luvtoride

@harryfat1Wow, that food looks amazing. Which specialty restaurant was that at on Odyssey of the Seas?? When you come to NYC, there are obviously some great Chinese restaurants in and around Chinatown where you can feast like that. Let me know if you research any that you would like me to check out for you before you come.

@harryfat1 maybe we will finally get to meet when you come to NYC. Although I retired from my company here last year, I am doing consulting with the firm and come into the office on the east side 1 or 2 days a week. Let me know when you're coming/ will be here and maybe we can meet up for bumper cars (oh, you're probably not going to be driving here) or a coffee. LOL. If you need any tips or advice before arriving, let me know and I'll be happy to help.

@harryfat1darn, I’m sorry we missed meeting each other at the photo gallery. That might be me with the flowered shirt in the picture 🤷🏻‍♂️🤣 We were arguing with the photo dept manager to get ALL of our family pictures including all of those with our grand kids in the pics, as per the package “inclusion” rules. They finally got tired of arguing and put all pictures of all 3 of our family cabins in our account so we could pick our 50 pic package. we opted for all digital and got most of them digitally on the spot vs waiting for the email dump after disembarking (which we received also). Although the prints would have been a good deal, they would not be as useful for our family as the easily shared digital versions.

@harryfat1 why don’t you take a cruise out of NYC? We did an NCL cruise from NYC in November and I got a couple of shots of the Statue as we were leaving NY Harbor. My photos aren’t great but the view was spectacular at Sunset. 🌅

And if the wanna be Elton is on the elevator with his piano, I'm sure that will decrease the allowed number and weight of passengers. I hear that Norwegian Air has started to weigh passengers and their carryon bags (on a "voluntary and anonymous" basis) on flights to achieve better weight distribution and estimates. Is that next for RCI on ship elevators?! LOL 🤣

We did our own boat charter tour in Curacao. After several hours of sailing, snorkeling and beach time, we took a taxi back to the port. The taxi could only drop us off by the vendor tents outside the pier area, quite a way from the ships. Some of our group walked back to the ship from there. As my daughter and granddaughter and I were resting before walking to the ship, I spotted a golf cart driving along the long Pier area. I flagged him down and asked him if he could give us a lift back to the ship. He picked up another dock worker and gladly gave the 3 of us a ride all the way back, saving us the long HOT walk. IMG_7282.mp4

I find it hard to believe that with the massive size of these ships Kitchens they can’t dedicate enough space for a great dim sum specialty restaurant. What a unique choice at sea this would provide!

@harryfat1Which cruise line offers that level of Asian food? That would be awesome if any of them did! I didn't eat at Izumi or Teppanyaki on Odyssey but from the menus I saw, they looked like pretty standard fare you could get t any decent Japanese restaurant.

It seems like some of you long time cruisers are spoiled by the service levels in the old days. I can’t even imagine what the room stewards would have to do with TWO room cleanup visits per day!? We thought that the cabin service by our Attendant on this cruise was very good and as we expected. We got everything we needed promptly and he was very nice always.

Our Cabin attendant saw me the first day and asked me what time we would like our cabin cleaned. He said all of his morning slots (til 1pm ) were filled, so he could do it after 4. I chose 4pm which worked out fine for us throughout the cruise. What does the family do at 3pm in the cabin…naps?

Kmom, sounds like BARRY (Bill Hader character and show) to me! LOL

There's a library on the ship? Damn, and I dragged my own books along on the cruise!

I guess he was under 107cm, whatever that is equal to in inches. Very disappointing.

@harryfat1What was the “Too young/small” restrictions? My almost 5 year old (and tall ) grandson was not allowed to do the bumper cars alone or with an adult. He was very disappointed!

An interesting article about this January Full “Wolf” moon (which we could not see here in the East). https://patch.com/new-jersey/fairlawn-saddlebrook/s/iuglq/how-to-see-full-wolf-moon-in-nj-and-why-its-namesake-howls?utm_term=article-slot-4&utm_source=newsletter-daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter&user_email=0ef2f8e48df15e41f8ce797a59759fa12b057c5850f594885e815022ef893277&user_email_md5=6b9b18b282d4cb58c67887c4dbc5bc0b&lctg=4daea851111cc9bda2055d20

Thanks @harryfat1 It is pouring here at the Jersey shore and we haven’t seen the sun (or the moon) for 3 days. Glad to know they are still up there 👍 Good night 😴

@harryfat1no photos of the slow method unpacking/ hanging shirts? No link to Marks YouTube speedy unpacking hacks?? Any advice on avoiding listening to Wooden Hangers clank against each other as the ships movement causes to happen if you don’t have enough shirts to take up every hanger? 🤷‍♂️😂

Yes 7:15 was our MTD nightly. We always waited together NOT on the line but by either by the elevators or just inside the MDR for our table to be ready. Usually within a few minutes of our time.

Our family party of 10 had one of these long tables with one side having "Booth seating". We were in the MDR with My Time Dining on Deck 3. After being moved around to different tables the first 3 nights, we were then given the same table for the final 5 nights of the cruise. We had a great waiter, assistant waiter and Head Waiter (Jackie) who made our dinner times awesome, especially for the kids!

Funny that Cheapo Dad would splurge on having 7 tablets to bring…isn’t one enough??😂. I’m pretty sure the cost of the Voom internet package for one device for the entire cruise was LESS than the cost of a tablet.

@harryfat1LOL, I guess you don’t purchase the “visit uncle in Prison” photo package from the cruise line then. Since I had pre-purchased the 50 photo package, I wanted to make sure we had LOTS of photos to choose from, thus stopping to visit uncle in prison before taking the elevator up to the boarding area.

Man, that’s taking Cheapo to a whole ‘nother level!🤦🏻‍♂️😂 we used those tag holders too and I wasted 2 sheets of paper to print two! lol 😂

Kmom, do you use packing cubes within your suitcase when packing? We have always used them but this time we stepped it up a notch and used “Compression packing cubes”. They really did work well for this trip. Besides packing for the 8 night cruise, we spent 3 nights in Florida before the cruise and 10 nights in Florida staying with friends after the cruise (and yes, the weather was cool and nasty @harryfat1 most of that time) so we were gone a total of 3 weeks. I know that it doesn’t impact the weight of what we pack (we did travel by plane to and from Florida so we did have to stay under 50 pounds) but the bigger bulky items do take up less suitcase space using these cubes. I’m still amazed from the number of people we met on the cruise who pack for the trip in a carry-on size bag, These people are my hero and I keep encouraging my wife that one day we will pack like that for a big trip! The only issue with packing for the return was our two Royal Caribbean robes we had delivered to our cabin, using our RCI Credit card points. They were really nice robes which were great to use while on the ship. Fortunately, we met up with other friends in Florida, who had driven down (they were spending several weeks in Florida) and we gave them the robes to drive home with them. Those would have been a problem packing for flying home. LOL.

I know you haven’t gotten to your actual “check-in” experience yet, but I wanted to comment here on ours. Our party of 10 in 3 cabins got a 12:30 check-in time. We were staying close to the port and got picked up at 11:00 AM. We were at the “buses drop off area” before 11:30. We flew thru check-in, security, boarding photos taken in the terminal and were on the ship by 11:45! I’m not sure what the “assigned” times are for and why it matters but RCI and the port staff were very efficient and organized to allow passengers to board when we got there. We were impressed with the whole process! BEFORE cruise photo…no tans 🤣