Blow That Dough 2026

[folivier]

Just returned from a trip to Pensacola Beach. It was a family trip, we rented a house on the beach with son's family and our 2 granddaughters. It was 3 houses from DW's sister and their family. Her brother and his family was a couple miles away also. 34 total. Great time, about $10,000 spent but worth it. And the best? it didn't hurt as much as I thought it would to spend that much. I really don't care for the beach but enjoyed the time with family.
Oh yeah the night before we left a sea turtle came in and laid eggs right behind our house. We didn't see it but saw the turtle patrol staking it out in the morning.

 

[COcheesehead]

He said he liked good wine, but he didn't invite me to try any

That’s just wrong.

 

[street]

I don't have news on BTD, YET! But Ii have been working on expanding the ranch with a purchase to acquirer more land. The guy that has it texted me last night and he said, I haven't forgotten you I will call when things slow down and we will talk about a deal. WOW!!! That made my day and I'm hoping sometime in the next 12 month's I can have a BTD event.
I will get a deal it is just a matter of time. I don't want to push it and want it when he is ready. My offer and details is a very good deal for him and he knows it.

 

[Souschef]

Added the Scottish Highlands extension to our 2026 Ancient Isles cruise. Pretty dear for 4 days but looks awesome.

Where are you going? I traveled there a lot.

 

[audreyh1]

Where are you going? I traveled there a lot.

Already back. We went to Edinburgh, Stirling, Glencoe, several stops all the way up the Great Glen to Inverness. From the ship we had already visited the Aran Islands, Iona, Staffs, Lewis Islad in the Outer Hebrides, Shetland Islands, Orkney Islands, and Aberdeen.

 

[Surewhitey]

Kinda BTD, DD gifted me a nice card, mug, steakhouse gift card and a $7k check for building their screen room. I asked her to put the check towards the 529...never turned down $7k, but it felt great.

The card & mug were more important...

 

[deserat]

Ummm-BTD ongoing-added even more travel. Just got back from Boston to go to BBQ of friend. Going to AZ this weekend to go to a concert with a friend. Bought tix to go to DC over 4th (250th anniversary of our country of which I served 30 years in uniform) and then two weeks later leave for Oxford class in UK, concert on Isle of Man, hiking in Sussex, weekend in Stockholm, three more concerts in Germany and then an e-bike cruise in Croatia. I have already done an 80s cruise to Caribbean and a month in Australia with flying a Cessna 172 for 7 days paying Australian fuel prices. This year will probably be one of my largest BTD travel years ever..and amount wise the highest so far outside of buying houses for cash....go-go-go year for me for sure...I keep looking at the portfolio and it is not decreasing...it is increasing!!

 

[Dtail]

Ummm-BTD ongoing-added even more travel. Just got back from Boston to go to BBQ of friend. Going to AZ this weekend to go to a concert with a friend. Bought tix to go to DC over 4th (250th anniversary of our country of which I served 30 years in uniform) and then two weeks later leave for Oxford class in UK, concert on Isle of Man, hiking in Sussex, weekend in Stockholm, three more concerts in Germany and then an e-bike cruise in Croatia. I have already done an 80s cruise to Caribbean and a month in Australia with flying a Cessna 172 for 7 days paying Australian fuel prices. This year will probably be one of my largest BTD travel years ever..and amount wise the highest so far outside of buying houses for cash....go-go-go year for me for sure...I keep looking at the portfolio and it is not decreasing...it is increasing!!

Impressive travel.

 

[Dtail]

Just spent close to 16k for the two of us on an 8 day European cruise. First time we have spent over 10k on a vacation. Was worth it.

 

[Chuckanut]

Just spent close to 16k for the two of us on an 8 day European cruise. First time we have spent over 10k on a vacation. Was worth it.

I’m considering starting to cruise. Care to give us a brief trip report?

 

[Dtail]

I’m considering starting to cruise. Care to give us a brief trip report?

8 day 7 night Western Mediterranean cruise by Royal Caribbean starting and ending in Barcelona.
Ship - Harmony of the Seas. Very large ship containing 6,800 people. Mix of old, young, married, single, some kids. It does not feel as crowded as it might seem.
Ports - Majorca, Marseille, Florence, Rome, Naples - each port for 1 day with 1 full daytime crusing.
Excursions - went on 4 of them to the first 4 ports listed above - some had long bus rides to get to the venue overall pretty good but not enough free time in the venues.
Dining - ate at the main dining room 3 nights (unlimited food unofficially) fairly good quality but not top of the line. ate at 4 specialty restaurants - better quality. Excellent service for all meals.
Entertainment - tons of entertainment on the ship. 4 set shows including Broadway style - nothing over 1 hour.Lots of trivia ( we won Name That Tune for 50's /60's music). Sports games including Pickleball, Soccer, Basketball, Table Tennis. Art auction, discounted watches and jewelry. Movies, many pools, spa services, gym.
Lots of bars with dancing, karaoke, live singers of good quality.
Worst part of the trip was navigating the Barcelona airport on the way home. Very inefficient processes for disability folks (fiancee had 3 back surgeries).
Hopefully this is a good start of info.

 

[sengsational]

I’m considering starting to cruise. Care to give us a brief trip report?

8 day 7 night Western Mediterranean cruise by Royal Caribbean starting and ending in Barcelona.
Ship - Harmony of the Seas. Very large ship containing 6,800 people. Mix of old, young, married, single, some kids. It does not feel as crowded as it might seem.
Ports - Majorca, Marseille, Florence, Rome, Naples - each port for 1 day with 1 full daytime crusing.

I got back from a similar one on MSC. We hit Tunisia, not Rome. Huge ship. We decided that's our last big ship cruise. We're glad we went, and the crowd control was reasonably managed, but nothing they can do when 5,800 people are trying to get off. Just before the MSC, we got off a Virgin Voyages ship that was half the size. Still big, but not was bad as the really big ships. The issue that has soured us on cruises lately is the ports are jammed with huge ships, and dumping off 25,000 people makes ports unbearable (rough guess at our day in Marsielle, as an example). There's a web site that shows port schedules, but you can count on the ports being jammed full of ships. Even in the very early part of the Mediterranean cruise season, it was packed.

If you really want to BTD, go on a smaller ship. We like Azamara, but they still share many ports with megaliners. We might try Silver Sea, but again, sharing ports with the megas is a reason to avoid specific itineraries. There are some small ship cruises on small out of Darwin that look really interesting, but BTD, and you'd need to check each port day for crowd estimates.

Another option are ships/boats that traverse rivers. They have maybe 15 cabins. And no crowds!! I went on one out of Manaus and really enjoyed it. All the passengers shared a sporting hobby, so a cohesive group. They have these kinds of boats in Vietnam and the Nile and lots of places. Way more money than the big ships, but a completely different (and much better) experience.

 

[Dtail]

I got back from a similar one on MSC. We hit Tunisia, not Rome. Huge ship. We decided that's our last big ship cruise. We're glad we went, and the crowd control was reasonably managed, but nothing they can do when 5,800 people are trying to get off. Just before the MSC, we got off a Virgin Voyages ship that was half the size. Still big, but not was bad as the really big ships. The issue that has soured us on cruises lately is the ports are jammed with huge ships, and dumping off 25,000 people makes ports unbearable (rough guess at our day in Marsielle, as an example). There's a web site that shows port schedules, but you can count on the ports being jammed full of ships. Even in the very early part of the Mediterranean cruise season, it was packed.

If you really want to BTD, go on a smaller ship. We like Azamara, but many ports with megaliners. We might try Silver Sea. There are some small ship cruises on small out of Darwin that look really interesting, but BTD.

Another option are ships/boats that traverse rivers. They have maybe 15 cabins. And no crowds!! I went on one out of Manaus and really enjoyed it. All the passengers shared a sporting hobby, so a cohesive group. They have these kinds of boats in Vietnam and the Nile and lots of places. Way more money than the big ships, but a completely different (and much better) experience.

Yeah, also considering a Silver Seas type experience.
We had a Key Card which had extra amenities attached. Thus we were one of the first ones on the ship, which really helped with unpacking, plus a non crowded lunch. We paid extra to stay on the ship longer due to our late afternoon flight back home. When we disembarked on 11:30am, no one else was with us.
The other days were with excursions, so disembarked with a group, which was fine as they separate the timing to some extent.

 

[RetiredHappy]

Yeah, also considering a Silver Seas type experience.
We had a Key Card which had extra amenities attached. Thus we were one of the first ones on the ship, which really helped with unpacking, plus a non crowded lunch. We paid extra to stay on the ship longer due to our late afternoon flight back home. When we disembarked on 11:30am, no one else was with us.
The other days were with excursions, so disembarked with a group, which was fine as they separate the timing to some extent.

We have only cruised on Celebrity Cruises where ships hold about 3000 passengers and cannot imagine going on a ship with more people like Royal Caribbean. I think for Transatlantic and Transpacific, larger ships like Celebrity work well but alot rougher with smaller ships like Silver Seas and Azamara. We love sea days. We are definitely leaning to only doing smaller ships in the future, starting with Azamara next September. After that we will decide whether to try Silver Seas or not, mainly because we are Elite with Celebirty and get reciprocity with Silver Seas.

 

[sengsational]

We had a Key Card which had extra amenities attached.

We didn't pay for the "Yacht Club", so just steerage class without perks.

I did my own shore excursions, so no easy-off. Once ashore, we hired a driver and guide in a few ports. BTD, but worth it! Had to do the 50 passenger bus thing in Italy, but had low expectations, which were barely met, lol!

 

[Teacher Terry]

The last cruise I took was seven years ago but back then royal Caribbean had smaller ships. Many of the ones we took had 2500 passengers and we actually got a really cheap price on a cruise that only had 500 passengers but then they retired the ship.

I have taken five royal Caribbean cruises and they were all great. I took one princess cruise and it was so bad that they could’ve made a Chevy Chase vacation movie about it.

When we got home, I sent them an email and never received a response. I know on one of the threads on cruising I once listed everything that went wrong and it was quite a lengthy list. You would now have to pay me to go on princess.

 

[Dtail]

We have only cruised on Celebrity Cruises where ships hold about 3000 passengers and cannot imagine going on a ship with more people like Royal Caribbean. I think for Transatlantic and Transpacific, larger ships like Celebrity work well but alot rougher with smaller ships like Silver Seas and Azamara. We love sea days. We are definitely leaning to only doing smaller ships in the future, starting with Azamara next September. After that we will decide whether to try Silver Seas or not, mainly because we are Elite with Celebirty and get reciprocity with Silver Seas.

Celebrity Cruises is also on our list of possibilities.

 

[sengsational]

Under the Carnival umbrella, I've sailed Carnival, Princess, and Costa. They also have Cunard, Holland America, P&O, Seaborne, and Aida. If you get a low price on any of these, I would not expect much, based on recent expense.with the three I've sailed. So since we are talking BTD, skip these, except maybe Seaborne, but no experience.

Under the RCL umbrella, I've sailed Royal only. They also have Celebrity and Silversea. I've sailed Azamara, but after the RCL divestiture. Royal seemed a little better than the Carnival clan, but not much better. BTD would be on Silversea, but no experience.

Then there's NCL. My experience with them is quite stale, but left a bad taste on a Hawaiian cruise. Their fancy brand is Oceania. It seems like the Oceania thing is more of a pricing thing...more things automatically included. But probably still low-brow basics.

I wouldn't try to go fancy on any of these cruise lines. By that, I mean I wouldn't spend extra to get access to special lounges and pools, etc, and I would not go on their fancy, small ships. The reason is that the same protocols and provisioning are probably ubiquitous, and so as much as they try to differentiate, it's going to be mostly the same.

MSC is separate, my last cruise, and like Carnival, never again. These megas, with cheap nightly rates nickel and dime the heck out of you, making it quite annoying at times. On MSC, the first night after dinner in the hallway outside the main dining room they had a guy pitching the $55 per person per night specialty restaurant! It was a confirmation that they knew the included food and service was sub-par. MSC is not a BTD option.

I've sailed Virgin and Viking (river only) and they are separate from the conglomerates. Virgin was different in a lot of ways, better in many ways, and a few annoying things they didn't do as well as the megacorp brands.

 

[Dtail]

We didn't pay for the "Yacht Club", so just steerage class without perks.

I did my own shore excursions, so no easy-off. Once ashore, we hired a driver and guide in a few ports. BTD, but worth it! Had to do the 50 passenger bus thing in Italy, but had low expectations, which were barely met, lol!

Actually was in steerage on the 4 plane rides, as Economy Plus was all sold out and booked it too late. Just don't want to spring for business or first class yet.

 

[Dtail]

Under the Carnival umbrella, I've sailed Carnival, Princess, and Costa. They also have Cunard, Holland America, P&O, Seaborne, and Aida. If you get a low price on any of these, I would not expect much, based on recent expense.with the three I've sailed. So since we are talking BTD, skip these, except maybe Seaborne, but no experience.

Under the RCL umbrella, I've sailed Royal only. They also have Celebrity and Silversea. I've sailed Azamara, but after the RCL divestiture. Royal seemed a little better than the Carnival clan, but not much better. BTD would be on Silversea, but no experience.

Then there's NCL. My experience with them is quite stale, but left a bad taste on a Hawaiian cruise. Their fancy brand is Oceania. It seems like the Oceania thing is more of a pricing thing...more things automatically included. But probably still low-brow basics.

I wouldn't try to go fancy on any of these cruise lines. By that, I mean I wouldn't spend extra to get access to special lounges and pools, etc, and I would not go on their fancy, small ships. The reason is that the same protocols and provisioning are probably ubiquitous, and so as much as they try to differentiate, it's going to be mostly the same.

MSC is separate, my last cruise, and like Carnival, never again. These megas, with cheap nightly rates nickel and dime the heck out of you, making it quite annoying at times. On MSC, the first night after dinner in the hallway outside the main dining room they had a guy pitching the $55 per person per night specialty restaurant! It was a confirmation that they knew the included food and service was sub-par. MSC is not a BTD option.

I've sailed Virgin and Viking (river only) and they are separate from the conglomerates. Virgin was different in a lot of ways, better in many ways, and a few annoying things they didn't do as well as the megacorp brands.

What were the annoying things on Virgin?

 

[sengsational]

What were the annoying things on Virgin?

One thing was their app failed to let us schedule dinners. Apparently all Android phones had the error, so the Apple people had all of the good bookings, while the Android people had to wait in line forever to talk to an agent. As it turns out, if you don't mind eating early (we don't), you just go to the restaurant right when it opens. They have no-shows, so usually got in within 15 or 30 minutes. But they give you the table on the direct line between all the tables and the kitchen, so walk-ins seemed to get the worst table.

We flew in, and they let you drop your luggage right away, but you can't board before your scheduled boarding time. I get that, but they literally sent us out in a cold rain... refused to provide shelter in some really nasty weather.

The food was interesting, and usually fairly decent, but not consistent. I got the ribeye in the Mexican place once, and it was fantastic. Nothing left on the plate. The next time it was harder to cut and 1/3 was inedible. I thought I just got unlucky, and the third time 2/3 of the steak could not be cut apart, and I left most of it.

There's more, but this isn't BTD talk, although spending 14 days on a ship ain't free

 

[Koolau]

One thing was their app failed to let us schedule dinners. Apparently all Android phones had the error, so the Apple people had all of the good bookings, while the Android people had to wait in line forever to talk to an agent. As it turns out, if you don't mind eating early (we don't), you just go to the restaurant right when it opens. They have no-shows, so usually got in within 15 or 30 minutes. But they give you the table on the direct line between all the tables and the kitchen, so walk-ins seemed to get the worst table.


There's more, but this isn't BTD talk, although spending 14 days on a ship ain't free

Yeah, that's what I want. Scheduling my dinners via phone.

Our one cruise we had assigned times for every meal up front.

 

[pdxgal]

Update re: empty airline seats. On my Delta flight from CDG to PDX last week there were about 40 empty seats at the rear of the plane. Basically the last 6-7 rows. Front sections were full. I asked the flight attendant for his take on the reason, and he said it was a seasonal thing. The vacationers who recently left the US for Europe aren't returning yet, and Europeans won't be leaving in large numbers till later in the summer. He said their upcoming flights were all fully booked. I still suspect the empty seats at the rear could reflect the K-shaped economy. If the upcoming flights are full perhaps it's because Delta has reduced the number of flights. In any case, it was nice to have the extra space!

 

[disneysteve]

I suppose this qualifies as BTD.

We had our kitchen fully remodeled last year. Overall we’re pleased with the results. Our contractor did a nice job, but painting is not his strong suit. There are spots where he just didn’t do a great job. And in the bathroom, which was part of the job, the paint looks particularly bad.

My wife got the name of a good painter that friends have used. He came by on Sunday to take a look and immediately identified all of the issues we were going to point out as well as some others. We are hiring him to totally redo the bathroom. Sand it down, prep and prime the walls, and repaint. For the kitchen, he needs to prep a couple of particular areas but mainly just needs another coat on the whole room.

He said the kitchen is a one-day job. The bathroom will be maybe 3-4 days because of Spackle and primer needing time to dry.

It's not a huge expense. $1,200 plus the $150 we spent on the paint yesterday. But enough to be a BTD in our minds. The kitchen is beautiful as is but we just want to eliminate the little issues that nobody really notices but us.

 

[pdxgal]

It's not a huge expense. $1,200 plus the $150 we spent on the paint yesterday. But enough to be a BTD in our minds. The kitchen is beautiful as is but we just want to eliminate the little issues that nobody really notices but us.

I totally get it, as I normally do all my own painting. But having it finished the way you want, and quickly, seems like money well spent in this case. Good for you!