Honolulu Blue

Aren't we all? Besides those who derive happiness and connectivity from conflict and a lack of direction? 🙃

Yes, yes, and yes. A couple of other thoughts: If you want to avoid crowds, figure out when and where they're going to be, and go somewhere else. Some crowds are unavoidable and some worthwhile activities will be crowded. Deal with them the best you can.

Thank you for taking us on your journey through the world of partial charters. It's been interesting so far. I hope you continue to share. Have a great cruise! 🙏

Oh yeah, there was Noro on that ship in March. Maybe it affected that particular sailing, but we didn't hear a thing about it. Thankfully. 🙂

I was on the cruise right after yours. I thought it was quite good, though the 80s theme probably helped some. 😃

The good news is I got another e-mail from ECP and The 80s Cruise. It's always good to hear from them. The bad news is they announced a new headliner and it's... The English Beat. Let's just say that I was hoping for better. Oh well, we've gotta have bands that other people want to listen to, since I can't pay for this charter by myself. 🤑

Oh no, another diva down! 😞 I just learned of Tina Turner's passing.

I've had two cruise ship stops in Jamaica - Falmouth and Ocho Rios. I had cruise ships excursions in both. I felt safe at all times. Then again, my last visit to Jamaica was at least 4 years ago. I'm not sure how I feel now.

I fully respect your opinion, but I disagree. I'm glad they're back for several reasons, but here's one of the more offbeat ones - I like to take a photo of them as they arrive. Those photos stay in my records for a long time for future reference (and sometimes I do refer to them after the cruise), while the events on the cruise are unavailable on the app after the cruise ends.

Me too. I imagine it's kept internally and parsed every which way, but some numbers are just small and would be deceptive if publicized.

Hi. I'm NOT part of this cruise, but Brand Ambassador John Heald made an announcement about some special guests on this sailing. I made a thread about it on the Carnival board: TL,DR: Carnival President Christine Duffy and Chief Culinary Officer Emeril Lagasse will be on this TA. They'll host some special events - one of which will be a chance to cook with Emeril (for a price - though it will be donated to St. Jude)

Nope, not the man himself. ☹️ I'll quote from his FB post (emphasis mine): [F]or those of you sailing on the Carnival Venezia Trans Atlantic you will be joined by Christine Duffy and our Chief Culinary Officer Emeril Lagasse. They will both host some special events and one of those is a chance to cook with this fabulous, brilliant chef. There is a charge for this and the money will of course benefit ST. Jude Childrens Research Hospital . The cooking demo will be in Il Viaggio and how brilliant that you will get a chance to learn and from the master of Bam himself. More details will be given once you are on board. Sorry for the interruption. Now you can go back to your previous discussions.

I was on the Summit in February with basic Internet access. We had Starlink. We did a run to Cozumel and back. Measured download speeds were remarkably consistent - between 0.87 and 0.95 mbps. Not good, but consistent. It felt a bit faster, because the pings were shorter than on most ships.

Thanks for sharing, and also sharing some of your live performance plans. I always figured that concerts outdoors were more vulnerable to hostile weather conditions. It's good to know that R&R and StarVista Live have backup plans indoors when they happen. P.S. I find it quite insane that any cabin for an "ordinary" cruise would be more expensive than any music charter. I'm happy when the charter is less than twice what I would pay for the same cabin without all the performances.

That was a nice and generous thing for you to do!

I've done three cruises with Princess since the restart. I hadn't had any cruises with Princess before then. I have no complaints about the service and in fact find it hard to imagine it could ever have been any better. YMMV.

Reason #42 why music charter cruises are better than festivals on land: Shows (almost) never get canceled due to bad weather.* Here's a link to yesterday's tale of woe at the Cruel World festival: Siouxsie Sioux's anticipated U.S. comeback concert canceled due to 'severe weather': 'Please evacuate the festival site immediately' (yahoo.com) . * I've been very lucky in my limited experience that none of the shows I wanted to see on my cruises have been canceled due to excessive sea motion (a definite hazard on cruise ships). I figure it's a matter of time before this happens to me. @George C, do you have any weather delay/cancellation stories to share?

That must have been quite a party in the steakhouse! I'm sorry to have missed it. How many people is that? 10? 11? 🥩🤑

My dinner buffets on the Summit in February were fine - good in both variety and quality. The fact it was a charter may or may not have helped. I've heard far fewer buffet disaster stories here since March, so I assume things are good fleetwide. But I don't actually know.

I don't have the monster amount the OP does, but my cruise in January will have $600 in OBC from my cruise that was canceled during the pandemic and $250 in shareholder credit.

Interesting. Thanks for sharing. I'm assuming it's a full baccarat table, as opposed to a mini baccarat table? I haven't seen or heard of any of those in cruise ship casinos, but I never look very hard for them.

Having dealt with a few different full charters, their chartering companies, and their terms and conditions, I'm pretty sure you're going to have to deal with the 3rd party promoter to get the changes you want and need. The charter companies have different conditions, but they tend to be stricter than the cruise lines. I encourage you to read their Web site (if they have one) and see if you can find your answers there. Then give them a call or e-mail - I'm assuming they have one or the other. Good luck to you, and best wishes to your brother. 🙏

I bought my ticket to the PB show this morning. I got a nice, close solo seat in the 7th row next to the aisle. On paper it looks near perfect. It was $78 including all fees. I'll fill in the plans around it later. My favorite song from Pat is "Invincible". She's likely to play it, but it's not a lock - call it 70%. She's previously said that she's never playing "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" live ever again due to all the public shootings. They haven't stopped ☹️, so I don't expect to hear it here - which is kind of too bad. "Promises In the Dark" is my second favorite from her. It's relatively obscure, so it might come down to how long the concert is. If it's a 25-song set list, she'll have no choice but to play it. If it's just 10 songs, she's probably going to prefer others.

I heard about Lionel Richie's Dancing on the Sand concert/adventure in the Bahamas that will be held at the end of November. Mr. Richie managed to pull in Sheryl Crow and Nile Rogers & Chic as his guests, among others. I assume these ex-Chic ladies weren't invited: (above photo from last year's UDC; I missed them on this year's UDC. ☹️) Anyway, the info page is at https://lionelrichie.vibee.com/ . I finally found out their prices. To make a long story short, it doesn't make enough value sense for me to go. Oh well, I'm sure they'll get plenty of takers and make lots of $$$ for those involved. Something that might be a good value is a recently announced show by Pat Benatar and her guitar-playing hubby Neil Giraldo at one of our nearby Native American megacasinos in August. Here's the link to that site: https://www.etix.com/ticket/p/5899452/pat-benatar-neil-giraldo-battle-creek-firekeepers-casino-hotel . I don't see any VIP experiences, but the base tickets are pretty reasonable for a Hall of Famer - $50 to $80. I like Pat well enough, so maybe I could make an evening out of this. We'll see.

I was on a Cali Coastal on the Majestic last year with those ports plus Santa Barbara. California, its residents, and the passengers who joined me were/are generally very casual. Some of the passengers were quite advanced in age (which can make them dress more formally), and I'm sure some places on land have fancier dress requirements and/or suggestions. Ensenada, from what I've seen of it from past cruises, is about as casual as California. I'll defer to others about dress in Princess' specialty restaurants. Whatever you decide to wear, have fun on your cruise!