My View: First Semi-Live From Oasis - The Cruise that almost didn't happen!

[mstelly]

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[APDMOM]

Specialty Coffee prices at Promenade Cafe:

 

 

 

 

 

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[APDMOM]

I could not find the Coastal Kitchen menu, as it is not posted anywhere we could see. We don't have access to Coastal Kitchen.

 

Hopefully, someone in a suite will post them :)

 

 

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[TNcrzr4life]

Thank you so much for the coffee prices!! Enjoy your last evening onboard [emoji4]

 

 

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[APDMOM]

Thank you so much for the coffee prices!! Enjoy your last evening onboard [emoji4]

 

 

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You are welcome! It certainly has been a very relaxing cruise for us - just what we needed :)

 

 

 

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[APDMOM]

Well, I did not quite get the Adventure Ocean pages ready to post yet. I will prioritize those when we get home.

 

It had been a great week, and a lot of fun posting my first "live" tidbits. I have plenty of pictures to share, as well as thoughts about our experience.

 

For those boarding soon: You are in for a treat! The ship staff members have all been extremely friendly and helpful. I will share more on that when we get home.

 

I hope I answered all the questions- if not, please repost. We will be on the ship until about 10 am.

 

Thanks for reading along!!

 

 

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[BillOh]

So did your husband zip line or not?

[OCSC Mike]

Back home (from this same cruise) and just catching up on stuff but I had to go back through your thread since I only got to skim it on board Friday morning. It was even more in-depth than I realized and should be required reading for anyone going on Oasis in the near future.

 

I saw you in the DL one morning towards the end of the week but was in a hurry so didn't stop to say hi. This was a family cruise with my DW's parents and sister's family including our 3 and 7 year old nieces so we didn't have a ton of say in scheduling at times. Still had a good time of course and I get along great with my in-laws but I couldn't help but miss planning things with my wife since our preferences are, well ours, and don't necessarily follow a schedule that involves afternoon naps, 5:30 dinners, and trips to the carousel.

 

I'll likely get a review up in the next few days but it will be more of an overview with highlights and low-lights.

 

Glad you enjoyed the cruise and, again, amazingly thorough job with the review. I kinda wish you had gone before us so I could have had such current info all in one place instead of searching CC and piecing together stuff from various reviews from the past couple months.

[MooNGaTe27]

Thanks for all the post hope you had fun:)

[irun5k]

Just off this sailing myself. Does anyone know anything about the injured person on Labadee? I heard it was a young lady on a jet ski. Obviously I don't know her, but just the same really hope to hear she is OK, such an awful thing to have happen.

 

I'm not sure where they would take a patient from here? Dominican Republic? The helicopter (spanish markings) seemed to take off low heading around the coast.

[DISFANS3]

Glad you made it on..

[OCSC Mike]

Just off this sailing myself. Does anyone know anything about the injured person on Labadee? I heard it was a young lady on a jet ski. Obviously I don't know her, but just the same really hope to hear she is OK, such an awful thing to have happen.

 

I'm not sure where they would take a patient from here? Dominican Republic? The helicopter (spanish markings) seemed to take off low heading around the coast.

 

Never heard anything. No idea where the helicopter was headed but if it wasn't leaving Hispanola I'm not sure why it needed to refuel. I won't even pretend to know anything about the subject though so I'll just hope for the best.

[APDMOM]

Hi, Everyone! We are back home and the first two loads of laundry are about done :D

 

I am working on loading my pictures onto the computer, and will post those over the next couple of days.

 

Tonight, I will post the promised children's programs. I will also try to recap our experience of this much needed and appreciated cruise. All our CC insurance cheerleaders will be glad to know that DH has now realized that trip insurance is a good idea.... LOL! We only bought it for 1 of our 24 cruises, but this will now become a line item on our cruise budget. ;p

 

It took an "almost miss" to bring us around.

[APDMOM]

Note regarding arrival and parking at the port:

 

Today's drop off was pretty backed up, because a pickup truck had broken down in the center lane... so, I am sorry for those who tried to get through that mess :o

 

Due to DH not being able to help with suitcases, and a very long line at the parking garage elevator, I got the car from the parking garage and drove around to pick them up with the luggage. (If you saw a lady with a blue dress lugging and loading luggage for her cowboy DH, that was me :D)

 

Doing this is a great option, as there are usually 2 lanes for pick up, 2 lanes for drop off, and one lane to exit.

So, after you pass customs, leave your luggage and a member of your party at the pick up area, get the carfrom the garage, and drive around. It saves time waiting at the garage elevator, or lugging heavy suitcases up the stairs.... and it should flow nicely if there is no broken down pickup truck.;)

[APDMOM]

So did your husband zip line or not?

:D Unfortunately, he was restricted from any heavy activities - including carrying suitcases. So, there was no ziplinining, rock climbing, or even minigolf. We had to cancel our parasailing this time, but I am looking for sales on our November cruise... would love to do it then!

[OCSC Mike]

We had an excellent, albeit completely different, experience leaving today. In total, we were a party of 8 with 2 groups of 4, 2 cars, and 2 from the group had just done a B2B. Short version... we had a lot of luggage and 2 cars parked on 2 separate floors. My BIL and I were going to get our 2 cars to bring down to pick-up but the porter who brought our 12 or so suitcases out of the terminal suggested letting him bring the whole cart up to the 2nd floor of the garage where it's less congested. So I went with my BIL to get his car from the 3rd floor and showed him where I had parked on the 2nd so he could re-park right next to me. After a short wait for the porter to get up the elevator, he loaded everything into the appropriate cars and (after a generous tip that we all agreed he earned) we were on our way.

 

We had an admittedly complicated configuration of cars, people, and luggage, so it might not be the way to go for others (I'm used to my wife and I packing light and wheeling our suitcases right off the ship) but I figured I'd share anyway.

[APDMOM]

Thank you! I am bookmarking this! We going on Oasis in October - same itinerary - and this has been so thorough and helpful!!

 

Question for anyone: I noticed the same wine (Kim Crawford Sauv Blanc) was a different price in several pix. Sometimes it was $13, another time it was $17. Has anyone ever experienced this before? Is one bar a more premium experience, perhaps? Thanks!!

 

Good question! I think Bob (Clarea) has the best description for this practice: "Dynamic Pricing." We have noticed that on almost every ship, you will get different price quotes for the same drinks. So, we go to the bars and ask them how much a certain drink would be (like our favorites - "love connection" or "labadoozie"), then buy from the cheapest. That has been our experience...

[APDMOM]

Back home (from this same cruise) and just catching up on stuff but I had to go back through your thread since I only got to skim it on board Friday morning. It was even more in-depth than I realized and should be required reading for anyone going on Oasis in the near future.

 

I saw you in the DL one morning towards the end of the week but was in a hurry so didn't stop to say hi. This was a family cruise with my DW's parents and sister's family including our 3 and 7 year old nieces so we didn't have a ton of say in scheduling at times. Still had a good time of course and I get along great with my in-laws but I couldn't help but miss planning things with my wife since our preferences are, well ours, and don't necessarily follow a schedule that involves afternoon naps, 5:30 dinners, and trips to the carousel.

 

I'll likely get a review up in the next few days but it will be more of an overview with highlights and low-lights.

 

Glad you enjoyed the cruise and, again, amazingly thorough job with the review. I kinda wish you had gone before us so I could have had such current info all in one place instead of searching CC and piecing together stuff from various reviews from the past couple months.

 

Thanks, Mike! I certainly understand the family schedule :)

[APDMOM]

A collective "you are welcome" to all who posted their appreciation!

 

It has been fun doing this first 'semi live' posting. It did not interfere with our cruise at all, and I think it has actually been part of the fun! In the future, if we get the internet package, I think this is the way I will start my reviews. It has been much less time consuming than I thought, and it saves organization time to start the reviews at home.

 

Thanks to all reading along!

[APDMOM]

Kids Programs - babies and tots:

 

 

 

Adventure Ocean:

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[APDMOM]

Teens:

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[APDMOM]

Unfortunately, I only have two days of specific planners for Adventure Ocean:

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[irun5k]

Note regarding arrival and parking at the port:

 

Today's drop off was pretty backed up, because a pickup truck had broken down in the center lane... so, I am sorry for those who tried to get through that mess :o

 

Ah so that is what it was. It took quite a while to get through. Our porter dumped our stuff right outside the terminal and then I realized as I was waiting in the line with the car to meet the wife, kids, and luggage that it would have been much, much better to walk the luggage further away from the terminal- but instead I had to wait in that big back up to reach them. Or, just take our own luggage up the elevator, although our 2 1/2yr old ties up one set of adult hands so that would have been difficult.

 

Actually, I was a bit depressed after seeing some porters taking luggage up the elevator. I saw this *after* tipping our guy $20 for 3 pieces of luggage. Had he helped us up the elevator to our car we could have skipped that big queue altogether. I realized he did up a bit of a disservice by dumping us right in that big pile of people outside the terminal. Oh well!

[legaljen1969]

actually ended up on same cruise as my boss (found out day before I left!) but have only run into them twice.

 

I really like my current boss, but I have a thing about my leisure time being spent with people I work with (especially a boss.) I would be so uncomfortable, even knowing the size of the Oasis.

 

Here at home, if I ever walked into a restaurant and saw my boss, I would leave and go somewhere else. I only once got cornered in a restaurant where I was already about to be served and my boss walked in. He saw me and said he would just sit with me. It ended up being a decent meal, but still....

 

Hope you have a great vacation.

[legaljen1969]

......including our 3 and 7 year old nieces so we didn't have a ton of say in scheduling at times. Still had a good time of course and I get along great with my in-laws but I couldn't help but miss planning things with my wife since our preferences are, well ours, and don't necessarily follow a schedule that involves afternoon naps, 5:30 dinners, and trips to the carousel.

 

We just had a similar experience on a Disney vacation with my brother and our 12 and 6 year old nieces. Having a pre-teen and a rising second grader makes the scheduling that much more interesting. We missed a lot of things we normally do trying to make it is "family" oriented as we could. We had one dinner by ourselves, but did most everything with family It's always good to be with family, and those times are cherished. But I totally know where you are coming from. We had a lot of nights centered around where our nieces could get plain buttered noodles (no tomato sauce or alfredo sauce). LOL