Ship Happens: A Reluctant Cruiser's Tale

Tracey shares her candid thoughts about her first cruise experience, addressing her initial reluctance and how she overcame fears of being left behind at port and navigating crowded spaces as an introvert.

• Preparing for a cruise by booking a hotel near the port the night before departure
• Getting priority boarding with "Faster to the Fun" for early access and shorter lines
• Traveling with 22 family members and the challenges of keeping everyone together
• Communication challenges at sea and the importance of purchasing phone packages
• The reality of cruise ship dining schedules and food quality (especially Guy's Burgers)
• Navigating excursions and the safety advantage of booking through the cruise line
• Benefits of balcony rooms and clever space-saving tips like magnetic hooks
• Watching your onboard charges and checking your bill regularly for errors
• Bringing sunscreen, Dramamine, and Ziploc bags for late-night snacks

Book the ding dang trip! Life is too short. Go travel, see something new, do something different, especially in this day and age where everything is just so crazy. Go enjoy yourself.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to the Charging Station
• 7:28 Why I Avoided Cruises
• 17:24 Planning My First Cruise Experience
• 22:42 Boarding Tips and Priority Access
• 28:44 Traveling with a Large Group
• 32:16 Connectivity and Communication at Sea
• 36:37 Food, Dining, and Ship Amenities

Transcript

Tracey: 0:03

hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, what's good everybody? Welcome to the charging station podcast. It's your girl, tracy massey of living my empowered life, welcome, welcome, welcome if you are new here, welcome to the shenanigans. We are making room on the couchy couch for you to have a seat. Come on in. Tap the tap the hand sanitizer. Take your shoes off, make yourself at home If you are returning, watch your listener, whatever. Hey, boo, you know I love you some. You welcome back.

Tracey: 0:33

I need everybody to go ahead and follow me on the socials. You know what to do. Find me at Living my Empowered Life on TikTok Threads, facebook, youtube, facebook, youtube. And I feel like I'm missing something. Oh, my email list. Join my email list and make sure that you are subscribing, sharing with your peeps. Whatever your preferred listening platform podcasting is. If it asks you to subscribe, subscribe. If it asks you to follow, follow Whatever it's asking you to do. Please do that and make sure that you rate and review the five stars. Go ahead and grab your coffee, grab your tea, grab your water, grab your wine, whatever your beverage of choice is. Go ahead and grab that thing. Have a seat on the couch because I'm about to tell you about my very first cruise.

Tracey: 1:19

Yes, I went on a cruise. So my cousin had this idea that we're going to do family trips every other year and the last family trip we did we went to the mountains in Tennessee and had a grand time. Y'all we had a time. That was a fun trip. It was maybe about 15 of us that were in this big old cabin and had a blast. So this year we got together and did a cruise. Unfortunately we weren't able to do the cruise where we had originally planned it, because we had a whole panoramic view that was happening in between time. It took us in between the time, but this this year we got to do it. So shout out to my cousin, super dome bj, for getting us together for our first cruise.

Tracey: 2:17

Now I'm gonna be honest y'all. I love to travel. I am a travel girly, travel enthusi. I don't get to travel as much as I want to, but I will get up out of here and get some stamps in my passport when I can.

Tracey: 2:31

But I never really had the desire to go on a cruise, mainly because I like going to destinations and experiencing the culture, being able to kind of mull around and I have this fear of being left by the ship. I ain't gonna lie y'all. I just I did not want to be a peer runner. Yeah, I'm working out and doing all that, but have you seen the peers of these ships? It's not fun to run. So I just had this fear about getting left.

Tracey: 2:56

And then, you know, I'm very much of an introvert, I like to be able to steal away and you know I would do an Irish exit in a heartbeat. And I just kind of felt like, ok, well, maybe a cruise is too much because there's too many people, there's people everywhere all the time. All the time I'll do a crowd, but I don't like doing a crowd for a long period of time. So I was like I really want to do a cruise. And then I was like, OK, well, if I do a cruise and I'll go on Virgin, because it's adults only, I ain't got to worry about nobody else. Chaps, you know, it's a different kind of clientele, blah, blah, blah, blah. So I had all these preconceived notions.

Tracey: 3:29

So when my cousin came up with the proposition to do a family cruise, which was, you know, a little bit more economical for everybody, and we did a short cruise four days to the Bahamas, I was like I want to, but I don't. I want to but I don't. And what outweighed, what persuaded me was the fact that I would get to spend time with my cousins. So it's rare that we are all in the same place at the same time, and even all of my cousins weren't able to attend. So the ones that were there, we had a blast.

Tracey: 4:02

So let me just walk you through some of the things that I've learned. So if you are a first time cruiser, this is for you. If you are not a first time cruiser, still stick with me in this episode and be sure to reach out and share some of your tips about cruising or whatnot. So I'm just going to share some of the things that I learned on my first cruise and some of the things that I would do differently, and I will even share if I would do a cruise again. All right.

Tracey: 4:30

So number one thing I am very much of a planner and we had a travel advisor with the cruise ship who, um, let's just say, as a planner, he didn't advise very wisely. I wrote a very nice email to the cruise line about him because I had to do my own changes, my own research and things like that. He was not very accommodating is not the word. He did not communicate very well. So a lot of the things you know when you're making, when you're traveling, you have deadlines and things like that if you want to make a change.

Tracey: 5:13

So I had to change out a guest. So the guest that was supposed to be going with me was not going, so I had to switch out somebody. And I actually went on the website myself and did it, because I asked the question when I first booked with the travel advisor, like, hey, if I have to switch out a guest, what do I need to do? And the only thing he said to me was it can be done, but it'll be very expensive. And I'm like, okay, well, what's the cost? He never did tell me. So I found out and honestly, y'all, there was a cost, very expensive it was. It didn't seem very expensive to me because clearly I did it. So there's that.

Tracey: 5:48

Um, I will say do your own research, even with you. When you have a travel advisor, they're human, they can get things wrong. All right, and this comes from somebody who has done travel before I. In my past life I was a travel advisor, I booked trips for people. So do your own research. And since this was my first cruise, that's exactly what I did, like I was all on the YouTube YouTube University, I was all on TikTok, I was everywhere researching, finding out the ports, because, of course, when you book your cruise, you know where you're going.

Tracey: 6:19

So we went out of Port Canaveral and we did a four day Bahamas cruise. So we did Nassau, bahamas and Princess Caves Island. So those are the two stops and we had one day at sea. We're going to talk about that fun day at sea. All right, and I'm purposely not saying the cruise line, but if you listen to what I say, you're going to know who the cruise line is. And I'm purposely not saying it because I don't want to get sued, but this is just an honest review.

Tracey: 6:55

So what I did was I booked a hotel the night before. So I flew down the night before to Port Canaveral for a couple of reasons. One, I did not want to feel rushed, trying to travel the day of. Anytime I'm doing something, whether it be an event, like if I'm going somewhere to speak, or if I'm going to a concert or convention or whatever I'm flying out the day before I would much rather be there and sitting than trying to rush to get to where I'm going, especially when you got connecting flights or you're trying to catch a ship. I'm there the day before. Some of my cousins, on the other hand, decided to come down the day of and y'all me being a planner, and they know how I am, me being a planner that thing was bugging me because I was like it's spring break, anything can happen. Why are you doing this? But they made it in time. They actually they made it in time, thank God. But, child, they had me stressed okay, but I flew down the night before and booked a hotel which was literally 10 minutes from the port. Some of my other cousins were across the street. Some of the cousins were at the same kind of at the same hotel. So the hotel where I stayed in Port Canaveral was very nice, one of the Hilton brands oh sorry, I'm trying not to say the names because they're not paying me but it was a very nice hotel and they had another hotel attached to it. So that must be something new. I had never seen that before. We have it's the same umbrella company, but it's two different hotels attached to each other. So some of the cousins were at the same spot that I was, um, which was great.

Tracey: 8:24

My sister, who lives in florida, sister number one came to pick me up from the airport in orlando and we just spent sister time. So we had dinner, she got to meet some of my cousins excuse me, meet some of my cousins at night, um, and we just had sister time because again we're getting to know each other. Um, and we just had sister time because again we're getting to know each other, so that was fun. She took myself and my cousin to the port the next morning, which was was fun. I will say this Um, if your cruise line, if you're cruising and your cruise line has an opportunity for you to get um early access, to like pay for early access, get it, get it.

Tracey: 9:05

We got what was called faster to the fun on the cruise line that we were on and I'm so glad that we did because we got priority boarding. We were able to get on the ship earlier than everybody. We were able to access our room, so drop off stuff off first. We weren't you're not allowed to go into your cabin until 1 30, but we were able to. We're not allowed to stay in your cabin until 1 30. But we were able to access our cabin and drop our luggage off um before that time.

Tracey: 9:37

So we had to drop our stuff off and then leave. But being able to drop our stuff off was great because then we were able to explore the ship. We went straight to the Lido deck. Well, no, no, no, no Let me take that back we did our muster station. So when you're cruising you have to go by your muster station, just check in. It's a safety drill so you know where your life vests are, where the lifeboats are, in case anything happens. You go to your muster station and that's where you report to if we have to evacuate the ship. That is a requirement. The boat, the ship, will not leave until everyone does their muster station drill. So we did that, went to our room, dropped off our stuff, then went to the lido deck and was like okay, we are here.

Tracey: 10:21

So definitely pay for the early access and it also gets you early access to priority in line. So at guest services you have your own line, cause I did have to go to guest services a couple times and anytime we're doing excursions you get prior boarding for your excursions. When we went to Princess Caves we had to do a water taxi because there's no, no dock there, no port there, so we had to take a water taxi from the ship to the actual island. So we got first dibs on that. Um, so that gave us longer time on the island, um, things like that. So you just get priority everything with fast and true to fun. It was worth the money for me.

Tracey: 11:06

So we were the first ones in our actual group to board the ship and just kind of hang out. So we were just kind of waiting on everybody to trickle in. Most of our boarding times was right around the same time, which was good. We did have a couple people that were later, but we just told everybody where we were and just waited for the sail away party. So we did have a little bit of time to explore the ship before everybody got on, which was nice because it wasn't crowded. So you can kind of get lost which is what we did and be able to sit and enjoy guys, burgers I got ice cream, you know. They started coming around and passing out drinks and things like that, so we were able to just kind of chill out.

Tracey: 11:48

So day one was interesting Once we were able to get into our rooms at 1.30, my cousin and I like we all dispersed and went to our rooms so we could unpack and kind of map out what we're going to do for that day. We all agreed to come back to the sail away party which was happening about. We were supposed to set sail at 3.30. So the sail away party happened at 3.30, but we didn't sail away. I don't know why we ended up leaving, maybe like an hour, hour and a half past the time that we were supposed to leave. And from what I saw online not pertaining to this particular cruise, but from what I saw online, when the ship leaves late like that from the send off, it's because somebody didn't do their muster drill. So, whoever that was the first week of April going to the Bahamas out of Port Canaveral and you didn't do your mustard drill, you're the reason why we was late and you're the reason why the captain was flying through the ocean to get us to our first destination.

Tracey: 12:53

Do what you're supposed to do, people. So my honest review first off, I did have a good time. My family is crazy. Um, if you're watching this on YouTube, I'm going to try to put in pictures and things like that I'm trying my editing bag, so bear with me, we're doing something new. If you're not on YouTube, I'm sorry, but this is where I would insert a picture, maybe right here. Um, my family and I had a good time. It was 22 of us and I will say this traveling with a such a large party y'all it can be Like wrangling cats. There was always a time when we were getting pictures done or something and somebody would just scurry off. So it's like the same people that would scurry off is the same people that we were like okay, where's this person? Oh, they went to go smoke, or oh, they went to the bathroom and then they missed the picture. So there's several pictures where we have certain people that aren't in there. So I say, when we do another trip like that, if we do another trip like that, we're going to get walkie talkies.

Tracey: 14:06

Because here's the thing when you're out to sea, when you're out to sea, your phone doesn't work. Okay, your phone does not work, but mine worked. Because here's what I did I called my cell phone company and I got the cruise package, so my phone would work at sea. And I also got the international package, which now my particular carrier has combined the two so your carrier may have a cruise or international package that's one in the same. So I got the at sea package excuse me, the cruise package to where my phone would work at sea. So I can get online, I can do, I can send emails, I can make phone calls, I can get into WhatsApp, because we were using WhatsApp. But if you don't have cell service, whatsapp doesn't work. So I got that and I also got the international package. So when we were at port, my phone worked, also got the international package. So when we were at port, my phone worked. I was one of the few whose phones worked, which was a challenge with 22 people and we're trying to figure out where we are, what we're doing, blah blah. So get the cruise package if you can through your car. Um cell phone carrier. Um, I did also get the um internet package on the, which a lot of people say don't do, but I did that just in case my phone didn't work Like.

Tracey: 15:30

I just wanted to have access to my phone. You know, being a content creator, I did not want to have an astronomical phone bill when I came back home. So I wanted to be covered on all bases and this was actually the best option for me economically. I wanted to be covered on all bases and this was actually the best option for me economically. And we did also get the app with the cruise ship. So a lot of the cruise ships have apps. But y'all, I'm going to be real, that app on our cruise ship did not work until like the day before we were supposed to leave. Like that was the time we actually had it working and it was like what's the point now? But when it did work, we were able to do that.

Tracey: 16:13

If you want to travel with a large group, my cousin had this great idea, before we set sail, to put everyone's room cabin numbers in the WhatsApp so you can go back into WhatsApp and we could call each other on the cruise ship phones. But that only worked if people were in their rooms. So make sure you know if you're with a large group or even a small group, you know which cabin you're in. We just so happened to be all of us, except for maybe like two or three people. All of us were on the same deck, which was great. But again, we're leaving and entering at different times, so we're not always in our room. So it was kind of hard to keep up with people.

Tracey: 16:48

Another thing that I would do was would book my excursions early. Like I said, I'm such a planner and I there are a lot of things that I wanted to do that I did not get to do because I was trying to make sure that I was with the group. I'm telling you right now I'm not doing that again. I'm not doing that again Because one thing about it is, with such a large group, everyone has different interests and their different adventure levels. So there were certain things that I wanted to do that people were interested in. There were certain things that my cousins wanted to do that I was not interested in. Like they wanted to go to the casino. Casino is not really my thing, so I was in karaoke or playing bingo and things like that. But I will book my excursions early and book them through the cruise ship.

Tracey: 17:31

Yes, I know that the cruise ship can be more expensive than booking with an outside vendor, but the thing is, if you book with a cruise ship, if you book an excursion with your cruise line and your your excursion gets back late, the ship will not leave you. If you book an excursion with an outside vendor and it is late, they beat you in trouble because that ship is not obligated to wait for you. Now there are some caveats around that where you can find out the name and phone number of the port manager or port something I can't remember the name of this but whoever's in charge of the port that you're in. If you find that name and number of that person and you call them and let them know, hey, my excursion is running late. Sometimes they can have the ship wait on you. But I wouldn't guarantee that. I wouldn't even try that.

Tracey: 18:30

Because here's the thing you get stuck in the Bahamas without your passport, clock it, you're going to be in some hot water because you cannot fly back to the United States of America without a passport and that's going to be a whole nother expense. And if you get left by the ship, your travel expenses you don't get refunded from your cruise. You got to pay for you to get your flight home and most of the time if you're out on an excursion you're not ready to travel. And then you got gotta pay to expedite an emergency passport, which is not cheap. So just keep that in mind. Sometimes it's just better to pay a little extra to make sure that you're safe and prepared.

Tracey: 19:14

I would say get travel insurance. I highly recommend travel insurance. Whenever you travel, whenever I take a flight, whenever I'm taking a cruise, whenever I'm traveling, I get travel insurance, because you never know what's going to happen. I'd rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it. So get travel insurance, and right now there are some travel companies who will give you really great deals on travel. You just have to again do your research and figure out which one works best for you and what's best for you financially. I'm actually thinking about getting there's a travel insurance company now that will give you a yearly plan. So I pay a yearly, one-time yearly rate or pay monthly, and I have travel insurance for wherever I go, anytime, and I think that's good for people who are on the go all the time, and one of my goals for 2025 was to travel more, so I just I'm looking into that. I'll let y'all know how that goes. Um, so let's see, we're on the ship, we're kind of scurrying, so I will say I will take a cruise again.

Tracey: 20:26

Um, at first I wasn't quite sure if I enjoyed myself. I did enjoy my family. One thing, a couple things that I did not enjoy. I did not like how everything just kind of shuts down at certain times. So you think that you're gonna have food 24 hours a day. That's kind of true, and I guess it depends on what cruise line you're on.

Tracey: 20:43

A lot of the places closed early. So, like, for instance, for breakfast, breakfast stopped. A lot of the breakfast buffets stopped at 10. Then you had some that were from 10.30 to 12, or you had a late lunch, I mean a late brunch or a late breakfast, but most of the places stopped serving breakfast around 10, 10 30. So I'm an early bird, so I will be up Like I still went to the gym and worked out and did things like that. So I would wait to have breakfast and be starving, waiting on my family. I ain't doing that, no more. I love y'all family. If you're watching this, I am not waiting on y'all, no more, because I was hungry, I was angry, but by nine, 10 o'clock, that's when everybody is up Cause, then that's about the time, especially when you're at on a port day that's about the time when everybody is out. So you're, the lines are ridiculous. So I would advise getting up early and going to have your breakfast. Um, we did do Sunday brunch, where we reserved a spot in one of the dining rooms and that brunch was delicious. So if you can reserve the brunch, I would do that.

Tracey: 21:49

Make sure that you are reading the itinerary that they give you every morning, because it shows you what's going on on the ship that day, what kind of excursions are available. It has important numbers, things like that. There's so much to do on the ship. We really did not get to see and experience everything.

Tracey: 22:08

I think having a four-day cruise for a first-time cruiser was great, because there was a certain time when I was like, get me off the ship, I'm ready to go home, and that was the fun day at sea. The fun day at sea was not fun for me because I realized we just sitting here. We were literally sitting in the middle of the ocean, we weren't moving, we were anchored just in the middle of the ocean. And I understand why the crews did that, because that's how they make their money, because you can't go anywhere Like. You're on the ship. You're going to be buying food, you're going to be buying drinks, you're going to be buying pictures, doing all that stuff. You're spending money. You're gonna be in a casino, you're spending money on the ship. That's how they make their money back.

Tracey: 22:49

But I felt like, okay, we could be, we could be heading back to port canaveral, get me off this ship, I'm ready to go. So four days for me was fine, um, to see and experience everything that I wanted to see and experience. I'll probably do a see and experience. I'll probably do a seven day cruise next time. I don't think I would do any more than seven. I can do seven days on the island. I don't know if I even seven days on the island is a lot for me, because sometimes I'm just ready to come home. But yeah, for first time cruises, I would say do four day, four or five, five at the most to get your footing and see if you like it. Also, pack Dramamine, because I am not one that gets seasick.

Tracey: 23:24

But I'm going to tell you, I went to work out and I was on a treadmill and the gym was at the front of the ship, which they call forward at the front of the ship. So at the front of the ship you feel everything bouncing and, like I said, because we left Port Canaveral late, our captain was making up time. So we were skipping through the waves, we were skipping through the ocean and I felt everything, and being on a treadmill while the ship is doing this was not a good idea. So I actually had to cut my workout short that morning and go back to my cabin and thank god I got some trump drumming, because after that I took the drumming I was like I was good, so I was ready for the day.

Tracey: 24:13

Another thing that I would do is you know they have dining times, so you have early dining or late dining. I like the early dining. We had dining at six because I like that time, because it gave us time to get back from our excursions and get dressed up for dinner, and then we had the rest of the evening and then I don't like to eat after eight. So that was a good time for me. I would say get dressed up. So we had themes for our cruise. We had an all-black night and we had an all-white night. I'm probably going to try to put the picture of our all black and our all white, because we was cute. It really did look good. So shout out to my cousin for that idea.

Tracey: 24:47

But have, if you're traveling with a group like have things, what else? What else? I did check my luggage when we boarded the ship because I just didn't want to deal with it. You can carry your luggage with you, but just remember, if you don't have prior boarding or fastitude of fun or whatever, you're going to have to carry your luggage around with you if you don't check it. I did not check my luggage the night we were getting off of the ship because I was leaving early. So I got off the ship at like 7.30 so I could catch my shuttle and catch the flight. So I had my luggage with me, which was great because I didn't have to wait. So just a little tidbits on that.

Tracey: 25:34

What else? Research the port that you're going to. I would say that Research the port where you're going to stop. The bahamas did a huge uh remodel of their port from, from my understanding, and it was beautiful, like it was really beautiful. It was long sidebar. Get you some good walking shoes, good running shoes, just in case you gotta run. I hope you don't have to run, but get you some good walking shoes because the walk from the ship where the ship was docked to the actual port, so down the dock to the port to the vendors. It had to be a good two or three miles. It was a long walk. That day we did like 20,000 steps. So get you some good walking shoes, because in nassau you get off the ship, you go down the dock, then you go through the port, the where the vendors and everything are, and that's like really long. Then you finally get out to the street, to the bahamas, and then that's another walk we Junkaroo Beach. I think that's what it was, and there have been mixed reviews about Junkaroo. I enjoyed it. It was a 10 minute walk from the port, from once you get outside of the port to Junkaroo, but we got some guys to take us on a boat on around. So it was, it was pretty cool, but I would love to see Nassau more, so I feel like I need another trip to Nassau to experience everything.

Tracey: 27:09

What else would I do differently? Um, I would still get a balcony room. Um, I got a balcony room and I'm glad that I did, because I love the water. I saw the most beautiful, one of the most beautiful sunrises I've ever seen. Um, I love watching the sunrise and I love watching the sunset. I kind of I did get to see beautiful sunsets too. Um, but I got a balcony room.

Tracey: 27:36

The balcony room was a pretty decent size, it's remember you're on a cruise ship, so it is a little tight for two people, but you're on a cruise ship, so it's not, it's it? It reminded me of a dorm room, you know, like a, it reminded me of a freshman dorm. It had a little bit of space to it. I'm probably I'm gonna see if I can stick the video of the room here, but it had some space to it. It was a decent size, but that balcony just added a little bit more depth to it, so it didn't feel confined. I think on my next cruise I may get a suite, just to see what the difference is. And also, I'm aware that it depends on your cruise ship too.

Tracey: 28:16

So we sailed on an older ship. It's one of the older ships, it's recognizable because it caught fire in in twice, so there's a element that's missing from our ship. Um, one thing I will say about this ship you can tell it's older, even though I've never been on another cruise. But from looking at other cruise ships online, I can tell tell the difference. And there was something about the ship that I was like. I don't know if I'm the only one that noticed this, but then when I said something about it, I was not the only one. It smelled like doo-doo. There was a faint smell of doo-doo on every floor and I don't know if it was because it was an older ship. I don't know if it was because the sept an older ship. I don't know if it was because the septic system was something was going on with. But yeah, when you walked into the hallway some days it smelled like straight doo doo. That was not pleasant. So I will say that Overall, the food was great, met some amazing people.

Tracey: 29:14

The staff was amazing. Our room steward Weedy awesome sauce. He was awesome. Miss Penny at the bar Honey, miss Penny got me right. Okay, miss Penny could make whatever you want. She made virgin drinks. It was just amazing. Everything tasted so good. The food was good. I'm proud of myself for not overindulging because I got goals. I'm still dropping this weight, but I did good.

Tracey: 29:45

Guy's Burgers Jesus, jesus. I now know if I take, if and when I take another cruise on this particular cruise line, I'm going straight to guys burgers. That burger was so freaking good, it was delicious. And the fries, the fries. If God himself touched the fries, I'm telling you. And I had one of the best omelets, one of the best omelets on this cruise. Okay, just good.

Tracey: 30:20

And the apple juice. Now I swear you can't tell me, and I hope somebody from the cruise line sees this, because if you see this, I just want to commend y'all for your juices. The apple juice tasted like somebody had picked the apple out of the garden of Eden, and I know the Bible doesn't say it's an apple, read your Bible. It's actually. It just says a fig, it's a fruit. It didn't say apple, read your Bible, read your Bible, read your Bible. But it felt like God himself plucked that apple, put it betwixt his hands and smushed it, got the juice out of of it and put it in the glass. That's how good the apple juice was. It tasted fresh. You can't tell me that these people do not have a juicer on these cruise ships, because every juice I had was delicious and it tasted fresh the apple juice, the orange juice, the guava.

Tracey: 31:16

But I will say this I'm gonna need y'all how to learn how to put sugar in your teeth, the sugar in the sweet tea and the lemonade. I'm gonna need some sugar in it. But the juice, chef's kiss. Also, I would recommend you get the drink package. Get the drink package, get the drink package. I ended up getting the drink package, get the drink package.

Tracey: 31:36

I ended up getting the drink package when I said I wasn't gonna do it because I wanted one glass of wine and that glass of wine was expensive. And then they charge you gratuity and tax and that's one thing I did not like about the cruise. I did not like that. We were nickeled and dimed about everything. I did not like that. That's why I said I was down at the guest services because they charged me $100 tip $100. When I went and got that drink package I said oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. What you're going to do is take that off, because I ain't tipping them $100 for this. No, and they took it off. But Chad, get the drink package.

Tracey: 32:16

This did affirm for me that I am an all-inclusive kind of girl. You know, I really like being able to go to someplace that's all-inclusive and not have to worry about nothing. I can just tip, like I will go and I will just tip my servers or whomever, my wait staff or whatever. Like if I get a butler, tip my butler the day that I'm there and they take care of me the rest of the time. But, being nickel and dime for everything, I did not like that. That. That was not enjoyable for me, um no.

Tracey: 32:44

So get the drink package, get everything that you think you're not gonna want. Get it before you go on the ship and watch. Watch your bill. So that sign and sale card. They give you a little card like this and we're not this is my marriott card, but from one of my states, from somewhere. But they give you a little sign and sale card and that is your currency. So you have to put a card on file and they will charge that mug. I sat and watched them charge my card every single time and at one point I was like, hold on, like y'all get a little happy, let me go down here and see what's going on. And I'm glad I did, because they were charging me gratuities and taxes on stuff and I'm like, hold on, I'm not, this is not what y'all doing. So watch your bill, because they will get you and it's easier to dispute it before you get off the ship versus trying to dispute it when you get off, because basically, once you're off the ship, the trip is over. So make sure that you're watching your sign and sale card.

Tracey: 33:45

If the app works, you can see your account in the app. If the app is not working, make sure you go down to guest services and make friends with the people at guest services. Be kind to them, because they're dealing with everybody that's on this ship. But if you're kind to people, they'll be kind to you. It costs nothing to smile and I understand that this is money and it's a vacation, but be kind to people.

Tracey: 34:06

And here's my thing If you're on vacation, why are you so tense? Chill out. My next thing will be make sure you bring sunscreen. I had two different kinds of sunscreen. My dear cousin who was fair skinned I don't know why she didn't bring sunscreen, didn't put none on and her whole face was red. She like a little cherry pop when we were done.

Tracey: 34:29

Make sure you have sunscreen. Make sure you have. Oh oh oh. I got this offline, but the walls in your cabin are magnet or metal, so get magnets. I had magnets. I ordered some magnets off of that place we're not supposed to be ordering from, but I ordered them anyway because I needed them and I didn't know where else to get them. But I got magnets and that was the best thing because we were able to hang our lanyards on the magnets instead of putting it down somewhere and trying to find something. You'd be amazed at how stuff can get lost in your room. So we got magnets. We were able to hang our swimsuits and hats and things up on those magnets, which was great.

Tracey: 35:06

Room service Room service is not included in your cruise but because things close early, like you have a late night place, buffet place that's open until like two in the morning, but that was not one of my favorite places. So I did order room service one night because I was so hungry and I wanted a soda and that was about 15. So room service is not included. Um, I saw this lady doing this at in in in line one morning. Well, one afternoon I was like why I had to ask her? I was like what are you doing? She had a ziploc bag, y'all, and this was genius. She had a ziploc bag so as she was getting her food to eat, she put food in the ziploc bag to take back to her room. So she had snacks. She had something to munch on late at night. I was like that's genius. So next cruise I go on, I will have ziploc bags.

Tracey: 36:08

If you see me, don't talk about me because that would have come in handy. If you are coming back from the club in the cruise ship at two o'clock in the morning, you don't want to stand in that line at the buffet and have something that you know they have, may have something that you don't want to eat or won't eat or can't eat, and then you can go to your room and have your snacky snack and also with the drink packages, depending on what you get. Like our drink package, we were able to get bottled water and we were able to get sodas. So I would say, get you a can soda or and get you a bottle of water, because you do get thirsty at night. Get you a bottle of water, take it back to your cabin and go back out and enjoy your day, but just have something in your room for you those late nights. So overall, I enjoyed myself.

Tracey: 36:55

Um, I enjoyed my time with my family. I will be doing a cruise again just to get a different experience with maybe not so many people. I'm not knocking it because I did have a good time, but I think I want to experience a cruise in a way that I would enjoy a little bit more, you know, so I can explore a little bit more. And I would love to do a cruise with my girlfriends. To be honest, I feel like that would be a time. A time will be had. I feel like we would have a good. We would have some shenanigans going on. So I would love to do a cruise with my sisters as well, because we've been talking about a sister trip for a minute and I think that would be a good opportunity for us to bond. So, yeah, I'll probably be doing a cruise again and I'll do another review.

Tracey: 37:40

So, again, I'm going to try to add videos and stuff, but I'm not an editor child. Y'all bear with me, because all of this is new to me. We've been trying out in 2025. Okay, we're just doing some new stuff. But anyway, if you have questions for me about this cruise yes, I know this is my first cruise. I'm not an expert cruiser or anything like that, but I will share my experience and, if I have missed anything, if you've been on cruises before and you have some other tips, please share them, because I'm pretty sure we all could use them Collectively. We're going to get through this life together.

Tracey: 38:12

All right, so that's it for this episode of the Charging Station Podcast. Thank you again for joining me. I hope that you got something out of this. I hope that this has sparked your travel bug. If you are afraid to travel, book the trip. Book the ding dang trip. Life is too short. Book the trip, even if you become a tourist in your own city. Go travel, see something new, do something different, especially in this day and age where everything is just so crazy. Go enjoy yourself, alright, until next time, boo, remember God loves you, I love you. It ain't nothing you can do about it. Baby, love you guys. Bye.