THE MIXED NUTZ ON ALLURE IS NEXT

Here we are just before Christmas getting ready with buying gifts and making plans for the holidays. Soon all of the holiday business will be past and then it will be time to dedicate our energies to planning all our fun stuff on Allure of the Seas.

I'm looking forward to making this a big old happy time with our old & new cruising friends. Every cruise with the Mixed Nutz is always a mixture of prior Mixed Nutz cruisers and new folks that that join us for the fun. We hope to see plenty of new MIXED NUTZ joining us on this cruise.

This time we are planning on making a commemorative shirt for men and women. I'll be working on a new design shortly. Send your ideas in.

Specialty Restaurants

I now stand corrected. Prior to this cruise I have resisted dining in the specialty restaurants. I said, "how good can they be?" I mean really...we are in the New York metro area.... the city is nearby, they have the greatest dining establishments in the world...... but........

What I always said was that of all the places to eat in NYC, there were no cruise ship dining room restaurants. I always enjoyed dining with large groups in the traditional dining room at both early and late seatings.

This time however we ate at both Chops & Giovanni's Grill. Both were EXCELLENT!

More on this soon.

There is much to see on Oasis

In the seven days on this ship I did not see everything. You have to kind of choose to be an explorer and spend your time that way or be an enjoyer and use your time in a participatory way. That means laying in the sun ......Rock climbing...... SPA treatments..... miniature golf.....Bs'ing at one or all of the twenty some odd bars on the ship.......shopping....... mall walking....... track walking....... working out...... watching shows...etc oh.... and eating! lol. The Promenade has the Promenade Cafe and Sorrento's Pizza. Central Park has the Park Cafe. The pool deck has the Wipeout Cafe... and a couple of soft serve locations. And of course there is the Windjammer.

Next....... Specialty Restaurants

OASIS IS HUGE!

I can say now after experiencing this ship that it is all that it's cracked up to be. Nearly 6,000 passengers and never a crowd. ( except when they wanted to create an EVENT in the promenade like for a parade or a party. Otherwise it seemed to flow as well as any Voyager class or Freedom class ship. The biggest difference I saw was on sea days where there was enough pool deck seating for everyone.

I really enjoyed the pool deck with the multiple pool areas. Our favorite was the Sand Pool / Sand Bar area. We made that our regular sunning place and we were there often.

One week to go!

Just a week to go before we cruise on Oasis. I'm really starting to get into the details of the ship now..... studying the layout and such. Many people report that one week wasn't enough to really get around the whole ship. Okay then.... at least we'll be in good shape for the ALLURE in April. We'll pretty much have the layout committed to memory.

Tomorrow I will get the luggage out and start the process in our staging room . ( The guest room) Always get rid of the guests before a cruise....we need the room....lol ) ( sorry Christine)

Okay...more to come as we prepare.

ONLY 22 DAYS REMAIN...........

until our cruise on OASIS OF THE SEAS. ( Not a MIXED NUTZ cruise event)

All of our pre cruise stuff is done. We have completed the set sail pass........ received our luggage tags........ made dining reservations and reservations for the shows. That part is new. Now you start planning ahead 90 days for shows you want to see. To me, this is getting a bit crazy because it is taking away from the "spirit" of cruising , which was having many choices of venues to pick from at any one time. I personally like to be able to have the choice although I am a creature of habit and do see all the shows onboard anyway. But I like to have the choice. Now it's a plan ahead deal or..... show up and wait for standby seating. Of course with that you are either lucky or un-lucky and likely getting the worst seats in the house.

I will be spending my time checking out the ship so our April 29, 2012 cruise event for the MIXED NUT will be as smooth as possible. I'll be able to pick out meeting places... finding out which areas get overcrowded ( if any) .....etc.

Small detail from the Princess Cruise in June. As I have said before, the Caribbean Princess was a wonderful ship and was staffed with an abundance of helpful crew members. Service was outstanding on our June 4, 2011 cruise.

Posting will be more frequent now that the weather is chasing me indoors.

....John

September news

It looks like we have reached the end of summer on Long Island, NY.

It was a nice summer for the first half and then we had to deal with a medical issue with wife Carol in the second half. I had an excellent tan going up until that point. We were able to get a last beach day in a few days ago trying to boost the tan a bit. I don't think it did much. ( I may have to resort to FAKE BAKE....lol )

Now we are in the under one month countdown for the OASIS OF THE SEAS on October 15, 2011. This is not a Mixed Nutz event but a few of us ( two) are going to be looking over the layout of OASIS and be ready for the MIXED NUTZ on ALLURE OF THE SEAS on April 29th of 2012. We have a big event planned for ALLURE and there is plenty of room for new MIXED NUTZ. We always welcome new folks to join with us and create new friends that you will keep in touch with forever. Once a Mixed NUTZ always a MIXED NUTZ. ( there is no singular ....lol ) So if you want to have a good time..... come and hang with us.

Right now we are looking forward to OASIS and all that it is. It promises to be a wonderful time. It seems like everybody who cruises on OASIS...loves it. And now...... just 4 weeks away.

There is an active cruise critic thread for this cruise and we look forward to meeting our cruise critic friends there.

We are back from Caribbean Princess

It's been awhile since my last post as I had been busy with a few projects. The 9 night cruise on Caribbean Princess was a nice new experience for us. I went on this cruise with the intention to NOT try to compare RCCL to Princess in every way. I will say this, it's all good with Princess. I may like some RCCL features better but that would not stop me from cruising Princess ships again. In fact, I am very interested in the new upcoming Royal Princess.

The Caribbean Princess is a large ship. I thought the decor was well done...not too over the top for glitz and neon as on Carnival ships. The food choices were excellent as was the service in the Horizon Court/ Caribe Cafe and the dining rooms.

In my opinion the itinerary times were not as good as they could have been. Mostly too short a stay on every port except Puerto Rico which for whatever the reason was all day and all night. ( Most folks said that was un-necessary and could just as well skip San Juan )

The weather was fair. It could have been better in my opinion as we had plenty of clouds with sun in between.

We had 4 new things for us this cruise.

1. First time leaving from NY

2. First time in a mini suite

3. First time in Bermuda

4. First time in Turks and Caicos

All in all....a very good cruise.

HERE WE ARE...IT'S APRIL

We are just 60 days away fro the Caribbean Princess cruise and for me, it can't come quick enough. There is no sign of spring here on Long Island. A few weeks back there was a teaser of spring for two days but the weather quickly reverted back to what I call "THE DOLDRUMS OF MARCH." It always was the worst month of the year to me. However, I must state that my sweetie Carol's birthday is in March but her date is almost April so that doesn't really count as March....lol.

Before we get to the cruise in June, we will be taking a little trip to Florida to see Carol's Mom. With that of course we will get a dose of much warmer weather, which will make me more annoyed when I get back to Long Island in mid May and still have lousy weather. Typically the weather thru May is so up and down. We used to plan on opening the pool for Memorial Day every year. ( pool is gone now) Some years it hardly seems worth doing because the weather was so poor. What it will be this year remains to be seen.

PRINCESS NEWS

The Princess boards for our cruise date on cruise critic is a busy one. There is a very large meet and greet planned and more people are joining in daily it seems. There are of course the thread regulars and we've met a bunch of friendly people so far. Tim, as it turns out, is also an avid movie maker. He has posted a trailer for our cruise on the thread. He did a great job and I look at it often as a pick me upper. GOOD JOB TIM. ( I think he's already working on a sequel.......don't say I told you ....LOL )

That's about it for April 4, 2011.

Allure...still a long way off!

This Mixed Nutz Friends and Family cruise is still more than a year out. At the one year mark I will be sending invitation / notifications to everyone who has previously cruised with us. Seems that a year in far out enough for many people to book. Not like us 100% NUTZ....lol. It's never too soon. It must be true.... I probably do have too much time on my hands. ( Thank God for that)

Denise ( derrick22) mentioned T shirts. I have been working on a design that will fit the bill for us. I want to make them in both mens and women's styles. Purple of course and maybe two sided. Let's have a slogan contest for the other side of the shirt..... for example........ " The Mixed Nutz are lost at sea for 7 days...DO NOT SEND HELP" You got the picture!

The CABIN CRAWL POKER GAME went well last time. I have a new and improved idea on that game.

Door decorating this time. We always had the door signs but individual creativity wins a prize this time.

Still lots of time to work out the fun stuff.

April 29, 2012

This is the MIXED NUTZ friends and family cruise. The group for this one is building already. We hope to get a really big turnout for this one.

Don't forget...... it's 2012... and since the world is supposed to end late in the year, this will give you one last chance to take part in a Mixed Nutz Cruise Group event......LOL. So... come and join us.

MORE NEWS!

The cruise on Majesty of the Seas for October 17, 2011 has also changed. We have reverted back to the Oasis of the Seas on October 15, 2011. CRAZY? YES! As it turned out, friends who we mentioned this cruise to, have decided to go. Okay...we killed another tree with all the paperwork. LOL.

The upcoming Caribbean Princess cruise looks real good and I am excited to go on it. Our first cruise on Princess promises to be a fun and new adventure filled time. I'll have more on this as I get some ship details of interest.

MIXED NUTZ ON ALLURE............ Come and join us! April 29, 2012

NEWS!

We made a late change and will NOT be cruising on the Celebrity Summit this June. We have switched to the Caribbean Princess, for a 9 night cruise to the caribbean, departing from New York. Once again we have secured a true aft balcony cabin. This one is on Caribe deck (10) on the corner...# C752. This is our first Princess cruise and our first cruise from our homeport, NYC.

We also had made a booking for Oasis in October but changed that as well. Once again we will cruise on Majesty, a four nighter out of Miami. It was so good last year ( and got an even better price this year) that it was too hard to refuse.

Still on the books ( and NOT TO CHANGE) is the MIXED NUTZ CRUISE GROUP on the ALLURE of the Seas. We were originally going on Oasis this year to get a head start on the layout of the ship. However, we will remain newbies for it and enjoy the feeling of awe as we board.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1249639&page=33 Come over to cruise critic and join our thread.

Upcoming cruises....

June 5, 2011

We are taking a cruise on Celebrity for the first time. This one is going to Bermuda... someplace we have never been. RCCL does not have a seven night cruise to Bermuda...only a five nighter. Not enough for us, so it's with Celebrity on this one.

October 17, 2011

Last September we cruised on Majesty of the Seas, a four night cruise from Miami. We originally had Oasis booked for 10/15/11, which would have given us a preview of what we would see on our next cruise on Allure. However, we thought it over and couldn't resist the spectacular savings by cruising Majesty. RCCL is offering a NY residency savings certificate. True.... you can't compare the ships but since we were going to be in Florida anyway for other reasons, the 4 nights work out just fine.

April 29, 2012

This is the MIXED NUTZ friends and family cruise. The group for this one is building already. We hope to get a really big turnout for this one.

Don't forget...... it's 2012... and since the world is supposed to end late in the year, this will give you one last chance to take part in a Mixed Nutz Cruise Group event......LOL. So... come and join us.

Lots of new stuff coming soon.

OASIS & ALLURE