mo&fran

On 3/13/2024 at 9:35 AM, CSHS1979 said:

 

We're staying on the coast. No way I'm going onto city

Good idea.  we did that tour on our first TA, and we decided no way would we ever do tour like that again.

41 minutes ago, George C said:

Yes there is a nightly concert in the main showroom each night and also some shows in the afternoon in main theater , then there are several other stages with show to the wee hours , plus shows from afternoon to midnight in pool area . Problem is trying to pick the shows you want . 
 

We left hotel about 11:15 and was on board in less than 15 minutes we have a large suite and get total vip treatment, escorted the whole way to our suite. Concierge and butler connected my iPad and wife’s laptop and phone. Had lunch in suite restaurant, ordered two lobster rolls which I love , they only have that on first days lunch . We also get two liters of liquor, we requested Hennessy cognac and Glenlivet scotch , we sometimes bring home these bottles since we have premium drink package and prefer drinking places with live music. All our luggage was delivered by 2pm and we gave butler instructions on what to stock in our fridge. Tonight show is Gino Vannelli at 6:30 then a really good singer at 10pm . Another perk is we get free specialty restaurants, but tonight we will eat in Luminae which is suite restaurant. 

You don't have one of the penthouse suites, do you?

31 minutes ago, A&L_Ont said:

Balloon is up. A first for us. 
 

Apps served. 

 

The fish seem to be like seagulls. 

 

 

I'll bet they have learned that when people are present a lot of crumbs 'accidently' fall in the water.

 Curiously, are there any signs about feeding the fish.

Look what  happened in 2020.

From reading this thread, it seems the only erosion of benefits is the about the access to the lounges and the coffee machine in the morning. I don't drink coffee , and since we have the vouchers, we rarely go in the lounge anyway unless we need to see the concierge, access is no big deal.

Since we turned Pinn about a year and a half ago, I have loved the faster boarding, breakfast in Chops, and free internet. We still get a bunch of wine and water, which we got as D+ anyway. I often do not  even use up my extra free drink.

I like MTD, we can usually get a  time to our liking, and since the restart, since I use a rollator, they have been seating us near the entrance. And we keep the same table the entire cruise.

If I had traditional, I don't know if there is a way to make that fact known   so they can use that information to choose a table. OR even if they would bother.

 Curious, we have a bunch of cruises booked on Freedom this coming October. As soon as they appeared on the website, i went to book my time, and MTD didn't start till 715, which I thought strange. We prefer 630 - 645. Now that they are talking about adding another shift , it fits in with what's happening.

 I did have to laugh  about people showing up late and having other people seated at their assigned table. We almots had that happen to use, the early diners shows up late to their assigned table If we had just gotten there a little earlier or they were just a little later. I told the waiter that our early cruises, if your time to eat was 6:00 . and you weren't there by 615 ,you didn't eat because the doors were closed and locked.

36 minutes ago, bobmacliberty said:

 

 

If you are at all a photographer or videographer, B&H is like Disneyland.  It's almost overwhelming how much stuff they have across 2 floors.  Just about anything you can find on their website is available to see/touch/discuss/purchase.  Their sales people are extremely knowledgeable.  I bought some filters and a light box while there several years ago.

 

If you look at their main store on 9th between 33rd and 34th using street view in Google Maps, you can click on their main door (middle of the block on 9th) and be taken virtually inside.  You  can virtually walk around and see the inside of the store.  Unfortunately, most of their photography stuff is on the second floor and I haven't figured out how to virtually go upstairs. 

If you go to Coco Cay  on google earth, you can zoom in to ground level, it will show some ground views that RCI provided Google.

When I got my current TV, a 72 inch Sony, the deal was the would deliver the TV and take the old one away. As I was paying, the guy asked if my old tv was larger than 45  in, I said yes, it is 55. Out of curiosity, I asked what difference does that make. He replied that he had to send a big guy. I said, "if he can carry a 72 in, taking the 55 out shouldn't be a problem". Apparently, the TV's have become lighter, so my 55in Samsung weighed more than my new TV.

BTW , Sony and Samsung , for that size were the same price.

AS I was doing my daily walk at our local mall, that starts out going through our local Sears, an employee told my this was the stores last day.  I don't know if they are closing all of them, but i think there are only about 13 left. 

Nothing on the news yet, but the guy said they had just found out.

11 minutes ago, Cruising89143 said:

I read a recent article that stated the shorter cruises are much more popular now. Royal is simply taking advantage of this current situation. The article also stated that the shorter cruises worked out better financially for Royal.

East coast ships goto Coco Cay where they siphon money out of cruisers wallets, without burning a lot of fuel doing it. they have to figure out how to more Oasis class ships with the existing terminals. THis year they had freedom class doing them

22 minutes ago, aussielozzie18 said:

Winter starts 1st June.  Winter solstice is on the 24th June this year for us.  It “usually” feels winterish here mid July.

 

Our shops will start stocking autumn/winter gear next week.

Makes sense. At least you get an extra day of summer this year.

4 minutes ago, aussielozzie18 said:

From the 1st March, it’s autumn

do you say winter starts on your shortest day of the year?

9 minutes ago, d9704011 said:

What do you call the period between the end of February and about 21 March?

Like we in the US consider summer to be over  after Labor Day. 

Are you sure it has a heater.  Looks shallow, and the sun would heat it pretty quickly. Plus a lot of people in it.

33 minutes ago, Tree_skier said:

We got back Saturday night and I have been going nonstop since.  This is, really, my first opportunity to post.

 

Here is a little cabin tour video I took while on Adventure.

 

I know a couple express concerns about the potential obstruction I would have being on the 6th deck but it wasn't terrible.  It was really peaceful back there and DW spent quite a bit of time on our deck quietly reading.  

 

I'd happily have the cabin again for the right price.

 

 

 

Isn't that a junior suite?

2 hours ago, Saab4444 said:

Navigator is not in Korea...

I doubt that it is, but cruisemapper shows it part way across the Pacific and looks like it is headed towards Japan.  

2 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

Yes I don’t do well on long flights with my knees. Need to be able to move around.

I do not find the TA flights to Europe bad, they have all been over night flights. 

We did do an east bound cruise, TPA  to AMS, that was great.

But it took a few days for the jet lag to go away.

16 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

Exactly! I am having a hard time even finding an itinerary that we haven’t already done several times.

I guess it is time to expand your cruising. TA cruises are fun. The ones we did visited some Med ports before the crossing. Those were Celebrity, the our first B2B on RCI, eastern Med , then across to Fl.

I'd like to go to Asia and Australia , but the long flight home makes me hesitate.

Some times my TV does magic.   A bit of time ago, I was on the phone with Xfinity, and the gal i was talking to said "let my see if there are any deals".  There was a deal that added HBO at no additional cost.  then the other day I got an email from Xfinity saying I can access Max for free, I guess since that is part of HBO.

 Of course, I am smart guy, i don't actually read instructions, I can do this. 

well , that didn't work. I read the instruction. TV had a QR code. Got my phone and  pointed the camera at the code , and a URL pops up. Touch the code and a window pops up asking for my provider .

DW was in the other room watching TV there, so I asked her if I could show her something on my TV,  Oh, can you do that on my TV. Turns out i needed to do the same thing. About 20 minutes later she came back and said she really likes Max.

Must have been good, I heard her playing a movie (language you do not hear on regular TV) and she was snoring up a storm, Put her right to sleep.

The gold Pinnacle sea pass gives you access to the sun deck and you can request CK reservations. You also get Breakfast, usually in Chops. Just like suites , priority boarding. You get access to the Suite lounge, depending on how many P's are on your sailing. I always assume I have access unless told otherwise. 

Best benefit is free internet for both of you.  And of course one more free drink.

After 1 and 2, they needed to build 4 additional terminals to use the other ports.

They bypassed that in Europe by  splitting boarding between BCN and Rome.

2 hours ago, Another_Critic said:

Seven Oasis class and three (or more) Icon class for 3 FL winter homeports?

 

When will they sell the first Oasis class to make room for the new ones?

 

Edit:  I forgot that Galveston can do year round Oasis class.  Maybe add a second ship?

 

Or run 3/4 trips out of FLL.

2 hours ago, orville99 said:

 

 

The only devices that can withstand 220 to 110 conversion are those that have the capability built into them. (Usually clearly marked 110/220V 50/60Hz on the UL certification label) The problem with using an after market adaptor (unless you spend a lot of $$$ on it) is that the ship’s 220 is 50 Hz and our 110 is 60 Hz, and what you are buying is merely a step down transformer - us old folk used to call that a rheostat). The inability of the adaptor to change from 50/60 cycles per second will generate additional heat on the motor, and increased load on the heating element. In short, the motor runs slower, thelements run hotter, and the device can’t handle that for long before the thermocouple safety overheats and shorts out the device.

I believe the ships electric system is 50 Hz., both 110 and 220.   That frequency is a function of generator speed.

2 minutes ago, Boro45 said:

I had a lot of police cars fly past me on PGA...wondered what was going on! 

That was probably it.  I did not know we had so many police cars. Jupiter was there there also, along with PBSO

What a crazy day.  Every day I got to the Gardens mall to walk and get a sandwich for lunch.  A normal day , which today was, I leave the mall at noon. About an hour later, Dw was watching tv in the other room when they had breaking news, there was a shooting at the mall. For reference, I am located in Palm Beach Gardens, Fl.

I came back to my TV, to see what other local stations were reporting, Holy cow one station was reporting a shooting in St Lewis also.

 At this point, Palm Beach Gardens  police think there was indeed think there was a shooting, and they may have found the victim at a local trauma  hospital. Now they have to search the CCTV videos to see if they can see the shooting. They do not think it was a random event , just a couple of people who don't like each other. 

 One thing that was impressive is that the malls store employees have been trained on how to respond to active shooter events, this coming from reports from both employees and customers.

Sorry for the disruption to the Super Bowl victory event, but  its good to hear @Sea Dog surgery went well.