harryfat1

Let's try to upload a few pictures of "The Book" before I call it a night. ++++++++++++++ Showtime at 7 PM. As with the Effectors, skip the next several posts if you don’t want the spoiler info. For those who want more, you can go to YouTube and watch the entire show from home as I have seen people upload videos of the entire show. I will give you enough for the sound and feel of the show but not all the details. The show is called “The Book”. It’s composed of 7 chapters with each chapter around 6 minutes of song and dance as each segment is supposed to represent a chapter within the book. Before sailing, I read some reviews on this show and some people didn’t like it because it lacked a cohesive storyline. As much as you can criticize the Effectors for having too short/too simple of a story, at least each of their segments connects. From my untrained non-artistic eyes, the Book is just 7 unconnected “chapters” of a mysterious book. I don’t know what book that may be but it’s certainly not a fiction book with a central character(s) going from chapter to chapter. I couldn’t make any connections between the chapters. If someone can/has read somewhere on the connection, please leave a comment. If this was a real book, it would be like a reference book or an encyclopedia. Those folks who read my Navigator report will know I’m a big fan of the Cirque Du Soliel franchise having watched their permanent shows in Orlando/Las Vegas as well as various traveling shows as I upload photos from attending the Corteo performance in SF in that report. For me, the Book is similar to that type of vibe of a Cirque show whereby you have singers singing songs you never heard of and acrobats perform gymnastic stunts on the side with various weird costumes and backdrop props. Ok, there are 2 songs from the Book some people might know but unless your music knowledge is extremely diverse, it’s unlikely you will know most of the songs. The Book checks all those boxes that make Cirque so great. So if you are someone like me who likes the Cirque show basics, then you should find the Book enjoyable. For those who want a Broadway-type musical with a straightforward storyline and not the Cirque-type weird mystical vibe, you may not like the show. Like food, entertainment is subjective. Not everyone will be pleased with all the entertainment options.

Hi Jim, Thank you for continuing to read along. I think we Finance people think the same in trading in one meal for 2. Being cheap, I did the math, and one lunch at Chops ($18) and one lunch at Giovanni's ($13) is better than one dinner meal anywhere else for a lower price and we get to experience two places instead of one.

Good info. Yeah, he seems very friendly and almost surprised that someone would take a picture of him filming his segment for the cruise TV.

Thank you for your kind words. Although I’m not sure reading Financial statements on the 10Q and late-night working is a good combination. The financial info is more of the “natural” sleeping pill and your boss may not understand why you have been yawning and rubbing your eyes the past week since we started talking about Finances of cruising. 🤪 We are not pool people so we didn’t go up there. In my past reports, we typically only show up for the Belly Flop Contest but due to a scheduling conflict, we couldn’t attend this sailing contest. As for Solarium, the pool area is less of a “pool” by definition and more of a hot tub size. I can only find a couple of pictures during our 1-minute visit to the solarium for the entire cruise. Here is the 2-inch deep water for one “pool” area and the other one is probably 4 feet high. If RCI wants to call these areas “pools”, they can but not sure how much swimming you will get out of it versus the hot tub. I suspect when the Odyssey sails from NJ in the winter, people will congregate on both ends of the ship. Soalraoum in the front and 270 in the back, depending on what type of cruiser you are. The more water inlined you are, the more you will like the solarium. Those of us who prefer a sofa/chair with a table to put down our drinks and snacks will prefer the 270. The pool area will be mostly empty similar to an Alaska cruise with only kids swimming and people in the hot tubs. The Royal Esplanade/Promenade will be busy as well for the shopping folks (aka visiting crazy aunt in the basement). Here is a picture from the 2022 Alaska cruise on the Princess with everyone looking outward at the glaciers on the left side of the picture and an empty pool due to the cold but few people at the upper deck hot tubs

Since we were way early in getting a seat on deck 6, we were taking a whole bunch of pictures and experimenting with selfies to amuse ourselves. No need to upload those pictures...🤪 6:30 and some of the seats downstairs are starting to fill up 10 minutes before showtime. Looks pretty full by then

OK. We made it to 270 at 6:15 for the 7 PM show. That’s 45 minutes early as that's just when they are open. Oh, yes, have your set sail card out as they will check that you have a reservation for the show or else you will be at the standby line. It's a personal preference to sit up close to be in the back to see the entire show without moving your head back and forth. In theory, we could pick any seat but they had workers on deck 6 blocking off the prime middle section seats. I assume those are for the suite people as they have a special section reserved for them. As a CFKACD, I’m relegated to sitting on the side of the theater with my ghetto cruisers as we are not worthy to be seated in the prime section. The ironic thing is that at 6:45, the workers that block the entrance leave as the center section then becomes a free-for-all as it’s no longer just suite seating. So if somehow you show up, try the seats on deck 6 in the middle as you might luck out if the suites people don’t show up.

On the way to the 270 theater, we saw this guy doing a video for the daily cruise news and he waived and said hi to me after he saw me taking a picture of him

I don't have any pictures for the rest of the afternoon as I think we just stayed inside the cabin watching sports on TV and took an early shower as we had reservations for the big show, The Book, at 7 PM as I wanted to see the show on Christmas Day as part of the special day (The lunch at Chops was the other special event). The show is for reservations only. You need to book it ahead of time on the app. You can't just walk in and grab a seat. Ricky, the cruise director, made it a point to tell people to show up EARLY for “The Book” as the area is limited in space, and even with reservations, you may not get a good seat if you show up late. Especially since they cancel out your reservations 15 minutes before the show so they can let the standby people come in.

I just find it amusing that they need to put a sign that says “display only” at all the gingerbread house displays here at 270 as well as Windjammer and entrance to the MDR. I guess on the outside chance someone eats the glue from the display and then sues RCI for not telling people not to eat the display…

Meanwhile, the boys and I went back to the cabin to watch football and basketball games on TV as they had live sports feeds in the cabins showing various games. I dozed off a bit as the game wasn’t that interesting as all the food from lunch made me sleepy. At 4 something, I woke up and walked to the back of 270 via the “secret door” shortcut and got a close look at the wake view. Went to café 270 to get some coffee and some fruit. Lots of people here at 270 just chilling for the afternoon so I’m not the only person who likes this place.

At 3 PM, they had some jewelry talk and to entice people to show up, they promised a charm for the bracelet that the people can collect throughout the cruise. My wife wanted to attend but we guys passed. This is the part of life where my wife wished she had 2 daughters instead of 2 sons so they could go with her to these jewelry things. Here are the pictures showing the long line of people attending the jewelry show and getting their charm. People lined up on the right Same line, different perspective My wife took this picture of the event as the workers tried to educate the cruisers on the basics of selecting a diamond

As Chops isn’t that far from the Bionic Bar, we sat there and watched the robots do more shake and bake (you have to be old to understand this reference)

The last picture of Chops before we walked out a little before 3 PM as the lunch took almost 1 hour and 45 minutes. Maybe they are understaffed but service was very slow. Like I said, no one even acknowledged us for the first 10 minutes after we sat down. As I showed previously, the restaurant is not anywhere near full with many empty tables so it’s not like they are overwhelmed with the cruisers. I had thought with specialty dining, the wait staff would be more attentive, but we got more attention from our MDR wait staff or even Solarium Bistro wait staff than at Chops. At the end of the meal, he asked us to rate him high on the service he provided. Which was the constant theme everywhere we dined on the ship as well as on the rest of RCI ship and on the Princess cruise as a week. The high-pressure sales pitch for high scores in the post-cruise survey is very noticeable now on every sailing. I assume I'm not the only person that has noticed this?

OK, back to the trip report as we were at Chops and just finished lunch ++++++++++ I’m not a foodie and I will eat many items at MDR or the buffet as I’m not that picky. The rest of the family liked Chops. As I posted previously, it’s a slippery slope to start dining at specialty dining as then you realize the gap in quality of the meat between Specialty dining and MDR. At Chops, they serve you Filet Mignon which is way better quality than the steak as the nightly option at MDR. In the old days when MDR had higher quality food, the gap between the two wasn’t large enough to consider an upgrade for us. Now with the MDR quality on the decline, if someone wants a more upscale dining experience, they will need to consider Specialty dining as an option. Would I go to Chops again? I’m OK either way but I think my wife would want to go back in the future if we can snag more BF deals. RCI sells some dining packages like “Chops plus one or two specialty restaurants” dinners if those interest you. Especially if you get the package before sailing with their periodic sales as it’s likely to be cheaper to get the package than individual bookings. For those on a tighter budget, look into going during lunch instead of dinner as the price is considerably less at lunch. The lunch menu is more limited but it will give you a different dining experience than MDR. At $18 for lunch (on BF deal), you get an 8-ounce Filet whereas for dinner, it’s 9 ounces. So unless you prefer something else on the dinner menu, lunch should be sufficient for many people. For the ultimate foodie, RCI sells you the “Ultimate specialty” dining where you forego the MDR all together and just dine at all specialty places daily. There are not enough of those restaurants on board for most ships if you have a longer voyage so it will likely repeat, which can be a good or bad thing.

Good thing your son didn't lose power for long and no major damage to his place. My cousin in San Jose still hasn't gotten power back since he lost it at 9 AM on Sunday as their friends are lending them lanterns so they can have lights at night. Maybe the East Coast folks are used to these storms and are better prepared than us on the West Coast as we are not used to this. Yeah, our yard is a mess with branches all over and tables and plants being blown over but that's nothing compared to the mudslides you see in the news. Took a couple of pictures of the metal bar from the awning that broke off. This thing was banging against the glass in the wind and you can easily imagine it breaking through the window and shattering it and then the rain and water damage that will come in to mess up the carpet. Here's the one time you are glad you are not out on vacation...

Yeah, especially since they just increased the rates. My utility bill last month was almost $300 and I have seen some neighbors posting on the "Next Door" neighbors chat saying their bills are over $500. I am sure there will be some sort of backlash against PG&E after this with around a million people without electricity. People are not going to be happy without power for a long period.

No, I just meant we got OBC for the 2 cabins at $100/cabin with the boys being shareholders as well as my wife and I. In the old days, when the boys weren’t old enough to officially register as guests in their own separate reservation, my wife and I would sign up for the 2 cabins separately with each kid and we would get our OBC that way. Now they are old enough to have their own reservations and they are shareholders as well, they got the credit based on their account. Speaking of shareholder OBC, I like how the shareholder OBC started showing up early in the account. In the past, they used to show up after we boarded the ship but this time, the OBC showed up early enough in my sailing account that I was able to offset the cost of specialty dining using my shareholder credit when I booked it a month before sailing during the BF sale. But with the boys’ cabins were in their name, I can see their $100 credit as we have linked accounts for the sailing but I couldn’t offset the second specialty restaurant’s charges against their OBC from my side. I think they would have had to log into their RCI account and reserve the dining under their name to utilize that credit. At the end, it didn’t matter as once we boarded the ship, their OBC were combined on my set sail account and we bought enough things from the cruise to utilize their OBC. Maybe there’s a way to “reach over” to grab their OBC pre cruise as a family cruising together for dining booking but I couldn’t figure out how to do it online.

The interesting thing about the Brunch menu (which I didn’t save from the app as I didn’t attend) is that they have the typical breakfast food items (pancakes/french toast/bacon) as well as your lunch items like burgers and fish on the same menu. So if you are the early riser in going there at 8:30 when they open, your stomach may not be in the mood for a burger or some sort of fish as you sip your morning coffee and drink your glass of orange juice. Yeah, you would have the entire tree area to yourself. No lines whatsoever. Thanks for the thought. The wind died down by late last night here in the Bay Area and today is clean-up and restoration time. Southern California is still going through it today and maybe tomorrow as well. My cousin in San Jose is still without power for almost 30 hours now. I have read reports of up to a million people in the state without power in the state at the height of the storm as our local utility is overwhelmed. I’m sure there will be some political backlash on their readiness for this as Californians are not used to big storms out here as on the east coast. Mudslide is something probably foreign to Florida residences as most of Florida is pretty flat but many homes in CA are built along the hills/mountains and when it rains, mudslides from the mountain can cause severe damage. Here are a few pictures from the news to show the mudslide damages:

CNN reporting 800,000 without power in the state https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/04/us/california-atmospheric-river-flooding/index.html

Desserts:

Main Course:

Here's us in our festive Christmas clothes as all of us have some sort of Santa theme outfit: My younger son has a Santa shirt while the older son has a Yoda Christmas t-shirt. My wife has a pink Santa hat and I have a Santa shirt and a Mickey Mouse Santa hat (harder to see the Mickey ears in this picture but trust me, I have Mickey ears on my Santa hat).

Appetizers/Starters: Mushroom soup Beef Carpaccio Jumbo-sized shrimp cocktail

If we had come that night (5 hours later), the price would have jumped from $18 to $99.99 as it was the special Holiday dinner pricing (and not part of any dining package). Sure, they will have a more fancy meal compared to ours with some champagne but chances are the meat could be from the same cow between lunch and dinner so call me cheap, but I wouldn’t pay the hefty premium for the Holiday dinner. Lunch is good enough for me. The bread is much more interesting than the basic ones at MDR at night time. Looks like a yam

Finally, the waiter showed up and we were presented with the lunch menu. No surprises here as we had already checked out the menu online before I even reserved the lunch.