCI TP from HI to Sydney, or a Jordan & Israel trip (I've already done a 10 day Israel trip in 2013, but Pam has not). All of them will cost a pretty penny.

My mom and I did a RT from San Francisco to Hawaii on Royal Princess in late March this year that included Kona, 2 days in Honolulu and Lahaina. We were supposed to do Hilo but they changed us to the extra day in Honolulu. Great cruise, but it was cold for the sea days. Unfortunately it was the last cruise of the season. But the onboard Hawaiian Ambassadors made up for it. Fantastic onboard Hawaiian themed events were offered. Does RCI offer anything like that on their TPs???

That still floors me that our TA was your first one. I thought you and Bucky had already done those dozens of times!

That's not being a chair hog. You are actually in the chair. During the Wonder TA there were some towels on chairs in the Solarium, but most of the best spots actually had people in them and this was at 6 a.m.