Picture Imperfect: Live on Harmony

[rsharp83]

Men’s bathroom. Deck 5. 

[Familygoboston]

Lucky you, perfect match! You can wait for steals and deals! 

Randy, I’ll never see that comic and it breaks my heart ❤️ a little 😭

Edited June 4, 2019 by Familygoboston

[Familygoboston]

OK LETS TALK ABOUT THE MONKEY IN THE ROOM....

 

 

 

KIDS 

 

First, a disclaimer I love kids, I have my own kids (all grown up) I worked with kids of all ages in my jobs and volunteer work, most recently as a preschool aide. I’m that weird lady who says hello to your kids in the stalled line at SPLASH mountain and shows pictures of my pets to squirmy toddlers at the supermarket. I love kids and I get that that are just being kids. So far I haven’t seen one doing anything on board that’s out of the norm for polite, active (sometimes super tired) kids,

 

BUT

 

If you are a person who is done with your own kids, never had kids, or just doesn’t want to be woken at 7 AM to kids leaping from bed to dresser to couch like flying monkies. (Maybe I have this wrong and we are actually in a cabin next to the Fine Line aerilists?)Or if you prefer to sleep in, when your neighbors kids think it’s a great idea to hurl pumpkins at the walls, I have a few pieces of advice. 

 

1- Harmony is by far the loudest ship I’ve been on (Been in all classes of Royal ships, plus dozens of other cruise ships) Not sure if it’s less soundproofing in the walls or what, but I miss that feeling I always had on a ship where you close your cabin door and it felt like you couldn’t hear anything outside the cabin. (Wait was that 7 short followed by one long???!?)

2- Avoid June, July, early August and school vacation weeks when quads and triples are more likely to be filled to capacity. 

3- choose a  cabin that abuts only other double occupancy cabins. 

 

We are among the loudest families around- so I get it. But one of the things we talked about with our girls was how hotel rooms and cruise ships are shared spaces and how to behave in them. It trained them to be good roommates!

 

Okee Dokee- sounds like the flying monkies went to breakfast, time to go back to bed! 🤣

[ShannonSC2]

18 hours ago, rsharp83 said:

Coco Cay Anniversary Day!

 

Ok. I understand (somewhat) the anti-plastic straw thing. But paper straws SUCK. Or more appropriately, they DON’T SUCK. Trying to do frozen drinks with paper straws is so frustrating. It just doesn’t work. So my recommendation is BYOS: bring your own straws. I got the jumbo smoothie kind. Will 40 of them last all week?

I totally agree with the paper straws.  I had a few frozen drinks in Jamaica and it it hard work getting the drink through the paper straw.  Great idea on bringing your own!

 

Quote

 

 

 

Quote

 

 

 

 

Edited June 4, 2019 by ShannonSC2

[Biker19]

19 minutes ago, Familygoboston said:

1- Harmony is by far the loudest ship I’ve been on (Been in all classes of Royal ships, plus dozens of other cruise ships) Not sure if it’s less soundproofing in the walls or what, but I miss that feeling I always had on a ship where you close your cabin door and it felt like you couldn’t hear anything outside the cabin. 

It's the poor welds that leads to the noise.

[ShannonSC2]

Love your review so far.  We are on the Harmony sailing on Sunday, June 9.  We have done the Oasis so I am excited to see the Harmony.

 

We were on the NCL Getaway during spring break with over 1800 children 18 and under on board (only reason we knew was because CD announced during the "drill". Our cabin was next to a group of teenagers who decided on the last night to invite about 1000 of them to their cabin.  Loud music, knocks on our door and doors slamming was too much to handle.  Called security and they showed up after 1AM. They were quiet all week long but this last night was out of control.   

 

 

Edited June 4, 2019 by ShannonSC2

[Familygoboston]

DAY 3 COMPASS 

SEA DAY! Lots of choices! 

[rsharp83]

WOW Bands

 

Jury is out for me on the bands. I’d say so far it’s been kind of useless. Swim up bar at Coco would be useful. But everywhere else you need to remove band to send with waiters or drink servers. And just now I got a water at Promenade Cafe. I showed her my band and she ask me to please bring my Seapass card next time. Well, if I have to bring my card then what the heck is the WOW Band for?? 

[PlanetX]

10 minutes ago, rsharp83 said:

WOW Bands

 

Jury is out for me on the bands. I’d say so far it’s been kind of useless. Swim up bar at Coco would be useful. But everywhere else you need to remove band to send with waiters or drink servers. And just now I got a water at Promenade Cafe. I showed her my band and she ask me to please bring my Seapass card next time. Well, if I have to bring my card then what the heck is the WOW Band for?? 

 

That's ridiculous.  In a time when mobile scanners are easily obtainable and RCI already has fast wifi onboard, there should be no reason why service staff can't simply scan the bands where you are.  Disney figured it out years ago with a much larger number of guests using bands on a daily basis, and the system works fine.

[rsharp83]

Yes Disney has it down to a science. But, Disney is typically way ahead of the curve.

[er345]

47 minutes ago, rsharp83 said:

WOW Bands

 

Jury is out for me on the bands. I’d say so far it’s been kind of useless. Swim up bar at Coco would be useful. But everywhere else you need to remove band to send with waiters or drink servers. And just now I got a water at Promenade Cafe. I showed her my band and she ask me to please bring my Seapass card next time. Well, if I have to bring my card then what the heck is the WOW Band for?? 

Hmmm. This is perplexing.  Someone else recently reported having similar issues with the WOW bands.  Luckily we never encountered that on Symphony.  Yes I had to take it off sometimes to hand over, but it seemed a lot of bars, and definitely the specialty coffee place had the scanner handy so you could just tap your wrist. I usually had both with me anyway, but I would be very annoyed if I had to go back to the room for the card.  

[rsharp83]

[Familygoboston]

We’ve noticed the bands are handy for shows, no fumbling just scan and go. For drinks it varies depending on whether you are at the bar or whether the waiter is bringing your drink to you (then they have to take your band unlike Disney they don’t have your name can be easily mixed up- we mixed up ours on the dresser! 🤣

 

I noticed Randy’s art photo. If you look in the cubby under your tv, there is an art book with several of the ships pieces and descriptions. It’s very interesting! 

[Familygoboston]

So Randy has enough folks on his cruise to “Get a room!”

 

 

What  I mean by that is RC offers a conference room or other space for meetings/parties or what not if your group is a certain size. Amy decided to use the room to teach a Zumba class. Much hilarity ensued as a couple dozen ladies and a couple of guys got funky and then smelled funky after the class! 🤣 

 

Our balcony is on the shady side of the ship heading south, so we are enjoying the ocean breeze here. Trying to decide where to go to lunch- so many choices!! 

Edited June 4, 2019 by Familygoboston

[OCSC Mike]

12 minutes ago, Familygoboston said:

Trying to decide where to go to lunch- so many choices!!

 

That's why you don't eat at just one place, like on Cococay, lol.

 

We usually check out the WJ b/c the menu changes day-to-day to see what they have then go from there.  We love Park Cafe and usually grab something there regardless but we know what's there.

 

It's a good problem!  Enjoy whatever you decide upon!

 

 

[rsharp83]

I REALLY don’t understand why this is sitting on the Promenade right now. It’s June 4th...

[rsharp83]

I never wear a watch. But if I did, this would have to be a contender. 

[snowdogsmm]

Casino promotion??

[ptf2009]

On 6/3/2019 at 8:50 AM, Familygoboston said:

I think that’s here at chill grill, where we are in chairs. I’ll take photos. Not sure if I can get them up during the day. Although the WiFi and your drink package “work” on coco cay, the internet is slooow. 

 

Also bring your seapass card as you can’t use the band to get off the ship. 

 

Bring your our own towels from the pool before you get off the ship 

 

if you have your own snorkel gear you can easily snorkel off chill beach where the rentals are. 

 

Please let me know what is included with no charge, i.e. the pool, any slides, restaurants? Have a wonderful cruise!

[Familygoboston]

So we discovered that the shamrock and pot of fake gold is part of a Promenade parade called “Celebrations” which features all the holidays. We were walking but at “New Years”! 🤣

we ended up in the solarium for lunch, met up with Randy and Amy. Blueberry cake not recommended. Carrot cake recommended! 

Coco cay Questions

chair, umbrella, towels,  a couple of lunch spots, kiddie park and kiddie slides, tram are included. Excursions, snorkels, boats, alcohol, balloons, cabanas etc are extra. The list of upsell items is exhaustive. Check the website. Bring cash for the market place booths if you want to shop for clothes crafts or sundries. 

[Familygoboston]

Solarium 

3 levels 

all adults

buffet and bar nearby

clam shell beds you can actually find empty

beautiful views 

hot tubs and misters (no pool 😥) 

view of the cool “I’m on top of the world” fly bridge

Theres no reason to go anywhere else! 

[rsharp83]

Amy in Wonderland! Let the adventure begin. 

 

 

[Familygoboston]

Wonderland was WONDERful! Yummy, I don’t want to try to explain it, you have to eat it to believe it.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 5, 2019 by Familygoboston

[rsharp83]

The Worlds Sexiest Man contestants.  One of our group finished 3rd. He’s 30 years older than the winner, on the right. Rodney rocked it! 

 

 

[Familygoboston]

After all the dining at Wonderland and sexy man excitement, taking in piano man in the Schooner bar. Tonight is standing room only for Beatles. 

 

 

Edited June 5, 2019 by Familygoboston