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Harmony Trip Report April 8-15, 2017: A Cruise to Remember!

CreativeCruiser119
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CreativeCruiser119

CreativeCruiser119

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I completely forgot to mention, I think it was this day when my mother and I walked through Central Park to see Tony the Garden Gnome and his setup. I even got a picture with him to send to his donator, Samantha Alexander as she and I are mutual followers on Instagram. She and her husband Matt donated him when they sailed on the Harmony in the Mediterranean last summer during her inaugural season.

 

It was after this that we went back to the rooms to get ready for lunch.3e3b50475ce43b01f06b5b1dc0c38b77.jpgfc6723cf34863cb37d7f93c9c025e0d9.jpg6fcd10d401aa7a780f43cacce3e3d53f.jpgc6d420f84e4d51bbd8f0b8a190e1caf1.jpg

 

 

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CreativeCruiser119

CreativeCruiser119

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Central Park is arguably my favorite feature of any Oasis-class ship. I just love spending time there, whether it's in the park itself or on my balcony. It's just so relaxing to take it all in and enjoy the beauty of it! I'm not too far from my balcony in the last picture. It was the sixth balcony after the living wall in the middle of the park, directly above Park Cafe and looking across at Jamie's Italian.

 

After eating lunch in the Windjammer, we went back to the rooms to reapply sunscreen and I changed into my bathing suit. I'll get to the afternoon next. Stay tuned!69ea3816cdf3663331e42668d0145b50.jpg59edeebeec025302773cec75f8f44b47.jpg5a0779ab776f5ba73919824a003c04be.jpg707b3188e52c9ecb6f1ce98da24140c6.jpg

 

 

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CreativeCruiser119

CreativeCruiser119

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Great job so far. We have to wait until December to board harmony. I am enjoying your review and tips. Thank you. :)

 

Thank you so much for the kind words! I'm glad you're enjoying it! December will be here before you know it, and you're lucky you get to do a B2B! I've always wanted to do that! Stay tuned for more, and don't hesitate to ask any questions along the way!

 

I love your signature too by the way!

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prekteacher

prekteacher

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Kevin, Thank you for your detailed reply to my post! It gave me a lot of information. You are doing a great job and this is by far the most detailed report of Harmony I have read yet. I stayed in CP balconies on both Allure and Oasis but this time I'm in a virtual balcony room connected to my kids inside room. I'm going to miss sitting out and listening to the music from below. It was so peaceful and beautiful. Did you try Sabor on this cruise? My husband and I loved it on Oasis and can't wait to see if it's ok on Harmony. Loved the chips and quacamole. Well keep up the great work.

Barbara

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CreativeCruiser119

CreativeCruiser119

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Kevin, Thank you for your detailed reply to my post! It gave me a lot of information. You are doing a great job and this is by far the most detailed report of Harmony I have read yet. I stayed in CP balconies on both Allure and Oasis but this time I'm in a virtual balcony room connected to my kids inside room. I'm going to miss sitting out and listening to the music from below. It was so peaceful and beautiful. Did you try Sabor on this cruise? My husband and I loved it on Oasis and can't wait to see if it's ok on Harmony. Loved the chips and quacamole. Well keep up the great work.

Barbara

 

 

 

I'm so glad I was able to help! Aren't the CP balconies the best?! I have also done Boardwalk on Allure (Deck 8, starboard side) if you have any questions about that as well. The virtual balcony sounds really cool, I've never stayed in one but I think you'll enjoy it!

 

I never did try Sabor! I know this is strongly discouraged but my family usually avoids the specialty dining because of the extra charge! I have heard the guacamole is AMAZING. I mentioned earlier in the review how my school principal went on an Allure girls trip recently, well they did the opposite- they went all out, visited 150 and Chops, and a few of her friends went to Izumi (which I really want to try as well). They never went to Sabor but when she came back she was eager to show me pictures of unique salts from, I think, Chops. Never seen anything like it! The onboard culinary teams do a phenomenal job.

 

Thank you so much for the kind words! More to come, and ask any other questions you may have!

 

 

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CreativeCruiser119

CreativeCruiser119

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Kevin-

 

How is kitty?????

 

 

~Andrea

 

 

 

Andrea,

She is doing well! She had an x-ray today and they do not think the cancer has spread, which means we will most likely still get a few years with her! Which, as I mentioned, was expected anyway since she's 12 and a half and cats normally live to about 15 or 16! I was so happy at the news. The x-rays will go to a radiologist tomorrow for confirmation, so keeping our fingers crossed! If the cancer had spread there would likely be no treatment option, so we would have no choice but to just let her live the rest of her life (not knowing how long that would be), and watch her health and unfortunately, put her to sleep when necessary. But now we think it'll be treatable, so that's wonderful news. I'll keep you all posted.

 

Thank you so much for checking up on my kitty, it really means a lot to have such caring people like you on here! Thanks for following along!

 

 

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CreativeCruiser119

CreativeCruiser119

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Day 2 - Sunday, April 9th

An Afternoon on Deck

 

First of all, my apologies in advance for no photos in this post!

 

After lunch I headed back the cabin, changed into my swim trunks and went out to the balcony to reapply the sunscreen. I made a beeline for the forward stairs and once I reached Deck 15, I dropped my sandals, towel and goggles off in a lounge chair near the entrance to the Solarium. I brought my goggles just in case I wanted to do some underwater swimming, but didn't need them at this point so I left them. There was a lot of this in the Solarium on Liberty with it being nearly 7 feet deep at the deep end (around 5 at the shallow end, for anyone who was wondering)- I remember even using them to recover someone's wedding ring! During my Harmony cruise, I brought towels from my cabin to the pool deck since I was almost charged for one last year on Liberty for forgetting to return one on the first night! (I know, stupid me). Luckily I managed to a stray towel before the end of the week and turned it in so the charge was cleared from my SeaPass account. Wasn't about to make that mistake again this year!

 

As always, I hopped in the cantilevered whirlpool, as I love to pool- and jacuzzi-hop on these ships. Got crowded, so I went to the Solarium, then headed out to the main Lido deck to spend some time in the pools. At 2:15 the World's Sexiest Man competition was held at the Main Pool. Unfortunately no photos were taken; I watched the competition from the jacuzzi to the aft of the pool. It was hilarious! After the competition was over I met up with my father and Matt and we did the Supercell, which is the champagne bowl in the Perfect Storm trio of waterslides. It was extremely fast but my father and Matt didn't even make it one revolution around the bowl! I made about two, not sure why!

 

When I went on the Liberty last year, the slides were complete but the Boomerango slide was closed all week due to safety upgrades. I was a little nervous about that too but like the Abyss, wanted to do it! So I was disappointed when they said it would be closed all week but still enjoyed the dual racers!

 

On Liberty, the launch area for the waterslides is an a room on top of a "tower," which had great views of the wake of the ship. On Harmony, it was open-air and had phenomenal views not only of the ocean on either side, but over the pool deck as well. Very windy too! One of the waterparks we go to in the Dells (the same one that has the FlowRider, and the same one we're going to this summer but almost had to pass up because of Delta) has two slides similar to this. The one inside is a body slide that takes you down a chute, then into a bowl and dropping you into about 4 feet into a 9-1/2-foot-deep pool. Outside there is one very similar, except you are in a tube and instead of dropping into a pool, you come out in a chute like a regular slide. The one on Harmony was basically a combination of those two in that it was a body slide, but landed you in a chute like the others. So it is easy to run into the wall in the middle of the bowl, but I think it's just a slight bump so it's not painful at all.

 

After being flushed down the toilet, we separated ways again and I went back to the hot tubs and arranged to meet back up with my father at the Sports Pool at 5:00 for pool volleyball, as advertised in the Cruise Compass. We had enjoyed doing this on Oasis and Allure and missed it on Liberty so we were excited to do it again. To our disappointment, the net was never set up but the pool was empty so I went back to the Solarium to get my goggles, and came back to do some laps as I enjoy swimming. My father sat in a poolside chair and watched me, where he had a casual conversation with the lifeguard, who was surprised to hear that I was his son- he thought I looked old enough to be his brother! Maybe it was because I was shirtless and wet?

 

It was really nice being able to do laps. Since there is no Solarium pool, this pool is adults-only so there are no kids. I'm not sure whether or not they've implemented this for the Sports Pools on Oasis and Allure as well but I remember having a hard time doing laps on the Oasis because a mother had her toddler son in the pool and I didn't want to splash him! I don't remember ever getting around to doing laps on the Allure, as I spent so much time in the Solarium pool during that cruise! The only laps I did on Liberty were the first night, when the Sports Pool was empty as it too was full with guests of all ages during the day.

 

You're going to hate us for this, but my family doesn't usually pack formal wear on cruises since we have the buffet, and since it was a sea day and we didn't want to be on a schedule for dinner anyway, we just ate at the Windjammer that night. It was nice to check out their dinner selection on these nights. The other 5 nights we ate in the MDR, where I loved the quality of the dishes. So after swimming a few laps, I went back to the Sports Pool hot tub and around 5:30, went back to the room to shower and change into dry clothes for dinner in the Windjammer.

 

Next up: another peaceful evening, 1887 & late-night hot-tubbing!

 

 

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Mr&MrsTop-Ret.

Mr&MrsTop-Ret.

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Andrea,

She is doing well! She had an x-ray today and they do not think the cancer has spread, which means we will most likely still get a few years with her! Which, as I mentioned, was expected anyway since she's 12 and a half and cats normally live to about 15 or 16! I was so happy at the news. The x-rays will go to a radiologist tomorrow for confirmation, so keeping our fingers crossed! If the cancer had spread there would likely be no treatment option, so we would have no choice but to just let her live the rest of her life (not knowing how long that would be), and watch her health and unfortunately, put her to sleep when necessary. But now we think it'll be treatable, so that's wonderful news. I'll keep you all posted.

 

Thank you so much for checking up on my kitty, it really means a lot to have such caring people like you on here! Thanks for following along!

 

 

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YAY!! That is fabulous news!!!!

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CreativeCruiser119

CreativeCruiser119

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YAY!! That is fabulous news!!!!

 

 

 

Absolutely! We tried to stay optimistic as she wasn't losing weight or losing an appetite like the vet said would be symptoms if it were to spread! She was a chubby kitty before the surgery, and still is [emoji38] she's so adorable. Not unhealthily overweight, just a little chubby! And she's recovered from the tumor removal surgery quite well and even though she's always been a lazy cat, she's still spunky and affectionate as usual! They said the cancer will likely come back but as long as we keep her medicated, it will stay under control and she'll likely be able to live to the average age cats live to so that's great news. Just hope it stays that way! Thanks so much again for checking up on her, we all very much appreciate the consideration!

 

 

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CreativeCruiser119

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Day 2 - Sunday, April 9th

Captain's Reception, 1887 & Another Late-Night Hot Tub Session

After a day on deck, we went to the Windjammer for dinner. I had a lot to eat and we checked out the Mongolian Grill they had set up. My family always laughs at the amount of food I get, but I just say I'm on vacation! Spoiler alert: I quite often wasn't able to finish my plate!

 

After dinner we went to the Royal Promenade to watch Captain Johnny give his Welcome Aboard speech. We saw a long line of guests waiting to have their picture taken with him. I wasn't dressed up and planned to get one with him at the end of the week at the Captain's Corner anyway, not to mention I already had one with him from the Allure, so we just watched. We thought we missed his speech but he apparently did it just as our show was starting. Tonight's show was 1887, the ice show. We had an 8:00 reservation for the show so around 7:15 we headed to Studio B to secure our seats and order our beverages ahead of time. I had, I believe, the virgin pina colada. My father brought me a Mudslide earlier that afternoon while I was in the hot tub and I loved it as I had never had it before.

 

The show was incredible and as I mentioned with the Aqua cast, it's insane how talented these performers are. After the show our Cruise Director Abe even remarked how crazy it is how they're able to do such advanced tricks on such a small rink. I had seen pictures of the rink in photos and wondered what the large circles on the ceiling were, as the rinks on Oasis and Allure did not have them. Turns out, they're designed specifically for this show! There are squares in the middle of the circles that come down at the end of the show. Abe also mentioned how remarkable the projection technology is in Studio B, as they were able to change the image on the ice in the blink of an eye. I forget the exact cost but he said it was extremely expensive, I wish I had remembered the number he gave! Truly an incredible venue and a show worth seeing.

 

After the show was over we went to the Promenade, got some pizza at Sorrento's and went up to Deck 8 to enjoy Central Park as I had also wanted to show off Tony the Garden Gnome to Dad and Matt. After going back to my cabin and watching the park from there, Matt and I put our swim trunks back on and went up to Deck 15 for some late-night hot-tubbing in the cantilevered whirlpool. After a while Matt was ready to go back to the room and get ready for bed so I headed over to the Solarium jacuzzi for a little bit, then came back to the cantilevered ones and had a nice conversation with two gentlemen in their 20's who owned their own business. It's people like that who go far in life! I enjoyed talking to them and hearing about all they'd accomplished in such little time.

 

Pretty soon I decided it was time to hit the hay, as we had an exciting day in Labadee planned! So I went back to the room, took a shower and headed to bed. As with on my Boardwalk Balcony on Allure, I often went out to the balcony on this trip to brush my teeth and enjoy the sights! They say to brush for 2 minutes, so that's what I do!

 

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CreativeCruiser119

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My apologies, there was so much going on I often forget little things. Day 2 was the only time I ever made it to the FlowRider during the week, and I did it during a pool/ jacuzzi break and unfortunately, nobody was around at the time to take pictures. To make up for that, here's one from the Liberty last year. See you all tomorrow as I cover Day 3 & Labadee! Have a great night everyone!

 

91ea65c20469e447e242cab93e9b98cb.jpg

 

 

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