Royal Caribbean Cruisers -- How Are Things Where You Are? (was "Routine" ​ 😁 ​day in lockdown... how was yours?)

[Island2Dweller]

28 minutes ago, Oceansaway17 said:

Dover easy to get to from Heathrow?  

Not especially.  About two hours by road - can be more as you have to deal with some of the most congested roads in Europe.  You can go by public transport, which will also be about two hours.  One change from Piccadilly line to rail at Kings Cross-St Pancras.

[grapau27]

5 minutes ago, Oceansaway17 said:

one of these days I would love to try P&O but unsure if I can book from USA.

I read that you have never been on a Holland ship even though you are on their threads is that True?

glad you had a nice time.

 

So next year I am sailing out of Southampton (Emerald Princess) and hope to take the National Express from Heathrow. Is it true reservations are not necessary?  Also, thinking perhaps a train from London.

Lastly, is Dover easy to get to from Heathrow?  

 

bye for now

 

I am sure you as well as others are disappointed that RCI is putting the Indy again in UK ports.

You should be able to book with an online agent for P&O in the US although Royal Caribbean ship facilities are in a different league.

On our recent cruise I spoke to Spanish and German passengers.

We have sailed on every P&O ship and would give you helpful information if you decided to book.

National Express special offers are online and for peace of mind you would be best to pre-book.

In 2007 we got a National Express coach from Heathrow airport to Dover when we sailed on NCL Gems maiden voyage.

I only post on the Daily on HAL and have not sailed on HAL and i joined when I got a mailshot of Rotterdam and wanted more information.

The majority of the Daily posters I would love to meet and the reason I still post here.

30 of our 67 cruises have been from Southampton and if only HAL sailed from Southampton we would sail with them without any doubt.

The few new HAL itineraries from Dover were twice the price of P&O balcony cabins and my wife Pauline likes P&O.

On Royal we have been Diamond plus for 10 years but now I mainly post on Dani Negreanus daily thread.

On P&O I mainly post on their daily.

Even though we are Elite on Princess I rarely go on their forum.

[Keksie]

Guess who stopped by yesterday for quick xrays before being transported to a refuge with the proper permits (but no X-Ray machine).  The picture is from the transporter who posted it on book of faces so it is ok for me to post.  We are not allowed to take pictures of our patients.

 

 

 

 

[sgmn]

5 hours ago, grapau27 said:

Thank you Sue.

There was 6500 passengers on board including 2000 first time cruisers but it didn't feel crowded

There are no tips required on board and no additional gratuities on drinks or food although I did tip in the speciality restaurants because the food and service was outstanding.

The price of drinks are reasonable considering they have a captive audience.

Aurora and Arcadia the 2 smallest and oldest ships are Adults only.

Arvia,Azura,Britannia,Iona and Ventura are all nice ships.

The biggest and newest Arvia and Iona have much more choice of everything.

We were on Iona in November 2023 and January2023 for 14 nights and March 2024 for 7 nights.

2 negatives on this ship are the deck 8/9 balconies are not private because of the wrap around promenade deck on deck 8.

The aft balconies are great but the Infinity pool on deck 16 has been known for people splashing water on the balconies below.

 

Thanks Graham. I think we may give them a go maybe in a year or two.  

BTW I'm not sure exactly where you live but there's a chance you may see a partial eclipse of the sun tomorrow,7.55pm 

[sgmn]

3 hours ago, lenquixote66 said:

It is based on the book and the film .I never read the books nor did I ever see the film .The series is very well made .There was only one flaw that I detected .

Thanks Lenny and Debbie @Sunshine3601 I'll add it to my list of programmes to watch.

 what was the flaw ?

[grapau27]

22 minutes ago, sgmn said:

Thanks Graham. I think we may give them a go maybe in a year or two.  

BTW I'm not sure exactly where you live but there's a chance you may see a partial eclipse of the sun tomorrow,7.55pm 

Thank you Sue.

Sunderland.

 

[sgmn]

10 minutes ago, grapau27 said:

Thank you Sue.

Sunderland.

 

Ah maybe just in the 5 min zone, more than us in the South anyway 

Edited April 7 by sgmn

[Oceansaway17]

50 minutes ago, grapau27 said:

You should be able to book with an online agent for P&O in the US although Royal Caribbean ship facilities are in a different league.

On our recent cruise I spoke to Spanish and German passengers.

We have sailed on every P&O ship and would give you helpful information if you decided to book.

National Express special offers are online and for peace of mind you would be best to pre-book.

In 2007 we got a National Express coach from Heathrow airport to Dover when we sailed on NCL Gems maiden voyage.

I only post on the Daily on HAL and have not sailed on HAL and i joined when I got a mailshot of Rotterdam and wanted more information.

The majority of the Daily posters I would love to meet and the reason I still post here.

30 of our 67 cruises have been from Southampton and if only HAL sailed from Southampton we would sail with them without any doubt.

The few new HAL itineraries from Dover were twice the price of P&O balcony cabins and my wife Pauline likes P&O.

On Royal we have been Diamond plus for 10 years but now I mainly post on Dani Negreanus daily thread.

On P&O I mainly post on their daily.

Even though we are Elite on Princess I rarely go on their forum.

aw thanks for your nice reply.  I will prebook like you said and pick the option if I get delayed.

A little worried about getting to Southampton as a lot of cruise lines no longer have hotel packages with transportation.  They send you to the trains.  I am glad I did Celebrity in 2019 with hotel packages.  

 

Nice to know bus goes to Dover.  I remember when more ships like say Disney went out of Dover. 

 

Hal is no longer even doing cruises out of Copenhagen. In fact, a lot of ships have pulled out of Copenhagen as well as Amsterdam.  I guess water issues and locals complaining just like Bar Harbor and Key West.  Glad I did Bar Harbor last year and the year before on Adventure OTS.

 

You must come over to Miami and get on the ICON OTS.  I will be on her in 4 weeks and looking forward to seeing the layout.

 

BTW where I live in PA, I will have 90% of the solar eclipse and will watch tv coverage and not look at the sun.

 

Well now good to chat with you.

 

[Oceansaway17]

1 hour ago, Island2Dweller said:

If there are still seats available, you can pay the driver and get on.  But services can be busy and if the coach is already full with reserved passengers then you will be left behind.  If you need to get to the port that day, I would certainly reserve a seat.

The trains to Southampton leave from central London (not Heathrow).  Not a recommended option if you are starting at Heathrow

do the trains fill up and need reserving.    I also worry if the plane is late about my bus so I would make sure I had a 4 hour cushion or more.  

[Oceansaway17]

1 hour ago, Island2Dweller said:

Not especially.  About two hours by road - can be more as you have to deal with some of the most congested roads in Europe.  You can go by public transport, which will also be about two hours.  One change from Piccadilly line to rail at Kings Cross-St Pancras.

aw thanks I will give Dover a pass.  Sounds like lots of roads in UK are busy.

[Gardener5b]

1 hour ago, sgmn said:

Thanks Graham. I think we may give them a go maybe in a year or two.  

BTW I'm not sure exactly where you live but there's a chance you may see a partial eclipse of the sun tomorrow,7.55pm 

We are in the path of totality, with expected time of 3 minutes 29 seconds.   They are expecting crazy amounts of traffic in our area.   Several major roadways have been designated for emergency vehicle access, and they are warning residents that cell phone coverage will probably be overwhelmed.    They are even starting our weekly trash pick up to begin at 5am to be off the streets ahead of the eclipse.  Thankfully we don't have to travel.  We have our Eclipse glasses, so are all set to watch from our home.

Edited April 7 by Gardener5b

[A&L_Ont]

6 hours ago, Jimbo said:

Wow, now that looks like really good Food. Hope Royal is seeing what P&0 is putting out and Royal steps up their game!

It sure does look good. If The Bee ever sees it, it will be worse for the boards here. 😆

[A&L_Ont]

We are preparing for the eclipse tomorrow. We do not have totality where we live, but are an hour away for where it will be so there should be good darkness 
 

@Sea Dog I might be sacrificing the old GoPro Black 7. Lisa might be getting me a new on for Father’s Day’s, especially if this one dies.

 

I’m going to cut out lense of the ISO eclipse glasses and tape it so it go over the GoPro lense. I’m going to try it with a time lapse. 
 

Maybe very video to come tomorrow night. 

 

 

[lenquixote66]

1 hour ago, sgmn said:

Thanks Lenny and Debbie @Sunshine3601 I'll add it to my list of programmes to watch.

 what was the flaw ?

I am not going to tell you till you see it.We can discuss it afterward.

[Sea Dog]

7 minutes ago, A&L_Ont said:

We are preparing for the eclipse tomorrow. We do not have totality where we live, but are an hour away for where it will be so there should be good darkness 
 

@Sea Dog I might be sacrificing the old GoPro Black 7. Lisa might be getting me a new on for Father’s Day’s, especially if this one dies.

 

I’m going to cut out lense of the ISO eclipse glasses and tape it so it go over the GoPro lense. I’m going to try it with a time lapse. 
 

Maybe very video to come tomorrow night. 

 

 

I like that idea. I hope you get a new one. That new Insta360 Ace Pro looks pretty interesting too if you are thinking of something different than Go Pro.

[Gardener5b]

25 minutes ago, A&L_Ont said:

We are preparing for the eclipse tomorrow. We do not have totality where we live, but are an hour away for where it will be so there should be good darkness 
 

@Sea Dog I might be sacrificing the old GoPro Black 7. Lisa might be getting me a new on for Father’s Day’s, especially if this one dies.

 

I’m going to cut out lense of the ISO eclipse glasses and tape it so it go over the GoPro lense. I’m going to try it with a time lapse. 
 

Maybe very video to come tomorrow night. 

 

 

That should work.   We ordered a set of glasses and a set of lens covers for our phones.   The lens covers are just slightly larger versions of the lenses for the glasses.

[A&L_Ont]

Just now, Gardener5b said:

That should work.   We ordered a set of glasses and a set of lens covers for our phones.   The lens covers are just slightly larger versions of the lenses for the glasses.

From watching a video I don’t think I will need to cover the lense of my go pro for a time lapse.  What do you think?  I’m not fooling around with my phone of mirrorless camera. 

[Gardener5b]

2 minutes ago, A&L_Ont said:

From watching a video I don’t think I will need to cover the lense of my go pro for a time lapse.  What do you think?  I’m not fooling around with my phone of mirrorless camera. 

Sorry, not really sure.  Everything I've read indicated the only "safe" time to be without special lens protection is during the few minutes of total eclipse.    I'm amazed at how big of an event this has become in our area.  

[h20skibum]

It was a beautiful day for hiking today, so we traveled to Nelson-Kennedy Ledges State Park in Ohio. They had four short trails.  One listed as easy, two listed as moderate, and one listed as extreme.  

 

There were quite a few large sandstone rock formations that made for an interesting hike.  We hadn’t watched any videos or researched the trails prior to jumping in. 

 

On the extreme trail, we made it through the fat man’s peril.

 

 

The trail kept getting narrower, and we got to the portion appropriately named “the squeeze”.

 

 

When you got through the squeeze, you ended up in the devil’s ice box.  The way out is straight up the rock wall where you can see a little daylight about 15-20 feet up. I had to climb up to a ledge, help Susan up, and repeat until we made the top. 

 

There were a couple waterfalls along the trails.  This one was at the end of an easy trail. 

 

 

Our last trail at this park took us on a moderate path.  Through the “dwarf’s pass”

 

 

And on to find the waterfall at the end of this trail. 

 

 

If you look at the top right of the photo, you can see someone sitting at the top of the rock, so it gives an idea of scale.  

 

One neat thing was the the gold miner’s cave that was behind those falls. 

 

 

 

 

[Lionesss]

Hi everyone. 
 

I am so happy my life centers around retirement. With so much free time. NOT!

 

This past weekend I was in charge of the cookie table for  our parish center dedication for one of the best Priests a Catholic Community could ask for. 
 

Now I made the buckeyes, nut keiffels, Kolachi and Almond soft batch. 
 

 

 

 

 

The women of our parish  also baked for a combined total of 34 varieties. 
 

Need I say it was a great success. 
 

Today I drove for one of my few remaining babysitter for Zoey as my daughter and son in law will be relocating to a new city. 
Brandon was accepted as the new assistant strength and conditioning coach at ………..(to be shared soon) as he makes the official announcement. 
 

Let’s just say it will make my travels much shorter 😁

 

And tomorrow here in Oxford Ohio I have my eclipse glasses in preparation of the sun event. 

 

Plus getting ready for our Symphony cruise in a tad under 2 weeks. 
 

Take care. 
 

Be safe. 

 

 

[George C]

4 hours ago, grapau27 said:

We sailed on MSC Virtuoso in April 2023.

I status matched our Princess Elite loyalty for their top Diamond status which got us a free speciality meal,10% discount and late cabin check out on disarmbarkation day.

Our Diamond+ loyalty would only afford us Gold second highest status on MSC.

We had an aft balcony but heard their Yacht club is special.

I left out another important thing about msc , they have the absolute best pizza of any cruise ship and free delivery if in yacht club. 

[Gardener5b]

48 minutes ago, Lionesss said:

Hi everyone. 
 

Now I made the buckeyes, nut keiffels, Kolachi and Almond soft batch. 
 

 

 

 Your cookies (and those of your fellow bakers) look amazing!

 

 

 

[voyager70]

1 hour ago, h20skibum said:

It was a beautiful day for hiking today, so we traveled to Nelson-Kennedy Ledges State Park in Ohio. They had four short trails.  One listed as easy, two listed as moderate, and one listed as extreme.  

 

There were quite a few large sandstone rock formations that made for an interesting hike.  We hadn’t watched any videos or researched the trails prior to jumping in. 

 

On the extreme trail, we made it through the fat man’s peril.

 

 

The trail kept getting narrower, and we got to the portion appropriately named “the squeeze”.

 

 

When you got through the squeeze, you ended up in the devil’s ice box.  The way out is straight up the rock wall where you can see a little daylight about 15-20 feet up. I had to climb up to a ledge, help Susan up, and repeat until we made the top. 

 

There were a couple waterfalls along the trails.  This one was at the end of an easy trail. 

 

 

Our last trail at this park took us on a moderate path.  Through the “dwarf’s pass”

 

 

And on to find the waterfall at the end of this trail. 

 

 

If you look at the top right of the photo, you can see someone sitting at the top of the rock, so it gives an idea of scale.  

 

One neat thing was the the gold miner’s cave that was behind those falls. 

 

 

 

 

Beautiful pics but that second one practically gave me a panic attack just looking at it. No way would I have been able to even attempt that and I’m a pretty skinny guy!

[derorim]

2 hours ago, h20skibum said:

It was a beautiful day for hiking today, so we traveled to Nelson-Kennedy Ledges State Park in Ohio.

That was quite a hike! 

[derorim]

2 hours ago, Lionesss said:

Today I drove for one of my few remaining babysitter for Zoey as my daughter and son in law will be relocating to a new city. 
Brandon was accepted as the new assistant strength and conditioning coach at ………..(to be shared soon) as he makes the official announcement. 
 

Let’s just say it will make my travels much shorter 😁

A shorter distance between you and Zoey sounds wonderful!

 

Also, the cookie table looks impressive.  I like the way the tables were arranged in the form of a cross.