irun5k

Me, I smuggle my own eggs, hot plate and frying pan. Scrambled eggs every morning, no $7.95 charge. Take that, RCCL!

Have you done Southern Caribbean? That has a different feel for us than the typical Eastern/Western.

Totally agree. Years ago I went on the southern itinerary, Monarch out of San Juan. Totally different "feel", as you say- hard to explain but felt more relaxed, more detached, than the boilerplate eastern/western itineraries.

Remember there are people who live in these environments day in and day out vs. just visiting for a few hours. Here in SW Florida it is an every day occurrence- we've just got a can of OFF by the back door and we do a light but thorough spray if we're going to be outdoors.

If you're only going to be on the beach in Labadee it is hard to imagine there being much of a threat but a bottle of OFF or Deep Woods spray should be adequate I'd think. Personally I go for deet, with all the scares we've had in FL over the years (encephalitis, zika, etc.) I'm personally not one to mess around with lightweight solutions. If you're going on a hike or into the woods in any of these ports, long sleeves/pants could give an additional level of security.

Ours was listed for free so we booked it, Jun 4 Oasis sailing.

While I'm in Florida, it's almost a 5 hour long and tiring drive to Ft. Lauderdale. So we used to drive down the day before to be nice and rested. Well, since it was only me going on the Harmony, I went by Red Coach Bus the morning of the cruise.

I've read mixed reviews on Red Coach, good to hear your good experiences with them... certainly seems convenient. There is a lot of travel in FL that is either a long car ride or an flight that is oddly expensive and involves more time at the airport that you'd spend on the road. So, a comfortable/reliable coach service is a good option.

We live in Tampa, normally go for 7 nighters- last summer drove down to WPB (~3 hrs) for a 2 nighter on the Grand Celebration. Was fun, but would be much more compelling without over 6 hrs in the car. For you guys that have to fly, I can't imagine doing shorter cruises unless you extend the stay either before or after.

She looks like a beautiful, well maintained ship. Given than we live here the Tampa Bay area I'd be more than willing to give her a try....

The gym in the "loft" of the VC lounge is a bit odd though. I think this change was made in ~2005 timeframe. I'm not sure where the old location was but the new location was considered an upgrade.

It's not whether Sabor is worth $19 for a meal. It is. It's whether it's worth $19 when you have countless complimentary options available also. And it's not. It's also not just $19, it's per person. Do I want to spend an extra $40 on lunch for my wife and I to eat mediocre Mexican food on a cruise ship? Not a chance. Sabor was fairly empty when we sailed Oasis last year as it was. I can't imagine this drawing a crowd! We'll see in October when I sail Harmony.

Like you I don't think it is going to draw a crowd at all. A combo at Tijuana Flats is $10, dos tacos meal and others even less. I don't typically order anything else besides a drink. So for me to reach that amount I'd need to be eating locally at a place that offers full entrees. (I know many consider Tijuana Flats to be low grade but I actually like it for what it is, and it doesn't sound much different from Sabor at this point.)

OTOH if you were to compare Chops to a nice steakhouse locally, you could get to the $40 mark or whatever it is now pretty easily just with the cut of meat.

It was bad to begin with but removing the entrees makes me wonder if it's just cost cutting or they will replace w something else someday. They must not want to use it for dinners anymore.

 

 

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I was thinking the same thing, if the menu really is reduced that makes no sense given the $19 charge. It is almost like they are putting it out to pasture. An odd way to go about it though, if true...

Yes in my (and others) cruise planners, it shows as free on Oasis.

What I wasn't clear on is what the menu is now. There were a couple of menus circulating at one time. Would love to see what they're actually offering right now, or even hear a few menu items if you remember!

Thank you for the review! Glad to hear your 10 yr old like Voyagers. Our 9 1/2 yr old last visited the kids club on Oasis when he was in the 3-5 age group. He loved it then, but I was worried about whether the Voyager activities would resonate with him.

I was concerned about GaGa ball- if it is similar to dodgeball I'm not sure he will like it, he'd rather play basketball than get intentionally smacked hard by a ball. I assume maybe it is different though, I can't imagine the cruise line wanting the liability of a violent sport. (I've read the posts of GaGa ball but didn't come away understanding how they made it less violent- e.g. you're not throwing the ball but apparently batting/kicking/etc. the ball against someone else?)

Just off Oasis today. They did have a Trolls Meet 'n Greet with Poppy & Branch one afternoon and the Adventure Ocean groups had some Trolls focused activities which our two granddaughters enjoyed. Didn't see the moving being shown.

Great information, thanks! Which age group were your granddaughters in? Our kids would love the Trolls theme if they are able to participate.

Doesn't Oasis have a Sabor Bar (in the middle of boardwalk- used to be called something else I think, and, not to be confused with the "bar inside of Sabor")? I've seen photos of it, for sure. Does it serve chips and guac or anything like that at all? I know they say it doesn't serve Sabor signature cocktails which seems odd since it is called the "Sabor Bar."

For me, I'd be much more likely to do al-la-carte somewhere than plop down a meaningful amount of cash for a single meal. I guess I'm in the minority but this is the same reason why we rarely spend a lot of money eating out at home... with the kids it just doesn't make sense. We'll not think twice about spending $25 at a local taco place for 4 of us, but I can't remember the last time all four of us spent $80 somewhere.... the risk of our almost-3 year old having an bad day while in the resturant makes it not even worth it.

I don't know if this was a pre-existing option or not, but just noticed the $19 Sabor in my cruise planner for the Oasis next month.

I hope this is just an "option" and not the rule, but sadly I'm afraid I know better. Was looking forward to trying this with the family- but my two kids eat like birds and my wife and I aren't exactly competitive eaters either so there is no way it is worth $76 (or anything close to it, assuming they're nice enough to give kids a discount.)

Thanks for the info... I'm assuming they don't open all of them? I'd want to take them back to my stateroom and enjoy over the next 2 or 3 days. Of course then I guess I'm committed to keeping them on constant ice?

I have always wondered what the rule is when your beer is already chilled but have guessed it is not good to let it warm back up and re-chill later... but then I guess in cold weather climates beer mile warm and cool as it is transported/stocked/etc.

Will be on Oasis next month... are the discounted buckets 'o beer still a thing that is offered, or has this been "overcome by events"... e.g. the drink package?

Actually more broadly I'd be interested to hear of any discounts, happy hours, specials, etc. that don't involve the drink package or drink card. If any of these things still exist...

Wondering now if I should cancel the card I preordered for my upcoming Oasis cruise. The point of something like this is to make life easier while getting a better value for buying in bulk. Sounds like neither may be true any longer.

Break even for the package is usually around 5 drinks/day. If both of you are the type that would drink 5 drinks a day then I think you'll have logistical issues making it happen- getting 10 drinks/day and funneling half of them to a spouse seems like a lot of work and stress.

OTOH if you might have one drink a night they'd really never know if he picks up a drink for you somewhere while in transit across the ship. This definitely happens.

Room service is now $7.95 per call (continental breakfast items excluded.)

You want mobile passport. Details here.

 

https://www.cbp.gov/travel/us-citizens/mobile-passport-control

Nice, thanks! Can you store multiple passports inside the app? Would be ideal if I could have the wife and kids together with mine.

I never really never understood the interest in cruise directors, they were always invisible to us. We weren't ones to crowd around a tiny pool for a belly flop competition or anything like that.

Then we were on the Oasis and had Kevin Spacey back in 2011. Loved him- and the belly flop competition he hosted in the aqua theater was beyond funny, and it felt like a major production. haha

i'd be more worried about the people constantly asking you , and literally standing in front of you blocking your way, just to sell their wares. thats 100% guaranteed gonna happen to you. and we made it through 2 aisles of the straw market before deciding the badgering was enough. do they think they can coerce you into buying? pushy people totally turn me off

Yeah, I say no to everyone as a general rule and somehow my entire family ended up on some stage playing drums for some tip-required photo op. It happened so fast I still can't explain it but it was annoying.

Then when we finally got out of that God-forsaken building that the Oasis dumped us out in, I still have the image of this elderly lady's face.... She was in the back seat of a van and the driver was adding more and more people to the van (well above safe capacity) and this lady's face was mashed up against the glass. Seemed like it would be a very nice tour, sitting that way, huh?

I can't think of a more wonderful day to enjoy the beautiful ship you're sailing on and have a lot of it to yourself.

So, for formal nights in MDR it WILL be ok if I wear dress pants, dress shoes, and a nice dress shirt WITHOUT a tie, without a jacket? I know what is suggested, but flying and packing so much easier without a suit or tux. OR do I need to take a tie to wear with a dress shirt and no jacket - looking for advice - sailing on Allure.

He may feel overdressed.

Royal would not need to pay commissions to TAs or staff as many people in their call centers to do those same tasks. Less money being paid out, less money in call center payroll, but increase in IT payroll - I'm fairly certain it would still be positive revenue for Royal.

It would have to be a win for them. They'd at least be close to breaking even almost immediately, and the downstream effect would be huge. They want us all spending more money on board- the best way to do that is to make the experience seamless and bug free so that people will pre-book all these extras. Can you imagine what would happen to Amazon's sales if you had to fight their web site constantly?

Just look at the attached, it is probably just a couple SQL update statements to fix that.

Edit: what the heck, speaking of bad software. Is there some magic to making images show up inline in your message instead of as hyperlinks? And forget about actually attaching an image, it has some seemingly random weird dimension constraints... a "jpeg" can be 19.5 KB, 620 x 280 (huh? a banner ad aspect ratio?) but a "jpg" can be 97.7 KB. Same media type, no? image/jpeg?