Harmony 1/5/20 Western Caribbean Review

Gregg00ss · January 27, 2020

Thanks for the review and pictures. I'll be sailing on the Harmony in November with the same itinerary.

jagsfan · January 27, 2020

A Wowzer of a review!

You included so much info in a relatively short space and made it personal at the same time.

Love your scavenger hunt...very inventive.

I wish my adult grandchildren weren’t already embarked on busy careers..we haven’t done a family cruise in a while. Now I really want one!

Edited January 27, 2020 by jagsfan
Typo

blueridgemama · January 27, 2020

Thanks for the lovely, informative review and pictures. I'm so glad you all enjoyed your family cruise and made memories, especially with your grandma😊

Drock20J · January 27, 2020

14 hours ago, Ren1216 said:

Ended up in a nice, new Jeep.

This was the Jeep we were going to take out, but due to the lax Car seat laws, we returned our purchase! Our loss was your gain!

Ren1216 · January 27, 2020

Thank you everyone for the kind comments. I really didn't know how long that was until I started posting it. What an eye burner!

48 minutes ago, Drock20J said:

This was the Jeep we were going to take out, but due to the lax Car seat laws, we returned our purchase! Our loss was your gain!

I'm so sorry the rental didn't work out for your day! I hope you found something else to do. Cozumel is pretty much on every Western route, but we still enjoy it. Feels familiar to us. Looking forward to your review, interested to hear your thoughts on the same sailing.

We were late arriving to pick up our rental. In addition to a slow start getting off the ship (hubs fault this time, not mine!), we had some trouble finding it. I should have included this in the review. Online when booking, the map and address provided put their location outside the terminal just a bit to the north (think it said across from some hotel). We headed that way expecting to see a sign or recognize the hotel. When that didn't happen, we eventually started asking people on the street.... they all had blank looks on their faces initially, then said they thought it was back toward the pier area. We weren't certain we could trust the directions at that point as most of these folks wanted our tour business. But we turned back, asked pier security (who also seemed uncertain), then finally one officer led us in the right direction. So we were an hour late. The rental rep made a slight mention of this when it came time to discuss the car we'd receive, they'd already given ours away. We understood. Then he said "but we have a nice Jeep for you to use that I think you'll be happy with". Indeed we were. A suggestion to others, definitely bring a printed copy of your rental confirmation, including the price! There was some discrepancy with ours, luckily I had it in writing.

Here's a map of the International Pier, captured from Google. The blue arrow is where we erroneously walked to, the red arrow is about where I believe the Alamo rental office to be. There was at least one other rental company here too, but I don't recall which. No idea if that walkway is actually open (left of red arrow) for easy access, I didn't see it but wasn't looking by that point.

2015829784_ScreenHunter_1174Jan_2712_22.jpg.c86bece94da9ce194eb7bf5a63c00c60.jpg

DISFANS3 · January 27, 2020

Awesome review...

Drock20J · January 27, 2020

1 hour ago, Ren1216 said:

Online when booking, the map and address provided put their location outside the terminal just a bit to the north (think it said across from some hotel).

When I pre-booked, I booked at the wrong pier. LUCKILY I found an Alamo representative in the Excursion area that led us to the office.

I do feel as though they only had jeeps, that was immediately thrust upon us. You also scored a better deal than we did, our final price was $135 for the same vehicle.

We did find something else to do (You will have to see my review for that!)

soulbait · January 27, 2020

19 hours ago, Ren1216 said:

Cozumel (International Pier): We originally had no plans for this port since we've been here many times. But about a week before sailing, decided to make a reservation with Alamo. Ended up in a nice, new Jeep. Price was a little steep since we took the insurances offered and the $20 return gas as-is option. Think the total was around $110 (actual rental was supposedly only $26). TIP: Check your credit cards for one that has no foreign transaction fee (used my Citi Costco card).

Circled the island, spending most of the day on the east side (something we've done before).

When reserving the car online, which Alamo did you choose? Where did you pick up the car from? I have been wanting to reserve a car at Cozumel for my upcoming cruise, but been having a hard time knowing where to reserve. Thanks!

cidymom · January 27, 2020

Great review! My family will be on Harmony sailing the same itinerary in March. Do you by chance have the daily Compasses for this itinerary? If so, would you be able to post? What was the price of the Native Choice tour that you took in Costa Maya (if you don't mind answering)? Is this a private tour or through RC? I've read somwhere that you can't punch the Seapass cards on Harmony, is that correct? If so, I'll have to get another type of lanyard. Is the International Pier in Cozumel near downtown Cozumel or do we need to take a taxi or is walkable? Thanks for your help.

Ren1216 · January 28, 2020

4 hours ago, soulbait said:

When reserving the car online, which Alamo did you choose? Where did you pick up the car from? I have been wanting to reserve a car at Cozumel for my upcoming cruise, but been having a hard time knowing where to reserve. Thanks!

There are 3 piers in Cozumel, you'll need to find out which one your ship uses. Pretty sure I read that Royal Caribbean uses the International Pier, but I'm not certain if that is the case for ALL of their ships or only the one I was on. If you are on Harmony or docking at the International Pier, see the map I posted above. The red arrow shows where the Alamo location was, to the best of my memory. I can't tell you the most direct way to get there because we headed out of the pier area and down the street before learning we were going the wrong way.

Here's the link for Alamo that I used: https://www.alamo.com/en_US/car-rental/home.html

For the pick-up location, type in "Cozumel" and it will list several options... International Pier is called "Cozumel Cruise Ship Terminal". If you'll be at a different pier, you'll see them all clearly listed, including the airport. No deposit or pre-payment was required. If you make a reservation, print you confirmation and bring it with you.

Ren1216 · January 28, 2020

4 hours ago, cidymom said:

Great review! My family will be on Harmony sailing the same itinerary in March. Do you by chance have the daily Compasses for this itinerary? If so, would you be able to post? What was the price of the Native Choice tour that you took in Costa Maya (if you don't mind answering)? Is this a private tour or through RC? I've read somwhere that you can't punch the Seapass cards on Harmony, is that correct? If so, I'll have to get another type of lanyard. Is the International Pier in Cozumel near downtown Cozumel or do we need to take a taxi or is walkable? Thanks for your help.

I do have all of the Compasses, minus 1 evening schedule (maybe my mom has it though). Give me a little time to track it down and scan them.

The Native Choice tour was private: https://thenativechoice.com/

We selected the Chacchoben Ruins Tour which was $55pp at the time. They offer several tours, very reputable tour company. To take their tour, you will need to make your way out of the pier area and out to the road. It's a maze of shops, pools and restaurants with no easy exit. Private tours are not allowed onto the port property. Just outside of the gate there are taxi's available, but none wanted to take my group to the NC tour office. They kept claiming the walk was only 3 blocks. This is not true, it's more like a mile. So if you cannot walk that far, insist on a taxi to take you. Here's the map I gave my group for getting out of the port area:

And here's the map from the NC website for finding their tour office (I edited it to better reflect that actual route, start at marker 3 after following the first map):

1886577393_ScreenHunter_1175Jan_2721_12.jpg.875e33780fc3b314ea4032fbca8c6a3d.jpg

Edited January 28, 2020 by Ren1216

tutzig · January 28, 2020

Did they have bottles of water? Reports are RCCL is moving to aluminum cans for water.

Ren1216 · January 28, 2020

I did not see any aluminum cans of water, only plastic.

tutzig · January 28, 2020

7 hours ago, Ren1216 said:

I did not see any aluminum cans of water, only plastic.

Hopefully it stays that way for March 1st! LOL

Thank you

Ren1216 · January 30, 2020

On 1/27/2020 at 4:27 PM, cidymom said:

.... Do you by chance have the daily Compasses for this itinerary? If so, would you be able to post? ... I've read somwhere that you can't punch the Seapass cards on Harmony, is that correct? If so, I'll have to get another type of lanyard. Is the International Pier in Cozumel near downtown Cozumel or do we need to take a taxi or is walkable? Thanks for your help.

I borrowed my moms set of the Compasses, I will work on scanning and posting them tomorrow. But I see that I forgot to answer a few of your questions. I had also heard that the SeaPass card shouldn't be punched, so I bought some plastic ID card sleeves from Amazon to use with our beaded lanyards (not sure if I'm allowed to post a link?):

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07PNQCHMZ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Here's a close up of one in use, they worked perfectly:

73553013_IDsleeve.JPG.08702dcab0978bfaf6f3e126674c3d0a.JPG

Here's a map of the 3 piers in Cozumel:

1) Punta Langosta Pier

2) International Pier (this is where Harmony docked, I'd guess about 2.5 miles from downtown)

3) Puerta Maya Pier

882379552_Cozumelpiers.jpg.610f1d4efdaa470126dcd581fc58f6c7.jpg

Edited January 30, 2020 by Ren1216

cgags47 · January 30, 2020

What was the prize for your scavenger hunt? I'm trying to set one up for my next sailing and would love some ideas!

Ren1216 · February 1, 2020

Our prize was an inside joke / gag gift that my husband put together. But I contemplated having everyone pay-in $5 or $10ea and doing a cash prize OR getting something that could be used on board (like Bingo cards, drink cards, credit for specialty restaurant, etc). Only problem with the latter is the hunt would need to conclude early enough for the winners to use their prize -- so I scrapped that idea. Gift cards for something back home would be good.... restaurant, gas, grocery, etc. Or maybe a cool souvenir from one of the ports you've visted. Though a single prize would work ok for couples, it would be problematic with a multi-person team. So I suppose the prize needs to be dictated by the composition of the teams.

NOTE: Compasses are coming, had a little medical-situation delay. Hopefully tomorrow.

Edited February 1, 2020 by Ren1216

Cruise a holic · February 1, 2020

6 hours ago, Ren1216 said:

Our prize was an inside joke / gag gift that my husband put together. But I contemplated having everyone pay-in $5 or $10ea and doing a cash prize OR getting something that could be used on board (like Bingo cards, drink cards, credit for specialty restaurant, etc). Only problem with the latter is the hunt would need to conclude early enough for the winners to use their prize -- so I scrapped that idea. Gift cards for something back home would be good.... restaurant, gas, grocery, etc. Or maybe a cool souvenir from one of the ports you've visted. Though a single prize would work ok for couples, it would be problematic with a multi-person team. So I suppose the prize needs to be dictated by the composition of the teams.

NOTE: Compasses are coming, had a little medical-situation delay. Hopefully tomorrow.

kids often have a scavenger hunt sponsored by the kids clubs.

Ren1216 · February 1, 2020

Personal note on Compasses: I don't care for the format of the Daily Planner section of the Compass. It's grouped into categories instead of simple chronological order. I prefer to see everything going on at a certain time listed together vs. checking all of the different categories. In case you misplace your Compass or want another copy, they keep all of the printed issues (all week) at Guest Services.

DAY 1