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

[h20skibum]

33 minutes ago, bobmacliberty said:

 

Mark - Have you guys been to Hocking Hills in OH?  It's a couple of hours south of Nelson-Kennedy Ledges State Park so I'm guessing a good 3 hours from you.  They have great hiking with lots of caves and waterfalls.  Hard to believe it's actually in OH given how flat and boring most of the OH landscape is.  Definitely worth staying a night or 2 there, especially in the fall.

That looks like a nice park we may be interested in.  Thanks for the info.

 

It would definitely be an overnighter for us.  Waze says it is just under 4 hours, but maybe the time estimates are being impacted by eclipse traffic at the moment. 

[Oceansaway17]

12 hours ago, dani negreanu said:

 

Our experience when sailing out of Southampton --

 

Book a private transfer from Heathrow to a London hotel.

Spend 2-3 days in London.

The day before the cruise -- book a private transfer from London hotel to, for example, Premier Inn West Quai Southampton. From the Holiday Inn you can just walk to the pier....

Morning of the cruise -- you're all set within 5-10 mins drive to pier.

 

National Express buses and trains -- all require additional transfers by taxi.

 

If flying in from US, might as well spend a couple of days in London, to get over the jetlag.

 

I have been to London 5 times now and I want to just get down to Southampton and spend a day there.

I would be by myself and not sure if I want to have a stranger drive me for more than an hour.

I would feel safer on the bus.   

I do see there are hotels within walking distance of bus terminal but a taxi is fin.

 

Lot of thinking before taking cruises from Southampton.  Did one in 2019 with Celebrity and i had a hotel package with transfer.  Now I think some ships want us to use train or bus on our own,  

 

Appreciate all you for your comments and who knows I might go into London for a day too.

[HBE4]

1 hour ago, DaniDanielle said:

Finally, got to see it.  It was exciting I must admit.  It was like looking at the crescent moon.

My granddaughter went crazy.  

 

It was pretty exciting! Glad you got to see it.  It started slow but then you could see a little dent in the sun that grew into a pac-man and then a very thin crescent moom.  And the crescent shifted, first just the top of the sun, the left side & finally bottom.  Looked like a big smiley face except the nose & eyes were missing.  Lol

 

Temperature did drop a bit & the lighting got weird,  not dark but ominous. 

 

I took a few pictures but they did come out. I can share a picture of the long line at B&H. I meant to post it earlier.  This is about 1/4 of the line.

 

[HBE4]

2 hours ago, Ozark_Kid said:

Simular experience.  When the total eclipse happened it was like someone turned on the air conditioner.  Now it's hot again!

 

We're you "over the moon" with excitement? 😃

 

I forgot to play a special Playlist. "Here Comes the Sun", "Paint it Black", "Total Eclipse of the Heart"...

[dani negreanu]

19 minutes ago, Oceansaway17 said:

I would feel safer on the bus.

 

The only time we considered travelling directly to Southampton from Heathrow was for a "tester" cruise on the Apex inaugural (April 2020, Covid cancelled).

 

I've found the process of booking reserved seats very user friendly and convenient (and, of course, when we cancelled due Covid, we were immediately reimbursed).

 

I've made a mock booking for July 11....

 

 

https://book.nationalexpress.com/coach/#/choose-journey?journeyType=single&departureStopId=57020&destinationStopId=65136&departureDate=11%2F07%2F2024&departArrive=DepartAfter&outboundTime=00:00&returnDate=11%2F07%2F2024&departArriveReturn=DepartAfter&returnTime=00:00&adults=1&children=0&infants=0&euroAdults=1&euroChildren=0&euroSixtyPlus=0&euroInfants=0&ouiAdults=1&ouiChildren=0&usingCoachCard=false&youngPersonCards=0&seniorCards=0&disabledCards=0&partnerId=NX&campaignId=DEFAULT&request_locale=en&numResults=4

[Arzeena]

1 hour ago, DaniDanielle said:

Arzeena, At least you are in Florida!

Yes! 😁

[Ocean Boy]

44 minutes ago, HBE4 said:

 

We're you "over the moon" with excitement? 😃

 

I forgot to play a special Playlist. "Here Comes the Sun", "Paint it Black", "Total Eclipse of the Heart"...

Let's not forget "Moon Shadow"... Cat Stevens, Teaser And The Firecat, October 1971.

[SteelCityCruiser10]

15 hours ago, h20skibum said:

I do admit that you had to be a contortionist to squeeze through some places.  
 

One small cave we went in, we found this guy trying to squeeze through this opening. 

 

He did make it through, but not without help.  We opted to go back out the way we came in. 

thinking about going through that small crack, even the other one you posted that you went through, gives me anxiety 😬 

[A&L_Ont]

We were out for the eclipse. 
 

 

 

Lucy was ready too. 
 

[George C]

1 hour ago, HBE4 said:

 

We're you "over the moon" with excitement? 😃

 

I forgot to play a special Playlist. "Here Comes the Sun", "Paint it Black", "Total Eclipse of the Heart"...

I believe rccl hired Bonnie Tyler to sing total eclipse of the sun on one of there ships a few years or so ago during a past eclipse.

[Sunshine3601]

7 hours ago, Ozark_Kid said:

A while back we started hardening off our garden plants. 

 

Sharon's older DB came to visit this week and helped plant the garden Saturday. 

We planted tomatoes 🍅 

 

A couple of buds have already popped out. 

 

And the traditional bed of peppers with cherry tomatoes on each corner. 

 

Here is the garlic we started last fall.  It's doing good.   Should be ready to harvest the first of June.

 

WoW!  Looking great already.   Everything is going to thrive with All the Love you and your Family give to your garden❤️

 

Way too early for us to plant.  I had frost on my car this morning.

[Sunshine3601]

4 hours ago, DaniDanielle said:

Went outside with glasses, saw nothing.  Story of my life😳

I'm in the same boat.  Beautiful clear sky all morning then clouds continued to roll in around noon or so.   Several of us went out between 3 and 3:30, saw nothing but the sky looking slightly dark, almost like it was going to rain.  

We were in the 89% totality range, bummer😪

[DaniDanielle]

Sorry Debbi.  Once we figured out which direction to look we saw it. Valentina went nuts, don’t think she will ever forget it!  One of the teachers got them glasses so that worked out.

[Sunshine3601]

4 hours ago, Jimbo said:

Was very cloudy here,did get a few seconds  a few times 

 

This photo looks exactly the same as my area.  We were all disappointed.

[Sunshine3601]

48 minutes ago, A&L_Ont said:

We were out for the eclipse. 
 

 

 

Lucy was ready too. 
 

She's one cool cat😻

Great family photo!

[Gardener5b]

2 hours ago, HBE4 said:

 

We're you "over the moon" with excitement? 😃

 

I forgot to play a special Playlist. "Here Comes the Sun", "Paint it Black", "Total Eclipse of the Heart"...

One of our local radio stations played a different rendition of Total Eclipse of the Heart each hour leading up to the eclipse    

[Ozark_Kid]

3 hours ago, bobmacliberty said:

 

 

As a casual Kentucky fan (daughter got her undergrad degree there), I was happy to see Coach Cal go.  I was not the only Kentucky fan to feel that way.  He has arguably had the best talent of any college team (NBA teams are littered with former UK players) but they were all one and done.  No matter how much talent you have as a freshman, it's tough to go against some of the more experienced 3 and 4 year players on teams like Virginia, or Villanova, or Gonzaga.  He had a hard time just winning the SEC.  Cal didn't seem willing to move away from the one and done model.  Worse, he complained every year about how his guys had a hard time adjusting to being great team players. 🙄

 

Hopefully he tries a different approach at Arkansas and has better success.  I think he's still a good coach.

I think it's the portal that is contributing to problems.   Arkansas had a great recruiting class this year. We beat Purdue in an exhibition and Duke.  The team just didn't jell.  Also effecting football. I think it's part of the reason Nick Saban retired. 

[Gardener5b]

We were on Splendour (British Islands/Norwegian Fjords) during the total solar eclipse in August of 1999.   It was a very different experience being out at sea, but it was just amazing.  We didn't book specifically for the eclipse but it turned out to be an awesome benefit.

[Ozark_Kid]

2 hours ago, HBE4 said:

 I can share a picture of the long line at B&H. I meant to post it earlier.  This is about 1/4 of the line.

 

Is this normal for B&H?  I agree they are a great store. The line is crazy long!

[Ozark_Kid]

1 hour ago, Sunshine3601 said:

Way too early for us to plant.  I had frost on my car this morning.

Our last frost date used to be April 14th but it moved up a week.  For the next 10 days the forcast low temp is between 47⁰ and 63⁰.

The new walkway the kids put in the garden makes it nice.

[dbancroft]

Here are some pics from Maryland 

[Gardener5b]

4 minutes ago, dbancroft said:

Here are some pics from Maryland 

 

Great photos

[Husky1987]

The nice thing about living in Seattle is we pretty much live with an eclipse October through April.

 

Drywall is up!!!

 

 

 

ETA:  First pic is living room.  One thing I always hated is that there was no lighting.  So we had them put in six can lights.  We also had them take out an arch that separated the entry (where I took the pic from) and the living room.  And there was a gas fireplace that was in the corner by the window that we never used...we had them take that out as well.

Edited April 9 by Husky1987

[Gardener5b]

49 minutes ago, Ozark_Kid said:

Is this normal for B&H?  I agree they are a great store. The line is crazy long!

That's crazy.   We did mail order for our glasses and camera filters from B & H.   Mail order service was very prompt.

[Sea Dog]

13 minutes ago, Husky1987 said:

The nice thing about living in Seattle is we pretty much live with an eclipse October through April.

 

Drywall is up!!!

 

 

 

ETA:  First pic is living room.  One thing I always hated is that there was no lighting.  So we had them put in six can lights.  We also had them take out an arch that separated the entry (where I took the pic from) and the living room.  And there was a gas fireplace that was in the corner by the window that we never used...we had them take that out as well.

Looks good. Are you going to do popcorn or knockdown? I wish I knew about knockdown when we built ours. I hate popcorn so when we finished the basement did a knockdown and it looks so much better.