Let’s give it a go…sort of live-ish Getaway February 18-26, 2023–I’ll do my best!

[Laszlo]

Don't forget to use the Concierge's for getting you off the ship.... and back on

 

 

 

[Dorhead1230]

1 hour ago, NYMama said:

I am on this sailing as well.  Traveling with my boys for their February break.  I have heard it is at capacity ~4800.  Probably at least 1000 of the passengers being kids.  The weather is shaping up to be pleasant, so at least both indoor and outdoor spaces can be utilized most days.  

I know the other social media site’s roll call looks very active for this cruise, but the CC one has been pretty dead, don’t you think? I am guilty of not even posting on there myself—under other circumstances I would have planned a M&G and/or slot pull, but I just haven’t had the time or energy with everything we had going on. I thought with such a full sailing the roll call would be constant chatter but it looked like mainly crickets!

[NYMama]

2 minutes ago, Dorhead1230 said:

I know the other social media site’s roll call looks very active for this cruise, but the CC one has been pretty dead, don’t you think? I am guilty of not even posting on there myself—under other circumstances I would have planned a M&G and/or slot pull, but I just haven’t had the time or energy with everything we had going on. I thought with such a full sailing the roll call would be constant chatter but it looked like mainly crickets!

I am part of the group for the other site.  There are a bunch of people supposedly attending the informal meet and greet on day 2.  I started the roll call here on CC, but have been way too busy with work and kids to organize anything myself.

[Grandmafreddie]

What other sites can i look at?

[Dorhead1230]

27 minutes ago, NYMama said:

I am part of the group for the other site.  There are a bunch of people supposedly attending the informal meet and greet on day 2.  I started the roll call here on CC, but have been way too busy with work and kids to organize anything myself.

I saw those posts. I’m sure I’ll be busy with LM so I doubt I’ll go to that. Plus I am not one to really hang at bars or do bar crawls. At least not the super crowded ones. I usually get my drink and move on.

[EllieinNJ]

We also had an almost non existent roll call here on cc for our Feb 1st Getaway cruise but there was an active one on that other website.  They actually pulled off having a meet and greet with about 30 people in the Tropicana room and about 6 officers and the cruise director Alvin attended.  They also had a nice slot pull with about 25 of us.  Only lost $2.

[Dorhead1230]

2 minutes ago, EllieinNJ said:

We also had an almost non existent roll call here on cc for our Feb 1st Getaway cruise but there was an active one on that other website.  They actually pulled off having a meet and greet with about 30 people in the Tropicana room and about 6 officers and the cruise director Alvin attended.  They also had a nice slot pull with about 25 of us.  Only lost $2.

That’s nice that it worked out for you that you got decent attendance! I think I’d normally be more into it, but it’s been such a stressful couple months, plus this being LM’s first walking and talking cruise and how crowded it is going to be in general and all…I think I just want to zen out with cocktails on my balcony all the way to Florida 🍹

[NYMama]

59 minutes ago, Dorhead1230 said:

That’s nice that it worked out for you that you got decent attendance! I think I’d normally be more into it, but it’s been such a stressful couple months, plus this being LM’s first walking and talking cruise and how crowded it is going to be in general and all…I think I just want to zen out with cocktails on my balcony all the way to Florida 🍹

I cruised with my oldest son when he was two.  Spent a lot of time on the balcony relaxing. My favorite memory was whenever we would head out to eat, my son would run down the hall saying “I’m coming food!”

[Dorhead1230]

@NYMama ahhh that’s too cute!!

 

Well, it’s after 9 PM and I don’t have a stitch of clothing packed, so the rest of tonight should go well. I’m starting off with all the assorted crap we bring; then I’ll deal with my clothes. I am armed for bear as far as meds and first aid stuff. I also have assorted band aids, tape, aloe, a thermometer, and a pile of Covid tests in case we (oh boy I hope not) need them. These wipes are my favorite for cruises and hotel stays. I get them from Amazon. They are the only wipes I know of that kill norovirus. Word of caution if you buy them, though—use gloves when you use them because the peroxide in them is strong enough to leave white spots on your fingers.

And…ta-da!! The Ziploc bag collection! I was taking zipper bags on cruises long before it became a topic of conversation on CC, and they have come in handy on many occasions. So people can scoff but I’ll continue to be a bag lady!

OK, probably time to make sure I have some clothes with me for the week 🤦🏻‍♀️. Hope everyone gets a good night’s rest, because I won’t! Wish me luck!

[kh6275]

43 minutes ago, Dorhead1230 said:

@NYMama ahhh that’s too cute!!

 

Well, it’s after 9 PM and I don’t have a stitch of clothing packed, so the rest of tonight should go well. I’m starting off with all the assorted crap we bring; then I’ll deal with my clothes. I am armed for bear as far as meds and first aid stuff. I also have assorted band aids, tape, aloe, a thermometer, and a pile of Covid tests in case we (oh boy I hope not) need them. These wipes are my favorite for cruises and hotel stays. I get them from Amazon. They are the only wipes I know of that kill norovirus. Word of caution if you buy them, though—use gloves when you use them because the peroxide in them is strong enough to leave white spots on your fingers.

And…ta-da!! The Ziploc bag collection! I was taking zipper bags on cruises long before it became a topic of conversation on CC, and they have come in handy on many occasions. So people can scoff but I’ll continue to be a bag lady!

OK, probably time to make sure I have some clothes with me for the week 🤦🏻‍♀️. Hope everyone gets a good night’s rest, because I won’t! Wish me luck!

A lady after my own heart!!

[Dorhead1230]

1 hour ago, kh6275 said:

A lady after my own heart!!

Is it the fact that I have nothing packed mere hours before we sail, the crazy first aid kit, or the plentiful supply of Ziploc bags? 😅

[Dorhead1230]

Well, 11 AM check-in time isn’t happening because it’s 11 and I’m about to shower and get dressed to leave 😅. Prepping for a cruise immediately after a move doesn’t go great, evidently. But DH is already loading the bags in the car so we’ll be out of here soon. And at least we don’t have to stress about a long trip—we’re LIE exit 53 so it’ll only take us about an hour to get to Pier 88. I’m going to silver-lining this and think about the fact that we’ll walk right onto the ship by the time we get there and I won’t have to amuse LM in the terminal. Onward! Arrival pictures forthcoming if we ever get there.

[mking8288]

Bon Voyage - have a great cruise ...  😄

 

There should be plenty of rooftop parking above Pier 88, Waze/Navigation showing smooth traffic on LIE Rt. 495 west direct to QMT across midtown to cruise terminal parking.  And, you probably will skip & miss most of the crowd & madness inside to get check-in and board, and staterooms hopefully ready by then.  The question is "what's for lunch" ??  

[Deacon22]

55 minutes ago, Dorhead1230 said:

Well, 11 AM check-in time isn’t happening because it’s 11 and I’m about to shower and get dressed to leave 😅. Prepping for a cruise immediately after a move doesn’t go great, evidently. But DH is already loading the bags in the car so we’ll be out of here soon. And at least we don’t have to stress about a long trip—we’re LIE exit 53 so it’ll only take us about an hour to get to Pier 88. I’m going to silver-lining this and think about the fact that we’ll walk right onto the ship by the time we get there and I won’t have to amuse LM in the terminal. Onward! Arrival pictures forthcoming if we ever get there.

Pulled in to drop the luggage off.  First thing porter said was  “we are normally around 3300.   4800 today.   Good luck.”

I said it’s  better than freezing. 

[Dorhead1230]

37 minutes ago, Deacon22 said:

Pulled in to drop the luggage off.  First thing porter said was  “we are normally around 3300.   4800 today.   Good luck.”

I said it’s  better than freezing. 

Only in NY would the porter be d-baggy enough to greet you with a comment like that 😂. Whatever, the extra 1500 are probably mostly kids and they don’t take up too much space, sit at my slot machines, or hog the booze so 🤷🏻‍♀️ lol.

 

1 hour ago, mking8288 said:

Bon Voyage - have a great cruise ...  😄

 

There should be plenty of rooftop parking above Pier 88, Waze/Navigation showing smooth traffic on LIE Rt. 495 west direct to QMT across midtown to cruise terminal parking.  And, you probably will skip & miss most of the crowd & madness inside to get check-in and board, and staterooms hopefully ready by then.  The question is "what's for lunch" ??  

Thank you! We’re finally on the road. We are looking forward to breezing right through the terminal. I know the cruise will be crowded all week, but the terminal to me is one of the worst points for just stewing in nasty germs 😷 so I will be glad to just walk right through an empty building. This is going to be our first cruise ever when we won’t have our first lunch in the MDR, but I do enjoy O’Sheehan’s so I think we’ll hit that up. As long as we can avoid day one lunch at the trough…ahem, buffet…it’s all good!

Edited February 18, 2023 by Dorhead1230

[Dorhead1230]

Finally almost there! Of course we hit traffic because we’re the official poster family for Murphy’s Law these days. It occurs to me now that I can’t provide any useful info about when embarkation started and how it went, etc. Previous reviewers covered that for you, though, and obviously that changes from week-to-week anyway! If you want to know what it’s like to be among the last onto the ship, I’m your lady! 🤗 I’ll be reporting back shortly on that!

[sailorusvi]

They just announced rooms are ready.  Although hubby started his nap 1 hour ago in our room.

 

Happy sailing.

[Dorhead1230]

1 hour ago, sailorusvi said:

They just announced rooms are ready.  Although hubby started his nap 1 hour ago in our room.

 

Happy sailing.

So, we heard the announcement from the parking lot lol. We weren’t the very last people getting here, though. We still had some company in the terminal, but we did sail right through and onto the ship. If you don’t care too much about squeezing in those first few cocktails, and your preference is to avoid lines when getting on the ship, then later arrivals are certainly better.

 

There was a major bottleneck by the forward elevators when we boarded the ship, but we managed to thread our way through and head through the casino to the aft. I am certain that a lot of people on this ship are either new to cruising or new to this class of ship, because we were the only people who thought of heading back to the aft elevators and we had a private ride up to deck 12. We dropped all our carry-on items in DM’s cabin and headed down to O’Sheehan’s. Unfortunately, it was about 1/2 hour wait so we took the pager, got some drinks, and waited. We’re sitting now and it’s taking a while for our food to arrive, but there’s not many people left in here so I hope we haven’t been forgotten…we’re going to have to choke down this food (if it comes 😬) and run right to the muster drill.

[Dorhead1230]

So a bang-up job already…I swear we are not complainers and always rolls with everything but we’re basically starting off pretty POed right now. Either our server didn’t bother to put our order in or the kitchen didn’t bother to make it, but our food never came and we got told to leave. When we said our food never came and we had been there 20-25 minutes, “The answer was, I’m very sorry about that but we’re closed now. We’ll be open later.” Which is very helpful when you have a 4 year old start crying because he’s hungry and got no food. We definitely didn’t order later than possible for them to bring the food, because people who sat down after us got served. DH is usually a quiet grumbler who will complain to me but never make a fuss to anyone else, and he went over to the manager to complain himself. That also got nowhere.

 

@mking8288 I feel like such a Karen right now, but if you still have that photo of the senior staff contacts, could you post it for me? I want to contact the F&B director. Thank you!

[mking8288]

@Dorhead1230  Glad to read that your embarkation went smoothly and onboard ... just a quickie look now,  (updated) ship just backed out of at Pier 88 a little after 5 p.m. and underway, turned south already for the Hudson River ... safe & happy sailing ahead. 

 

O'Sheehan's can be a hectic place on embarkation day b/c some of the servers were diverted to help with luggage & stateroom turnaround related assignments.  Metin is / should be the F&B Manager [he was GM until ("super") Mario returned from vacation last month] - here is the calling card from the M&G ...  Or, go to the Restaurant Manager - just dial their extension numbers directly. 

 

 

They claimed and said to be reading & following CC for comments, feedbacks and what not ... let them know, we hope that they do pay attention and make every effort to do a little better; that, we aren't interested to see failure.  They really do need go above & beyond.  

 

 

Edited February 18, 2023 by mking8288

[Dorhead1230]

@mking8288 thank you so much for the info!

 

So, I don’t plan to buy the unlimited Internet and I’ll be pacing myself on the included 150 minutes. I plan to continue making notes journal-style and then I’ll post them once or twice tomorrow. Monday and Tuesday I’ll be able to add a lot more when we are in Florida. Right now, we’re just enjoying the view out DM’s balcony door (don’t want LM to know he can go out there just yet!). Beautiful sailaway and beautiful sunset! 😎

[Deacon22]

Sorry you didn’t get your order.  It was crazy there.   Waited an hour.  The beeper went off.  Service took very long and food was cold. 
 

passing the Statue of Liberty as we speak

[Deacon22]

[Kruizin'Kath]

Beautiful!! We are sailing her for the 10 day March 26th and following this wonderful thread! Thank you to all for taking the time to post!

[Deacon22]

Third time at guest services today to wait.  My card keeps disabling.  😁Dinner at Teppanyaki was wonderful though.   Gotta accentuate the positive.