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PT6A posted:Sea days would seem to be the whole point of the average tropical cruise. I mean, honestly, what's the point of getting off a floating resort to visit a tourist town that's entirely filled with... resorts (but also more hawkers and pickpockets)? Ah, you see the point is to get off the boat, away from the generic touristy poo poo, to a beach away from all the cattle pouring down the gangway. Preferrably to a quiet beach where you only get charged the local price for beer, and have access to some decent snorkelling. Then sprinting back at 1658, just barely in time for a quick shower, and touch of sleep before your next watch. Never ever tell another living soul where exactly to find this beach. I used to work in the basement of a cruise ship. I'd be happy to answer questions about any behind the scenes type things anyone might want to know about.
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May 3, 2019 17:33
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Silly Burrito posted:Not sure if this will come through but this is a shot directly from our balcony facing down right now. Just a funny thing to see on a boat instead of the normal port pier. My dad was just at that Walmart a couple weeks ago. Had to pick up a new SIM for his phone so I could get many unneeded updates daily from their stops through the Canal.
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May 4, 2019 13:31
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Welp, time to come back to reality. It was an excellent cruise. Now I’ve been on seven cruises, and this Disney cruise was the best one. Pluses: Ship feel and staff: Very clean ship, extremely helpful staff (to be fair, this applies to all ships I’ve been on as well). The staterooms were bright, and we had enough room to move around in the bedroom/couch area. Entertainment: The Broadway shows are the best shows I’ve seen on a ship. Compared to Carnival/Royal Caribbean, Disney’s shows have more special effects, better sets, and I simply enjoyed them more. The Frozen show was the highlight of the trip, and I definitely would not have thought that before last week. Food value: Disney is expensive, but I didn’t feel like I was nickel and dimed like I did on Royal Caribbean. Plenty of places to eat for “free” and 24 hour access to soft drinks, hot chocolate, coffees. Having three different themed sit-down restaurants that you rotate through nightly was a neat idea. Shop sales: Not a lot of pushy sales or gimmicks in the shops. While that might mean no 2 for $20 T-shirts, it was nice not having alcohol sales, gold sales or watch sales cluttering up the aisles when you’re just trying to see a show. Characters, characters, characters: This is the #1 reason I’d recommend Disney as a cruise line over others if meeting Disney or Marvel characters is your (or your spouse’s) thing. Last night, Braksgirl and my sister took 6-7 photos in 20 minutes with various characters, and they had so many opportunities to do so. You’d also just sometimes come up to them as they walked around the ship and grab a quick selfie (but walk fast with them because they are hustling). Lots of activities: We never were at a loss for things to do, and Disney smartly plans two shows at appropriate times for their big events to accommodate dinner times. You’d think that would be a no brainer but I’ve been on Carnival ships where there was one big show at 7 something and we would either have to wolf down our food or just skip it. We played a lot of trivia, and there were so many little events, shows, and other activities that I mainly took Friday off knowing that yesterday we would do a lot. And we did. 🙂 Kids: We did not bring our kids this time but we did take them in March on Carnival. I know my father is concerned about kids crying and wailing as a reason to why he doesn’t want to go on a Disney cruise, but it was never a problem for me. The kids had their own club and you didn’t see a ton of them running around on the ship, but even when you did, it wasn’t a crazy screaming mess. In fact, the worst crying we heard was when we debarked, which is understandable. The cast catered to the kids and the adults but it was cool seeing the littlest kids stand in awe of Mickey and company. To be fair, many adults did the same. Minuses: Cost: The main one everyone will immediately think of is cost, and I understand that. I was actually surprised because I’ve heard others say that Disney would blow me away and I’d be forever spoiled. Personally, I was not spoiled forever, but I think that’s also a testament to how much I just enjoy cruising in general and how nice some of my previous cruises were. I could easily take another Carnival cruise and not feel like I’m missing a ton. But to be fair, I’m not a mega Disney fan. If you just plan to lie out by the pool and hot tub, see a couple of shore excursions, and just laze around, I would think another cruise would work just fine. But if you liked Disney/ Disney movies as a kid, like going to the parks, or want to meet and take photos with the characters, you definitely get a lot of that theme park experience without waiting in line for hours and hours. Adult Quiet Area: This is Quiet Cove on Disney and Serenity Deck on Carnival. But, I found that every now and then, they’d bring in a singer in Quiet Cove or they’d blast the ship’s horn directly over us and I can assure you that it was not quiet. I much prefer the Serenity deck on Carnival because al I want to do there is sit down, hear just the ocean and read my Kindle books. No 24 hour food: I honestly didn’t need this, but both Carnival and RC have some sort of 24 hour food (like pizza or cake) and unless I missed it, Disney doesn’t have this. They do have late night room service and pizza until 11 or 12 and usually I was full, so this isn’t a huge downer, just something I noticed. Time changes: Holy hell did this mess with me. We left San Diego, had to move our clocks forward one hour in either Cabo or Matzatlan, and then had to move our clocks forward another hour again in Puerto Vallarta. Then we had to roll the clocks back one hour again that night and again the next night. It felt like two years worth of Daylight a Savings Time in one week and messed with my sleep. On other cruises we have just stuck with ship’s time, so I’m not sure if it’s a west coast thing or a Disney thing but that was definitely annoying. Split bathrooms: Personally I disliked them because the toilet room was way too small. I get the concept and I can see where it would be helpful, but I felt very cramped. The shower part wasn’t as bad and had a bit more room to maneuver around. Burgers: Both Guy Fieri (Carnival) and Johnny Rockets (RC) blow Disney’s burgers out of the water. This is the one (admittedly minor) place where Disney came in a distant third. TL;DR We talked last night whether I’d rather have one week on a Disney cruise, one week at Disneyland, or one week at Disney World, and even though I love to ride rides, I’d pick the cruise again easily. We had a lot of fun, and it’s amazing how fast seven days goes when you don’t want it to. Hope this helps anyone trying to plan a trip.
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May 5, 2019 19:10
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We've been trying to plan out our next vacation, and a cruise sounds like an interesting option. We're two adults with no kids, and Seattle and Vancouver based cruises are in easy driving distance for us, especially Seattle. My partner is not a morning person, and likes to be up late and sleep in. For a lot of other trips this is a problem, with nothing to do outside the hotel room after one in the morning. It sounds like some cruises have 24 hour activities, so if she's looking for something fun to do at 3 AM there are probably some ship amenities still open? I know food tourism is big for other people, but we're both pretty picky with food, and on many of our international trips it becomes a big source of anxiety. It looks like a lot of the cruise ships have a good variety of food styles we like, especially breakfast foods. Also some appear to have some OK food options available 24/7, and some have relatively open eating schedules, too. We don't like being stuck eating on a schedule, we would rather eat when we are hungry. We haven't been to Alaska, so that would be interesting to visit. The main downside is my partner does not like extended cold on vacations. Over 70 F would be ideal during the day, but above 50s is still fine for the average day. An excursion or two in colder / freezing temperature is no problem and fun for both of us. Is there a good place to look up the average temperature ranges for Alaska cruises during the at-sea days? We both like to swim, are the pools fine to use for most of the trip, or is it too cold? We want a good variety of activities available, and she doesn't drink, so we want something that's fun for someone not drinking. It looks like quite a few cruise lines leave out of Seattle and Vancouver. Reading this and other threads it sounds like Disney is the king (and available from Vancouver), but we would prefer Seattle unless it's a huge difference. Out of Seattle, it looks like Carnival has the most focus on on-ship activities. Celebrity Cruises looks upscale, but doesn't seem to have a lot of on-ship activities. Norwegian Cruise Lines seem to have more on-ship activities than Celebrity. The cruise sites make it hard to understand what a total budget to expect to pay, on top of the cruise tickets themselves. Would budgeting about $200 per person per day cover food / excursions / on ship premium activities / daily alcohol pass for me + soda pass for her? We can be pretty flexible with our trip date, but a late May trip (in 2-3 weeks) sounds pretty good to me. It looks like that also puts us in a good timing window to get some last minute deals on the cruise tickets, or is this the kind of thing we should book way more in advance?
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May 5, 2019 19:45
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A few random thoughts for you, from my own experience. I’ve only been on Caribbean cruises. Other than the casino and maybe one “nightclub”, the ships generally seem to shut down by around 11pm - midnight. You can still get some food, but the decks are pretty empty. In addition to advertised ticket price, pay attention to the “fees, taxes, and port fees” charge. This usually will run you an extra $100-200 total per person. You’re also expected to tip your service people, like cleaners and waiters. In the old days, that usually meant a bunch of envelopes showed up in your stateroom on the last night, but nowadays most lines seem to have a thing where you can opt to just add $16-20 bucks per day to your room charge. Alcohol passes, you generally can’t buy one for just one person — everyone in the room needs to sign up, I think those are about $60-80/day/person? And I’m just guessing here, but “above 70 during the day” on an Alaska cruise probably isn’t going to happen, especially in May. Water is cold.
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May 5, 2019 20:16
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$200 a day per person may be a bit high. It just depends on which shore excursions you do plus how many drinks you have. Also add in a few souvenirs if you want them. Maybe use $10 per drink as a rough average for calculation (but if you get a drink pass I think it’s $50-55 or so a day on Carnival, roughly 8 bucks a day for the soda pass.) Excursions vary in cost, but I’ve paid $70-150 per person for whatever activity you want to do. Also, on sea days you won’t have those excursions. You may also decide to eat in the “fancy” restaurant, but if you eat in the normal dining room, no extra fees apply unless you get a steak or lobster tail on Carnival/RC. If you like photos prepare to spend about $20 per photo unless you buy a package. If you or her likes spa treatments, those can get pretty pricey fairly quickly.
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May 5, 2019 21:14
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It looks like Carnival cruises are generally either sold out in the near future, only have interior rooms available, or cost about 2-3x as much for balcony rooms as other cruises. I'm still doing research, but I'm pretty sure we would rather have a balcony on a less exciting cruise ship over a tiny interior room on a more fun ship, especially if the price swing is so big. I think she will want to go for the spa treatments. I tend to over budget my per day spend on trips. It's better to come up with extra money than to have money get tight on the vacation. July is the soonest a Carnival cruise is available with the balcony rooms, but the other cruise lines seem to have some available for the end of May. I'm leaning toward end of May right now because it fits my schedule better. It looks like we could get a suite on Norwegian for less than the price of an interior on Carnival right now.
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May 6, 2019 03:08
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I've done Alaska 3 times (twice with opposite halves of the family, once with my wife). RC twice, I think Holland once. Last time was around 2012 so keep that in mind.Chainclaw posted:My partner is not a morning person, and likes to be up late and sleep in. For a lot of other trips this is a problem, with nothing to do outside the hotel room after one in the morning. It sounds like some cruises have 24 hour activities, so if she's looking for something fun to do at 3 AM there are probably some ship amenities still open? quote:I know food tourism is big for other people, but we're both pretty picky with food, and on many of our international trips it becomes a big source of anxiety. It looks like a lot of the cruise ships have a good variety of food styles we like, especially breakfast foods. Also some appear to have some OK food options available 24/7, and some have relatively open eating schedules, too. We don't like being stuck eating on a schedule, we would rather eat when we are hungry. quote:We haven't been to Alaska, so that would be interesting to visit. The main downside is my partner does not like extended cold on vacations. Over 70 F would be ideal during the day, but above 50s is still fine for the average day. An excursion or two in colder / freezing temperature is no problem and fun for both of us. Is there a good place to look up the average temperature ranges for Alaska cruises during the at-sea days? We both like to swim, are the pools fine to use for most of the trip, or is it too cold? quote:We want a good variety of activities available, and she doesn't drink, so we want something that's fun for someone not drinking.
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May 6, 2019 03:52
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Thanks for all the info. We've booked a cruise on the Norwegian Bliss.
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May 6, 2019 05:13
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I’m about to depart for NCL’s seven day cruise around the Hawaiian islands in an hour. My sister and I bought our parents a wedding anniversary gift and this was part of it. We’ve been in Waikiki since Monday and explored as much of this island as possible. We’ve driven up to north shore, up and down the beaches, walked up Diamond Head, and I ditched them to play a round of golf and go up the Koko Crater Trail. I really don’t want to leave; this place is absolutely beautiful. The only downside of this cruise is there’s no casino on board due to state law prohibiting gambling. I’m sure I can spend time elsewhere on the boat, but as other posters mentioned, poker players are awful on the boat and you can easily pay off the trip by winning other people’s money.
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May 11, 2019 22:04
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I’ve only recently gotten it into my head that I wanted to go on a cruise with my husband for our delayed honeymoon. Thinking about booking for something in the summer of 2020, maybe time it for being on the water during the 4th of July? I’m torn between Bermuda, the Caribbean, and the Bahamas. Any insight from goons?
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May 13, 2019 01:44
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How long a cruise are you looking at? What departure ports are you considering? Basically it’s Somewhere In Florida, New Orleans, or Galveston. (Or San Juan I guess). Shore stops are generally like 8am to 4 or 5 pm. Anything in particular you want to do? Is just chilling on the ship your main focus?
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May 13, 2019 02:15
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Around 7-10 days give or take. Enough so that we'd have weekend buffers to wind down before going back to work. I haven't given the departure port much thought. Somewhere relatively cheap to fly to coming from Pittsburgh? As far as activities go, we're pretty flexible. It would be nice to see the sites, get in some beach and sun, relaxation. We're not really crazy party people and this is more for chilling and kicking back on or off ship.
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May 13, 2019 04:10
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About 3 hours away from embarking on our Cuba cruise! Weather is kind of icky, but I'll be happy just being on a boat and away from work.
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May 13, 2019 13:11
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Dazerbeams posted:Around 7-10 days give or take. I don’t know squat about Bermuda except that it’s a lot further north than I thought when I was younger. The Bahamas are really close to Florida, and Bahamas cruises tend to be short (3-5 days). There may be some cruises that stop in the Bahamas before making the big eastern Caribbean loop. I would assume most Bermuda cruises are short, too. If you’re looking at the Caribbean, I think the first thing to look at is western or eastern. Eastern is like the Grand Turks, the Virgin Islands, and possibly down to Aruba and/or Curaçao. Western would be mostly Jamaica, the Caymans, and along the gulf coast of Mexico. Some also stop on the island of Roatan off Honduras, and Belize City. And Cozumel, the island just off the coast of Cancun, seems to be the most popular cruise destination — that is, tons of cruises stop there. A lot. Not sure what you mean by “see the sites”, but many western ports will give you the opportunity to visit Mayan ruins, which we found really cool but be warned because of the limited time in port and the fact that the ruins aren’t located right next to the cruise ports means those excursions are kind of time limited and generally not chill at all where a clock is concerned. In my limited experience, a ruins excursion is usually a 6 hour deal in total (from leave ship to board ship), and 2-3 hours are at the actual site. For Florida ports, I think it’s safe to say Miami is the busiest one as far as number of departures. Port Canaveral I would guess is next — it’s an hour due east from Orlando, and there are lots of cheap shuttle services between the two so you wouldn’t have to rent a car. There are also some cruises out of Ft. Lauderdale, and a few out of Tampa. All pretty big airports with cheapish fares. Since you mentioned wind-down periods, you might not rule out a shorter cruise + a stay near your departure port. As an example (and not necessarily a recommendation) a few years back my wife and I took a 7-day western Caribbean cruise out of New Orleans, then booked a 3-night stay in NO for after, before flying home. (For info, if you consider this option Port Canaveral is on a barrier island right next to Cocoa Beach). I’d just start browsing the cruise lines' web sites and seeing what’s generally available. You can filter by all sorts of stuff when you search. I might be able to answer some more specific questions about western Caribbean ports if you think of any.
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May 13, 2019 15:56
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For the best rates and airfare, you're going to want to leave from Florida. You'll get the best itineraries from there too. I book a lot of my cruise clients out of Florida, usually Port Canaveral or Miami. If I can help you, let me know.
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May 13, 2019 20:19
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WithoutTheFezOn posted:I’m no expert here, but I’ve taken a handful of Bahamas and western Caribbean cruises. Over many years, so some of this may be wrong. Thanks for the info! I would have to take a look at comparing east vs west but the Caribbean sounds like it offers more variety in terms of ports than Bermuda, which seems to only be a single port for the duration of the cruise. I've been scoping out Norwegian and they do 7 night cruises there but just the one location. Yeah natural and historical places of interest are what I'd consider to be sites. And my idea of chill is on the rails, handheld tours and things of that nature. I don't want to deal with having an unsupervised adventure into an unknown city where I'm a giant mark while my husband is getting anxious. Full on tourist experience please. We're more homebodies than anything else and we'll have pets waiting for us at home so I doubt we'd do an extended stay anywhere once the cruise is over and done with. Will browse the websites to get a better feel for what's on offer. For the Caribbean, is there much of a rain/hurricane risk during late June? I'd rather not get caught in bad weather but that's kind of the best time for us to be taking vacation. And do either of you recommend any particular cruise lines?
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May 13, 2019 21:01
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From what I understand June “officially” starts the Caribbean hurricane season, but hurricanes tend to hit later in the year. From my experience rain in southern Florida and south of there is it rains often but not for long, not like the “it’s cloudy all day and it drizzled for six hours” stuff you may be used to in PA. Also as an anecdote, once on a Bahamas cruise the day we landed in Nassau it was raining really hard and .. well we were wearing flip flops, it’s 85, didn’t care at all. Ive never been on what I would call a bad cruise, but they were different situations and different itineraries so I would hesitate to make a recommendation. As far as on-ship stuff goes, I can say this though: Carnival definitely does not have the nicest ships of those I’ve been on, but I’ve had more fun on Carnival ships than on others, personally.
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May 13, 2019 21:40
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Hurricane season is June through November. The tail ends are usually much less risk and the peak is the beginning of September. With cruises though most of the time your voyage will be rerouted (ex: switch to a Western Caribbean itinerary if the storm is headed to Puerto Rico) instead of cancelled.
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May 13, 2019 22:01
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I've done Disney, Carnival, and Royal Caribbean. Disney is by far my favorite, but if that's not your bag, then Carnival is my next favorite. The ships are fine, not the best I've been on, but I've never had a bad time on a Carnival ship. They are pretty consistent both in food and activities across their fleet. Royal Caribbean, in my experience, varies on quality from ship to ship. Our ship was a smaller one, and we felt that the shows and activities left a lot to be desired. We liked our RCCL cruise fine, but prefer Carnival (in my husband's case) and Disney (my preference).
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May 14, 2019 04:38
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Well Disney isn't really our scene, and my husband nixed Carnival because all the horror stories he's heard about cruises involve them. So I guess that leaves Royal Caribbean and maybe Princess Cruises? There are a lot of different port stops. I'm leaning more towards Western Caribbean although I'm not sure why. Brak, are you a travel agent?
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May 14, 2019 05:01
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Norwegian cruise lines also runs many Caribbean cruises.
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May 14, 2019 06:26
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Dazerbeams posted:Well Disney isn't really our scene, and my husband nixed Carnival because all the horror stories he's heard about cruises involve them. So I guess that leaves Royal Caribbean and maybe Princess Cruises? There are a lot of different port stops. I'm leaning more towards Western Caribbean although I'm not sure why. I am! Feel free to PM if you like!
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May 14, 2019 13:09
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Dazerbeams posted:Well Disney isn't really our scene, and my husband nixed Carnival because all the horror stories he's heard about cruises involve them. So I guess that leaves Royal Caribbean and maybe Princess Cruises? There are a lot of different port stops. I'm leaning more towards Western Caribbean although I'm not sure why. I’ve done a few Royal Caribbean cruises, and have always loved them. At this point, as Brak pointed out, higher quality is on their larger, newer ships and even then, I think their overall quality has gone down a little since my first time. And the nickel and dime-ing has increased. Overall, I’d still highly recommend RC, especially over Carnival. My family is doing our first Disney Cruise in February, which we are super excited for, but it’s also much more expensive than any past cruise we’ve done. But quality is top and there’s less nickel and dime-ing.
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May 14, 2019 13:17
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Yes, the nickel and dimeing seems to be pretty standard on RCCL and Norwegian, though I can't speak to it from personal experience on Norwegian as I haven't sailed with them. Carnival does have some pay for restaurants, but I never noticed anyone really pushing them like they did on RCCL. With Norwegian and Princess, I do know they sometimes offer amenities such as free dining in the paid restaurants or a free beverage package. That is one thing I love about Disney cruising, sodas are included in the cost. It's dumb, but I hate having to pay for soda on a cruise.
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May 14, 2019 13:46
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Braksgirl posted:Yes, the nickel and dimeing seems to be pretty standard on RCCL and Norwegian, though I can't speak to it from personal experience on Norwegian as I haven't sailed with them. Carnival does have some pay for restaurants, but I never noticed anyone really pushing them like they did on RCCL. quote:That is one thing I love about Disney cruising, sodas are included in the cost. It's dumb, but I hate having to pay for soda on a cruise. And for whoever asked, I can vouch for Braksgirl's travel agent skills. She planned a wonderful Disney World vacation for me and my wife. She found us some great discounts and stayed in communication throughout the entire process, letting us know about dates and deadlines and new promotions as they appeared (we totally would have missed the free dining plan if not for her!).
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May 14, 2019 14:00
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WhiteHowler posted:Seems like most (all except Disney?) cruise lines have premium/upcharge restaurants on board. I didn't try any aboard Holland America, though I heard they were all good -- it just feels weird paying that much for a cruise, and then having to pay $20 extra for better steak or Italian or whatever. Disney has Palo and Remy so they aren't above an upcharge restaurant. That said, I've eaten at Palo and it is worth every penny. Every cruise line has free lemonade, tea, and coffee, but I loathe Carnival's iced tea. It's disgusting. As someone who has to watch their sugar intake, I can't drink sugary lemonade and juices, and there's only so much coffee one person can drink. So unless I want water only, I drink a couple of Diet Cokes per day. Everyone has a vice. Mine is cold, bubbly, artificially sweetened and flavored junk fluid. Thanks for the recommendation! I'm glad I was able to make your vacation fun!
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May 14, 2019 14:13
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My biggest complaint is that RC doesn’t label their hot water pitchers as either ‘coffee’ or ‘tea’ or ‘hot water’, so they end up all tasting like coffee due to not fully washing out the coffee flavor between uses...
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May 14, 2019 14:29
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WhiteHowler posted:Seems like most (all except Disney?) cruise lines have premium/upcharge restaurants on board. I didn't try any aboard Holland America, though I heard they were all good -- it just feels weird paying that much for a cruise, and then having to pay $20 extra for better steak or Italian or whatever. And if we’re talking beverages, I always seem to turn into a pineapple juice monster on cruises. Norwegian seems to almost always offer a “free at sea” thing where there are like four things you can pick from — free drink package, free WiFi, premium dining credit, or a $50/port excursion credit. You can pick one with base staterooms and I think multiple when you up your ticket price. If you have two alcohol drinkers, that’s kind of a no brainer choice. E: oops Braksgirl already mentioned that. WithoutTheFezOn fucked around with this message at 20:25 on May 14, 2019 |
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May 14, 2019 20:19
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It's all a matter of perspective. My family is used to doing Disney World vacations so the prices of specialty dinners on Royal felt like a great deal. Food was also a lot better than you get at most Disney restaurants now. But if you have 20 years of cruising from when everything was included then the addition of specialty dining probably feels not as good. FWIW we never felt any "hard sell" pressure on our last Royal cruise. I think one crew member asked us about dining packages at lunch on the first day. We already had one so he moved on. No one else ever approached us again. Zero One fucked around with this message at 20:54 on May 14, 2019 |
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May 14, 2019 20:46
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So I’ve watched dozens of hours of YouTube videos and read lots of blogs so I think I have a good handle on things for my upcoming cruise. Bought a bunch of recommended stuff to make the cabin experience nicer (magnets, portable fan, shoe organizer,etc). Didn’t plan any excursions as we just want to relax and unplug. We just plan on wandering around the port shops and chilling on the ship. We’re not huge drinkers so we’re skipping the alcohol package but are getting the soda package. I’m buying a bottle of Vodka for the room which with our 2 bottles of wine will cover most of our booze needs. I got some flaskaps for our tumblers so we don’t have to go back to the room for booze as often. Any other tips for a first timer? This is my relax/unplug vacation for the year so that’s the priority
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May 14, 2019 23:29
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skipdogg posted:So I’ve watched dozens of hours of YouTube videos and read lots of blogs so I think I have a good handle on things for my upcoming cruise. Bought a bunch of recommended stuff to make the cabin experience nicer (magnets, portable fan, shoe organizer,etc). Didn’t plan any excursions as we just want to relax and unplug. We just plan on wandering around the port shops and chilling on the ship. We’re not huge drinkers so we’re skipping the alcohol package but are getting the soda package. I’m buying a bottle of Vodka for the room which with our 2 bottles of wine will cover most of our booze needs. I got some flaskaps for our tumblers so we don’t have to go back to the room for booze as often. Not sure if you’re a reader, but if you are, get a Kindle and load it with books from the library (or just bring a few). Bring one of those Anker multi-USB chargers so that you can charge your phone, camera, etc with one plug as there aren’t a ton of outlets in your room. When you get your itinerary, plan a few things to do on the ship but don’t be worried if you miss one. Bring comfortable stretchy shorts/pants. Bring extra medicine, sunscreen, aloe, and baby powder/cornstarch. Buy a t-shirt and/or a few crappy souvenirs. Take some fancy photos and some stupid ones. Figure out the best way you want to carry a ship and sail card (lanyard, pocket, wallet) and pack that. If you are the type to want to get on stage for silly gameshow type games or other events(like Newlywed game, trivia, karaoke, dance-offs, etc.), do it without caring. We all are laughing and no one else won’t care one drat bit once we are off the ship, but you will look back with fondness on some stupid fun. R-E-L-A-X
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May 15, 2019 00:02
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I’m slightly afraid to ask, but ... magnets?
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May 15, 2019 02:19
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To decorate your room door or to hang stuff on the back of your room door.
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May 15, 2019 02:45
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WithoutTheFezOn posted:I’m slightly afraid to ask, but ... magnets? It’s my understanding the walls and ceilings are metal so I bought some magnet clips and a pack of hooks. I guess they’re useful to hang things on or clip papers up on the wall. That’s what cruise YouTube says anyway. I’ve got my nook loaded with e books and a non surge protector power strip, my 6 port usb charger and an extension cord ready to go as well. All great suggestions.
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May 15, 2019 02:49
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Oh right I forgot magnet hooks and clips exist. Also for your packing list, why has no one mentioned earphones and possibly a spare set of earphones?
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May 15, 2019 02:58
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I’ve never been on a cruise, so I’m not sure if they have ATMs on board, so ignore this if they do. However, I’ve been sailing around the Caribbean for a while now and I recommend bringing a few hundred dollars as an emergency stash if you’re going to go off the boat on excursions. Some islands have issues with their ATMs running out of cash or just being stubborn with US cards. Most of the issues I’ve found are on islands that use Eastern Carribean Dollars (I.e. Dominica), but I’ve also had issues on larger islands like St. Martin.
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May 15, 2019 03:27
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WithoutTheFezOn posted:Oh right I forgot magnet hooks and clips exist. I don’t have those on my list oddly enough. I have 2 different kinds of earplugs, but no earphones. Didn’t really think about them since I was going to lock my phone in the safe and not use it on the cruise.
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May 15, 2019 03:38
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Slow Graffiti posted:I’ve never been on a cruise, so I’m not sure if they have ATMs on board, so ignore this if they do. However, I’ve been sailing around the Caribbean for a while now and I recommend bringing a few hundred dollars as an emergency stash if you’re going to go off the boat on excursions. Some islands have issues with their ATMs running out of cash or just being stubborn with US cards. Most of the issues I’ve found are on islands that use Eastern Carribean Dollars (I.e. Dominica), but I’ve also had issues on larger islands like St. Martin. Yeah, not a bad idea, also bring some smaller bills for tips for excursions (but I think you said you weren't going to take any). Also having cash makes it easier to haggle if that's your thing because if you bring out a credit card to some of those smaller shops, they're just going to look at you like you're crazy.
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May 15, 2019 03:40
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skipdogg posted:I don’t have those on my list oddly enough. I have 2 different kinds of earplugs, but no earphones. Didn’t really think about them since I was going to lock my phone in the safe and not use it on the cruise. The last two cruises I’ve been on had ATMs, and you could also get cash at the casino cashier. Both had significant service charges, though, I think the ATM was $6 per transaction. Also agreeing with Silly, every time we’ve travelled to the Caribbean we wish we’d have brought more 1s and 5s.
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May 15, 2019 03:53
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