Wooo! 9/1 & 9/8 B2B Oasis Review w/ pics!

[shonandsuzie]

Ok this review is now like HEROIN........

I NEED MY FIX!!!!!!!!!:D

I totally understand!!!! Sorry for the big break. I had a bit of an emotional "I hate being back in the real world with resposiblities" breakdown yesterday. Today, I am back at work so I can work on the review more.:D

 

I will also go back through and double check that I answered everyone's questions, etc. so make sure you all keep checking back. Lol...I am creating a cliffhanger, huh??? ;)

[shonandsuzie]

I know I talked about it but not sure if I posted the picture of the gift from room service.

 

Someone brought up the characters around the ship so I will talk about that now. There were tons of oportunities to see the varying characters. I was a little concerned that it would be too much but it wasn't obnoxious in our opinions. Most of the time, they were in the promenade area but they weren't invasive. If you didnt care about them, you'd probably only notice them during the parades. If you did care about them, you would see them all over the place.

We did catch part of the character breakfast that they do. It was extremely cute but we sat WAY away because I am not that friendly before the 4th cup of coffee and the little kids were all excited and giggly. I know we will be right in the mist of that when we bring our kid though.

 

 

 

[shonandsuzie]

And now the "smooth" transition from cartoon characters to ALCOHOL.

 

The Rising Tide bar was amazing to me. They had special martinis which were great but really you go there for the moving bar experience. We planned to watch a parade from it because lots of CCers said the view is great from it but we were too slow and never got on it in time. I could see what they mean though. Several times they had parade props and characters right on the Rising Tide bar.

 

 

 

 

The view from it while it's halfway up:

 

People take pictiures of you taking pictures on there too....

[shonandsuzie]

The water under the bar was so cool. It changed colors and did different things. The kids would just stand there and stare:

[shonandsuzie]

More about ALCOHOL:::

 

Our favorite staff person may have been Claudia. She was our bartender in the main dining room for our anytime dining. We actually requested tables in her area instead of for a specific waitstaff because she was so nice and friendly and fun.

 

 

I asked her for a hot coffee based drink and she created this for me. We called it the Claudia Coffee.

 

We also enjoyed the abundance of free drinks at the past cruiser and C & A activities. We drink way more on cruises than we every would in our day to day life and we're pretty cheap about it. You will never see us posting about some $1000 account bill. We try to find free stuff and I wont "SAY" we ever bring our own.....

 

We buy special drinks throughout the cruise too. Our all time favorite is the BBC although I LOVE a nice Mojito. We tried a couple drink of the days too. We probably bought 1 drink a day- give or take. Our sea pass bill (because we had onboard credit and prepaid tips) was under $100 the first week and then since I had to visit the stupid doctor onboard, it was just under $200 for the second week.

[shonandsuzie]

Our favorite onboard activities:

1- POOL DECK

2-COMEDY SHOWS

3-QUEST

 

Speaking of Quest..... (shhhhhh)

 

 

 

 

The comedy club irritated us. Mostly because we couldnt go see comedy each night. We MUCH PREFER the comedy club on Carnival where they have different comedians and different shows each day. I understand (sort of) that everyone gets a chance to see the same show in an "intimate setting" on Oasis but blah.

We did enjoy Simeon, the comedy host, though. We saw him around the ship a bunch and he cracked us up. He seemed like a friend or something. Cool dude.

 

 

[shonandsuzie]

[shonandsuzie]

About the FOOD:

Main Dining New Menus= Success (in our opinion). It was great to have new things. Some of the dishes were quite inventive. I was going to take pictures of each menu but I didn't. Sorry.

We had my time dining which worked really well most of the time. It was simple to get whatever size table we wanted right away almost every time. 8:00 p.m. was by far the most busy time and on formal nights, you better pick another time. I did take pictures of the bad line one day but really we barely had a line. Also, they had 2 lines. One was "with reservations" for those who called ahead to reserve a certain My Time dining time and then "without reservations" which was for walk ups who didnt want to set a time in advance of the meal. That line system DID NOT WORK. Both lines were always equal and they sat 1 guest from the "with" line and then 1 guest from the "without" line. Also, if you didnt have a reservation, you could still go to the reservation line. We never made reservations ourselves but I felt bad for those who did.

 

 

 

 

 

Lunch in the main dining room on sea days is THE BEST. They had an awesome salad bar with huge shrinp and grilled vegetables and everything else under the sun. The chefs actually serve you (similar to the way they do in the Park Cafe). They also have fancy entres for lunch.

 

[shonandsuzie]

 

 

 

 

We went to CHOPS for our anniversary and 1 time the next week too. The food was great. Shon ordered the Porterhouse which was ridiculously big.

 

 

 

 

[SeaTeach]

Thanks for taking the time to post. I'm waiting for more, more, more.

[shonandsuzie]

Random things of interest arounde the ship....

 

I saw lots of places to be alone on this big ship. Reviewers for the most part have all agreed that the ship didnt feel crowded and we agree. The reason is all of the venues everywhere. Different people enjoy different things at different times. I thought these little cove seats were cool, for instance. There were a few of these on some random deck and you could sit there and chat and look out at the water:

 

 

Another cool thing (to me) were the cute baby loungers in the kid's pool area. Parents would be sunbathing while their kids played in the water and I guess the kids could chill out too!

 

The Johnny Rocket wait staff does a dance here and there outside of their restaurant on the Boardwalk. We checked it out from our balcony.

 

The cool "secret" balconies at the aft of some of the decks. Including deck 11 which was "bonus" for us. You could sit there and watch the aquatheater or sit on the other side and watch the water. Usually it was empty. Lots of lounge chairs and lots of peace and quiet. During the water shows, there would be more people on these decks but other than that, not really.

 

 

[shonandsuzie]

Next I think I'll make my attempt at showing the ports. That will be after I am home so... who knows. We have been so tired from this real world life. Laundry, cooking, WORK... Plus, our grandson has been at our house since we got home on Sunday because we missed eachother. If I cant do it tonite, I'll do it tomorrow at work.

[Just The 3 Of Us]

You guys are adorable - thanks so much for sharing your time on the Oasis!!!

[sjn911]

OK happy and caught up...sooo nice,,,thanks and rest up too now...Sarah

[iwannacruznow]

We stayed at the Embassy suites in FLL. The day before our cruise I looked out our balcony and saw this.

 

 

It was a gas station that was being torn down and one of the workers started the fire with a torch.

[iwannacruznow]

You guys are adorable - thanks so much for sharing your time on the Oasis!!!

They are adorable.Aren't they?:D

 

[workingmom200112]

Sorry for the big break.

 

Welcome back Suzie, you were missed! I almost started a new thread titled "Suzie where are you?" :D.

[shonandsuzie]

We stayed at the Embassy suites in FLL. The day before our cruise I looked out our balcony and saw this.

 

 

It was a gas station that was being torn down and one of the workers started the fire with a torch.

Wasnt that crazy!?! I plan to do the pre/post cruise part at the end... including the fire.

They are adorable.Aren't they?:D

 

SPY!!!!!!!!!!!!!:p

[gertiesmom]

Hi shon & Suzie! Looks like you had a great vacation! can't wait for the rest of your pictures! We miss you guys a lot! We just booked our first NCL cruise today... Mainly for the itinerary, but thought we would give something new a try. We have to get together sometime!

[shonandsuzie]

Finally, a sleeping 4 year old and sleeping husband. Work done, cooking done, dishes done, floors cleaned, X Factor watched. Review time!!!!

 

So, the PORTS:

 

Week 1: Western Caribbean Route

Labadee- Private island, great free beach day.

Falmouth- Jamaica. Hot.

Cozumel-Great place to buy stuff--prices are cheapest here for t-shirts, etc. Great beaches.

 

Week 2: Eastern Caribbean Route

Nassau- Used to be great place to buy "knock off" purses. Not this time :(

St. Thomas- Over visited. Seems every cruise goes here. Not our favorite.

St. Maarten- Of all of the stops, St. Maarten is our favorite. We love St. Maarten. It's so beautiful and perfect to us. If I was going to move to an island, that's where I would go. Nice that we finished our cruise there. :)

 

There were pros and cons about both week's ports of call. For this set of cruises, we cruised for the ship with very little concern about which ports we would visit. We didnt plan excursions since we had been to these places before several times.

 

 

LABADEE:

 

 

 

[shonandsuzie]

FALMOUTH:

 

 

 

 

 

[shonandsuzie]

COZUMEL:

 

 

 

 

[shonandsuzie]

NASSAU:

 

 

 

 

[shonandsuzie]

ST. THOMAS:

 

 

 

 

 

[shonandsuzie]

ST. MAARTEN