Cruiser Formerly Known As Cheapo Dad's Trip Report on Odyssey of the Seas Sailing to A Minus B Plus C Plus H Islands

[harryfat1]

Then my younger one.  He's much lighter so he was abe to fly higher

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

After everyone was done, the instructor put on the show at the end and you get to see how the “pro” does it as he makes it effortless in his motions. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

 

The basic session for iFly lasts up to 1 minute inside the tube.  If you pay an extra $50/pp, RCI gives you one extra minute.  Seems to be a very steep price for one extra minute. 

 

I checked with my son afterward and he said your body will start to feel the strain of being bent in the shape to keep yourself afloat.  He said his tolerance is right around the one-minute mark.  Any longer than that, it’s more of a torture on the body being bent than having a fun experience. 

 

So depending on your body shape and experience with iFly, maybe for the first time, just try out the basic experience to be sure you like it before plucking down $50/pp for something you may not enjoy.

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

 

OK, done with iFly.  Now is the time for a late breakfast at 9:30 at Windjammer. 

 

The Seaplex this morning was hosting the now very popular Pickle Ball event.

 

 

I wasn’t hungry after the 2 pastries this morning for breakfast so this was all I had for the second breakfast as I knew I would be eating an early BBQ lunch at Labdee soon.

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

OK.  After a quick breakfast, it was time to go back to the cabin to change for the beach day.

 

It’s TGIF out there in the real world but you don’t care as all you know is today is day 7 of the cruise and this is your last port before going home

 

 

Off the ship at 10:40

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Time to visit the uncle in prison

 

 

For the mooring line fan club:

 

 

 

 

Edited March 1 by harryfat1
Why do I need to explain why I am editing my own post? You try to type with your feet and have no typos...

[harryfat1]

Maybe I’m not up to the latest beach attire trend but this looks interesting

 

 

I like this perspective

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

As we were walking to Labadee at 10:45, there were already people walking BACK to the ship at the time – see my picture above.  Maybe those were the same people who got off at 7:30 and now are done for the morning and heading back to the ship as the beach is starting to get crowded. 

 

If you are a morning person, get off the ship ASAP before 7:30 and head for the beach before most of the people to enjoy a secluded beach for a couple of hours and then leave after it starts to get crowded later in the morning

[harryfat1]

OK.  Let's try to frame this puppy.

 

Nope. Too far...

 

 

Too close...

 

 

As Goldilocks would say - just right.  Yeah, I could zoom in more to have the Holiday frame only but I wanted a bit of the side background to show the viewer the background - guess that's a personal preference thing...

 

 

[perfect match]

 

On 2/28/2024 at 9:52 PM, harryfat1 said:

There are so many events on the daily compass that you can easily miss an event.  I heard about this event pre-cruise so I had it marked as something I wanted to see

 

I had it marked on my list, too. High priority! That’s why I am so disappointed that I missed it. I’m pretty sure that it was time conflict with something else we also had marked as a high priority. 
 

On 2/28/2024 at 10:15 PM, harryfat1 said:

For the mooring line fan club

 

 

 

love all of your mooring like shots! I started taking my own mooring line shots when we first started cruising because I thought they were interesting. I didn’t know at the time that there were others who liked them as much as I did. Now I love to see everyone’s mooring line pictures! Yours have bee great! 
 

 

I loved doing iFly! I did have to convince the staff that my hip and knee replacements had been long ago and were solid enough to hold up to me doing iFly. I’m really glad I was allowed to proceed because I absolutely loved it! As much as I loved it though, I would never push anyone who really was reluctant or uncomfortable to go on any thrill ride that they didn’t want to do. It surprised me that my DH did not want to do iFly, especially since he has some experience in skydiving. Since he didn’t want to go, I put him in charge of photography! 

[CntPAcruiser]

On 2/24/2024 at 9:50 PM, harryfat1 said:

A couple of people ahead of me at Guest Services early in the morning.  So I talked to the guy at the far right and explained to him that I wanted a later luggage tag as we were not in a hurry to get off the ship and besides our tags are different than our kids.

 

The lazy-ass bugger didn’t want to give me new tags.  He just said we could get off whenever and after our time slots were called and we could just go to different stations to get our luggage.  Which was what we didn’t want as we wanted everyone’s luggage to be in the same section. I didn’t do the passenger survey or else I would have given him a 2 out of 10 for bad service as how hard is it to just give me new tags?

 

So instead of getting new tags, since they issued 2 tags per passenger, I just used the extra tags from the boy’s group and attached them to ours luggage instead

 

Much easier to ask your cabin attendant for whatever luggage tags you want--they are the ones who distribute them, and they don't care who gets off the ship when. 

 

Bizarre that you were told you could get off whenever at Guest Services, considering they make announcements all morning long on departure day to NOT do exactly that.

[CntPAcruiser]

On 2/24/2024 at 1:19 AM, harryfat1 said:

 

 

 

 

Looks like a delicious dinner of grilled flip-flop with fried seaweed! Probably not what you were expecting when you ordered filet of sole. 

[harryfat1]

2 hours ago, CntPAcruiser said:

 

Much easier to ask your cabin attendant for whatever luggage tags you want--they are the ones who distribute them, and they don't care who gets off the ship when. 

 

Bizarre that you were told you could get off whenever at Guest Services, considering they make announcements all morning long on departure day to NOT do exactly that.

Yeah, assuming I could find her as we seldom see her in her hallway.  With other sailings, I typically see our cabin attendants every morning going to breakfast or dinner but on this sailing, she was seldom seen.  I wasn't impressed with her anyway and she forgot to deliver the day 8 daily compass to us.

 

The announcement means that you do not go out BEFORE they call your number as they clear luggage section by section.  So if you are assigned group 40 and you disembark when they called 25, you can't access your luggage once you get to the terminal until groups 26 to 39 have been called and just standing there in the way of people.  So that's why they don't want people to go down before their numbers are called.

 

I searched my photo of our luggage tag and we were assigned #26.  I wanted #60/61/62 as those are the last tags.  I want to go later, not earlier.

[harryfat1]

2 hours ago, CntPAcruiser said:

 

Looks like a delicious dinner of grilled flip-flop with fried seaweed! Probably not what you were expecting when you ordered filet of sole. 

This is not a picture of a fish.  It's grilled Eggplant.  

 

I didn't take a picture of the menu that night but here's a copy of the menu from online

 

[CntPAcruiser]

2 minutes ago, harryfat1 said:

This is not a picture of a fish.  It's grilled Eggplant.  

 

I didn't take a picture of the menu that night but here's a copy of the menu from online

 

 

I knew it wasn't fish--it was wordplay. Sole the fish versus the fact that it looked like the sole of a shoe! Or a flip-flop, maybe. That was the first thing that came to mind when I saw the picture. Oddly enough, I would probably still have eaten it. I like eggplant.

[harryfat1]

5 minutes ago, CntPAcruiser said:

 

I knew it wasn't fish--it was wordplay. Sole the fish versus the fact that it looked like the sole of a shoe! Or a flip-flop, maybe. That was the first thing that came to mind when I saw the picture. Oddly enough, I would probably still have eaten it. I like eggplant.

Oh, sorry. I'm clueless on the wordplay as I only know numbers and YouTube videos on baby got back...

[CntPAcruiser]

8 minutes ago, harryfat1 said:

Oh, sorry. I'm clueless on the wordplay as I only know numbers and YouTube videos on baby got back...

 

Don't feel bad--I don't think anyone else gets my humor either! Really enjoyed your review, as I have the others before them. Thanks for doing them!

[harryfat1]

18 hours ago, perfect match said:

 

 

I had it marked on my list, too. High priority! That’s why I am so disappointed that I missed it. I’m pretty sure that it was time conflict with something else we also had marked as a high priority. 
 

love all of your mooring like shots! I started taking my own mooring line shots when we first started cruising because I thought they were interesting. I didn’t know at the time that there were others who liked them as much as I did. Now I love to see everyone’s mooring line pictures! Yours have bee great! 
 

 

I loved doing iFly! I did have to convince the staff that my hip and knee replacements had been long ago and were solid enough to hold up to me doing iFly. I’m really glad I was allowed to proceed because I absolutely loved it! As much as I loved it though, I would never push anyone who really was reluctant or uncomfortable to go on any thrill ride that they didn’t want to do. It surprised me that my DH did not want to do iFly, especially since he has some experience in skydiving. Since he didn’t want to go, I put him in charge of photography! 

You are much better than me. 

 

I didn't even try the iFly as just watching people having to lift their bodies seems to be a lot of stress on the muscles.  It's like if I just lay down on the floor on my stomach and reach back my arms and legs in the air for 45 seconds would be a tiring event on its own without all the wind blowing in my face on top of not seeing much without my glasses.

[harryfat1]

Here’s the map of the Labadee area.  We always go to the Columbus Cove area as that’s supposed to be the best family beach area.  See my red arrow on the map on the lower right

 

 

To get there from the dock (left-hand side) you can either walk it in the heat or take the free tram.  Being lazy, guess which option we typically choose?

 

[harryfat1]

To take the tram, you have to line up at the tram stop and wait for the next available tram. I think they are supposed to run once every 10 minutes or so, but since we were there during “rush hour” with many families wanting to go to the beach, they were running one tram after another so even though the line seemed long, it moved quickly as soon as one departed, there’s another one coming within a minute.

 

 

You see from this picture that the tram on the right has already picked up the passengers and is on the way to drop them off at the various stops.  As they are leaving, the next tram is pulling up to get more passengers.  Similar to Disneyland/Disneyworld tram rides if you have experienced those.

 

 

[harryfat1]

We made it on the tram

 

 

My son's new T-shirt from the cruise

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

This is the Artisan Market – one of the stops of the tram route. 

 

 

More shops

 

[harryfat1]

Along the way, there’s a long row of Haitian vendors for anyone interested in shopping for local goods.  We have never stopped here as we always took the tram but if you plan on walking to Columbus Grove, you will likely walk past these vendors

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

OK, we made it to Columbus Cove. 

 

Labadee has different beaches but from the various reviews in the past, this is the most family-friendly and we typically come here.  If you have $$ to burn, RCI is more than happy to sell you the waterfront bungalow for 4 figures but being cheap, I will opt for the free chairs.

 

 

Speaking of free chairs, it looks like they replaced the beach chairs to be orange or blue solid-colored ones.  The old ones with blue and white stripes from my previous 2017 visit are no longer here

 

 

 

Our chairs

 

 

Chairs from 2017