⭐Live Allure TA 🚢 March 1, 2020 - Time to rub the lamp 🧞

bobmacliberty · March 19, 2020

This is the first I've heard of Sitges. Why is it preferable? Better beaches? Fewer crowds?

Well worth flying into Madrid and then training to Barcelona, for something different. We spent 4 days in Madrid over Christmas and really enjoyed it.

Ocean Boy · March 19, 2020

9 minutes ago, RFerrington said:

To me, this is where you know if you have a good Genie or not. A good Genie will either be there in person or call, shortly after the food is supposed to be delivered and make sure that you have everything you ordered and/or need. I understand that in John's particular case there were scheduling conflicts that probably precluded that...and that is a unique situation but it is still the Genie's job to make sure that you are getting the experience you expect. It sounds like (from this and a few other situations that John has described) that the Genie just wasn't up to the task, which is unfortunate. I recall that John said that Jay never even contacted them that night. Completely unacceptable....especially considering that he knew that they were entertaining a guest.

I also agree with John that the inside dining table in the ATS (or any of the Star suites, with the possible exception of the RLS) just doesn't accommodate enough people, especially when you take into account all of the food paraphernalia. For the ATS, the outside dining table is definitely where they anticipate that the big groups will be dining. The fact that it was not convenient in John's situation is disappointing but unavoidable.

We have been both in the ATS (3 times) and Deck 17 (4 times) and my experiences on 17 have just been better, all the way around. Just an OBTW, IMO, Reyno is, hands down, the best party planner Genie that I have had. I have other issues with Reyno, but if I am planning a Suite party, I want him in charge.

I am so thankful to just sail in run of the mill balcony cabins. So many less things to go wrong....😆

atgood · March 19, 2020

1 minute ago, bobmacliberty said:

This is the first I've heard of Sitges. Why is it preferable? Better beaches? Fewer crowds?

Well worth flying into Madrid and then training to Barcelona, for something different. We spent 4 days in Madrid over Christmas and really enjoyed it.

When you’re not from a place, there’s always something to go do and explore. From my memory, it’s on the beach, the restaurants are good, and not nearly as crowded. Something different from Barcelona, but not too far away.

DaniDanielle · March 19, 2020

👍

DaniDanielle · March 19, 2020

Thumbs up for the run of the mill balcony rooms!

bigeck · March 19, 2020

10 minutes ago, bobmacliberty said:

This is the first I've heard of Sitges. Why is it preferable? Better beaches? Fewer crowds?

Well worth flying into Madrid and then training to Barcelona, for something different. We spent 4 days in Madrid over Christmas and really enjoyed it.

I'm waiting to see if Allure is keeping this years sailings. I Have Anthem Ta booked but looks like it will be gone so Allure is a possibility. Don't see Spain recovering anytime soon

happicruzer · March 19, 2020

John - regarding moving.

we built a custom home on the Intracoastal. After several floods we were lucky enough to receive an offer we couldn’t refuse. For the first time ever in forty years of marriage we no longer lived paycheck to paycheck

we moved to a Del Webb community, over 55, with a golf course, which my husband enjoyed. Many others golfed elsewhere due to the high cost per game.

many clubs were formed with many inside cliques forming. Newcomers found it difficult to get involved.

I missed my water views, and facing huge HOA costs if the builder got away before fixing issues ($3M in repairs to date from emails) I wanted to move. we got out but the builder had to make over $3M in repairs - at least we aren’t part of the lawsuit.

Getting away from the water, I didn’t miss the hurricane and flooding prep and cleanup after. I definitely missed the water views, boat activity and porpoise jumping. Maybe a lake or storm water pond would have worked, but not trees.

Finally found a condo near the beach and port with lagoon views. Don’t worry about flooding, stayed put for the last hurricane warnings despite child saying - come to my mobile home - located in tornado prone area of Georgia!

if your neighbors did not offer to do your shopping the problem is with them, not you.

would I move away from water view? Not as long as I am capable of controlling my life or until our barrier island disappears

I remember you having COA issues after a storm. One oceanfront condo near you had a $$$ assessment and two condos are now on the market.

At his age, my husband has no desire to maintain a private home - he refused to clean the clogged gutters. My Solution - move - our COA is now responsible for all outdoor maintenance.

hard feelings will pass. Several owners will move out. Give yourself time

i Agee with the folks who recommend renting to get a feel of the area. We have cousins in The Villages. They are the only year round homeowners on their block.

RFerrington · March 19, 2020

5 minutes ago, happicruzer said:

John - regarding moving.

we built a custom home on the Intracoastal. After several floods we were lucky enough to receive an offer we couldn’t refuse. For the first time ever in forty years of marriage we no longer lived paycheck to paycheck

we moved to a Del Webb community, over 55, with a golf course,  which my husband enjoyed. Many others golfed elsewhere due to the high cost per game.

many clubs were formed with many inside cliques forming. Newcomers found it difficult to get involved.

I missed my water views, and facing huge HOA costs if the builder got away before fixing issues ($3M in repairs to date from emails) I wanted to move. we got out but the builder had to make over $3M in repairs - at least we aren’t part of the lawsuit.

Getting away from the water, I didn’t miss the hurricane and flooding prep and cleanup after. I definitely missed the water views, boat activity and porpoise jumping.  Maybe a lake or storm water pond would have worked, but not trees.

Finally found a condo near the beach and port with lagoon views. Don’t worry about flooding, stayed put for the last hurricane warnings despite child saying - come to my mobile home - located in tornado prone area of Georgia!

if your neighbors did not offer to do your shopping the problem is with them, not you.

would I move away from water view? Not as long as I am capable of controlling my life or until our barrier island disappears

I remember you having COA issues after a storm. One oceanfront condo near you had a $$$ assessment and two condos are now on the market.

At his age, my husband has no desire to maintain a private home - he refused to clean the clogged gutters. My Solution - move - our COA is now responsible for all outdoor maintenance.

hard feelings will pass. Several owners will move out. Give yourself time

i Agee with the folks who recommend renting to get a feel of the area. We have cousins in The Villages. They are the only year round homeowners on their block.

Thank you so much for your info. If it would be ok, I would love to chat with you privately as we are actively looking into 55+ communities. I do not want to hijack John's thread any more than I have already.

My email address is rayezfun at yahoo dot com

Thank you !!

John&LaLa · March 20, 2020

4 hours ago, RFerrington said:

To me, this is where you know if you have a good Genie or not. A good Genie will either be there in person or call, shortly after the food is supposed to be delivered and make sure that you have everything you ordered and/or need. I understand that in John's particular case there were scheduling conflicts that probably precluded that...and that is a unique situation but it is still the Genie's job to make sure that you are getting the experience you expect. It sounds like (from this and a few other situations that John has described) that the Genie just wasn't up to the task, which is unfortunate. I recall that John said that Jay never even contacted them that night. Completely unacceptable....especially considering that he knew that they were entertaining a guest.

I also agree with John that the inside dining table in the ATS (or any of the Star suites, with the possible exception of the RLS) just doesn't accommodate enough people, especially when you take into account all of the food paraphernalia. For the ATS, the outside dining table is definitely where they anticipate that the big groups will be dining. The fact that it was not convenient in John's situation is disappointing but unavoidable.

We have been both in the ATS (3 times) and Deck 17 (4 times) and my experiences on 17 have just been better, all the way around. Just an OBTW, IMO, Reyno is, hands down, the best party planner Genie that I have had. I have other issues with Reyno, but if I am planning a Suite party, I want him in charge.

I think they are well trained in parties

John&LaLa · March 20, 2020

Laura's Birthday event

Now I posted some of this already. The cake request, final pics, the spread, the challenges, the evac, etc..

But let me summarize in a central post. I owe it to Jay, he really came through.

Laura's birthday is/was the last day of the cruise, not really a good time to try and celebrate, especially with the confusion of the last night. It was always my intent to try and do something on the Rising Tide during the 70's party, or if they had an ABBA night in celebration of Mama Mia. I mentioned this in my pre cruise survey, and even said I had a special cake request that I would take up with whomever our Genie would be.

Sent Jay the cake design,

IMG_20160129_161628.jpg.0653cc37f64cf3bcbc4ba3a7746300a4.jpg

he said he would meet with pastry chef and see if they could do it. He sounded optimistic👍

They succeeded in my opinion

But I'm getting ahead of myself

I also brought a few gifts for Laura from both Pat and I, Jay said he would be happy to wrap them.

This will come up later.

Once onboard, Jay confirmed the partial reservation of Rising Tide, and it would cost $30 pp, fair enough. Said we could have the front section by the DJ. Works for me. But 2 days before the party, Laura woke up sick. Told Jay we would have to reschedule, no problem, he just needed 48 hours for the cake creation.

Laura felt fine a few days later and suggested we have the Trivia Team and the group we graded to the cabin for a deck party. Perfect, we can do it then, and it's still a surprise. Surprises are over rated. Invited all the parties involved, scheduled it with Jay and even got Laura a hair appointment so we could have the room. I love it when a plan comes together.

Party is at 4pm, Laura has a 2:30 hair appointment, Jay will arrive to set up at 2:30. We will have cake, another seafood tower, wings, fruit, and a meat board. Plus wine glasses, plates and utensils. Can't fool me twice. 😉

This is looking really easy.

And then it starts to fall apart.

At lunch, Laura decides to move her appointment up to 1:30. She neglects to inform me until she is leaving the cabin at 1:15.😱 Like I said surprises are over rated. So I tell her the good news and she can't be here at 2:30. She says she'll work it out.

She calls from the Spa and says she will get her makeup done. Crisis averted, but surprise spoiled. Oh well.

So Pat and I tidy the cabin, really not that hard because our cabin steward is a gem.

In the spirit of Mama Mia, time for Intermission......

BRB

RFerrington · March 20, 2020

The cake was so adorable !

John&LaLa · March 20, 2020

Birthday Party continued

Jay arrives right at 2:30 and says he wants to decorate the balcony, suggests we drop the blinds to hide it. Great idea, nt hi first rodeo so to speak. He puts up a huge sign on the window, adds streamer, balloons, makes paper flowers, etc..

Balloon machine, don't leave home without one

So the guests all arrive around 3:45 - 4:00, somehow I missed @twangster, we were probably on the balcony. Sorry.

And now it's 4:00 and no guest of honor. I try the cell phone, no luck. Maybe she stopped in casino. So I send Pat to hunt her down. Finally they arrive around 4:15, she said the makeup guy was really slow and kept trying to get her to do more, buy more. But she did look nice. 😁

And we had quite the spread of goodies, including my favorite cherry peppers from Vintages (Laura ordered those for me)

They even made her a second cake, it was chocolate, just like Bell's head we found out.

We actually kept this and enjoyed it on her actually birthday. It held up nicely

The happy family, and even an unsuspecting Bella

I forgot to mention, it was the perfect evening for an outdoor party due to our unscheduled medical evacuation. We were pretty much parked for 2-3 hours

This is why I don't have a lot of pictures of our guests. Well that, and the wine we were chugging

Time to say goodbye to Bella. I don't think she sees the knife in Laura's hand.

And yes, we did not have a proper cake knife. so close and yet so far.

Knife to the head, just like a lobster. Sorry Bell, it had to be done

I'm enjoying this way to much.

The aftermath. BTW, we eventually took the food inside and ate a lot of it.

The cake was delicious. You haven't seen it, but Jay also provided a pitcher of OJ and a bottle of bubbly. Nice touch

And just like that it was over

Forgot to take a group picture at the party, so I got one the next day at trivia.

If I was taking this, I would have put guys in back, girls in front and had a tighter shot.

They were a fun group

Now I want to add that nothing we had that night was billed to us. It was all complimentary.

I provided the Caymus and the Morgan. We used our 3 gift bottles for the rest.

I did tip the delivery team and the clean up team, plus a special envelope for the pastry chef.

Jay got his tip at the end of the cruise, of course.

John&LaLa · March 20, 2020

1 hour ago, RFerrington said:

The cake was so adorable !

If you look at the instructions picture, the icing is supposed to be rolled fondant. This was all whipped icing, piped on. It worked fine except the point where it meets in the middle of her head.

But like I said, we were absolutely tickled.

Some folks over on the STAR FB page say it's one of the best they've ever seen

And there were a few that said they couldn't do it. 😉

John&LaLa · March 20, 2020

Ocean Aria view from Deck 8 is very similar to the view from Deck 7

We probably saw every performance because it kept getting moved due to rough seas.

Here are some misc pictures. FWIW, I still prefer this to both Fine Line and Hiro. Aqua 80 is pretty good, though. Maybe allure will get something like that eventually

Don't drop me bro

These guys were both amazing and funny

bigeck · March 20, 2020

Looks like a good day. Cake was awesome. Wonder what bell would have done if you placed that down in front of her

emeraldcity · March 20, 2020

Thank you again for graciously inviting me to the birthday party. It was an enjoyable afternoon with a group of very congenial people. And the cake was adorable!

I am still amazed at the great weather we had on the crossing. I had expected that it would be pretty chilly much of the way, but it was a bit cool from time to time, but not overly chilly.

island lady · March 20, 2020

13 hours ago, James4me said:

Sorry, but ewe. Try to stay where you are. Maybe lease it, put it up on AirBnB? I’m only saying “ewe” to Central Florida. So you guys don’t get all riled up.

So I am "ewe" living in central Florida? Have previously lived in California...sorry...will take the "ewe" living here anytime over that. 😉

Edited March 20, 2020 by island lady

John&LaLa · March 20, 2020

5 hours ago, emeraldcity said:

Thank you again for graciously inviting me to the birthday party. It was an enjoyable afternoon with a group of very congenial people. And the cake was adorable!

I am still amazed at the great weather we had on the crossing. I had expected that it would be pretty chilly much of the way, but it was a bit cool from time to time, but not overly chilly.

Look who I saw people watching on the Boardwalk

Pretty smile