RCCL trip report! Freedom in Eastern Car Jan 26-Feb 2, 2014

[gumbypee]

I suppose so! And omg your username...

Lol it was a phrase my sister used as a kid to say "I love you" without having to be embarrassed by saying the words

 

[bumbershoot]

Lol it was a phrase my sister used as a kid to say "I love you" without having to be embarrassed by saying the words

Awwww.

 

[bumbershoot]

Got a burst of energy just now, and started scanning all the paper stuff I accumulated during the trip. I'll pretend like some of the stuff was given on the first day...some might have been, some might have been later. I'll talk a little bit about one or two of the things as well.

While it'll be different from ship to ship and particular sailing to sailing, I figure things will be *basically* similar. Heck, I noticed while scanning that a thing about Adventure Ocean says Freedom on the first page and Vision in a paragraph on the 3rd page...but the info was still good.


First up, Spa Services!

Second, schedule of Fitness and Seminars. I did ONE thing on here, a Fab Abs class. I wish I had done more. As you can see, they tell you what costs extra.

Ooh I'm such a VIP. They want me to learn how to buy jewelry!

Gotta tell ya, I went to two of the seminars. Some decent info. Big huge sales session. Kinda silly. Ian, the guy running the show, is a salesman and will exaggerate or tell different stories if he feels like it. Salesman. He also had an annoying typo in his second slide presentation..."emeralds" are not "emerlads", know what I mean? (yes I told him, of course I did! that's just embarrassing.)

I was glad to go to the seminars; gave me something to do and was kind of fun. Gave me something to do in St Maarten when it became obvious that we weren't going to hop a taxi and tootle around the island. Snagged all sorts of "free" (er, well, paid extra to "upgrade") "gemstone" earrings, got to see some shops, felt like a little scavenger hunt, and we got to meet some nice people.

(photos of the things I got will be after I can find one little thing to take a picture of, so check in a further-on post)



Just like DCL, they give you a ton of info on that first day! You do, however, have to read it.

I actually really liked this barebones overview. Got an extra copy, folded it up, and kept it with me!

 

[bumbershoot]

Referring back to the jewelry presentation page...


Remember the "Free Diamond Charm Bracelet for all who attend"?

You got a paper telling you to go to Diamonds International. From there you had to go all the way to the back to the lady with all the bracelets. She would give you the bracelet and then want $5 for a charm. Ah, but Ian told us to tell her "Ian said it would be free for me". So I did that and got the charm at no cost. And we also got a charm (before we got the bracelet) at the second seminar on Day 3.

So here's the bracelet in the packaging.

Ah, I still coudn't get the picture perfectly enough to show you that IF there's a diamond in there, it's less than a speck of dust. It's not even pave´anything. It's sort of a starburst of lines that make you THINK it's sparkly. I think it's more that it's a "charm bracelet that you could put diamonds on if you wanted to do that"...

And here is the bracelet still in the packaging (just took these today) and the charms.

I will be showing these to my MIL, as she is going on a cruise to Alaska in May. I don't want her wasting any bit of time in jewelry stores looking for such things as this. And that's also why I'm showing you. If you like what you're seeing, YAY! Get them! If you want to have some fun and get some blingy stuff, YAY! Get them! If you want to have a scavenger hunt, again, YAY! Do it! But if you think that you'll be getting something with any sort of noticeable diamond in it, or that it won't already be turning just a bit greenish without ever taking it out of the packaging...hopefully you now know the truth.



Also at the seminars, they talked about the free pendants at Effy. There are, I believe, 4 Effy locations in St Maarten. They are bright and nice and pretty. You take your card in there, show it to someone (trying to not look around, of course), and they hand you a baggie with a pendant on a piece of paperboard. They tell you that you can upgrade to pendant and gemstone earrings for $10. OK why not. And then they hand you a different baggie with earrings and a different pendant on paperboard inside. That pendant is bigger.

Of course, these "gemstones" aren't anything truly valuable. And I have no idea what the metal is. (these activities aren't for anyone with metal allergies, that's for sure!)

Since I was there with the family, and since my son is sweet and says hello, at each place I went to but one, they just handed him the "free" pendant. So I got the upgraded baggie and he got the other one. At one place I didn't like the color of the stone (black, not my style) but they gave him the free one anyway. At another place I got the upgrade and they didn't give him the other. No biggie at all, just telling the story.


Baggie, paper, and free pendant.

Paper, free pendant, and upgrades.

And to give us a frame of reference for the size of the stones, something that is credit card sized.

Pretty, but worth $10? Maybe, maybe not. But I had some fun, got to meet nice people, had a bit of structure for our time that was going to be spent wandering anyway...and got some pretty bits of glass. As a bonus, the kidlet got some pirate jewels.



Last...the free tanzanite studs mentioned on that same page...

Again, you take your card to Tanzanite International (in St Maarten this is part of the Diamonds Intl building if I recall correctly). Again, you meet nice people. And you see really pretty things.

On this day they were super-excited because some jewelry designer was there, and "if you missed the chance to see Christos you would regret it forever".... I wasn't really partial to the jewelry, so I didn't think I'd regret it for a minute. What would I say? "Hi, I don't really like your stuff, nice to meet you!"? Nah.

So they showed me the free studs, and they were not my style.

But wait! Ian had mentioned that with ANY purchase you would get a necklace with a triangular tanzanite pendant on it. This necklace was worth 100-something bucks. You could buy tanzanite studs for $99 and get this necklace. Wow, what a bargain! Get the cheapest thing for sale there, and get the same thing anyone buying a gazillion dollars would have gotten with the purchase.

By this time, seeing all this jewelry, DH was jonesing to buy something. I'm serious. He was raised by a jewelry-freak of a mom, and he LOVES buying me jewelery (though I think he just likes buying it...even if it just sat in a drawer). Since I'm not a huge jewelry person, this has caused tensions, LOL. Today I was willing to at least look.

So after a lot of convincing, I ended up with upgraded-one-level earrings and the "free" necklace. Oh and their hook for getting you to upgrade is that the necklace stone is triangular while the cheapest earrings are round. Upgrade one level and the earrings' stone shape matches. (colors don't really match but oh well)

So here's the sucker, er, me wearing the earrings and necklace. Maybe I should have had Robert model them.

 

[gumbypee]

Love your good nature about it all!!!

 

[bumbershoot]

Ok that's enough about jewelry and seminars and silliness.


Here are scans of the info we received. First up: Adventure Ocean.

Note: on our sailing, the 6-8s were in with the 9-11s. Reverse that. The older kids were in with the younger ones; the door to the Voyager area was never open.




The next page mentions the Youth Evacuation Program. The kids (or at least all kids partaking at all in AO?) have a concert-style wristband that gives the assembly station info so that they will be brought to the correct place in case of emergency.

It's also the page where it mentions Vision of the Seas, LOL.

The first paragraph is SUPER important for those doing My Family Time (they call it My Time Family?) Dining. I didn't see it until just now. E never wanted to leave dinner to go, we were all happy to have him with us, but it would have been nice to know. And it almost seems like they put the important info in reverse order, because the first bit of info needed is to sign the kids up for it each night! Hope that helps someone.

I counsel people to READ the stuff given to you ASAP, but I have a hard time doing it perfectly. And the AO stuff was just as hard for me as Disney's Oceaneer's Club/Lab stuff.

Check out the free family arcade hour! Makes you think it's only for families, but there were many people there. Basically they just turned most of the machines to free play! Not the ones that gave tickets, and not the BIG ones, but there's not much wrong with free Ms Pac Man.

 

[bumbershoot]

Love your good nature about it all!!!

Well thank you.

I know I've jumped ahead in the jewelry stuff, so you don't yet know how much I had tired out my guys the day before in San Juan. I'd hoped to do more in St Maarten but it just wasn't going to happen.

And I figured I would get that stuff done with first. Anyone going on RCCL in the Bahamas/Caribbean (and Alaska if I recall) is going to be bombarded with that info. Might as well know what you get, right? I can't remember if Disney cruise had those seminars and shopping guides (only place we've been with them is Nassau and I don't know if they have Whatever-Stone Internationals there).


Now if only I can remember, at a later date, to talk about the WATCH purchases that were made. Talk about embarrassing in retrospect...



If any of my photobucket links up there are broken, let me know. I moved things around and can't totally figure out if I missed anything while fixing them!

 

[bumbershoot]

Each day's Compass has a half-sheet (as I think I mentioned), and that seems to give the specials of the day and what feels like last minute info.

Forgive the writing on some of these; I couldn't find the clean copy for every day.

And I have nothing to do with the grammar problems found on this page, especially in the "super suite upgrade" section. Ugh.

And the back side of the above page just shows the officers' pictures and info.

 

[annmarieda]

I am here!

Never having been on a cruise, I find it all very confusing. I thought so much of it was "all inclusive" now I am seeing that is not the case. Lots of little add ons... or big add ons.

For some reason too... I didn't realize that you were not on a Disney cruise. I guess I just assumed. I would have figured it out faster if I had read your title...

 

[Hernandez6060]

Really enjoying reading your trip report. We are Sailing Freedom for New Years 2014-2015. We just sailed Disney Wonder and love reading about RCCL from someone who knows DCL. Please keep it coming. I am hooked.

 

[bumbershoot]

I am here!

Never having been on a cruise, I find it all very confusing. I thought so much of it was "all inclusive" now I am seeing that is not the case. Lots of little add ons... or big add ons.

For some reason too... I didn't realize that you were not on a Disney cruise. I guess I just assumed. I would have figured it out faster if I had read your title...

Hi Ann! Sorry for the confusion.

Cruising used to be so much more inclusive, but I suppose you have to increase costs even more to truly do that. So jut like themeparks they just chip away at what's included.

Disney has free sodas, Royal charges for them. Royal has Ben & Jerry's that you pay for, Disney doesn't have that "level" of ice cream. Etc.

Really enjoying reading your trip report. We are Sailing Freedom for New Years 2014-2015. We just sailed Disney Wonder and love reading about RCCL from someone who knows DCL. Please keep it coming. I am hooked.

Thanks for reading! How fun would a New Years trip be? Wow!

 

[bumbershoot]

We're still on Day 1's pictures.


If I recall correctly, hubby and son were tired and wanted to laze around. I was tired, too, but find it VERY difficult to laze around when I have new things to look at. So I went on out, camera in hand. Probably snagged my first iced latte with the Replenish package while I was at it, too.

I think this room is in the Solarium area. In the daytime it's nice. We had a chance to wander alone at night on maybe the 5th day, and it actually kind of freaked me out. SO dark, the water is also SO dark, you're just so alone. Felt spooky to me. I had to leave! I'm sure normal people would find it romantic at night.

Never actually used the Solarium on this cruise. The one time I tried, the chair "hogs" were even worse than out in the main area!

The bridge is surprisingly steep.

The weather that day was weird. No big surprise, as it had been weird the whole time we were in Florida!

For newbies, this is the water play area. Looks very different in the bright sunshine when kids are playing all over!

I went to ask questions about registering DS for AO, which is when I found out that the 9-11 year olds would be in with the 6-8 year olds. So this door was never open.

Walking in to the arcade, which is the indoors way to get to the kid's clubs.

But with the noise, THIS is how the arcade always FELT to me. Poor wittle me is really sensitive to loud noises.

Wandered some more. Found that Johnny Rockets has a veggie burger! We never got back there, but at least I knew it.

Never got here, either. Flowrider OR rock wall.

There are games out along the deck with Adventure Ocean.

Pictures from above! You can see that kids have come out. The donut shaped thing towards the left is a "lazy river". Obviously we called it the lazy donut, instead. When DS finally went in it, he had a very fun time.

Boy oh boy was it gloomy!

I was fascinated by the "hole" in the bow of Dream.

 

[bumbershoot]

I don't want to criticize RCCL, but this was a problem all over the ship. They really really need someone to make SURE they have things spelled correctly. I only wish I had taken note of what stairway/deck this was in/on so I could let them know.

Weird art.

Promenade.

Underside of light-up bridge! Just in case anyone gets paranoid that "up skirt" pictures can be taken from under. (answer = no, thank goodness)

By this time my guys had woken up and I dragged them from the room. It was obviously time for ice cream.

It was also time for a Boddingon's Ale for me. (or perhaps a Le Fin do Monde?)

When I went into the English pub to order that, I brought my card and DH's card as well. This allowed me to get us both bottles of water. I also paid OOP for my beer. The bartenders were really nice. I liked that I was able to get both of us waters as long as I had both cards.



Eventually it was sail-away. We didn't really participate in the party, but wandered as we wished. The Dream was following us. Pirates.

We had My Family Time (or My Time Family?) dining with that early early seating.

We were at a table of 6 with a super-awesome family from Georgia. By the end we were all so sad to have the cruise end! Their family consisted of a mom, grown daughter, and 16 year old son.


Our serving staff was so much fun. Server was Jean (as in the French way of saying that name). His nametag said Mauritius as his location, but he said he was from Madagascar. Cool, either way. He was lovely and fun. His assistant was Donovan.

I found the menus to be decent for figuring out what we, as ovo lacto vegetarians (which means we do eat eggs and dairy), could eat, though not perfect. I have a picture from a later dinner that showed a fish or seafood meal as being vegetarian. They know better from previous menus, so it was an error. A typo. And ONE night the dessert menu suddenly had the symbol for vegetarian on some items, which I *think* just meant someone decided to put it on there and not the others, but it COULD mean that the other desserts from previous and future nights all contained gelatin. I think that in the future I'll just skip most desserts on RCCL and head to Ben and Jerry's. That ice cream tastes better than anything I ate at dessert!

The drinks server came around once that night, we didn't want any alcohol, and she never came around again. The whole week. I didn't notice this until around a week AFTER our cruise, so it didn't bother us. The thing that caused me to notice it was that I was unpacking and realized I didn't have any little shot glasses like I did after our Radiance cruise for our honeymoon, and I realized those little cordials had never even been offered to us. Strange but no big bother.



After dinner wanderings... We didn't do a show and DS didn't want to go to the club. We did partake of the free family arcade hour, though. (I say that like we meant to do it...we didn't. We had forgotten all about what we had seen a couple hours before on the Compass. Just happened upon it.)



Saw Po. From behind.

Elevator lobby.

Helpful sign to help you find what way to turn! 1700 was all the way in the back of the ship, so it was a bit of a walk sometimes.

Eventually we turned in for the night. CocoCay was the following day.

 

[Hernandez6060]

...... I went to ask questions about registering DS for AO, which is when I found out that the 9-11 year olds would be in with the 6-8 year olds. So this door was never open.....,,

Really enjoying your trip report. Did they tell you if the 9-11 year old club was closed for a particular reason? I'm guessing not enough 9-11 year olds to justify opening it? Just curious as we have 2 kids in that age group.

 

[mommyofthreeboys]

Enjoying your report. TFS

What is the Replenish package?

 

[bumbershoot]

Finally it was Jan 27th. Our first time on CocoCay. I was a little bummed I didn't get to run a 5K like on Castaway, but I quickly got over that.


Compasses!

This page describes one of the things I had wanted to do. A Treasure Hunt while snorkeling. But we were NOT up to it on that day, so I'm really glad I didn't book it.

For the drinkers reading; well, the drinkers who don't quite need the drinks packages, notice that page!

Happy Hour-50% off!
Head over to Casino Royale on Deck 4 for the best Happy Hours onboard Freedom of the Seas! 50% of all house and call brand cocktails today in the Casino from 5:00pm to 8:00pm.

I believe that this Happy Hour was had every night of our cruise, though we didn't partake of it. With it being in the casino, and given how sensitive I am to smoke, it would have required Robert going down and getting my drink then bringing it up, and while that's not a huge pain, it was just enough to make us never really think about it.

 

[bumbershoot]

Really enjoying your trip report. Did they tell you if the 9-11 year old club was closed for a particular reason? I'm guessing not enough 9-11 year olds to justify opening it? Just curious as we have 2 kids in that age group.

They did not. But when I think about how relatively few kids there were each time we dropped him off or picked him up, I think they just had a really small group of kids between both age groups. So we did dropoff and pickup at the 6-8 year old room.

The room was big and bright and airy, but it wasn't packed with *stuff* like on the Disney cruise kid's clubs. The staff, however, were great. Cheerful, happy, and really personable. And happy to see him. He only started going to the club 4 days into the cruise, but in no time they had learned his name and would even greet him when in different areas of the ship.

My son is really good at interacting with young AND older kids, so it wasn't a problem for him, and I think the staff are really good at making sure everyone can participate without getting too bored.

Enjoying your report. TFS

What is the Replenish package?

Thank you!

Replenish is the NON-alcoholic drinks package they just created this winter. Before, they had soda "cards", water packages, and wine packages. Now they have 4 more packages.

Replenish includes specialty coffees, which means lattes, mochas, frappucinos, etc. We always got them from the espresso stand next to Cafe Promenade. It's possible you can get them from bars, though I don't know that absolutely. It also includes premium teas, which I think means Tazo vs something like Red Rose. Also the fresh-squeezed OJ in the mornings, bottles of water (500mL), smaller bottles of sparkling water, and mocktails! You also get soda; if your ship has a Freestyle Coke machine on it, you'll get a cup that works with the Freestyle machine (though you can show your card at bars and get soda there, too, if you don't have your cup with you). If you aren't on a ship with the Freestyle machine, just get it from bars.

It's $20 per day for an individual. So if you're not a big alcohol drinker but do want mochas and virgin coladas and things like that, it can work out well!

You do NOT have to buy the same package for everyone in a room; you don't even have to buy A package for everyone in the room. You can order it ahead of time (which means you pay for it ahead of time), you can buy it once onboard (so if you have onboard credit that can be used to pay for it). If you don't buy a package and then decide to do so, you can buy later in the cruise, *as long as* there are at least 4 days left in the cruise.

Oh, and the packages include a 15% gratuity, so you want to keep that in mind!



Here's a copy and paste from the PDF from the package section on Royal's site.


ROYAL REPLENISH* $20 USD per person, per day
Includes:
• Premium coffee
• Premium tea
• Bottled water: Sparkling
(375ml) or Still (500ml)
• Fresh squeezed
orange juice
• Non-alcoholic cocktails
• Fountain soda with
Coca Cola® souvenir cup



SELECT* $40 USD per person, per day
Includes:
• Beer
• Wines by the glass
(up to $8 value)
• Non-alcoholic cocktails • Fountain soda with
Coca Cola® souvenir cup



PREMIUM* $55 USD per person, per day
Includes:
• Call, and premium cocktails (up to $10 value)
• Frozen cocktails
• Beer
• Premium wines by the
glass (up to $12 value)
• Non-alcoholic cocktails
• Bottled water still (500ml) • Fountain soda with
Coca Cola® souvenir cup



ULTIMATE* $65 USD per person, per day
Includes:
Virtually unlimited options. A combination of all the benefits from Premium and Royal Replenish packages.





Enjoy 20% off bottles of wine with the Select, Premium and Ultimate package.
• Package prices already include gratuity. Any additional gratuities are at your discretion. • Available on sailings of 4 nights or longer. ^
^ Packages available to purchase onboard up to 4 nights prior to end of sailing.

 

[bumbershoot]

We didn't get up early, we didn't disembark early. I had meant to, but we were too exhausted.

DS and I had been sick while in Florida. I got that virus from Hades on Jan 6th, and he got it on the 11th. We spent the rest of our WDW portion sitting around feeling miserable, spent nearly a week in Daytona even more miserable, and most of our week+ at Universal still not healthy. Although we were well enough to answer the health questionnaire honestly and still get onboard, it's not like we were totally rested and rarin' to go. DS was still having rough nights which made for tired mornings.


But with a balcony like this, you get a view like, well, this.

Since the balcony is on the corner, you can look around and see off to the side.

I'm pretty sure I enjoyed that view with an iced latte and bottled water in my hands, having run down to what I'm just going to call Cafe Promenade from now on. (on cruisecritic they call CP the place where you get sandwiches and treats, and they call the espresso stand Lattetudes...but it's the same people making your coffee as getting your cookies from the case, so to me it's the same place)

Got everyone ready, had breakfast at Windjammer. Food is decent there. BEST part of it, for those who eat eggs, is the made-to-order egg section. On Freedom this was the midway point where the "back" of the buffet meets. There's an employee who takes your order then calls it when it's up. You get in line to order then mill around, listening for your number. We like eggs overeasy around here, and they made them perfect!

I would get those, a bunch of fruit, maybe a pancake or two. Yum.


Finally we made our way down to the deck to get onto the tender. Boarded and sat for awhile, waiting for it to fill up. Met some nice people while waiting!

 

[bumbershoot]

This is a brochure you get. Front page gives you tidbits about booking excursions.

And here's the back page.

Here is one side of the map inside the brochure. It's actually perfect to start off like this.

You can see where the tenders dock. The little houses on the map are places like bathrooms, excursion offices, the "Boss's" house. Straw Market (much like on Castaway), hair braiding.

You can just barely see a bridge at the edge of the right side of that part of the picture. (the island also continues over to the right, but that will be the next picture) That should let you across to the "bottom" of the island.

#21 is the Water Slide. I had imagined the water slide as being IN the water, as I *think* the slide at Pelican Plunge is. But it's more of a slide that you might see at a really big fair or company picnic, with water in it, not in the water.

#22 the number is on this page, but the actual things for 22 are on the other page. It's Caylana's Aqua Park. This, like the slide, are excursions you pay for.

#23 is Adventure Ocean; DS didn't go to it so we didn't see it.

#24, aw, Nature Trail Entrance. Sounds nice! Wish we had gone.

#25, a bar.

#26 is the Kayak Adventure and Floating Mat station.

#27 is the Barefoot Beach Cabanettes. I know NOTHING about those. I know that on Labadee cabanas are only available to those who have access to the concierge lounge. (which is more and more how it's going with DCL) But I don't know about the "cabanettes".

We got off the tender and went towards the bathrooms. Then we sort of wandered, not sure where to go. On Castaway you follow the herd and the paved path to the trams. You get on the trams and go where everyone else is going. But on Coco, there are a variety of paths. There are trees near you. There is sand (crushed shells?) that you're walking on, not pavement.

There are chickens!

(and roosters, more than one of them, as we heard later on)



So now for the other side of the map!

As you can see, there are small inlets. It's not just the long expanse of beach like on Castaway (to those who haven't been on Castaway, forgive me...it's the only small private beach island I'd been on before Coco, and I know there are many others who have been on the island and want the comparison). Each little inlet feels almost like an island unto itself. Or maybe that's just me.

After walking a bit, we found a nice bit of beach right near #12, the Floating Mat Station, in that small inlet.

Yes, water shoes are nice here.

I did not go in the water here. Just didn't want to. Here are my knees. And my view.

These are pictures DH took of fish.

Bigger fish.

Very close to a bigger fish on the left side of the picture.

And supposedly there's a crab on the rock , along with the partial fish, in this picture, but what I notice is that something went awry in the camera for this ONE image.

 

[bumbershoot]

I lazed around, I had some food. I had a Coco Loco ("so nice, yummy yummy, so nice"...as the servers call out in calm beautiful voices) in a souvenir cup. I relaxed, read my mystery on my Kindle, and took pictures.

Ship looks like it's *right there*. It's not.

Whimper. Can I be there right now?

Me and DH in one magical shot.

Me. And my son. Robert knew the kiddo was doing that behind me, and took the pictures amusedly. Since it's my kid and he's doing it in my picture I think it's funny. (if anyone is reading the Themeparks "photobombing" thread, you would understand why I'm being careful to explain why I'm OK with my kid doing that in DH's picture of me, but wouldn't be OK if he did it to someone else or if it had been some other kid doing it in my picture)

Food! I liked the food just as much on Coco as I do on Castaway. I don't think they had a veggie burger like Castaway, but they had other vegetarian items and they were just as good. Instead of cookies, they had cake; I had a spice cake that was good. Since I do NOT like the cookies from Cookies or Cookies Two on Castaway, the dessert was an upgrade for me!



More pictures.

Yes there's a pelican there on the pilings.

We wandered a bit. Saw the water slide, visited more bathrooms, saw that there was more to the island than I had seen when walking in (mainly the stuff down on the bottom of the map). Lots to explore!

Finally we had to leave. So sad. I was somewhere between the sadness I felt the first time I went to Castaway (super duper sad, chain me to the buoys kind of sad) and the second time (wow it's hot I want to go back a couple hours early).


We took a longish way, and it was pretty. I think we might have crossed the little bridge I pointed out on the map, which might be called Cocothepia Bridge.

The whole time we were revisiting bathrooms and walking along, we could hear two roosters talking. Back and forth, talking talking. I grew up with chickens (and the very occasional rooster) and I liked it. Especially since it wasn't the break of day.

One of them was hiding in here. You can just barely see a rooster shape just sort of above the top rope on the "fence".

And that's a:

In case you're trying to get lost, it's difficult.

Through the metal detectors and bags through an xray, you could take your waters but leave the shells on the island please. And onto the tender. As we made our way to the ship, this is the view that your eyes could see.

So if you hand your camera to your taller husband and he zooms in to avoid all the arms, you see THIS.