Norwegian Escape Trip Report 3/12 - 3/19. OK, Pre-Trip report for a little while!

[#55worktoplay]

I'll be onboard as well with my twin 17 year olds :) You can't miss them, they're 6'9 and 6'7.

 

Looking so forward to it!!

 

Can't wait for your live report.

 

P.S. Try to stay out of strangers cabins :):):)

[jewelmick]

Great Start!

 

Looking forward to the post report with a bunch of picture :D I'm not afraid of the Smilies.

[grammyfrimpy]

wow----I stopped reading after the part where your boys were not paying attention to your announcement to you wife about your friend's accomodations. way too much personal info....FYI

[Clarea]

Enjoying the report.

[TrojanDrew]

Back to the land of the living, I'll have my first installment up shortly! We had a great time, Weather was awesome!

[TrojanDrew]

wow----I stopped reading after the part where your boys were not paying attention to your announcement to you wife about your friend's accomodations. way too much personal info....FYI

well...here is where I need more emoticons. I apologize but do not know how to do a trip report...which is very personal..without being personal. So...probably best to not follow along.

 

Sorry if I offend anyone with my TR....but I am who I am. I promise to not give you my social security number. :)

 

Drew

[Bball35]

well...here is where I need more emoticons. I apologize but do not know how to do a trip report...which is very personal..without being personal. So...probably best to not follow along.

 

Sorry if I offend anyone with my TR....but I am who I am. I promise to not give you my social security number. :)

 

Drew

 

Can't wait to read the rest!!! Great sense of humor- loving it!!!! We leave Saturday!!!! YAY!!!

[TrojanDrew]

As luck would have it, day 1 would provide us with challenges right off the bat. Our flight was supposed to leave at 10:33am out of SFO. This meant an early rise and exit out of our house so we could get there, not worry about traffic, and not stress on the way to the airport. We rolled out of bed around 6:15 or so. i could be wrong on the time, and DW will correct me if I am. Plus she is sitting beside me and I already asked her a couple of questions.

 

Normally I do not write trip reports as I go, but I decided this time I would try. I even bought myself a blue tooth keyboard for my tablet so I didn't have to bring my laptop with me to do it. Yup, I planned ahead...which is a bit shocking actually. So We are actually floating just out of port as I write this so it's kinda embarrassing that I have to ask questions. Short term memory is going away. yikes! Damn you emoticons!

 

So anyway, we have a dog. Names Harley. He is a little white fluffball of a Maltese. Unfortunately for him he does not get to go on the trip with us, he get stuck in a kennel...well normally we pawn him off on my sister in law..but they are also going on a trip. I know, that is just wrong. why did they not check with us first and schedule around our schedule. The nerve of some people!

So we were due to deliver the dog to the kennel at 7:30am.

 

This is Harley. and Nick in the background. Yes that is his tongue hanging out. I'm pretty sure it gets longer every year. We have quite the collection of ugly harley pictures. He's a good dog though (but don't tell DW that. She doesn't need to know I like him.

 

We got out of the house shortly after 7, so we were right on time if not a bit early. check.

 

Delivered dog. Check.

 

Dog barked and tried to dig his way out of the kennel. check.

 

Now time for the drive. Without traffic we are about 1 hour and 15 minutes from the airport. Even with traffic generally no more than 1 hour 45 minutes. No, the issue was not with the drive. In fact the drive was pleasurable. We just broke down and finally bought fasttrak including the fasttrack that allows you to carpool on the new carpool lane on 580 in the Bay Area..so we flew on the way to the airport, not slowing down until we got onto 880 in Oakland. the entire time Connor was whining about food. Literally the moment we got into the car.. "when are we having breakfast". It's how he rolls.

 

Once we got close to the bridge we dropped off and stopped by Jack in the Box for breakfast. Now...I'm part of the generation that called Jack in the Box thinks like Jack in a Sack, Barf in a Bag among other things. But I have discovered gods gift to this green earth...their breakfast burritos. Particularly the sausage one. It is like nectar from the gods...except it's not liquid so that analogy makes no sense at all. Its got hash browns inside of it (take THAT Taco Bell, thinking you invented that), awesome sausage and egg. Good stuff all around. It does, however, have a boatload of grease...and I'm not exaggerating on the boatload part. Needless to say...phenomenal and if you have not been to Barf in a Bag lately...you don't know what your missing. As a side note...DW does not agree. But I digress.

 

Sorry for taking us off topic but let's be clear here I warned you from post number one that this was going to happen. Now is not the time to whine about me wandering while I tell a story. Save that for the end.....so I actually finish. Hopefully. DW can fill you in on that.

 

Anyhoo....using fasttrak we got to fly through the toll.....and then drive slowly on the bridge. Then we got on 101 north...and it was jammed. I'll be honest...I was getting a little nervous...I've done that trip a million times but 101 north right there is not usually backed up. But then...ah....a tow truck. Of course. There is a tow truck on the side of the road and a slightly banged up car that everyone, and I mean everyone, must stare at. I believe that is now on the California DMV test now. if you drive by anything on the side of the road you must stare at it. I read somewhere once that everyone would be willing to give up their 5 second look at an accident if everyone else did, to save time and keep traffic flowing. However, everyone DOES look because they just sat in 40 minutes of traffic getting up to the accident and, hey, they deserve a look don't they? Ahem. I digress. Again. Sorry.

 

While we are pulling off the freeway it happens. The dreaded....yes dreaded sound indicating that DW has a new e-mail. Why dreaded? At this time, this close to takeoff...can mean one thing...yes..we are delayed. OH, forgot to mention, before we even got to the parking lot, not 5 minutes after finishing breakfast...Connor..."what are we doing for lunch". Priorities kid. Priorities.

Yes we are delayed. From 10:33 until around 12:15. Our intention was to get to Fort Lauderdale and meet our friends for dinner. They flew on a redeye Thursday night. Well, that became Friday morning as they got delayed from 11pm until 2:30am. We were making fun of them as we would get more sleep. Uh huh.

 

So we park at a lot we had never tried at the Hilton at the Airport. The shuttles run every 20 minutes. Right when we get there and I'm unloading the luggage the bus pulls in...so I'm rushing the kids..come on kids..let's go and get on this shuttle. The guy HAD to have seen me. I mean I'm a big dude as you will at some point see in the pictures. So we finally get everyone out...Connor and Nick sure took their time...and...off the bus drives. nice. That made a good impression on me let me tell you. I am somewhat demanding. LOL...OK I'm overly demanding of service people because I believe that if you are in the service industry....you need to...oh I don't know...provide service. duh!

So we sat and froze our rear ends off, particularly Connor who was in Shorts. His rationale? When we get to Miami it will be hot. We laughed at him. Let me give you a little preview...not so funny later. But you will have to wait for that.

 

Finally the shuttle came...nice little guy and very helpful getting our bags in and out. and we got to the airport in no time. So we could sit around and wait. And wait. The lunch question answered itself as lunchtime came and went. Love spending $50 without buying any drinks. I travel alot for work...so don't think about it as much..but jeez! There is only one obvious answer here...i need to become independently wealthy. I'm kinda pissed off at my parents for not being multi-millionaires. At least they could own an NFL team or something. But I digress.

 

We finally took off around 2:30 pm which means we would land around 11pm Fort Lauderdale time. The flight was fine, always nice to have TV to watch. Jet Blue also gives you free internet now. Unfortunately because SFO has not entered the 20th century yet and there are not many plugs all of our devices were basically dead (a mistake we will NOT repeat on the way home). Add to that Jet Blue doesn't have plugs. I find this quite weird as pretty much everyone does. OK, Southwest doesn't I don't think. I took the hit on this from Connor because a few months ago he asked for a backup battery thing...and I told him he didn't need it. one of those times when your words come back to bite you. Damn you emoticons!

 

Little selfie to get us going.

 

So one interesting thing on the flight. the row in front of us kept going back and coming back with arms full of snacks. I think like 3 times. Not sure what possibly they could be doing. Stashing them? Taking them back to their home country (they appeared to be from another country). it was kind of strange to me...but maybe I'm part of the guilty generation that feels guilty even taking 2 bags of chips!

 

Yes you can follow our progress. Aren't you lucky. Well if this was live maybe this would be a good picture. But I didn't...so you are bored. Sorry about the keyboard marks on your forehead when you fell asleep and your face hit it.

 

We landed fine...unfortunately we had to check our bags so we then had to wait for them to come out at the baggage claim...then go get our car (a jeep), and head to the hotel about 20 minutes away. Connor was, shockingly, hungry. And interestingly enough there are no fast food places right near the airport. At least not that we could see. Weird. Finally we found a McDonalds, grabbed some food and made it to the hotel about 1:30 or so....in bed by 2. Long day....but the next day was time to board...and let the vacation begin. That's all for today...until next time!

 

I promise more pictures in upcoming episodes! Let me know if you have any questions along the way!

 

Drew

[Jim The Lizard]

Excellent fun review so far. Keep 'em coming!

[Sand and Seas]

OK....now I'm addicted and have to find out what happens on the cruise!

[TrojanDrew]

Morning came earlier than any of us would like. DW wanted to shower so we set the alarm for 7:30. I realize that doesn't sound bad when I put it that way. Keep in mind two things. 1. I am lazy. 2. we are still on California time...so that's 4:30: Yikes emoticon here.

 

Combine laziness with 3 hours...not good for grumpy kids. anyhooo..up and adam, grabbed our free breakfast downstairs.

 

Waffles...yum.

 

We went back finished packing, loaded the cars and off to Walmart for a few key items like Gel (so very key to my world), and suntan lotion. As we didn't check a bag we had to buy it here. Mission accomplished and off to the port.

 

So you can take this tip or not but we have found it very successful. Rent a car, and then drop everyone and the luggage off at the port. Do not, I repeat, do not drop the car off and take the rental car shuttle with everyone and your luggage. This will lead to whining kids, a broken back for dad, and just general stress you don't need. If you time it right you won't lose any time on the ship. we, of course, didn't time it right.

 

Our friends had rented from Budget who had an office downtown Miami. We rented from National and were returning to Miami International. Thinking back we should have dropped at the airport, then ridden in my friends car downtown and taken their shuttle to the port. We were stupid and did it backward which made it take longer and was just bad planning. Live and learn. Plus..we needed gas. No biggie. There are gas stations in Miami. Unfortunately I waited too long to plug the need for gas into Waze...so we had to go by the budget car return, to get to the gas station. Again no biggie..but as luck would have it....had to wait for a drawbridge to let a boat through. Seriously. Talk about timing. Then insult to injury...we gassed up...then while driving to return the car found another gas station for $.40 less. Figures. LOL

 

Made it to Budget, and then National at MIA, dropped that car too, hopped the shuttle and headed back. DW meanwhile had snagged boarding group number 5 and was giving me running commentary as they started to call groups..along with "when are you going to get here".

 

Luckily the shuttle dropped at Pier B first...so we were the first off, blew through security and came to a stop while we had to wait for everyone else to check in.

 

And there is the crowd. Maybe you are n the shot!

 

So there in lies the disadvantage of doing things my way. However, if we had all returned the car we would have been hauling luggage too...so my way is still better. It IS, after all, my trip report! :)

 

Finally we made it through, then up the gangway and onto the ship.

Connor and DW getting ready to get onboard

 

Now we have been on a number of cruises, so I wasn't shocked by the size of the ship, but she is very large. The entry not so impressive as they have you walk through crew areas...I found that a big odd, but it was easy enough to do. We pondered a few options for lunch and decided to hit the buffet. We learned very quickly to walk around and to the back to find seats...everything up front was packed...but in the back there was plenty of room.

 

I have to say, Norwegian does a nice job with flow. Though I knew there were thousands of people all trying to get their meals at the same time....there wasn't a problem getting food and getting it quickly. I found that quite impressive.

Ordered the first drink of the cruise...went with Coors Light which I later regretted. Not a big fan...and when I saw someone walking with a bottle of Corona with a lime in it I was jealous. I knew I would rectify that situation at a later date.

 

Drink numero uno. If you can call Coors Light a drink. Not much different than water....

 

Food at the buffet was nothing to write home about, except the ice cream. They have hand dipped hard ice cream in the buffet. Dreamy! So good...I went Butter Pecan which is one of my favorites. That definitely made the lunch time for me. Good vibes emoticon here...oh wait...there isn't one. Damn you emoticons! :)

 

Lunch over...we took the kids to sign them in at the teen club, the name of which escapes me, while the ladies went and dealt with reservation stuff. After that it was up on deck to find some chairs and let the kids change and hit the pools. As other people have noted..it gets busy on deck and finding chairs was not a breeze. We did end up finding chairs by the big tube waterslide...made our way to get drink number two at our now favorite bar, and settled in to chat.

[TrojanDrew]

Hopefully it's legal to post pictures of alcohol here.

 

The ladies finished and went to the staterooms and joined us on deck. I escaped for a little while to put stuff in our room and to put up the door magnets. Huh, I was just about to type that we appear to be the only door magnets onboard. HOWEVER, our stateroom is 17172, which is right by the stairs/elevators...so honestly I have no idea if others do as we never make our way through the hallways. I might have to do that at some point so I can honestly report on that. Oh, did I mention I'm lazy...yeah, that's not likely to happen.

 

 

The room is nice, and efficient. We are used to Disney which has the biggest rooms in the industry, but I can't say much bad about it to be honest. Maybe a little tight with two teenagers and two adults...but not terribly so. We LOVE that our room has the bed by the balcony...as Nick tends to stay out to all hours and it's nice to not have him crawling all over us to get in late at night. Plus DW tends to get up early, then she can hit the balcony and read. On other ships she would have had to crawl over the kids to get there....not here! So all in all I would give the room an A. Functional, Efficient, bed is super comfortable. As I'm a cheap bastard, no suite for me...so it's as good as I'm going to get!

 

The rest of the afternoon was spent by the pool hanging out. The drop slides were not open at all, at least as far as we could see...which brings me to my first rant. I do not understand why the attractions are not open all the time during the day. I have seen people say..oh it's the staffing. But Norwegian did order the ship, right? and I assume the ropes course and waterslides were not a surprise, right? So sorry, staffing isn't an excuse. It's being cheap..which to me is not acceptable. Those things should be open all the time, and should have some evening hours too...the kids LOVE to go on waterslides at night..it's fun. I would just like to see them consider this as it can have a big impact on what you do. I have heard they don't even open the ropes course in port until late afternoon...again...should be open for those that don't want to get off the ship. Just the opinion of a jaded traveler. LOL

 

Many drinks were had through the afternoon. my buddy Ben discovered "liquid marijuana" which is a Malibu based drink and has become a favorite of the ladies.

 

Liquid Marijuana

 

I'm not a huge fan of Malibu...so not for me, but many a beer and various other drinks were had through the day. I can't remember if I told you guys that I got a bunch of dollar coins for tips...but we of course forgot them in the stateroom. Will have to do that tomorrow.

 

Must be spring break. HUGE crowds of people in South Beach.

 

Nick and I on the balcony

 

Connor and I on deck. At least I think thats on deck. Can't tell for sure....and you wouldn't know any different....so yeah on deck. :)

[TrojanDrew]

Here is our closet..er..our room. yeah, already a mess. That was a constant struggle.

 

Dinner that night was at the Manhattan club. I didn't do food porn...so sorry about that folks. The restaurant was very nice and the service was good. I had the beef tenderloin which was, in a word, fabulous. I always cringe when ordering steak on a cruise ship outside of their steak restaurant....but this was great. Dessert not so much...the had a caramel brownie desert with ice cream...it was sugar free (should have been a clue), and was extremely dry, and came with no ice cream. He went and got it..but come on. LOL. I also tried a baked apple desert...and the way they wrote it I was picturing a whole apple baked. But no...it was basically apple pie filling. It was like....oh we had left over filling for the apply pie..throw it on the menu. So needless to say desert was a bust at dinner for me. Ben ordered Pistachio crème Brule which he loved...so it was good for some people!

 

Here is a great picture of our group in the Manhattan club.

 

After dinner we walked around the ship a bit...went and found the shops...and bumped into the liquor tasting. Wowza...that was cool. Tried John Walker Black and Double Black. I'm not a scotch guy, but had always wanted to try. Pretty interesting as you could definitely taste the difference between the black and double black. The double was much smoother. we tried a few other things as well, but none of which really stood out. Our friends said the alcohol prices were quite good (Kim works at a CVS and said that something was the same price as their sale prices, so if you are a big alcohol person there you go).

 

Shortly after the boys all went to the teen club to try to meet some people. Connor had met a friend earlier when we played ping pong (did I mention that), so he met him at the club, but was back in the room not long after. He is not that much of a social butterfly.

 

Nick ended up with a group of 4, which Matt then joined later, and they were out until about midnight. Couple of them are from Canada and one from Florida I think. He did that the last time we had a cruise too...and we only saw him at dinner time and sleeping in his bed. Not sure if that will be the same this time or not..we shall see how that works out.

 

The adults hung out for a while and then went standby for the 9pm comedy show. The thing that sucks about the comedy show is you wait in the atrium right under the casino...so smoky. As was the main atrium where guest services is. I'm surprised with a ship this new why there is so much smoke. Seems pretty easy to put ventilation in there and pump it out of the ship. At least one of the pay restaurants is right there by the comedy club...and a big group was eating right below the casino...can't imagine paying for a meal, and then having to sit there inhaling smoke while eating. Funny...we all did that not long ago! Do you remember? I'd say so far the smoke is the most bothersome thing to me. not a huge deal, just kind of annoying.

 

We got into the comey show which was pretty funny. Certainly good entertainment. We then had about an hour until the 11pm show which we had a reservation for. So we went back to the rooms for a bit...I have no idea how I didn't fall asleep but somehow managed to stay awake and we hit the second comedy show which was funny as well. It was an adult show so it was a bit rude, but funny. we finished that up and headed back to the room for the night.

Our towel animal was a cute little duck. good times. :)

 

Here is our duck!

 

That's it for today. next up: Chapter 3: Day at sea

[TrojanDrew]

sorry for multiple posts. I'm limited to 6 pictures, including emoticons. Damn you emoticons! Feel free to ask any questions along the way now while it's fresh. By the time I'm done i might not remember!

 

Drew

[TrojanDrew]

Excellent fun review so far. Keep 'em coming!

As you wish! Got harassed by DW to get it done sooner!

 

OK....now I'm addicted and have to find out what happens on the cruise!

Spoiler alert: we survive. :)

[pats4ever]

DH, you are doing a great job so far...you remember more than I thought you would:p. Just one correction...we were in 13172, not 17172 (although we sat out in the sun the majority of the time on the 17th deck so maybe it seemed like that is where our stateroom was!)

[CruisinwithZ]

Great report, we are sailing this coming Saturday... Is the motion of the shop any more noticeable than other cruise you have been on? Thank you.

[pats4ever]

Great report, we are sailing this coming Saturday... Is the motion of the shop any more noticeable than other cruise you have been on? Thank you.

 

The motion wasn't bad, but we did notice it more than on other ships. It was more of a shaking/jerking motion (I know that sounds weird, but it was hard to describe the movement). It wasn't a rolling movement or anything like that. Hope you have a great time!

[Jenjer]

Great report....squirrel :)

 

When I read your bio of loving Disney and disliking RCL I was worried your review would be pretty negative. Because nothing is Disney except Disney.

 

I am wondering why you disliked Rccl so much?

 

We did a Disney a couple of times when the kids where younger and then switched to Rccl now we go back and forth between Rccl and NCL. Between slides and flowriders.

[TrojanDrew]

Great report, we are sailing this coming Saturday... Is the motion of the shop any more noticeable than other cruise you have been on? Thank you.

As DW said...not bad, but it was just a constant shimmy. The only time I felt it really was when we had to speed up to get to St. Thomas....spoiler alert! But even the shimmy was not bad, easy to get used to and not noticeable at all.

 

Great report....squirrel :)

 

When I read your bio of loving Disney and disliking RCL I was worried your review would be pretty negative. Because nothing is Disney except Disney.

 

I am wondering why you disliked Rccl so much?

 

We did a Disney a couple of times when the kids where younger and then switched to Rccl now we go back and forth between Rccl and NCL. Between slides and flowriders.

hahahah...squirrel. Love it.

 

Actually you won't see a lot of negative here, we really had a good time. There will be some as there are some issues that could pretty easily be resolved...but overall it was a good experience.

 

As far as Royal goes...we did a 11 night trans-atlantic just the two of us (dumped the boys on the parents-in-law. Not sure which ship exactly right off hand, but it is now the second largest with their newest ship that came out. The ship herself was beautiful...the design very cool with Central park and everything. Our issue was mainly with the activities (some of the same issue on Norwegian), which were nonexistent. The rock wall was open for very short hours, the skating rink, the same thing. No movies playing ever....well except one night where they played grease. Just no activities. We did a 15 night Panama Canal on Disney and there was non-stop activities every night for you to do. Royal had activities about every 3rd night (because they repeated the same things). You couldn't sign up for some things because their website was not up to date. Quite frankly it seemed like they were surprised that they were doing a trans-atlantic. The ship was going into dry-dock, and it was like they figured they didn't care about trying to entertain passengers. We were not the only ones that felt that way, other people who sailed royal all the time were disappointed too.

 

Insult to injury...when we sail by ourselves we love to be at a big table with other people so we get to know others. We had requested early seating big table. When we showed up they had given us the equivalent of free style....dining. Not what we wanted. When we checked in they said...oh well, you have to change it on the ship. which was fine, but when we went to change it there was chaos and it was not obvious where to go, just a bunch of people milling around, and it took us over 2 hours to change it. Not a good way to start vacation. We again requested a big table. When we got to dinner that night they sat us at a table for 6. Two of which immediately switched (maybe we smell). So we got to know our other two table mates...but just not what we were looking for.

 

Finally and then I'll stop whining..the food was TERRIBLE. Awful. Gross. This was every night...not just once or twice. I ordered a pork tenderloin and you couldn't even stick a fork into it it was that tough. I showed the server who was concerned but didn't seem to see an issue. LOL. DW got calamari that was white....like they didn't even bother to fry it. Finally we decided to try the mexican restaurant which you had to pay for. Ordered the chips and salsa and fajitas. The chips were store bought out of a bag and the salsa was Pace Picante sauce. The Fajitas...I love fajitas. And when you think of them you think nice pieces of grilled chicken and nice vegetables. Nope, this was chicken sautéed in the fajita seasoning you buy at safeway...so much sauce that you couldn't taste the chicken. The server was awesome...everything else was just bad. particularly if I'm going to pay for a restaurant I expect it to be unbelievable. Now that I'm writing all this I realize I intended to send a letter to Royal but never got around to it.

 

Anyway, while the experience of crossing the atlantic was pretty cool, the RCCL experience not so much and we will not return.

 

All of us agreed we would definitely do Norwegian again however.

 

Sorry for being a debbie downer, but there ya go!

 

Drew

[Jenjer]

Your experience does not sound at all like my experiences with RCCL but we have never done a transatlantic pre dry dock. I would not have enjoyed what you described either. Thank You for sharing it. We miss the good old days of making friends at dinner, funny even my DD (14)misses it. Not enough to give up the big mega super ships.

 

If it was the 2nd it would have been Oasis since Allure is biggest (by like a foot) and Harmony will be even bigger by a small amount.

[pats4ever]

Your experience does not sound at all like my experiences with RCCL but we have never done a transatlantic pre dry dock. I would not have enjoyed what you described either. Thank You for sharing it. We miss the good old days of making friends at dinner, funny even my DD (14)misses it. Not enough to give up the big mega super ships.

 

If it was the 2nd it would have been Oasis since Allure is biggest (by like a foot) and Harmony will be even bigger by a small amount.

 

DH doesn't remember details like that...that is what I am here for...sometimes he likes me for it, other times, not so much. We were on the Allure. The biggest thing missing from a ship that size (in my opinion) is the slides. The other thing that we did not have in our favor was the cooler weather. I am fine if I can sit out in the sun and relax. But after the first couple of days, the weather got too cold to lay out. I think I read 14 books on that cruise since there wasn't much else to do. Good thing I like to read and had my Kindle all full! I also ran/walked on their track (which I hate doing, so that tells you something). But at least their track did not run right through the sun deck like it does on the Escape...not such a great idea on NCL's part.

[Jenjer]

Neither would my DH. Just last night he saw the Royal ad and said "maybe we(you) should check the price on our cruise?

 

ummmmm first we are sailing NCL and 2nd we are long after final payment. :cool:

 

We are looking forward to the collision of Flow riders and water slides on Harmony. Yeah!!!!! Its the perfect ship for us because DD lives and I do mean lives on the flowrider and DS who at home will barely go outside will climb the stairs for water slides for hours.

 

 

Can I ask you at totally non cruise question? Your from the San Fran area are you familiar with Tri Valley? How bad is the traffic there? Is it at all like OC or LA?

[pats4ever]

Neither would my DH. Just last night he saw the Royal ad and said "maybe we(you) should check the price on our cruise?

 

ummmmm first we are sailing NCL and 2nd we are long after final payment. :cool:

 

We are looking forward to the collision of Flow riders and water slides on Harmony. Yeah!!!!! Its the perfect ship for us because DD lives and I do mean lives on the flowrider and DS who at home will barely go outside will climb the stairs for water slides for hours.

 

 

Can I ask you at totally non cruise question? Your from the San Fran area are you familiar with Tri Valley? How bad is the traffic there? Is it at all like OC or LA?

 

Well our DH's sound very similar! Made me laugh about you being way past the final payment:) The Harmony sounds like it will be a great blend of the ships. I'm sure my boys would love the flowrider and the slides.

 

As far as the Bay Area goes...with Tri Valley, are you talking Pleasanton area? If so, I am very familiar with that area as I went to high school there. We now live a about 30 - 40 minutes from there. Regardless traffic is getting bad here. We used to live in LA and one of the main reasons we left was because of the traffic. Well, I think it has caught up to us. They are adding more Fast-trak/carpool lanes so that is helping, but it can sometimes be brutal. Let me know if you want any specific or general information and I am happy to help with what I can.

[TrojanDrew]

So I completely forgot a bit of information that I think is important about Fort Lauderdale Airport. I apologize that this will be whiny, but I think it will help people who are headed that way.

 

The rental car bus is an absolute nightmare. First we could not find where the bus picks up...there is a sign that points to the rental car bus...that's nice..but no actual sign where they bus picks up! It is actually between the terminals. We walked past it, to the other terminal where we saw the next rental car bus sign to keep going. That didn't seem right to me so I asked and realized we had gone past it. That was not the worst part.

 

I travel a lot. So I'm at airports a lot. It bothers me that so many airports seem to not know how many people are coming through the airport. In the case of rental cars, they don't seem to know how many people are renting cars. This annoys me even more because I sell software that could very easily show them how many people they should hire for these jobs! They know EXACTLY how many people have rented cars...and even which flights they are coming in on with in a few.

 

I digress...sort of. By the time the bus finally came it was packed..and we made it more packed. We were bumper to bumper in there. One guy behind me got mad because my backpack got in his way. LOL..not sure what I could have done about that.

 

I was closest to the door, so we decided that I would get out and go get the car (National so we got to pick our car). We made it to the rental car center and I hopped out. The sign said that we could get our rental cars on the second floor. OK...when you enter a building what do you do if you need to go to the second floor? go up, right? Wrong. We came in on the 3rd floor. Yeah that's not confusing at all. LOL. DW did exactly the same thing, so by the time Nick and I came down the escalator they were going up so we waited for them.

 

This is just a warning for those who are renting cars there...be aware it will take some time. Now a general observation. There are many airports throughout the country, obviously. At many of them the rental car companies have their own busses. At many others they are like FLL where they have one bus for all the companies.

 

I can say without a doubt....the airports with one bus are not nearly as efficient as the ones where the companies run their own busses. The bus drivers just don't care, and some airports (like Seattle) you have to walk 6 miles to get to them.

 

Anyhoo...don't want to be a downer but figured people may want to know.

 

I'll try to post another episode tomorrow!

 

Drew