LeeW

Pre-covid Allure had two different ice shows and two aqua shows. No reservations possible for the alternate shows and their timing was such that they were half empty. In October Allure had two sessions of the Aqua show and they were working on a new show. We happened to go to both and while the theme was the same they were quite different. The ice show was offered multiple times and as far as I know was the same. Their updated version of the Monopoly show was much improved on the original but still recognizable.

You do know that US citizens don't need a passport for a closed circuit cruise to the Bahamas. If you need to renew a passport you have to send in your old one (can't do the emergency route with the online application) or your birth certificate for a new one. I don't see anything on the state department site defining "Urgent Foreign Travel" but you need to call them to schedule an appointment at a passport agency and then get to the agency. We just renewed our passports and were planning on using birth certificates for a cruise in February if they didn't arrive on time. It took 7 weeks exactly from when they received our applications on Nov 8. Probably half of the folks cruising these days use birth certificates.

We sailed there twice on Vision from Galveston. Interesting port with long jetty to the ship requiring a bus to get to town. Great place to visit ruins like Uxmal and Chichen Itza. If I had to guess the problem is bus capacity. They don't have much turnaround space at the port end and buses were having to wait partway down the jetty for the two buses at the end to fill and depart. Long lines even with just Vision in port, especially when ship tours were loading.

Lines like Princess close one side to reset for another meal. Royal closes the whole buffet for quite a while between meals.

Ours have taken about 4 days after a cruise to post.

Common due to covid during 2021 but haven't seen any in last year. Exception is the Hubbard Glacier Explorer, which boards directly from the ship and sails much closer to the glacier - there is no port there. Around $399pp last fall so we were not interested. As I recall there sometimes is a similar one if the ship is going into Tracy Arm.

Kind of liked the sheets, but the pillow keeps slipping around. And they are warm - like flannel. Try the Giza Dream Sheets - much better and cheaper. Coupons not worth much (unless you were going to buy at those stores anyway) but wife did win a massage. Problem was there were no appointments left for the cruise.....

Quick Shuttle picks up from pier and then several hotels before heading to the US. You get to take all your luggage off the bus and have it scanned at the border. Couple of stops, including casino on US side and some downtown hotels and ends at Seatac Airport. Left at 9 when we took it and total time to airport was around 5 hours. The problem we have had with car rentals is that Avis northbound has no dropoff charge but southbound was over $100. So we rent going north and bus going south if we are flying into Seatac. We have also taken 2 day Princess cruises from Seattle to Vancouver, stayed a few days and then taken a different ship south to LA. Also have take ship from Seattle to Vancouver, stayed a few days and then taken Vancouver to Whittier Alaska cruise - you can't stay on the same ship due to PVSA but can switch ships.

Checkin typically opens around midnight port location on checkin day. With app you can skip everything and just get the port arrival time and fill in rest later. Online has you do personal data, credit card, emergency contact, passport/id and photos before you do the arrival time. If you have security photos and photos of passport on your computer you can use those.

In October Allure had fixed seating in the MTD dining room at 5. We had 6:30 MTD reservations but they really weren't sending anyone in until about 6:45. Sometimes we had to wait for the table, latest was around 7:15. In theory the fixed seating folks could get in until 5:15, but sometimes they didn't show up until later. Lots of folks both in the MTD reservation line and non-reservation line were taken up to another level that had open tables. Our son did that on another cruise on Allure and seldom waited more than 10 minutes.

Typical balcony cabin on Symphony will have a couple of 110v US outlets at desk and 220v European outlet. Ours had another 220v under the desk that powered a multi outlet insert into the desk (3 US, couple of USB). Problem with most outlets is that they are clustered too close together to fully use them unless you have narrow plugs. There is also an outlet behind the TV that you might be able to reach.

Turquoise Bay is an AI resort on the NE end of Roatan. Fairly long bus trip from Coxen Hole. Three levels of experience, normal (chairs/umbrellas with food and drinks), VIP which has enclosed beach beds and upgraded lunch and the overwater bungalow. We did the standard and photo below shows all three levels. Water is smooth bottom, no decent snorkeling. Restrooms closer to the VIP area on a upper level shelf. Food at normal level was fine, they added steak and lobster for VIP. Some hammocks and tables in water.

Outdoor pool was warmer than indoor in September. But not many people in either, just lifeguards that didn't have much to do. Did have some good waves in Solarium Pool sloshing over the steps at the end and flooding a lot of the deck (our flipflops tried to float away).

Refundable to credit card. Supposed to be the one you used but might actually go back to the one you use onboard. Can take a while so better to take any excess out in casino before leaving ship.

You want to avoid using a debit card for onboard charges - Royal will put holds on it each night and then charge the full amount at the end of the cruise. This means that until the holds vanish your account was charged twice for the onboard expenses. If you have a low amount in the debit account it can get overdrawn and not pay other automatic bills. You can use a cash account onboard - this limits your charges to (normally) $500 before they will call you down to Guest Services to pay it off.

Lots of discussion on Gulf Port board: https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forum/316-gulf-coast-departures/

The no sharing language is really for the drink packages.

Check the Gulf Coast Departure boards for more info, including hotels, transportation and lack of car rentals on the island (And the closest one on mainland is closed Sunday). Galveston shuttle is pretty good. https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forum/316-gulf-coast-departures/

Wrong. If you miss the ship in Canada and all the other ports including the debark port are in the US then you would be taking a trip from one US port to another, illegal. The EZ Air guarantee doesn't apply if PVSA will not allow it. People do miss the ship in Vancouver all the time on one-way itineraries and they are not allowed to board in another port. If the cruise is roundtrip Canada, you can legally get on the ship in Skagway, Juneau or Ketchikan and end in Vancouver.

Military shows up without requesting it but I can see that in my Princess account. Shareholder requires that I send in the broker statement.

Just note that EZ Air can't put you on a plane to next port for cruises leaving from Vancouver unless the ship is coming back to Vancouver at the end of the cruise. If you are on a one-way cruise to Whittier you would be boarding in a US port and debarking in a different port, which is a violation of the PVSA.

Normal. You likely won't see these until you connect to the ship wifi. You can try selecting the current sailing from your profile page (bottom, select different sailing, select ship and then date). Might give you an idea.

Recent past the beach bars in quite a few Eastern Caribbean ports have been only open to ship tours. Assume that is changing slowly. Magen's Bay they have a parking space for your bus but the beach is open to all and you have to go to the store to get things like floats. Don't remember ever paying for chairs. Places like Playa Mia may put you all in the same area for their convenience but it varies all over the place. With ship excursions you get to wait for all the people to show up, load the bus and unload. Then you get to wait when they don't show up at the assigned time at the far end. You really don't save any time with these - people going direct beat you to the beach. Some tours include chairs, umbrellas or drinks. Some do not. Also note that boat excursions tend to pack in like sardines on ship excursions - much better to book these independently. Now if you have the OBC, it doesn't hurt to book excursions. But a straight beach trip may not be worth it - look for extra features. Or pick excursions that can only be booked through the cruise lines when ships are in port. Some places like Cozumel have cabs that charge by the cab - 4 people to Playa Mia is the same as 2. Take that into account if you are picking cab trips. Or book through the consolidators like shoreexcursioneer and shoreexcursionsgroup.

Note that the coconut cookies there are a large chewy macaroon rather than the normal coconut ranger. DW wishes these were available onboard.

In the past have seen dining and drinks well over a year out. Now my January 2024 cruises only have one Nassau excursion and nothing else. Possible they are shortening things up so that when they make changes to the cruise they don't have to do as many refunds.