vistapat

We were on Serenade December 4-11, 2017. Muster was outside and no movie was shown. It is actually shorter than sitting for the movie, I think.

Wow, Denise. Great surprise for you guys. Sailaway party's at your place, yes?;p

Pat

We did a Baltic Cruise several years ago, and, to this day, was our favorite cruise. I am a regular contributor on the Northern Europe/Baltic port of call boards. When you do book, head over there for some really fantastic advice on all the ports of call. Some amazing people over there give you first hand info on anything Baltics.

If I can answer any questions, just ask away.

 

Cheers

Len

Len - we're doing a Baltics cruise next September. If we don't have much response on our roll call, is it possible to book the private tour companies like JT or Alla without organizing a group.? Just book it as a couple, but ask to be part of a group rather than a private tour?

Thanks, Pat

I didn’t even know there was a problem. I use Tapatalk to read threads, and all my subscribed ones just magically show up at the top.

I'm a semi-dinosaur. I'm inextricably wedded to my desk top PC. Don't even use our laptops much, and almost never use my phone for the Internet.

Pat

Posted this in the bugs forum yesterday along with a whole slew of others. Sailing in two weeks, and I really got spoiled being able to access my roll call through the Users CP. Now I have to go through the whole rigmarole of accessing through the roll calls boards. Sigh!

Pat

Thanks, Lenny. Let's hope we have some quiet drunks;). Pat

New carpet in many places including hallways and cabins. The blue carpet in the Windjammer was new as the fuzzies were all over(from new carpet). The bathroom in our room (7174) had a new toilet and shower doors. The wood railing on our balcony did need a refinish though(yes, nit picking).

 

Agree with OP, the ship was overall very good looking.

Lenny - thanks for your comments on the drydock changes. We will be in 7676, just two down from you, on December 4th. Hope if new bathroom fixtures were needed they will have been provided. I have a question - did you have any issues with noise from the nightclub just below the cabin?

Thanks, Pat

Something to be aware of - Holland America will indeed let you carry on as many bottles as you choose. But they will charge you a corkage fee of $18 per bottle for any bottles over the two they allot. Doesn't matter where you drink it.

Holland America has several cruise-land tour trips which are round trip Seattle. We just booked one for September, 2018. You fly to Seattle, then from there HAL flies you to Anchorage the next day. After overnight in Anchorage, you take a train to Denali for, in our case, a two-night stay which includes the 6-8 hour Tundra Adventure tour. Next is a bus from Denali to Seward to board the southbound cruise on Westerdam. The cruise ends in Vancouver and HAL buses you to Seattle to fly home. This was particularly attractive to us because we can use airline points for the round trip to Seattle, avoiding the open-jaw airfare.

Pat

Take a look in the Ports of Call and a possible private vendor if you want to make sure you have something booked.

Second this advice. We are going to Antigua on our December Serenade cruise and found several private tour operators recommended on the Ports of Call board. We are booked with one, at a reasonable price, and looking forward to it. The nice thing is that many private tour operators do not require payment or deposit in advance, so if RCL does release excursions and you are interested, you only need to let the private tour people know and book the ship's excursion instead.

Pat

Thank you for all your kind replies. My husband was quite reluctant based on the long bus ride to Seward, and on the possibility of things being closed/unavailable in September. I read him your replies, we talked it over, and we decided to go ahead and book it. We leave September 5, 2018 and I'm really looking forward to it. While I know there are no guarantees that our experience will be like yours, I'm really excited to be going back to Alaska and I want to thank you again for sharing your comments.

Pat

I do have one more question. How long is the bus ride from Denali to Seward? I know about the train ride from Anchorage to Denali - I've done it. But Denali to Seward on a bus sounds like a long time.

Pat

Thank you all for your responses. We're not worried about the weather as such - the reason we want to do the tour at that time is that our last several Alaska cruises have featured warm to hot weather. Not what we travel there to experience. I'm just worried about spending the not-inconsiderable money for the trip and then not being able to enjoy the features we were expecting. Will definitely have to weigh our options.

Pat

Roger and John - thank you both for your information. John - I could hope that global warming might change the weather we would encounter, but there would still be lots of closures for the season. Roger - your pictures are beautiful. I have seen that some recent cruisers were lodged in the old Denali Park Lodge - sure would prefer the McKinley Resort. Still don't know what we will do about booking this for next year.

Pat

We are considering an Alaska Cruise-Tour in September of 2018. The tour would leave mid-September and end in late September. I'm a bit concerned that some of the things listed for the tour might not be available due to winter closing in up there. I'm specifically worried about the Denali Wilderness Tour listed as 6-8 hours long, and activities offered from the lodge at Denali or in Anchorage. For anyone who has done a cruise-tour that late in the season, were there any problems due to the weather? Were any activities not available or altered significantly? Also, where in Denali were you lodged?

Thanks for any information.

Pat

Serenade in drydock. Photo credit Mario.

 

 

 

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Great picture. I'm staring straight at our cabin, 7676 on the aft, for our cruise one month from today. Thanks for posting.

Pat

Our first cruise was on the Britannis of the old Chandris Line (later to become Celebrity) in 1977. I won the cruise on a TV game show! The ship was old even then, but had many unique features, such as raised doorways to the cabin and from the cabin to the bathroom. Can't tell you how many times this klutz stubbed her toes on those. Dinner in the dining room was amazing - I remember having quail, octopus, caviar and venison to name a few. We sailed from Puerto Rico, and went to Curacao, Guadeloupe, Grenada, and Caracas, Venezuela.

Britannis was truly an ocean liner, rather than a cruise ship. The differences are hard to describe, but they are real. We got real busy raising our family after that cruise, and didn't cruise again until 1998. But we did cruise again, and again, and again.

Pat

Daughter works for University of Houston. They are closing all three campuses tomorrow at 1:00, so traffic in those areas will be bad. This is the first week of school for the students.

One thing which is not just an issue today - those ship shortcuts on the right do not list Ovation, and haven't since I started thinking about a cruise on her and noticed the omission.

Pat

So true - but I did just call and speak to C&A (time #1) and they verified that vouchers can be used in the MDR and "all other areas of the ship" - let's hope they are right???

Pat

Think I will give C&A a call and ask if they have any information on this.

Pat

Was able to use them everywhere on Oasis this summer including MDR, WJ, theater, Studio B, and of course bars. On the June 4th sailing the DL concierge told me they had changed the rules to include MDR and wherever else wasn't previously included a few weeks prior.

Wow. Does anyone have any official information on whether this is only on Oasis, fleetwide, or just a fluke? That would eliminate the "find a bar near the MDR and order wine just before we're ready to go in" shuffle for us.

This is our first time considering a dining package. Are they only available before sailing? And if also available on the ship, are the prices for the packages higher?

Thanks,

Pat

Another aspect of dealing with Air2Sea. We booked business class round trip air San Diego to Rome for our August cruises. Unfortunately, we had to cancel the cruise due to some health issues. I called Air2Sea, and after deducting the $175 per person cancellation fee, which we had agreed on when we booked, we received our entire $5000 plus airfare back within a matter of days, and without any questions asked. I have a suspicion things might not have gone as well if dealing with Delta direct. Obviously there are different terms and restrictions for different types of fares, but I can't tell you how relieved we are not to have lost the entire amount, and the whole transaction was painless (unless you count losing probably our only chance at flying first class to Europe).

Pat

These prices are also what is showing in our cruise planner for our December cruise on Serenade, so they should be good at least until then.

Chef's Table: $85.00

Chops Grille: $35.00

Chops Grille Lunch: $19.00

Giovanni's Table: $21.00

Izumi: a la carte pricing

Pat