Our cruise experience--embarkation day

[annecolorgreen]

September 18--we flew from Maui to Oahu and made it aboard painlessly (truly the easiest embarkation and debarkation of any cruise that I've done). The muster drill and then a "meet and greet" with CC members. UNFORTUNATELY, I misunderstood the original instructions--I thought were meeting in the Molokai Bar but it was the Molokai ROOM which wasn't listed on the ship cheat sheet of instructions of how to find things. Sadly, we had a "poor" turnout of only eight. Sad, because we didn't meet as many of you as I had hoped AND because the ship sent out several crew members to meet with us and had chocolate chip cookies/tea/coffee/juice prepared. I'm so sorry to any of you who tried to find us :(.

We headed out to the "pub crawl" which was really fun. One of our group wasn't even drinking and had fun following along. They gave out funny names, had funny toasts, and provided some "games" along the way that you could choose to participate in--or not. We had 158 people that afternoon and probably 40 people on Friday (I think because everyone was tired and packing up--because everyone seemed to really have a good time on this). $20 for five drinks/five bars. The end was poolside and there was a band and the group kind of hung out together for awhile.

Our room--balcony (worth it), clean, lots of storage, the room steward did a great job. The first day, I left a note and a $10 tip and asked if she would please clean out the fridge as I wanted to use it for personal items and she did it right away. I also tipped extra at the end (we were so busy, I didn't get to do it daily as planned). She was worth it. Kept ice in our bucket daily (sometimes twice a day) and we had plenty of towels and towel animals almost every night. I brought a large magnet announcing our anniversary and a "shopping list" type magnetic paper/pen and placed it on our door. We had several nice messages from people and one not so nice one. Oh well. It was also helpful for leaving your whereabouts for others.

I was awakened the first night because we didn't take time to hang clothes and the hangers were "clanging" in the closet as the ship rocked. Another night, I had left our kukui nut leis hanging in the bathroom on the door hook and they banged the door and woke me up. Just some thoughts on how to keep the room a bit quieter ;).

[kwbound]

Thank you for posting. I'm looking forward to the rest of your review. We leave next Friday and I can't wait!

[annecolorgreen]

I promise to get it up pretty quick--I've got to head to work for a few minutes! I will say that it was an overall wonderful experience...the only negative was the food wasn't amazing on board...but, to me, it's not about the food. We splurged a few nights at restaurants and that was worth it. We did the "Culinary Passport" which was $60/person for four restaurants.

[sue402001]

Can't wait to read the rest of your review!

[kwbound]

What time was the muster drill (or the Herman Munster drill as we call it in our family)? And what time was the pub crawl? That sounds like fun, although I don't know about 5 drinks. We have early mornings planned every morning. The pub crawl on Friday might actually be the one we would do.

 

Thanks!

[annecolorgreen]

The muster drill was at 4:30 although they were shutting everything down before 4:00 to prepare. We did NOT have to take our life jackets :D. The pub crawl started at 6:00 pm but sign ups were any time before that at any bar or from anyone selling drinks. If you signed up during the "normal" sign up time at the bar, it was pretty crowded.

 

We had very early mornings each day and the five drinks weren't bad. They weren't full sized but weren't small either. You could drink them quickly. It really was a fun way to start the cruise.

 

Hope this helps!

[smrtypnts]

So far so good. Looking forward to hearing everything you can share. Love the details.

[Sunny AZ Girl]

It sounds as if you had a nice start to the cruise. Too bad about the "not so nice" note. Some people don't have anything better to do.....:rolleyes:

[donaldsc]

Our room--balcony (worth it), clean, lots of storage, the room steward did a great job. The first day, I left a note and a $10 tip and asked if she would please clean out the fridge as I wanted to use it for personal items and she did it right away. ).

 

She would have done it if you had not bribed her in advance. We never do and they always take care of our reasonable needs including an extra bucket of ice every day at 4:00 to cool off our wine. Of course, we do tip extra at the end.

 

DON

[annecolorgreen]

oh, I know, I was just in a good mood ;)

[Ms belp]

She would have done it if you had not bribed her in advance. We never do and they always take care of our reasonable needs including an extra bucket of ice every day at 4:00 to cool off our wine. Of course, we do tip extra at the end.

 

DON[/quote

 

Well ladidamda. Bribed? I think she gave a very good review of what to expect and your comment was unwarranted. I for one am looking forward to our first Hawaiian cruise. Tipping extra is nice, not needed, but much appreciated.