perfect match

I loved the sunrise shot of the Opera House! The view of it from North Star wasn’t bad either. 😎

What an incredibly special time for you and your family! Thank you so much for sharing it with us! 

Twangster, I’m halfway through this review and I’m totally blown away! The wildlife pictures are spectacular. The penguins, especially the parents sitting on their chicks are probably my favorites. Then there’s the Rockhoppers, I’ve always loved them. Then the various seals, the birds in flight, I’m at a loss for words….. and I haven’t even mentioned the 360 degree camera and the commentary that accompanies the photos.

When I finish here I’m going to have to go and find your Galapagos thread. While I’d love to get to Antarctica some day, the Galapagos are at the top of my bucket list. 
 

Thank you for sharing your travels with us.

Great set of pictures, Harry! I don’t think I ever took any pictures there, or very few at best. We were always hurrying off to get somewhere or the area was so packed with people that I didn’t bother. It’s nice to see your pictures. 

2 hours ago, Jenna said:

It’s doing 7 day cruises. These short cruises were only the preview and shakedown cruises before the first revenue sailing. 

Thank you. You’re right, of course. I just realized that I was mixing up Icon and Utopia and came back here to correct my mistake. Add in Star of the Seas to the mix and with all of these shiny new ships coming out I can’t keep them straight.  
 

All I can say is WOW! I am loving seeing Icon through your eyes! 
 

I had no plans to book this ship. At her current prices I still don’t. If the prices come down enough then I’m in.

I hate that Icon is only sailing short itineraries now. There’s way too much to see and do on this ship for 3 or 4 day cruises. Yes, I know I can do a B2B like we’re doing in a couple of months. I’d rather have a 7 or 8 day sailing so I didn’t have to deal with a turn around day.

I can’t wait to read the rest of your review! 

14 hours ago, h20skibum said:

This may be the one you are thinking of, although this diagram is from Anthem. I had downloaded it while looking at cabins for that ship.  It shows the double Davits in front of Harry’s cabin. 

 

Yes, basically the same deck plan. I think the specific one I saw and haven’t been able to find again was for Ovation. As long as the room numbers are the same it should be the same with any of the Q class ships. In Harry’s case, the angled balcony is a perfect reference point. 
 

Thanks for posting this.

40 minutes ago, harryfat1 said:

 

 

Was this picture from your room with the angled balcony or the regular one? Even though it is interesting to get an up close look at how the lifeboats are suspended, I’d rather not be looking at that view for the whole cruise. I remember that a few years back someone had posted a link to deck plans that showed exactly where the lifeboats were and which ones were the most obstructed like your picture. If I can find it I’ll post a link but it won’t be tonight. Bedtime 😴. 

What? No textbooks in college any more? 😱 I don’t know how I would have gotten through school without my textbooks and highlighters! Thank goodness those days are behind me! Far behind! 😂

We were in a JS on Odyssey so we had upgraded bathroom amenities, or maybe it was because we’re 💎. I’m not sure but what we had was ok. When we sail Wonder in September we’re in a Boardwalk balcony so I’m not going to expect anything more than the single soap for everything. I’m going to put a note in my folder for that cruise to bring my own soap, shampoo and conditioner on that cruise. Thank you for that reminder. 
 

We never did get to ride the bumper cars on Odyssey. It was on our list of things to do, but we always seemed to have other things we wanted to do when they were open. Guess we will just have to book another Odyssey cruise! 😎 Not out of NY, though. Florida based cruises work best for us. 
 

We are traditional late diners like your family. We did switch to MTD on our first couple of cruises right after the restart, but have gone back to our preferred traditional late time slot. Like your family members, I have food allergies and I really appreciate the fact that I don’t have to go over the foods I need to avoid with a dire rent waitstaff each night. I’m happy to report that I’ve never had a problem on any cruise ship that we have been on. 

I am very happy for you and your family that you were the ones chosen. Mr Bayley’s office made a great choice! 
 

I’ll bet you’re glad you answered that phone call from the unknown Miami number. I probably wouldn’t have. 
 

I will definitely be following along here!

14 hours ago, island lady said:

 

LOL...maybe the parents.  Radiance class been out longer than when the larger ships came out with the Ben and Jerry's suite.   😉 

So, hove those cows been on board Radiance since she was built? Must have been the inspiration for the Ben & Jerry’s cows. Now I’m  wondering where those Ben & Jerry’s cows have gone. 🤔

We have yet to sail on a Radiance class. We had one booked but were bumped for a charter. We’ll have to try again. 
 

10 hours ago, Ocean Boy said:

Next ducks will not be allowed to be brought on board. They will have to be purchased on the ship with an 18% gratuity added, of course.

Please don’t go giving them any ideas! 😱

@SteelCityCruiser10, I’m glad Emma is feeling better. She’s a beautiful dog. I’ll be checking Dani’s thread for updates on your VV cruise.

Thank you very much for a wonderful review of your Jewel cruise! Your pictures have been fabulous too. 
 

Hope your dog is ok. I always worry about our cats whenever we are away. I’m quite sure that neither of them would willingly accompany out cat sitter to the vet should it become necessary. 🙀  Having a family member available and a mobile vet was a great solution. 
 

Hope you have a safe trip home. 

18 hours ago, island lady said:

 

LOL...forgot about those cool Flamingos!  We have....Cows.  😉 

 

 

@island lady, Are those cows refugees from the former Ben & Jerry’s “Sweet”? 😂

On 1/26/2024 at 12:46 AM, harryfat1 said:

By then it was 3 something so we headed back to the cabin since they had promised the suitcases would be delivered.  Of course, they were not delivered.

 

OK, never mind.  Not going to wait for these to be delivered.  Just DIY as I know where the luggage is – just down the hallway less than 30 feet away.  So we went down the hallway and just grabbed our luggage from the group and brought it in to unpack.

 

In not watching Mark’s YouTube video on the speedy unpacking hacks, we were just going about it the old school way in slowly unpacking the shirt-by-shirt method into the closet.

 

If we see our luggage anywhere in the hallway on boarding day we always grab it ourselves as soon as we see it and get it into our room. That way we can get unpacked right away. 
 

23 hours ago, harryfat1 said:

Bonus coverage for the night before I log off.

 

Saw the full moon tonight from the parking lot leaving work tonight. Just had to take a picture of the moon.

 

 

Crazy zoom from the Samsung cell phone. I will have more moon shots from the cruise later on

 

Nice photo from your Samsung! I think my iPhone can do better at zooming in than I know how to make it do, I’m working on my photography skills and have made some progress but I still have a way to go in the learning process. 
 

5 hours ago, harryfat1 said:

Mark,

 

Thanks for the pointer on the PDF copy of the compass.  I’m sure many people will benefit from this.

 

I am a hard-copy kind of guy.  I print stuff out at work when my colleagues just read from the computer.  I am old school in that I need to highlight/write on a piece of paper before my fuzzy old-man memory can retain the info.

 

So I prefer hard copies to touch/feel it.  In the old days, we used to get multiple copies of the compass, we would mark up one copy with highlighter and pens the night before so we could have a game plan for the next day.  Then I take a clean copy home and scan those as a front page of my daily trip report.

 

But the younger generation, like my sons in college, they never print anything out.  They can just read from the monitor and tablet.  I can’t do that…

Harry, I can totally relate to you liking the hard copies and even use them the same way as you do. I can manage reading from my iPad but my iPhone, not so much. My aging eyes just can’t manage as well on the smaller screen, and I find writing notes or highlighting to be very helpful. I’m glad we have options. 

1 hour ago, little britain said:

Not sure if many are following these posts but I’ll keep ploughing on! 

I’m following! Enjoying the journey. 
 

I suspect that a lot of people are a bit distracted by the Icon sailings. 

Norris and Carol, thank you for another fantastic GSJ! I enjoyed every last bit of it - well, except for the part where you both got Covid again! 
 

Barry and I sailed on Koningsdam but that was before Covid shut everything down. We very much enjoyed our 10 day Southern Caribbean sailing in our aft balcony room. Besides the great aft view, the thing I most enjoyed about our balcony room was something I never thought I’d have reason to say - the shower! We will most likely sail on HAL again at some point. 
 

While I have no idea as to what may have changed since cruising restarted, based on what I know about your and Carol’s cruising style from reading so many of your GSJ’s I think you will find your Rotterdam cruise to your liking. 

Looks like I’m late finding your review, Twangster. I’ve also been intrigued by Antarctica for many years and I love your reviews and photography so I’m going to take my time and enjoy this trip.

Great pictures and great report! We normally cruise and love the big ships but you’ve got me thinking about Jewel. We would certainly like your itinerary. Thank you.

Harry, we had a similar experience to yours in booking what we wanted to do online once we boarded the ship. We got to port early AB’s since we were in a JS we were able to wait in the suite area. It was a nice place to wait. At the rate prices are going up lately, we may never be able to afford even a JS again though. ☹️ Well, we do have a JS on each leg of our upcoming B2B on Allure, but that’s the last we may have for a while.

Anyway, as soon as we got on board I logged on to the internet and was able to book both the free and paid slots that we wanted on both the North Star and iFly. I was also able to book The Book and sort out a problem with my excursion in Grand Cayman. My pre cruise booking for The Book had disappeared from the cruise planner somehow. I have no idea how or why that happened but I was able to replace it. My Grand Cayman excursion disappeared when they added additional times available pre cruise and I tried to change to a different time slot. It cancelled my booking but wouldn’t let me rebook the new times. I had to go to the Shore Excursions desk to get that sorted out. The paid sessions for both North Star and iFly were always marked as sold out pre cruise from the moment they appeared on the cruise planner pre cruise, but as I said earlier, I was able to get both our free and paid spots booked on day 1. 
 

My one comment about having to book everything on day 1 was that it really made our first couple of hours on the ship feel very hectic. I would much prefer to already have all of those bookings done before I step foot on board so I can relax and enjoy the ship instead of having to take care of things that could have been done beforehand. I’m hoping that on Allure I will e able to do my bookings beforehand like I have done on all of our past Oasis class cruises.

On 1/20/2024 at 6:15 PM, h20skibum said:

it was $32 per day on Allure this month.  Maybe higher price was a function of the shorter cruise.  We shared our free days and didn’t buy.  Just plan to use our free days on Utopia too.

Wow! I think that’s the highest internet price I’ve seen. We’re doing a 4/3 B2B on Allure in a couple of months and I’m planning to just use our Diamond days. Internet in my cruise planner for both sailings has been $20.99 on sale.

On 1/20/2024 at 4:29 PM, Ourusualbeach said:

The room will be the exact same as all of the other balconies but I will definitely post pictures of the balcony.

Balcony pics would be great! Thank you. 
 

On 1/20/2024 at 6:06 PM, Ourusualbeach said:

He thinks so.  He slso thonks the day bed was bought for him.  

He looks so comfortable there! It must be for him! 

I would love to see wha the Aqua Theater looks like 

Ken, I’d also love to see pics of your large aft facing balcony room. That’s one thing we miss on Oasis class ships!
 

At today’s prices, I’m not likely to book Icon, especially since she’s doing s Horta Bahamas s cruises. How ever, for the right price and an itinerary with the 4 day going somewhere other than the same 2 Bahamas ports like our upcoming B2B on Allure I could be tempted.

I will definitely be following along here!

Yes! We’re boarding the ship! 🛳️ 

We have those same luggage tag holders and I like them. I do need @h20skibum to post a You Tube video of how to print out all those luggage tags on one page though. It would be a whole lot easier than having to fold each tag exactly right so that I could squeeze the bulky tag into its holder! 
 

I have the Uber app on my phone but have never used either Uber or Lyft. We do most of our cruises out of Port Canaveral so close to home and an easy drive there. In FLL we’ve had good results with the hotel shuttle. We’ve only cruised out of Miami once. We were going to use Uber there but decided at the last minute to use the shuttle. It was not a good choice. The shuttle driver drove all of the way out to our terminal there but did not stop. He looped back through heavy traffic and stopped at every single other terminal before finally circling back around and out to our terminal and yes, he knew the first time past that we were going there! So by the time we finally got back to our terminal the computer system had gone down and we were left standing outside in the Miami heat and humidity for well over an hour before we even got inside. I doubt that we will ever take another hotel shuttle in Miami again! 😱

We never visit our “uncle in prison” any more. Our pictures never seem to come out good so we don’t buy them anyway. 

Norris, I hope you’re feeling better soon. 

Norris, I’m sad that this review is drawing to a close. I’ve enjoyed cruising along with you. I believe I still have a day in FLL to look forward to before you’re done here. 
 

I have seen a number of weather reports from Chicago recently. It sounds like you’re getting everything we moved south to Florida to get away from! I hope that you and Carol and your adorable feline family members 🐈‍⬛🐈‍⬛ stay safe and warm throughout all of the winter weather.