Strophic

However i think like the previous poster said even if you don't believe in god you can respectfully take a moment in quiet reflection while they pray. Usually it's less than 2 minutes.lol

Sorry, but for me that's still participating in a religious/spiritual ritual. I don't take moments of quiet reflection before I eat a meal, I just...don't do it. If someone wants to do something like that, that's between them and their deity. I don't need to be involved in any way.

I would only talk about politics at a cruise dinner table if it was very apparent that everyone was on the same page. And even then...it's vacation, it's my one week a year where I don't have to think about that stuff. I'd rather talk about pretty much anything else.

The most reliable conversation topic is the cruise itself, since everyone has something to contribute. My table talked a lot about the different activities and excursions we all did during the week. It's nice because no matter who you meet, you know you have at least one thing in common.

Other than that, I like talking about video games and movies, other travel-related topics, funny anecdotes from life, relationship stuff ("How did you two meet?" "What did you do for your wedding?"). I like to keep it light.

If you are dining at a Fixed seating with an assigned table, the waiter will normally wait a specific period of time for missing folks. It could be 10 minutes...or perhaps a bit longer. Meanwhile, those at the table are just sitting on their hands. The normal protocol is that folks, planning to skip a meal in the MDR, would let either the waiter or somebody at the table know that they are not coming to dinner. Otherwise, everyone (including the waiters) are held up....while they wait.

 

Hank

How do you let them know? Do you physically go down to the dining room to let them know and then walk all the way back to your alternate dinner venue? There wasn't a number to call when I asked. I was only travelling with my boyfriend and we ate together every night, so I couldn't give someone at my table a heads up in advance since we only ever saw them in the dining room during dinner.

Our last cruise we did fixed time dining in the late slot and were seated with three other couples in their 20's. While I wouldn't say I made any lifelong friendships that week, the conversation was good and everyone got along. I liked having new people to talk with, but my boyfriend is more shy than me, so he didn't talk nearly as much as he would have if it had been just the two of us at a table.

We're trying out any time dining on the upcoming Royal cruise and I am very interested to see how it compares!

I didn't use a lanyard on my last cruise, but I wouldn't say I'm opposed to the idea. It's not nearly fanny pack levels of embarrassing, and it could be convenient. At college they always said that you could spot the freshman by who was wearing their student ID on a lanyard.

Does a lanyard make you a cruising freshman? I'm not sure, but I wouldn't sweat it too much, personally. Fellow cruise patrons' perceptions of me are pretty low on my priority list—it's not like you'll ever see them again, so it doesn't matter if they think you're a newbie.

As a practicing Christian I would be highly uncomfortable praying to Allah, for example. He is not my god and I would feel blasphemous doing it just for the sake of politeness.

Technically, he is! Muslims and Christians actually worship the same god, "Allah" is just the arabic word for "god." It would be just like if a French Christian of a different denomination prayed to "dieu"...different word, same dude.

That piece of trivia aside, I definitely agree with the sentiment that you shouldn't be expected to participate in a prayer of a different religion or denomination—heck, even the same denomination. I also grew up in an area where one's religion was very much a private, personal thing. When people make a public production out of their faith I actually find it a little scandalous, a little like if they started going into detail about the particular things they enjoy in the bedroom. Just "Woah...kind of TMI, don't you think?"

I also agree that bowing ones head/folding ones' hands is a form of participation. I am an atheist in a Christian family and bowing my head during grace is the kind of thing I do to fly under the radar and hide who I am...it's not something that I would choose to do when I am being my authentic self. Don't get me wrong, it's not like I would tell someone saying grace to shut up, but I am not going to participate in it. And I would certainly prefer if they would say it inside their head and keep their grace/rituals/etc. within their 1-person bubble of personal space.

Now with THAT out of the way.

I don't get how it holds everyone up if you don't show up for dinner? We had a steakhouse reservation for the first night on Carnival, and another night we decided to eat at the buffet instead of going to the MDR. It's not like we swung by just to tell the staff we weren't coming that night. I even asked if there was someone I should notify and they said "No." I'm sure a lot of people skip the MDR for various reasons so it should be an extremely common occurrence to have no-shows.

Hi.

What is the weather like that time of year.

Thinking of last week november/ early December for wife's special birthday.

We went to the Caribbean from Dec 3-10 last year and the weather was perfect. It felt like summer, but not oppressively hot and humid either.

Also seconding early December as a good time to cruise to avoid kids. We did Carnival Magic for our early December cruise and, while I wouldn't say there were NO kids, I only really noticed them in the water park/kiddie splash zone area.

Photobucket has been trash for years. You've got to love a site that loads everything BUT the image first and then takes several seconds to load the only piece of information you're interested in.

Imgur is my go-to for image hosting, kind of annoying that neither it nor Gyazo are allowed on this site. Actually, the fact that this site blocks certain image hosting sites but not others is completely baffling to me in the first place. I don't know of any other forum that does that.

The worse thing I have seen is small groups talking loudly and laughing as if they are on a private boat... no consideration for anyone else... annoying ... especially when it is in the buffet area... we seldom go there anyone as we like it more quiet...

This seems kind of silly to me. Of course they are going to talk and laugh because they are having a vacation on a cruise, not a study session in a library. Of all the eateries on a cruise ship, I would think that the buffet is one of the places you should have to worry least about staying quiet. I mean...it's not like they were laughing and carrying on in an otherwise quiet steakhouse, right? At least on the cruises I've been on, the buffet area is pretty loud as far as ambient noise and conversation noise goes. If you want quiet, you should go places where you would expect it to be quiet.

As for me, I'd say the worst thing I saw cruisers doing was being rude to staff and crew members, especially when they threw out "I'm a DIAMOND member!" in a huffy voice, as if that made them royalty. I've gotten through life just fine without ever barking orders at a person in a service position once. I don't see how it's ever necessary.

A cruise, even with meals included, is going to be just barely more expensive per night than a stay at any old hotel where you just get a room and breakfast. Think of all the things you are getting for the price and you will realize that it's still a good value even without food taken into account. And it's not like you, you know...aren't going to eat anything for a week, so you'll get the value of the included food as well.

Hope that helps! Sorry you feel like you're so superior to everyone else. I'll try not to be a "glutton" in your presence so as not to offend your delicate sensibilities.

I tip the driver and the tour guide. I can't help but roll my eyes at people like notentirelynormal who will drop thousands on a vacation and then try to nickel and dime their tour guides as much as possible. Throwing down an extra five dollars won't kill you. In fact, it will make you feel good! So why not do it? You could apply the same logic to justify not tipping a waiter at a restaurant, but you wouldn't do that (I hope).

It depends on where you cruise, but a lot of popular cruise ports are very impoverished countries where a couple dollars goes a long way. If you enjoyed your excursion, a $5-10 tip will mean a lot to your guide, and what is it to you? Not even two drinks. I'm sure that giving an extra $5 to your driver and tour guide won't hurt your wallet too much, and it will make you feel good.

What a stupid reason to throw $5,000 down the drain. Just keep your kid out of the pool, they are too young to remember the cruise anyway. On my last cruise I had a great time without going into any of the pools even once, pool time is not make or break for a good vacation—especially if it's a baby's pool time.

Disney Magic, 1998. I was five, haha. Second cruise was 2005, Carnival Triumph. Another long gap and I did my first cruise as an adult (and my first vacation planned, executed, and paid for by myself) in 2016 on Carnival Magic :) We're finally picking up the pace doing two in two years!

I carry my usual fabric cross-body bag with me when I am on the ship, and then for outdoorsy stuff I have a drawstring bag that can be carried on your shoulder or worn like a backpack:

Not the most stylish, but very functional :) And one bag each was more than enough for me and my boyfriend to fit all our stuff that we wanted to take off the ship.

Smoking can really help you lose weight! You can also lose 20 lbs quick by sawing off your leg :)

Just because it works (in the short term) doesn't mean it's a good idea. The fact that your smoking habit is impeding your exercise is more worrisome than what it means for your weight loss goals. You should really try as hard as possible to quit—what's the use getting thin and healthy if you're just going to ruin your health in another way?

Not to stretch this discussion out but, for some folks, that extra time driving could be used to earn extra income, which would easily offset any cost difference.

 

 

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I don't know about you, but I don't work the kind of job where the 6 hrs saved flying instead of driving will offset an additional 1k in travel costs.

I booked exactly one year out between my first and second cruises (Dec 3-10 '16 → Dec 3-10 '17) and the wait has been killing me D: I do want to go on a cruise in 2018, but I want to go later in the year and take advantage of Norwegian's 3rd and 4th guest sail free promotion, so I need to wait for that special to become available for the fall/winter cruises.

On our last cruise we left Charlotte, North Carolina in the evening after my boyfriend got home from work and drove through the night/early morning to an AirBNB in Jacksonville, FL. We got there around 3am, slept for a couple hours and then drove the remaining 2 1/2 hours to Port Canaveral with plenty of time to spare for some shopping. Honestly? I would do it again. It worked well for us, maybe I'd ask my boyfriend to take an additional half day off work so we could leave a bit earlier, but the whole reason we did it that way in the first place was because we don't have a ton of extra vacation days to spare for the sake of getting into the port town a day early.

I think if you are driving, getting to port the day of is fine. Driving is less unpredictable than flying—save for a catastrophic mechanical failure, it's not like your car can "get cancelled". I did plan to get to the port town relatively early in the morning though—I wouldn't be comfortable planning to arrive later than 10-10:30 for a ship boarding at 3.

We don't exactly have a huge sample size of experiences to choose from, but we're loving December so far. The 1st/2nd week of December is cheap to cruise, and it's really nice to go from cold weather in North Carolina to summer-like temps in Florida and the Caribbean.

I think you guys missed some very important context here. I wasn't actually comparing sharing drinks with genocide, I was humorously illustrating the ridiculousness of comparing sharing drinks with burglarizing a home (a comparison that someone actually made in earnest.)

But I guess I am just a degenerate thief with loose morals and a thirst for crime (and free sodas). You know the people who put out bowls of Halloween candy saying "please take one"? Sometimes I would take two. Someone should have noticed these warning signs early on before it got to the point of sharing drinks on a beverage package. My friend would take two too...an accessory to my crime!!

I doubt anyone really has a problem with the scenario you described. The problem are the 'push the envelope' people who turn

 

'what if I give a sip to a friend to try' to

 

'what if I take a sip of a drink and hate it and hand it off to a friend to finish - it's just gonna get thrown away anyway' to

 

'So I can share the beverage package by ordering the drink my friend wants and then deciding I don't like it'

 

 

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Who cares if people do this? You would enjoy your vacations more if you didn't spend so much time hemming and hawing over things that have no effect on you.

But if someone asked me if it was okay to burglarize a house I would say - no, that is stealing.

What an asinine comment. Of course overdrawing your drink card to the tune of $2 worth of soda syrup should never be placed on the same level or compared to burglarizing a house.

What are you going to say next? "Oh, you think it's okay to kill ants? Do you also think it's okay to kill SIX MILLION JEWS???"

We drive from Charlotte, NC to Port Canaveral, so there is plenty of time to listen to some tunes :)

Some highlights from last year's playlist include:

And a couple standouts from this year's playlist-in-progress:

Obstacles - Syd Matters

Nothing particularly travel or sea related, I like songs about any subject as long as they are upbeat and/or catchy.

I had people on here telling me it was wrong to get a drink, like it a lot and want someone to have a sip, one sip just to see if they liked it. I mean really guys, lighten up.

 

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I saw someone complain that they had seen someone wear beige sandals in the main dining room on formal night. I cannot fathom expending the emotional energy while ON VACATION to care about what someone's feet look like tucked away under a table on the opposite side of a dining room.

By the books answer: Sharing is not allowed.

Practical answer: As long as you are not blatantly passing out drinks right in front of the bartender's eyes, the only trouble you'll get into is with the busybodies on Cruise Critic. If your kid is not going to drink enough soda to justify his own drink package then you aren't Literally Hitler for letting him bum off your card a couple times.