perfect match

Thanks for taking us along with you on your cruise! I’ve enjoyed being included in your adventures. 
 

That towel turtle certainly is cute! 🐢 

Safe travels home.

11 hours ago, alishac said:

For Utopia? I'm sailing 9/2 and no reservations online yet.

No, for Wonder. Sorry for causing confusion. I should have said which ship. Hope your Utopia entertainment opens soon. 

Descanzo’s Beach Club looks nice. 🏖️ I’d give it a try if I ever get out there. 
 

Glad everyone is safe from the earthquake. 

19 hours ago, dani negreanu said:

I'd really love to be with you on the same boat in the cabins of our choice 👍

Me, too! 
 

Instead, we’re going to be more like we’re on ships that sort of pass each other in the night. We get off Wonder on September 15, you board Voyager on September 16. 

15 hours ago, dani negreanu said:

 

Thanks, I'm checking several times a day. The cruise is Sept. 16th, so all the "blocks" have been released a long time ago...

I’m in the same boat. I don’t love my guarantee location but my category is sold out. Between the two of us we’re going to wear that website out with all our checking to see if a cabin we would prefer opens up! 😂

On 8/5/2024 at 9:18 PM, harryfat1 said:

Nancy,

 

Being a Disney fan, you might be interested to check out Mark’s @h20skibum trip report on the RCI boards.  He just got off the cruise ship and is spending time at WDW now with his family.

I’m already there, Harry. We’re on Utopia in January so I wanted to get his take on the ship with a bonus of some Disney thrown in for good measure. 
 

We definitely need a Disney day in the near future. Preferably only that’s not so hot, humid, and thunderstorm ⛈️ filled to leave us with heat exhaustion.  We’re old enough now that we can’t afford to push our boundaries with that. When we first moved here 20 years ago we would go 2-3 times per week. Now, that’s not happening but we are still going and still enjoying our coaster rides while we’re there! 

18 hours ago, h20skibum said:

We found there were even lines at stores in Disney Springs yesterday. 

 

That is to get into Gideon’s for cookies. 
 

 

Although we are locals, we don’t often get to Disney Springs. Recently we were treated to a box of cookies from Gideons. We thought they definitely lived up to all the hype! 
 

I’d love to get down there to see the drone show while it is still on.

We haven’t been to Ohana for a while, so that’s on my must do again soon list. We’ve certainly had some memorable dinner there. 
 

Great pictures of Animal Kingdom! That uncooperative elephant 🐘 may have been the reason for your delay in boarding the Safari ride. If an animal is on the safari trail or are somewhere they shouldn’t be the safari vehicles are not allowed to pass through until the coast is clear and the animals are settled down where they’re supposed to be.

I think we’re overdue for a Disney day! 

I’m here and getting ready for all the pounds I’ll be gaining just by looking at pictures of what you’ll be eating! 😱🤪😋

I just looked at our January 2025 sailing on Utopia and found no sign  of Royal Railway. It wasn’t even listed as sold out. Doesn’t bother me much because I wasn’t planning on booking at $119/pp anyway but wondered if it was available for those old king to book. I hope that those of you who are looking to book are able to do so and that you enjoy the experience. I also hope those of you who do book come back and tell us what you thought of the experience. 

We are Disney locals and Annual Passholders. We’re in one park or another on a very regular basis. We already know where everything is and what we like. That said, these latest changes even have us confused 🫤. I wish Disney would quit making changes “to improve our experience” because at this point all they’re doing is making us think about not renewing our passes when they next come due. That makes us sad, and feeling like a lot of the magic has gone out of a visit to Disney.

Be sure you ask for the ketchup when you go to Whispering Canyon! 😀 You’ll thank me later! 😇

On 8/2/2024 at 3:09 PM, harryfat1 said:

Why do I want to visit every Disney property worldwide?  Simple – because my wife and I are big Disney fans.

 

How big?  We had various Mickey and Minnie items at our wedding.  We flew to Florida’s WDW for our honeymoon for 5 days before going on a Caribbean cruise.

Harry, I didn’t realize that you and your wife as big Disney fans as we are. We got married at Disneyland in California. When we decided to move from CT to FL we drew a circle on the map around WDW that would make it an easy drive to get to the parks in an hour or less and have been Annual Passholders ever since. I could go on but let’s get back to your awesome NYC trip instead.

I figured that’s what the policy would be but I figured it couldn’t hurt to ask. It’s still a JS which I didn’t have before and at half the price they had been previously asking for choose your own room. Previously the asking price even for a guarantee was more than we wanted and the room is a JS no matter where it is. 
 

Thank you for your reply. 

I recently booked a suite guarantee and have found my room number through the barcode trick. We got a JS which is what I expected. I have no problem with the JS and will stay with it if I have to but I’d really prefer a different location.

Do I have to wait for my current room assignment becomes official before I can call and try to switch locations, or if a JS in a location I would prefer becomes available can I go ahead and call now to make the switch.
 

Right now it really doesn’t matter because there none available but I’d hate to miss the chance to switch if a JS I’d prefer does show up. 
 

Thanks.
 

13 hours ago, jk04 said:

@h20skibum Loving your review and Happy Anniversary!!!!

 

Were you able to make any entertainment reservations prior to the cruise?  We sail next month and those still have not opened up to book.  Wondering if it's wait until onboard.  Thank you!

 

     J

Entertainment reservations opened up for our September 8th cruise opened up August 1. Everything but the Headliner show was available and I was able to get to get bookings for our group for all available shows. Hope yours show up soon. 

3 hours ago, h20skibum said:

I read on the site that shall not be named, that some had flights delayed and some were diverted to FLL because of the storms in Orlando.  
 

Maybe we lucked out, because we only had a brief rain shower on the way to the port.  Sunny and nice for most of the day, and waves are small at the beach tonight. 

 

 

 

We live about 90 minutes northwest of PC, 45 minutes north from MCO. Absolutely poured rain, thunder, lightning ⛈️ at our house. Roads that don’t usually flood were flooded, tree branches down, all the fun things that usually come with our Central FL summer afternoon storms. Glad your travels were not affected.

Happy Anniversary 🥂🍾 ! Loved the wedding picture. 

I should be home for your sailaway so I’ll be watching for Daryl to see what shenanigans he manages to get into. 🦙❤️

On 7/31/2024 at 4:34 PM, BecciBoo said:

Has anyone ever seen the Hideout Cabanas at Hideaway for less than $1398 pp?  And did anyone get a better reduction a couple weeks out.  They have 7 cabanas left so I'm betting they may go down before the last couple weeks. And Labor day is coming up before our cruise too! Sept. 2nd and we board on the 14th.

@BecciBoo
 

Here’s today’s prices for Hideaway for our January 27 Utopia cruise. this is a screenshot from my cruise planner. I’d say you should probably keep looking for price drops! 

Harry, with regards to your question about whether you should do London first or Paris first what I like to do is research what major events will or maybe will not be going on at the time you plan to be there as that might make a big difference in what you’ll be able to do there. 
 

I’m not at all familiar with London or Paris these days so I’ll use a more local to me example. We were planning a trip to Daytona Beach a few years back. Before we booked I made sure that we would not be there during the Daytona 500 or any of the other major race weeks, Bike Week, or Spring Break weeks. It’s one thing if you’re going to participate in one of those events, but that was not our plan. I was glad I checked because we would have picked the wrong week to go.

Yay! Daryl is on another cruise, and he’s taking his family along with him! I love Daryl’s antics, so I hope he finds plenty of harmless, fun trouble to get into. 🤣

I loved your video so much I even stopped it to read the credits. 😃

We will be on Utopia in January so I’m excited to be following you on  this cruise! 🤩 

On 7/26/2024 at 7:53 PM, harryfat1 said:

Now this wouldn’t be a Cheapo Dad’s trip report (supplemental or not) if there wasn’t a Line picture in here somewhere.

I was hoping there would be a mooring line picture at some point during the NYC portion of your travels! You did not disappoint! There aren’t many mooring line shots like the one where you are able to stand right next to the guy working the line!

I love that your touring plan took you out into so many different parts of the city. You got to see a lot of the city using your plan. 😀

Thank you for doing this review @APDMOM! I’m glad I found this review and had a chance to cruise along with you and your family again.

You reminded me of all of the things we enjoyed about Princess enough so we’re thinking about booking with them again after a somewhat lengthy absence. We do have two cruises already booked with another line, but with Princess starting to sail out of Port Canaveral it could happen!

I have a Princess account but haven’t sailed with them in about 10 years. However, I have been logged in recently with no problem because I was looking to book another cruise. I tried just now to log into my account but was unable to do so even though I know my login info was correct. I’ll keep following here and once I’m able to get back into my account my password will be changed.

Harry, I know you’ve done your research so you must have learned that New York is the city that never sleeps! At any hour of the day or night there will be people out there doing whatever it is that they do. The nonstop activity level in the city is part of my love/hate relationship with that nonstop city. I find it an exciting, wonderful place to be, but it also exhausts and overwhelms me. It’s a place I’ve enjoyed visiting but I wouldn’t want to live there.

Your pictures and descriptions are, as usual, spectacular! 

On 7/22/2024 at 9:20 AM, little britain said:

Just watched the blog lengthy utube video - it certainly is a lot more 'colourful' than your average RCI ship - but wow, that outside seating on Giovannis looks incredible.  Not sure if I would like to be in those first BW balconies though!  I guess they could always throw you a bread stick! 

We almost booked a Boardwalk Balcony on Utopia. However, my DH has very much turned into an early to bed kind of gut as he’s gotten older, so our daily time schedule has had to change to meet his needs. We were going to be all the way aft on the Boardwalk and I was afraid the noise would be too much for him especially with the late start time of the AquaTheater shows. I’m a night owl so I would have been out on our balcony watching the but DH would not enjoy the cruise if he couldn’t sleep. I looked around and found an OV balcony that I liked for as decent a price as I could find and booked that instead. We’ll be a lot happier there. If I really want to go to the late show in the AquaTheater I’ll just go there and see it.

6 hours ago, Hooked.on.Royal said:

Effectors homecoming parade up next 🤷‍♂️. My little guy is upset it’s not the normal pirates parade. 

How did your little one like the superheroes on parade? I wouldn’t be surprised if he got over the lack of parading pirates really quickly once he saw them.At least I hope he did! 

Thank you to everyone for sharing their experience on Utopia. We will be on in January, a weekday 4 nighter in attempt to enjoy the ship without the full on weekend party crowd. Nothing wrong with it if that’s your thing but DH and I were done with that scene many years ago. Maybe it will bring back some memories from those days ….. that is, if I can remember them! 😂😱😜

Great report, Harry! I’m enjoying seeing New York through your eyes. 
 

Life has been busy around here lately so I haven’t gotten here every day but I catch up when I can. You can count on me following along until you’re done showing us the sights of New York.