DragonOfTheSeas

I am going to start my discussion about food. That is always a big topic on cruises. . . and Royal Caribbean has just launched their new menu in March. I will start with Breakfast. Breakfast has always been a favorite meal of mine. I like almost all types of breakfast food traditionally eaten in the US. Although, I usually just have yogurt or an English muffin at home. So, on the ship I look forward to breakfast. I was not disappointed. Ate three breakfasts in the windjammer, 2 in the Park Cafe and the rest in the main dining room. We liked the food in all three places. In the Park Cafe The premade sandwiches [eggs + ham, breakfast burrito, etc] were not the best. But, the yogurt parfaits, fruit, pastries, etc were a good light breakfast. The windjammer served pre made items and had an egg-to-order station. [omelets, etc] The days we were there did not have corned beef hash and I missed that. The main dining room had the same menu everyday--but, plenty of variety. Breakfast service was pretty fast. But, I must admit we usually arrived within the first half hour of service. I did not take many pictures of the food because I am not awake in the morning. 😉 This was DH omelet the first morning. It was too well done. But, the other days it was fine. Everything is served with the hash browns.  My favorite breakfast was the market vegetable breakfast bowl. It was two fried eggs served over sautéed veggies. I could have eaten those veggies each night for dinner. My one disappointment at breakfast was the raisin bread--or as I thought of it, the no raisin bread. The sweet bread was tasty, but it is nothing like the raisin and cranberry bread they used to serve. We tried about half the items between us in 10 days. If breakfast is a hit, lunch is a bit of a miss.

🤣 🎈 that’s a good analogy, but it was still a lot of fun.

I’ve never seen this activity before on the ship. It’s kind of a fun fair in the center on the children are having a great time. there are games like golf, Jenna, etc. and demonstrations. They’re even demonstrating how to make beds using cots. That’s something that I’ve got down pat. Ha ha ha. Magic tricks balloon animals for children this was a good way for crew to showcase their skills And for guests to have fun.

I have been looking for ducks around the ship. But I am obviously not a very skilled observer. But one of our Facebook members gave me this duck. 🦆 Thank you!!

The ship serves Lavazza coffee in the restaurants, and I find it is pretty good. The coffee shop onboard is called Cafe Latte-tudes. These coffees are not free. I am fond of their Americano and the iced caramel macchiato. 😁☕ Here is a price list. They are no more expensive than on land. Cafe Latte-tudes shares a counter with the Ben and Jerry's ice cream. [There is a soft serve machine outside the windjammer available all afternoon and ice cream is on the menu each night in the dining] room.

Today I am going to share our thoughts on this ship and things we think will be useful to Vision of the Seas cruisers. This posting will just be a few random items. More things later. 1. The Vision OTS has steam and dry saunas in the men’s [and women’s] locker room. DH used these a few times during the cruise and enjoyed them. They are free on this class of ship. That is not true on all ships. So, take advantage of that. Also, the showers in the locker rooms are a good way to deal with a family all trying to get ready at the same time. JMHO 2. If you are trying to unplug from electronics on your cruise, but still need to check in for a flight or contact your ride home the ship sells a 60-minute internet connection for $15 on the last day. The regular daily rate onboard the Vision is $28 for 24 hrs for one device. This may not be the same rate for all ships. You can spread this out over various days. [i.e. noon one day until noon the next etc.] Also, you can log out of one device and into another at any time—so, you may not need a 2- device package unless both devices need to be connected at the same time. If you do not get a Crown and Anchor discount it will be cheaper to buy internet before the cruise in the planner if you need/want it for the whole cruise. It was regularly $23 for 24hr in our cruise planner. There usually is a sale on Black Friday and Cyber Monday for items in the cruise planner. 3. The app has a chat feature that you can use to communicate with other people on your cruise. It uses the internet. But, since this is part of the app and the app is free to use, this feature is too. Passengers really like this. However, about 2 weeks ago a passenger used it to message everyone on the ship. This pointed out a weakness, so they disabled it. [read this in a thread on Cruise Critic] Let’s hope they get a fix soon. I like the app. While it is not perfect it is a big upgrade in communication.

It’s our last full day of our cruise. We Will be home tomorrow-early. The weather has definitely become chillier. The Cruisevcompass said high today would be 68. That’s quite a come down from the 88 and steamy that we had in Aruba our last port of call. The sea is still very calm, thankfully.

You will not be sorry you did. Check out their website. woodwindbonaire.com. They do not advertise, because they don’t need to.

One of the changes that I’ve noticed from before the pandemic. And I don’t know if the vision is the only one in his class that got this Upgrade. But the elevators now have digital call buttons. I think it makes the elevators come faster, and it’s certainly easier to tell where the elevator is. The only difficulty I’ve seen with it is that if you push the button once inside the elevator, it notes the floor you want. However, if someone pushes that button again, it will turn it off. This works much the same way as a computer touchpad. There were a few times I thought the elevator had a mind of its own. But it’s generally an upgrade.

We went to Abraham Lincoln president and first lady show today. I think that’s the best so far.

I just attended the veterans ceremony. This one also honored first responders and teachers since we’re in the weeks that I honor those groups, too. it began with a bugler doing America. Then a medley of all the different branches fight songs. As they did the fight song, they were all asked to come up the stairs. then they made some remarks read a poem and sang the national anthem. At the end of the ceremony, the captain announced that we were still on vacation, we could eat cake before lunch I always like to attend this ceremony.

I’m not sure, but I’ll ask my state room attendant. I don’t think they can be opened. Here is a picture, and there’s a bolt on both sides. It does not appear to have a hinge that opens.

It’s a beautiful day. The ocean is like glass. I find that amazing since we’re out in the open Atlantic Ocean. The temperature is very pleasant. Warm enough to be nice, but not nearly as humid as it’s been. We are northeast of the Bahamas, about parallel to Cape Canaveral. At this rate, we should get into the Chesapeake Bay tomorrow evening. The time we get in the bay varies so much from Cruise to cruise. Often it is 10pm or after. On our last cruise, it was at dusk. I like to see the lights of the Chesapeake Bay bridge tunnel. It’s so unique having bridge lights going off in two directions and seeing a gap in the middle where we sail through.

yes, we found a number of events and activities conflicted with our dinner time. They are still giving out the usual items for winning things. (I.e. trivia or game shows) I think it’s interesting that they’re still giving out highlighters when they’re really not giving out many hardcopies of the Cruise Compass. They likely still have a supply that they need to get rid of. There was one game show that we hadn’t seen before in the centrum and I can’t remember which day it was. It’s called “guess my lips.” It was terrible, and I don’t say that about most things. There were two teams of four. The two teams faced each other. One team wore the headphones that are used for the silent disco. They have a song that is piped in through their headphones. And they have to sing the song without words. Either humming or singing la la la la to the correct tune. (Think charades) One or two of the tunes were very recognizable. But some of the others it was next to impossible. And the longer it took the other team before they recognize the song the louder the participants “sang.” Imagine four people singing la la la la off key and progressively louder. We had gone to the centrum because we wanted to see the next activity and we wanted seats. It is telling that there were seats available.

I like proof of life photos too. When my daughter told me about that several years ago I really laughed. But her kids have been very good about that. Anytime they’re away with friends. They always send her a picture every day. No young person wants to be caught in with their parents every day. But they all Snapchat. So it’s no big deal for them to snap a photo to their mom. Yeah some of those pictures are really funny. they will look for the most amusing thing to photograph. Sometimes it’s only part of their body on the picture. 🤣 Swimming with the turtles was terrific, and I thought that would be the highlight of the trip. But swimming through the two schools of fish with them all around me was very surreal. I think that’s my highlight.

Tonight is the 70s disco party. But we have seen that so many times we’ve decided to miss it. But earlier tonight they had the final competition for karaoke. They had invited the people who had performed and impressed the staff all week long. They were excellent. This was the winner. What impressed me was the prize they gave him. Usually you get highlighters and a picture of the ship. Hahaha 🤣 Or a key chain. They gave him two free dinners in a specialty restaurant. But he was that good. I like when they have events and things in the centrum. Because people can sit and stand on all the floors from 4 to 8.

They had a new entertainment activities that I haven’t seen before. It’s called the Centrum Wow: renaissance. It is a performance by the singers and dancers. But it started at 7 o’clock and our dinner was at that time so I only saw the first number. The headliner singers are waiting to come on stage.

DH and I have attended 3 of the dramatic presentations on the presidents. We have seen 5 presidents so far. Tomorrow is Lincoln. I know some people were skeptical of going to what were partial lectures at the beginning of the cruise. But they’ve been very entertaining and the audience has been mostly full each sea day.

They do not provide written copies of the cruise compass unless you ask for it. It’s no problem to get them. But they want you to use the app for everything. If you want a PDF version of the cruise Compass, you can get it using the QR code. Here is a sample of a couple pages from today. I’ve been using the app. That’s worked fairly well for me, better than I thought. But DH does not carry a smart phone around. So he needs the hardcopy.

I thought it was a crew area too. I was standing at the door looking out and a crewmember came by to get into the back door of the park café. I asked him if it was a crew area. He said no that’s a guest area. We went to the park café for lunch, and all four tables were fully occupied a half an hour before lunch even opened so I may not have known they were there, but other people did. Ha ha. here is a picture of that area of the deck plan from the app. You can see where the stairs are, and the tables are right in front of them.

We went to the park café again this morning for breakfast. It’s very easy breakfast doesn’t take very long and I eat so much less. Ha ha. I had a strawberry yogurt parfait and a half of a bagel. That’s much closer to what I might eat at Home vs the full breakfast they serve in the restaurant. This is day eight on the cruise, but I discovered something today I had not seen before. I noticed that if you pass to the left side of the park café, there’s a set of doors that lead to a small outdoor area with four tables. if Grandeur or the Enchantment has this area, I’ve certainly never noticed it. Although it’s certainly possible that I’ve been that clueless. 😜 there’s also a set of stairs leads up to deck, 10 in the walking track.

We went through the pass between Puerto Rico and the Dominican republic last night about 8 o’clock, and we left the Caribbean and entered into the Atlantic ocean. Interestingly enough, the Atlantic seems to be calmer than the Pacific with a little less wind. No whitecaps at all. Today at noon, we were just off the coast of the Turks and Caicos’s.

Yesterday was a beautiful sunset. Going, going, gone!

Delta— I went by the Park café today after 1 o’clock during what they call afternoon snacks. But it looked to me like a little bit smaller version of the lunch they used to offer they were sandwiches, fruit, desserts, pizza, and a mini salad bar with maybe five or six choices. DH and I are going to go by there tomorrow afternoon and have lunch. Will let you know and I’ll take some pictures. Here are the times for today. I don’t believe these were the same hours that we had for the first to sea days. But we have 40 days in a row, so I’ll be able to check it out.

I did buy reef safe sunscreen before I left home. And Woodwind had some if we needed it.