1st cruise in 17 yrs! On Allure

[bdiddy]

So tell me about the Allure! Did you love it? We are just under 2 months to our first RCL cruise since 2002.

DH and I actually got married in St. Thomas (our daughter’s name is actually Charlotte Amalie!) on our first cruise in May 1999 (on the Grandeur) and loved it so much we went on another in 2002 (on the Monarch). We had always intended to go on more but life and kids and our other traveling adventures kept putting it off. But we are finally cruising again in June on the Allure for our 20th and the kids are coming too!

I’m super excited but a little overwhelmed at how different cruising seems now and all the nickel and dining there seems to be. Back then all you needed money for was tipping, alcohol and if you wanted to gamble. I hate the idea of even paying for soda now! I’ve got our dining booked and some shows and stuff but am still undecided about the drink and internet packages. DH and I don’t really drink alcohol and don’t even drink soda that much so are unsure what to do with that.

Anyway - I’d love to hear if you’ve been on the Allure and what you thought and for any long time cruisers - how did you handle the transition to all of the new changes?

 

[FabFourteenFamilyFun]

You will LOVE it!! I hadn’t been on a cruise for about 15 years (Carnival). This was a family (3 generations of women) cruise on Allure. My mom had been on over 60 cruises and she said Allure had the best entertainment, food,etc! We had a Boardwalk balcony. I am not a soda drinker so free water and iced tea were fine with me! We all met for happy hour and would have 1-2 drinks. I couldn’t stop talking about it when I came home so my husband wanted to go and we got 4 friends and booked Harmony! This time we all had the deluxe drink package. We all loved the convenience of it and made it worth it I don’t think if it was the 2 of us or we had children( of any age) we would have come out ahead. They all loved HOTS so now we are all booked on Anthem for 9 days- Canada and New England. It would cost $1000( on sale) for the drink package. The cruise is port intensive and won’t be as warm heading to Canada. We just don’t think it would be worth getting it this time. Have a great time!!

 

[starvenger]

I did a review of my Allure trip last August - link is in my signature.

If you don’t drink a lot of alcohol or the fizzy stuff don’t get a drink package. Just go a la carte or wait for the 10 drink card to show up around Day 4.

Internet is a personal choice. Some people love to unplug, others don’t. Might be worth getting one if your group is a mixed bag - you can share the internet with your group, but only one device at a time.

 

[elaine amj]

We loved the Allure. U will find it different from your other smaller ships. So very many more things to do. I cruised on both the Liberty of the Seas before this year's Allure and found the Allure just had so many more options for activities. While I kept busy the entire 5 day cruise on the Liberty, I found the scheduled activities to be a bit of a letdown.

 

[tltay2005]

We loved the Allure. I have a trip report in this thread, we went last June. We are also sailing this June (9th) and can't wait. The ship is huge, at time you forget you are at sea. Don't worry about "nickle and diming" as you only have to spend extra if you want extra. We did not do any specialty dining nor did we buy a drink package. We did buy a couple of drinks, spend a little in the casino in the slots and played bingo once, but that is all the extra money we spent and we had an amazing time. If you don't drink soda, you will find plenty to drink without spending any extra, water (flavored and plain) tea, lemonade and coffee are available in multiple places. Same with food, there are plenty of places to get something to eat that are included in your cruise fare.

 

[bdiddy]

You will LOVE it!! I hadn’t been on a cruise for about 15 years (Carnival). This was a family (3 generations of women) cruise on Allure. My mom had been on over 60 cruises and she said Allure had the best entertainment, food,etc! We had a Boardwalk balcony. I am not a soda drinker so free water and iced tea were fine with me! We all met for happy hour and would have 1-2 drinks. I couldn’t stop talking about it when I came home so my husband wanted to go and we got 4 friends and booked Harmony! This time we all had the deluxe drink package. We all loved the convenience of it and made it worth it I don’t think if it was the 2 of us or we had children( of any age) we would have come out ahead. They all loved HOTS so now we are all booked on Anthem for 9 days- Canada and New England. It would cost $1000( on sale) for the drink package. The cruise is port intensive and won’t be as warm heading to Canada. We just don’t think it would be worth getting it this time. Have a great time!!

Thank you! Glad to hear you loved it!

 

[bdiddy]

I did a review of my Allure trip last August - link is in my signature.

If you don’t drink a lot of alcohol or the fizzy stuff don’t get a drink package. Just go a la carte or wait for the 10 drink card to show up around Day 4.

Internet is a personal choice. Some people love to unplug, others don’t. Might be worth getting one if your group is a mixed bag - you can share the internet with your group, but only one device at a time.

Thanks! I'll read your trip report and let you know if I have any questions!

 

[bdiddy]

We loved the Allure. U will find it different from your other smaller ships. So very many more things to do. I cruised on both the Liberty of the Seas before this year's Allure and found the Allure just had so many more options for activities. While I kept busy the entire 5 day cruise on the Liberty, I found the scheduled activities to be a bit of a letdown.

Did you feel overwhelmed at all on the Allure with there being too much to do?

 

[bdiddy]

We loved the Allure. I have a trip report in this thread, we went last June. We are also sailing this June (9th) and can't wait. The ship is huge, at time you forget you are at sea. Don't worry about "nickle and diming" as you only have to spend extra if you want extra. We did not do any specialty dining nor did we buy a drink package. We did buy a couple of drinks, spend a little in the casino in the slots and played bingo once, but that is all the extra money we spent and we had an amazing time. If you don't drink soda, you will find plenty to drink without spending any extra, water (flavored and plain) tea, lemonade and coffee are available in multiple places. Same with food, there are plenty of places to get something to eat that are included in your cruise fare.

Thank you! I'll look for your trip report. I'm thinking we are going to skip any kind of drink package and wing it. I think on our previous cruises we got a couple of those strawberry pina colada things they used to have a few times and that was it. And with being in 3 ports, it probably doesn't make sense to worry about even the little pop we do drink.

 

[elaine amj]

Did you feel overwhelmed at all on the Allure with there being too much to do?

The first day or two I was running from activity to activity all day haha. But I didn't sleep well on Night 2 so was wiped out on Day 3 and skipped a bunch of stuff. I waswreally bummed I never made it to any of the Solarium nightclub. I did make sure I fit in afternoon naps, etc after that.

I did find it hard to fit in the basic ship attractions though. Stuff like the flowrider, ziplining, rock climbing, ice skating, etc. On the very last sea day we went out of our way to squeeze it all in so didn't take advantage of them as much as we would have. I relied heavily on the app to keep track of my achedule and since those things cannot be scheduled into the app, I kept putting them off.

As for feeling overwhelmed, the app helped a LOT! When we were together with our group, I would list out my plans for the next few hours and the others would join or not as they pleased. It was really nice to have a variety of activities so everyone could go off to do what they liked.

The one thing was we didn't spend as much time with the friends we cruised with as we normally do. Even for meals, some meals they did the buffet while we went to the MDR. Partly it was because DH, my mother and I all really liked the MDR while our vegan friends found the buffet easier to manage.