My View: The Blonde, The Bullethead, and The Brilliant Ship (Semi-live B2B)

[hapster85]

Our Turn Over Experience:
We enjoyed a leisurely breakfast in the main diningroom.  We picked up our new seapass cards at guest services around 8:45, then waited in Café Latte-Tudes while the last of the guests were being called and escourted off the ship.  They had to call about 8 of them by name... seems like they were trying to stow away [emoji23] (Just kidding!  Don’t spread that as a rumor).
 
We met about 9:20 in the conference room, walked off the ship, got our passports checked in the terminal (just in a hallway, not at the customs counters), and waited about 5 minutes to board again.  Easy Peasy!  It was such fun to walk back on as the 3rd, 4th, and 5th guests of this sailing!
 
 
 

Just found your review today, so I'm late to the party, but glad I found it. Always enjoy reading your reviews, and loving the pictures. Definitely helps pass the time until our next cruise in September. Not a bad way to kill time at work on a Friday afternoon, either.

Too bad you couldn't stay onboard for turnaround, like we did last summer on Adventure. But a cruise is still a cruise.

[NemoCrownie]

On 3/20/2019 at 3:50 PM, APDMOM said:

We returned from breakfast to our room nicely cleaned and made up, with a surprise on the balcony...

 

It is not quite a lounger, but at least MUCH more comfortable than the chairs that are provided on the balcony.  When you are short and your feet don’t touch the ground on the regular balcony chairs, there is just no way to relax.  Now I have this nice chair to enjoy our balcony!  It came just in time, as this cruise has been markedly more crowded and rowdy... more about that later.  The way I secured the chair was by asking Sue, our concierge in the diamond loung,  if they have any old or semi-broken loungers stored somewhere.  She made a phone call and this was the result:

 

Bliss!  An amaretto sour ($10.80 with gratuity, for those who don’t buy the package) on my newly found lounging chair:

I am so disappointed to see your balcony furnishings; I had noted on a previous cruise that Serenade's extended balconies did not have loungers but hoped that was just an anomoly. Above is our furniture on the Jewel two years ago (you can barely see it but there are 2 tables, 2 loungers and 2 chairs).  We adored our cruises on the Brilliance but I am sad to see that our main reason for booking these cabins has been eliminated.  I have so enjoyed your review and it looks like it was a wonderful b2b.  

[LBumb]

Great photos

[nivek82]

Hope you had a great last day. Thanks for bringing us along and all the pictures. Sorry to see this end but it also signals it’s my turn to board.  😀

[APDMOM]

5 hours ago, hapster85 said:

Just found your review today, so I'm late to the party, but glad I found it. Always enjoy reading your reviews, and loving the pictures. Definitely helps pass the time until our next cruise in September. Not a bad way to kill time at work on a Friday afternoon, either.

Too bad you couldn't stay onboard for turnaround, like we did last summer on Adventure. But a cruise is still a cruise.

Hi, hapster!  Always fun to see a familiar face here 🙂 Yes, we would have loved to do another leg, but work calls.  At least our next adventure is only 10 weeks away - 14 days on MSC Seaside.  Looking forward to exploring that new experience.

[APDMOM]

4 hours ago, NemoCrownie said:

I am so disappointed to see your balcony furnishings; I had noted on a previous cruise that Serenade's extended balconies did not have loungers but hoped that was just an anomoly. Above is our furniture on the Jewel two years ago (you can barely see it but there are 2 tables, 2 loungers and 2 chairs).  We adored our cruises on the Brilliance but I am sad to see that our main reason for booking these cabins has been eliminated.  I have so enjoyed your review and it looks like it was a wonderful b2b.  

I will definitely be mentioning in my survey about the balcony furniture.  In my opinion it would be a nice compromise for the noise from the atrium.  In fact, we had read about the noise, but could not have imagined the intensity.  We thought that the large balcony would make up for it.  However, without the loungers, this balcony is a “no go” for us in the future.  I will definitely recommend the compromise of loungers in both my surveys.  🙂Maybe I could help some future CC friends! 

[APDMOM]

The Colony Club:

 

 

 

[APDMOM]

Last Dinner (for now):

[APDMOM]

Packing time... I guess I need to do that 🙂

 

If wifi keeps, I will be back later tonight.

[jaspercat]

WooHoo -- a live review with tons of great photos from APDMOM! Have a couple more pages to catch up on, but wanted to say "Hi" and Thank you APDMOM - your reviews and pics are always great!

 

Edited March 23, 2019 by jaspercat

[APDMOM]

1 hour ago, jaspercat said:

WooHoo -- a live review with tons of great photos from APDMOM! Have a couple more pages to catch up on, but wanted to say "Hi" and Thank you APDMOM - your reviews and pics are always great!

 

Thank you, jaspercat!  Found us just in time... Unfortunately, this is my view tonight:

 

The Cruise Graveyard:

[APDMOM]

Day 5 Cruise Compass and Adventure Ocean Program:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[APDMOM]

My View:  End of Day 5, Second leg

 

Sundowner 🙂

 

[APDMOM]

With that, I bid you goodnight for now!  I will be back with a few more ship and cabin pictures, tips & takeaways, as well as the verdict on Brilliance... Did she surpass our current favorite ship?  We will share that from home.  🙂

[APDMOM]

3 hours ago, nivek82 said:

Hope you had a great last day. Thanks for bringing us along and all the pictures. Sorry to see this end but it also signals it’s my turn to board.  😀

 

Sleep well!  We will try to get off quickly so that your adventure can begin 🙂

[perfect match]

11 hours ago, dpostman said:

 

Ooooo Thank you so much.  Secret Hideaways and areas are my 3rd favorite spots on ships.

 

Now would you kindly delete your amazing pictures so no one else finds out 😁

 

dp

 

Too late! I already saw the pictures!😁

 

Now to find and book a cruise on Brilliance to take advantage of those wonderful looking spots! 

[DISFANS3]

Awesome trip report..

[Lovetotraveltami]

Thank you very much for the detailed review.  We will be on Brilliance in 13 days. This is our first Caribbean cruise.  Looking so forward to it as we have had a long winter up north.

[I_r_a]

Thanx for sharing, AP

 

Ira

[RazorbackIslandGirl]

APDMOM- Thank you so much for taking us along on your B2B adventure! Your photos are absolutely beautiful! They help ease the pain of waiting until we are able to "ding" that card & start our own adventure at sea!

[mcgore83]

Great review and photos!  As usual, I have enjoyed your review.  Thank you for sharing.

[APDMOM]

My View: Back to Reality!

 

We are back home and just finishing up a third load of laundry.   😬 Despite my best intentions to sleep through the night and ignore “The Bridge”, I just could not do it.  I woke up at 1 a.m. and was on the balcony by 3:30 a.m. with my camera in hand.  I am thinking besides the cruise addiction, there is this camera addiction too!  So, I saw Rhapsody sail under the bridge, captured a few more pictures, and finally fell asleep. 😂

 

 

[APDMOM]

Stateroom/Cabin 8088: With tips and tricks

 

I love the fact that there is a curtain to divide the room:

 

For the newbies:  There are storage cabinets behind the mirrors at the vanity, as well as the mirror in the bathroom:

 

 

 

 

During the week, this nifty nightlight showed up inside the bathroom door.  It detects motion, and therefore activates at night so that you don’t need to turn on the bathroom light:

 

Unfortunately, the shower still has the old-fashioned curtain:

 

 

 

 

[APDMOM]

I will hopefully wrap up my review tomorrow, after I unpack and post the debatkation info, diamond coupons and a few more ship pictures.  I have to look back to see which areas I did not cover, because after nine days my brain is a bit fuzzy.  😂

 

A Great Big Thank You for all the followers and compliments!  It has been fun bringing everyone along, even if only virtually!

[blueridgemama]

19 hours ago, APDMOM said:

My View:  End of Day 5, Second leg

 

Sundowner 🙂

 

 

Your photos are beautiful. You can tell that you put a lot of thought into the composition and framing.