XPCDOOJK will Not be doing a LIVE on the Harmony beginning Saturday!

[A&L_Ont]

1 hour ago, xpcdoojk said:

Andrew, the staff was reasonably good about the newbies on the wave.  However, we didn’t have very many on our cruise.  You are supposed to ride the boogie board wave, get a signature on your white band then you can go to the stand-up side.  They frequently announced these rules.  Of course, the newbies are not around during the announcements and even if they are they aren’t listening.  Generally, they allowed 2 plus minutes for experienced riders.  Some would time you but they weren’t super hardline on time.  My experience was by 11AM on sea days the line got long, and it got worse in the afternoon.  I felt like both waves were good.  

 

I think your cabin would be great for seeing when the line dwindles for a lunchtime oppurtunity.  Tell MX JC says hi!

 

 

Thanks for the information. Our plan is to get the bands on embarkation day ASAP. We are fortunate enough to have 2, one hour secessions for Star but that’s the only time we will take advantage of it. We might do a private rental if the lines are bad all week. 
 

I’ll say hi the MX for you. 

Edited December 28, 2022 by A&L_Ont

[xpcdoojk]

1 hour ago, A&L_Ont said:

Thanks for the information. Our plan is to get the bands on embarkation day ASAP. We are fortunate enough to have 2, one hour secessions for Star but that’s the only time we will take advantage of it. We might do a private rental if the lines are bad all week. 
 

I’ll say hi the MX for you. 

He is from South Africa and he has a gold tooth…. When he gets going on the microphone he doesn’t know when to shut up.  We bonded during the key hour.  Good guy.

[xpcdoojk]

So, I have officially survived Covid and the Flu and I am back to something close to 100%.  We spent New Year’s Eve at our lake house, and we took our bikes to Dogwood canyon for a ride.  Then after the New Year we travelled with friends back to Chapel Hill to show them around where we used to live, and Franklin Street and we went to the Notre Dame and Wake Forest games with very expensive stubhub tickets.😂 So, I am just now finally getting caught up to finish off this Not Alive review.  We had a great time in Carolina, Erby, and makes me think that my future Airstream needs to winter at Jordan Lake during basketball season in the future! 😁

 

So, Saturday was the last day of the cruise, and we had extremely calm seas all the way back.  The FlowRider crowd was predictably bad, and I was still having sore legs, so I only surfed for a couple of hours.  I didn’t participate or watch the BOB, but Rodney from Florida won according to MX.  I made the mistake of joining the gang for some trivia games, the music one was somewhat tolerable, but the identifying the celebrity by baby photos was an absolute no go on my part.  I went back to the wave for an hour, got in another two rides and called that a trip.  

 

Our flights were scheduled for 1PM from FLL and there was a 9 something flight that was wide open so we decided to go standby for that flight to Dallas (DFW) and then try to get home earlier.  There were something like 80 empty seats and the flight attendants were outraged when Krystal and I were assigned seats in the last 8 rows.  Apparently, they like to keep that area for themselves as a private hang out.  They were like what are they doing putting passengers back here.  So much so, they told us to sit in a row a couple up from where we were assigned.  When we got to DFW we could see that the next flight only had about 8 empty seats and the standby list was about 18.  I had the highest standing in the AA system, and I was able to get one of those seats.  I am guessing that the luck of my seat mate might have been the source of my flu/covid, as it was a college kid coming home from Arizona and he didn’t seem like he was feeling well.  That said, my DW got symptoms more intense and sooner than I did…. So it could have been from the cruise.  I had my nephew pick me up at the airport(we had a limo to and from), and I was able to get all of the groups luggage, I was able to go to the grocery store, I was able to go to the pet resort and get Rodrhi the Welsh Terrier, I was able to prep dinner, and still have time to go back to the airport to pick up the group (we cancelled return limo).  

 

At work the next afternoon, I was dealing with drainage and a lot of throat clearing.  Krystal said she felt awful.  We both stayed home on Tuesday with temps over 100F, and did self-testing on Wednesday Krystal got a positive test after a visit to CVS.  I continued to test negative, even after I got a positive Quad test on Thursday.  I know I mentioned this earlier, but it was eye opening.  

 

All in all, the Harmony is a great ship.  We did zero specialty restaurants.  We found the food to be be mostly good, and I don’t think our experience suffered by eating all of our meals in the MDR (I did eat in the Wind Jammer one night, and it was less than good, previously mentioned).  We had a good wait team and the head waiter was flirting with Sally (she is single and attractive), so our service was exceptional.  Any need or want they took care of.  Every night after the first night (different wait team) was perfect on the service side.  We like the pumpkin side rolls and after the first night (2nd night overall) with the final team, we always had those rolls.  The rest of our group initially was not a fan, but by night 5 they were eating our pumpkin seed rolls!  

 

The Diamond lounge, like others, needs to have jelly or marmalade or something to go with croissants in the morning.  I don’t understand this.  The lounge was almost always empty (less than 6 people in the morning) when I went for the coffee run.  The raisin bread formerly Austrian Stritzel was my go to, and it was good.  The one time I mentioned previously that I went to the lounge during the early evening time, the lounge was still sparsely filled.  

 

We got two different Aqua Theatre shows since it was an 8 night cruise and two different ice skating shows.  Our group appreciated this.  

 

Sally, who was on her third cruise with us, felt this was by far the best cruise, and that it was perfect.  She even loved her inside cabin because it was much better sized and laid out than the Radiance.  Of course, she preferred the balcony on the Navigator, but liked the money savings. 

 

We are on the cruise shelf until the Anthem Transatlantic this spring.  Not sure I can wait that long.  

 

Feel free to ask any questions.

 

JC

 

 

[xpcdoojk]

Another thought, since we were trying to catch early flights, we did self carry of our luggage.  They started about 15 minutes after the scheduled time.  It probably took another 20 minutes for us to get off. 

 

JC

[xpcdoojk]

Another thought, the Border entry process is just wierd, where you look at a camera and then you just go.  How do they collect any income from people who might claim they bought more than the limits in the islands?  Don’t get me wrong, I like the system, I just don’t understand the change.

 

jc

[Ocean Boy]

57 minutes ago, xpcdoojk said:

Another thought, the Border entry process is just wierd, where you look at a camera and then you just go.  How do they collect any income from people who might claim they bought more than the limits in the islands?  Don’t get me wrong, I like the system, I just don’t understand the change.

 

jc

Did you like having four sea days? I'm doing the same itinerary on Odessey and have never had more than three. However, I guess if you have a Trans-Atlantic booked you are good with sea days. 

[xpcdoojk]

So, OB, you do know that I like the FlowRider, right?  So, of course, I love those sea days.  On ships with 2 waves, there is stand-up surfing from 9 or 10AM until 5 or 6PM on those days.  So, I think in the past I have done 7 straight days without a port stop.  Even without a FlowRider, the ships have a lot to do.  So, in some ways Sea days are better than port days.  Plus the jewelry stores at the ports are far more likely to do budgetary harm than the shops on the ship.  Not to mention the potential of eating and drinking off the ship, instead of just doing my D Plus drinking on the ship.  That is another way the FlowRider keeps me healthy, I don’t drink during the day!  

 

JC

[JamesEM]

As far as getting off the ship, if you had made any large purchases on board RCL will report that to Customs and you will be pulled out of the line.

[xpcdoojk]

8 hours ago, JamesEM said:

As far as getting off the ship, if you had made any large purchases on board RCL will report that to Customs and you will be pulled out of the line.

Do you know this or just guessing?

 

What about large purchases in Aruba or Curacao?  

 

JC

[Ocean Boy]

Just now, xpcdoojk said:

Do you know this or just guessing?

 

What about large purchases in Aruba or Curacao?  

 

JC

Only purchases made aboard the ship. It has been pretty extensively talked about on these boards. The US has a lot more power over cruise lines operating here than they do over sovereign countries in the Caribbean. 

[xpcdoojk]

10 hours ago, Ocean Boy said:

Only purchases made aboard the ship. It has been pretty extensively talked about on these boards. The US has a lot more power over cruise lines operating here than they do over sovereign countries in the Caribbean. 

So nobody is going to knock on my door?😂