*Live* Oasis of the Seas 11/17-11/26

Happy Friday y’all!! Our vacation officially started this morning. We will be on Oasis starting Sunday. We have VOOM so I will be posting pictures and answering questions when I can.

For this cruise I have the GoPro, 360 camera and will be live on Periscope (@pinkclouds2014).

Let me know if you have any question!!


Original Itinerary:* Eastern Caribbean (St. Maarten, Puerto Rico, Labadee)
New Itinerary:* Western Caribbean (Cozumel, Falmouth, Labadee)


Intro:
We booked this cruise when we were onboard the Oasis in May 2016. That cruise was our first on an Oasis class ship. It was just my husband and myself so we wanted our kids to experience this amazing ship.


About us:
We are a family of 4 that currently lives 25 miles south of Minneapolis. We are an Army family that moves every couple of years. We have lived in our current location since May 2016.
Paul (DH) is active duty Army currently working at Fort Snelling. Cruising likes: The shows, relaxing in the hot tub, trying new drinks and exploring the ship & ports. Interesting facts: Lactose intolerant, Dr. Who fan, enjoys working out. Paul has been on 12 cruises.
Lori (myself) is an RN currently working on an outpatient observation floor. Cruising likes:* People watching, relaxing in the sun, socializing at the bars in the evenings and trivia. Interesting facts: Breast cancer survivor, Cubs fanatic, crocheter. I have been on 14 cruises.
Briar (DD) is a junior at the University of Minnesota majoring in sports management. Cruising likes: The food, trivia, slot machines, and seeing new places. Interesting facts: Aspires to work for the Chicago Cubs, foodie, loves baseball. Briar has been on 10 cruises.
Darian (DS) is a junior in high school. Cruising likes: Trying new foods, swimming, drawing and the beach. Interesting facts: Pescaterian, amazing artist, transgender, plays trumpet in the marching band. Darian has been on 9 cruises.
We are all C&A Diamond status. This will be our first cruise as diamond and are looking forward to the new perks.
When we first booked this cruise it was going to be the four of us. Somewhere in the middle of planning my best friend and her family decided to join us. This will be our first cruise traveling with another family. My best friend and her family live in Australia. I was born in New Zealand which is where I met my her. When we were both 7 her family moved to South Africa and my family moved to the US. She has a son and a daughter the same ages as my kids. We refer to their family as the “Southern Hemisphere version of our family”! For my review we will call them the Oz family.


Planning:
I am a huge planner! I love to read reviews, check prices, hunt for past cruise compasses and menus. Sadly for this cruise I was not able to find us a better rate than what we had originally booked at. I was able to find some pretty good deals on the beverage packages, Voom and excursions.


We booked 2 boardwalk balcony cabins. The Oz family booked a boardwalk balcony and regular balcony. All of our cabins are on Deck 11 port side.


We received the Stay & Play package with our boardwalk cabins so the soda packages, one time Johnny Rockets lunch or dinner and private family rock climbing session was included. We purchased the deluxe beverage & Voom package, photo package and excursions all prior to sailing. In Labadee we will all be doing the Dragon's Breath Flight Line and in Cozumel Paul and Darian will be doing the Starfish Sanctuary & Palancar Reef Snorkel.

Pre-cruise:

We are flying out of Minneapolis/St. Paul today at 3:55 pm with an arrival time of 8:15 pm in Orlando. We are currently in the Delta Lounge enjoying some yummy food and drinks before out flight.

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Enjoy your cruise and looking forward to your live updates!

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Thank you for taking the time and effort to do a live report. It's cold hear so looking forward to my vicarious trip to the tropics. ;p :D

Have a wonderful cruise.

Bon Voyage.

Keith

Following!

The 360 pics I hope will be great.I hope you can take some pics of the coastal kitchen & let me know what you think of Labadee.

I had cabin 12729 on the Allure & loved it . Its great for watching the shows

I can't wait to hear all about your trip! Have a blast!!! And...thanks so much for doing the live report. Love reading them!!

Following along!

Enjoy your cruise! So exciting! We booked a boardwalk as well for our upcomming cruise (at 307 so would love to see the location in 309 if you're able to share). Have a good flight, and rest before your cruise. It's always great when you can come in early and unwind from life first.

Looking forward to your review. I’ll be sailing on the 3rd December and have a Boardwalk balcony for the first time.

Terrified of heights but going to try and conquer my fears with the Dragon zip line.

Have a fab cruise. [emoji41]

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following!

Please could you tell me the earliest departure to self disembark? Thank you.

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We did B2B back in October and loved every minute. I was wondering if I could give you my email address to forward to someone that works on the ship? They had given us their email but left out part of it. If possible, you could contact me at meandralph@hotmail.com. If you don’t want to do this, I totally understand. After all, you are on vacation. Have a wonderful trip

We’ll be on board this week as well. May chime in from time to time.

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Following along. Looks like fun.

BTW, Dr Who fans eh? My Jeep License plate says ALLONS-Y.

Have a wonderful cruise.

dp

We did B2B back in October and loved every minute. I was wondering if I could give you my email address to forward to someone that works on the ship? They had given us their email but left out part of it. If possible, you could contact me at meandralph@hotmail.com. If you don’t want to do this, I totally understand. After all, you are on vacation. Have a wonderful trip

I emailed you

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Happy Sunday!!

I will add my review of the last couple of days sometime this afternoon/evening. We had an interesting time checking into our hotel!

I will be Periscoping once on the ship so if you don’t already have Periscope on your phone, install it so you can watch!!! Periscope - @pinkclouds2014

Have a great day!!

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Have a terrific cruise. Looking forward to your thoughts and comments...

Happy Sunday!!

 

I will add my review of the last couple of days sometime this afternoon/evening. We had an interesting time checking into our hotel!

 

I will be Periscoping once on the ship so if you don’t already have Periscope on your phone, install it so you can watch!!! Periscope - @pinkclouds2014

 

Have a great day!!

 

 

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Connected on Periscope! Looking forward to your review. Sailing in 2 weeks. [emoji41]

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Not sure whether to credit Royal or sailing from FL in general, but we were on board, had lunch, explored all the neighborhoods and unpacked before 2. That doesn’t happen in New York.

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Pre-cruise:

Friday 11/17

Our flight was scheduled to leave at 3:55 pm from the Minneapolis/St. Paul airport. We had errands to run on the way to the airport so we left extra early. We arrived at the airport around noon. After checking our bags we made our way through the TSA pre-check and to the Delta Lounge. The TSA pre-check is one of the most valuable things we have ever done. It has saved us so much time and hassle over the years. We enjoyed a couple of hours in the lounge before heading to the gate.

The flight went smoothly. Once at the Orlando airport we grabbed our bags and headed to Hertz. We ended up with a bright blue SUV which turned out to be really easy to find in parking lots! The drive from the airport to our hotel was easy with very little traffic.

We arrived at the Radisson Resort by the Port at 9:30 pm. It took about 15 minutes for the hotel to find us a room and check us in. We loaded up the luggage cart and pushed it all the way to the room which was quite a challenge navigating corners and the bumpy walkways. We put the room card in the door and the door opened but the chain seemed to be on it on the inside. We closed the door and tried again. Same thing. Weird. So my husband left us there and went to the front desk to find out what was going on. A couple of minutes later a very tired and confused man opened the door that we were trying to get into. Apparently the hotel had booked us into a room that already has someone staying in it. We were just very thankful that the chain was on the door and we didn't just all barge into the room!! The hotel did comp us a night for the inconvenience so no complaints about that issue from me.

My short review of the Radisson is that I would not stay there again. We had originally booked the Comfort Inn and Suites but due to the hurricane it will be closed until December. The Radisson is in need of updating. The beds are small and uncomfortable. Not the worst hotel I have stayed in but certainly not the best.

On Saturday the boys and girls split up for the day. The girls did some shopping at the Merritt Island mall and the boys went to tour the space center. I am happy to pass along some information on the space center if anyone is interested. We had a couple of really awesome Uber drivers while in Port Canaveral. Very chatty and entertaining. After shopping we went to Grills restaurant and bar right next to the cruise port. We were able to see 2 Carnival, 1 Disney and the Navigator sail away. The food was good but the drinks were not. We aren't even sure the mixed drinks had any alcohol in them. I would definitely go back to Grills to watch the ships but next time I would order bottled beer!

After dinner we headed back to the hotel to pack up and get ready for the next day.

Next up...Cruise day 1!!

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Great start cannot wait to read more about your adventure.

Look forward to reading your review. We really enjoyed our trip in August. I have friends who are on there also but apparently they had issues with their room key. :o

Day 1 - Port Canaveral

We had our suitcases already re-packed so we got to sleep in a little. We woke up around 9. We were out of the hotel and on our way to the port by 10:30. There was no traffic until we hit the light to turn into the port. We sat in the line to enter the drop off line for maybe 10 minutes. The only issue we had was a really inpatient, rude taxi driver behind us that kept honking. We were in a line of cars unable to go anywhere. When we made a slight turn the taxi went around us and cut in front of us almost hitting the right front of our rental car. I noticed that the taxi had a handicap tag hanging on the rear view mirror so he was able to bypass all of the other cars and drop the people off. I called the number on the taxi to let them know how rude and dangerous the driver was. The response I got from the taxi company was extremely rude and then they hung up. The guy I spoke to on the phone must have contacted the taxi driver because we saw him a couple of minutes later and he honked at us and gave us the finger. So professional! So, my advice, stay away from Merritt Island Shuttle (but comes up as Merritt Island Shuffle when I Googled the phone number). Ok, rant over!

DH dropped us off and returned to the hotel to pick up the OZ family. After dropping them off at the port DH returned the rental car and took the shuttle back to the port. This whole process took about a half hour. We waited on a bench right by the line to enter the terminal. It was very entertaining to watch the people try to line up and enter the terminal. They really need a sign because the lady that was trying to direct people which proved to be very frustrating for her. To enter the terminal the line is to the right of the rope. If you are diamond or above you enter to the left of the rope. This seemed to confuse people that were in suites. It seemed that if you had a suite but were NOT diamond you had to enter in the regular line. This was just to go through security. After security it was then split by suites and decks as well as diamond and above.

We did learn that if you forget to print out your set sail pass you can fill out papers. I was a little worried because the OZ family forgot to print out the set sail pass for the kids. Our check in went smoothly and we walked right on the ship. All together we arrived at the port at 11 and boarded the ship at 12.

Once on the ship we headed to the pub for our first drink. The only downside to purchasing the beverage packages online is that you don't have the soda cups until you get to your cabin. After downing our first drink we went to Central Park to wait until we could get into our cabins. We found comfy chairs and had the husband's bring us food from the Central Park Cafe and drinks from the Trellis Bar. At 1 we headed to our cabins. As we were walking down the hallway we found our luggage so we just took it with us. Since we had our luggage we decided to unpack to get that out of the way.

After unpacking it was about time for the muster drill. We headed to the Aqua Theater, listened to the speech and watched the video. We then walked up to deck 15 for the sail away and walked around and took some pictures. We had 5:30 dinner reservations so we went back to the cabin to clean up.

I had made all of our my time dining reservations in advance. We did have an issue with finding our reservation but only had to wait 10 minutes. Our waiter and assistant waiter were very nice. Not as outgoing as in the past. Food was good but not great. I thought the menu was limited compared to past cruises. Several starters, main courses and desserts are on the menu every night leaving on a few different choices nightly. I am happy to post menu pictures and food pictures in a separate post if anyone is interested.

After dinner we went bar hopping to find a bar and entertainment that we thought we might like to go to nightly. Our favorite pub entertainer is Jimmy but we are not sure what ship he is on right now. The pub entertainer on the Oasis currently is Rob who is know for signing Neil Diamond. I personally didn't like him but he seemed to be popular.

We had an awesome first day!

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Menu pics would be great if it is not too much trouble. We will be cruising in 2 weeks!

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