Holidays!

Cruise Tips

Our cruise was 13-16 Sept 2021, during COVID-19 period. We drew reference to lots of stuffs from my dear friend, Jia, from her previous Royal Caribbean cruise, pre-COVID. Most stuffs were from her. Much thanks!!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️

Royal Caribbean App & Crown and Anchor Society

You can already start download the Royal Caribbean app to take a look at what is on the app.

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Click on “Get more details on ships we support”, then select the name of your Cruise. Sometimes it does not appear, I will check again next week if it appears.

App also comes with map of the ship. Trick from Jia on navigation is that Entertainment is the front of the ship and Food is the back of the ship.

Jia recommended us to sign up for Crown and Anchor Society (their rewards program). Can get some discounts here and there. Maybe because we did not purchase anything, hence we didn’t enjoy the discount. Regardless, signing up is free, so why not.

COVID-19 PCR & ART Tests

Royal Caribbean is very good with their email prompts, maybe even a bit excessive, however we can’t blame them as it is the COVID-19 period and they have to keep reminding. Hence, please read their emails and follow the instructions there. We have to book for our PCR test around 3 days before our voyage and on the actual day, we had to do ART test. We were allowed to board only when our ART test are cleared.

Boarding Time

You will have to book for your boarding time. We opted for the earliest one (1:30pm I think) because we are kiasu. And luckily for us, that gave us more time to go back home for our passports (read Day 1). We also managed to cover FloRider on Day 1, so it was good.

Packing for the Cruise

Bring passports people! Passports!!!

Drama aside, here are the stuffs we brought which are useful:

• Toothbrush & toothpaste (not provided by Cruise)
• Toiletries – shampoo, body foam, conditioner (only all in one provided, which I don’t like)
• Body moisturiser, lip balm, hand cream (it is dry onboard. At night Hubby started itching and luckily we brought body moisturiser. Thanks Jia!)
• Bedroom slippers (personal preference that I will wear bedroom slippers in hotel rooms. Not provided by Cruise)
• Hand soap w pump (Cruise only provided bar soap. Hubby thinks can do without this, but I find it very convenient, now that hand washing is very important.)
• Big CLOTHES PEGS (We brought 5 to rotate around but actually can bring more. Can kiap swimwear, clothes & undies. BIG thanks to Jia for this impt tip!)
• Small bottle of laundry detergent (I hand wash my undies, I brought it also in case really not-so-lucky we have to stay in the ship for 2 weeks. Luckily that did not happen and hence all’s good. I thought it was good to be prepared. #kiasu)
• Jackets (can be quite cold at night)
• TRAVEL ADAPTERS (see below pic for their sockets. We brought our Mogics donut but it was deemed as extension wires and was confiscated – to collect from Security before off boarding ship)
• Magnet for sticking papers onto wall (Pre COVID Jia received hardcopy activities itineraries which she can highlight and stick the papers onto the wall. We only can rely on the app, but there are still information papers to stick. E.g. luggage tag for last day)
• Lanyards with card holders (you will need to scan your SeaPass everywhere you go. Wearing a lanyard make things a lot easier. Genius us brought lanyards without card holders. 🤦🏻‍♀️ We slipped the SeaPasses in our phone covers in the end. Please note you will have to take out SeaPasses every time you try to open the stateroom door.)
• TraceTogether Token (to attach to lanyard. Especially on boarding day, you will need to scan for entry and the app is just cumbersome. Plus there will be a queue behind you. Wearing a lanyard might not look cool but it is #efficient. Anyway you are wearing mask, so nobody will know you. If you are really worried, u can wear sunglasses with your mask. Onboard you will be given Tracelet [see below pic] to wear where ever you go for contact tracing [except during water sports], hence we did not bring along our token, but if it was attached to a lanyard, it is not really a hassle.)
• Carabiner hooks/ S hooks (the stateroom toilet is really small and poorly ventilated. So, hanging our towels there to dry is not a good idea. Nobody likes to use wet towels. So we used the clothes hanger to hang our wet towels and then hang it on the carabiner hooks which are hooked to the rather narrow cabinet handle.)
• Sports wear & shoes (for activities)
• Not something to bring, but take note that stateroom air con thermometer is based on Fahrenheit not degree celcius. Quick reference is 25C is 77F & 21C is 69.8F.

Things which we brought & stuffs not to bring:

• PS4 (yes, Hubby brought to just add on our luggage weight. He was unable to plug in PS & apparently the TV is unable to change input source. Sooo… Learn from his mistake, leave the PS at home. Nintendo Switch can bring, but cannot connect to TV.)
• Extension wires (Mogics donut considered as extension wires as mentioned)
• Mini cooking pots (I noticed a few at Security. Mummies & grandmas who are keen to cook porridge for babies can leave the pot at home. Maybe bring more baby puree?)

Stuffs we might bring the next time: (PS: some might be because we are imm chim)

• Wet wipes (to clean the balcony handles before we kiap our clothes, and maybe the deck chairs)
• Wet magic clean wipes (for balcony floor so that we can walk barefoot. For our voyage we brought in our outside slippers. Another alternative is to wear flip flops in your stateroom and balcony. For me stateroom is bedroom slippers.)
• Pillows (the one on Cruise is too flat and since there is no limit in luggage space [and no PS], maybe we might bring the next time)

We didn’t check in our luggage as we wanted everything with us when we can enter our stateroom. The service is definitely available though. They are also structured for departure, e.g. leaving the luggage outside stateroom for them to pick up.

WIFI/ Messaging onboard

If you decided to get WIFI, recommendation is for you to purchase WIFI plan before your voyage as it is likely to be cheaper.

We were contemplating if we should get WIFI for our voyage but decided not to because,
1. Time away from connection is not a bad thing
2. Online reviews are that satellite WIFI can be quite weak in stateroom. We saw quite a number of guests at the top deck to get signal, so guess that is quite true
3. WIFI onboard is not exactly cheap. It was $60+ for 1 device throughout the voyage. Which Hubby recognised that it can pay for 2 months’ home WIFI already.
4. I thought that communicating to each other onboard will still be possible via their app if we are going to do separate activities, hence we need not use Whatsapp. (clarification below)

Anyway, recommendation by Jia is that if getting WIFI, to try to get something called The Key which will allow priority queues rightfully. However, some of the service crews might not know what that is. Regardless, purchasing WIFI before the voyage will be cheaper than getting it onboard.

Regarding #4, I thought wrong. You are required to pay to use the app for communication, and all participants must purchase to chat.

Activities

Pre COVID-19, guests are able to book everything they wanted to do via the app once they board and are connected to the cruise’s WIFI. For our voyage, even when we book, it was only to add the activity into our calendar. No reservations are made. Some activities require you to call to make reservations, so please read the description for the activity.

If the venue reached the max capacity, they will reject. Hence for activities which you are really keen on, recommend that you turn up earlier for them. Or, go for the first slot, so if missed, you can still go for the second available slot. For instance, KPop dance was quite popular, when I reached on the dot, they were already full.

Pre-COVID days they also had laser tag and escape room. Quite safe to say that activities we saw were a bit more boring as they are required to take safe distancing into consideration.

Charges & Tips

All charges are in USD, including the casino. All payment onboard will be tagged to SeaPass card which you will need to settle the payment the night before you offboard.

Crew survive quite a bit on tips, hence please change some USD to tip them as we read from forums that they were not allowed to offboard the ship even when the ship is docked.

Meals

We did not opt for any speciality meals and only went for what is complementary. Only guest with purple wristbands (vaccinated) can dine in, otherwise they will have to have their meals in their stateroom. Seemingly all guests we saw are vaccinated.

Complimentary food will also stated in the app. Whatever that needs to be paid will be stated in the app, so it pays to read the texts.

Pre-COVID days Jia mentioned that sometimes during the cruise they will have promotions for Specialty restaurants / on last day will have promo for their lobsters / Chops Grill Steak / Kitchen tours etc. So if these feel optional to you, you can try waiting for promo. If you really really wanna try something, then you can book earlier in case later no promo then very sad. We did not notice the promotions during our voyage though.

Only breakfast in-room dining is complimentary. You have to call them to place your order the day before. They are quite generous with the portion. Our preference is to go Windjammer for buffet style breakfast rather than in-room dining. For other in-room dining services you will need to pay $7+ for delivery and 18% for service charge, which they will state in the app, so hence please read the texts before ordering.

From pre-COVID days, some of the food outlets were closed. For instance, Solarium Bistro is now closed, we also do not see food available in the casino during our voyage.

Restaurants will always have plain water and house coffee and tea. Cappuccino and latte etc atas coffee will need to be paid.

Alcohol

• Each stateroom can bring 2 bottles of wine
• If can, bring wine with screw caps, otherwise please read Water section for a temporary fix, but you will still need to finish the whole bottle during your cruise
• If you were to open your wine in any of the dining area or restaurants, you might have to pay for corkage
• You can get empty wine glasses from the bars. Pool bars will give you plastic ones while restaurant bars will give you glass ones. The crew will give them to you freely, so need not be shy.
• We pour our wine into the wine glasses in our stateroom before bringing them to the dining area. 😀
• After dinner can leave the glasses on the table as it is the ship’s glasses

Water

We brought 2x 1.5l of plain water from home as I was worried that water is not drinkable from the tap or there is no place to refill on board. You will still be able to refill water from Cafe Promenade and restaurants. Jia mentioned there is a water cooler at SeaPlex but I didn’t notice it as I already have my own water. If we were to go on cruise again, we will still bring in our own water as it is more convenient. To prevent leakages, after capping the PET bottle, I wrap a small piece of cling wrap around the cap. Which the cling wrap doubles up as a temporary cap as our wine bottles did not have screw caps. I reused 1.5l bottles from other drinks to bring my own water, a little green effort.