gagenie

First time to Norway and we are wanting to do Alesund Troll Road Tour which company do you recommend using? Rather not use the Cruise lines tour

I received the email also, wasn't sure why they sent the email so late. Me & my son are both fine and we did the self disembarkation cause we had a early flight

Looking forward to your review and thank you for doing it!! We leave this Saturday on the Sky going to the Eastern Caribbean and these pictures are making me so excited!! 

Thank you for the video!!

We will be in Saint Thomas Feb. 25 and we are doing the sea lion swim. Couple of questions do they allow you to video or take pictures in there?

Also when you got off the ship was it easy to get a taxi to go to Coral World?

Thank you!!

Thank you so much for your blog!! I have enjoyed it and the pictures!! Can't wait till we board!

Thank you!! We board the Sky Feb 22 so looking forward to your blog!!

4 minutes ago, Mar18519 said:

We sailed the Royal in Alaska in July 2019 and had to pay extra to have lobster tail AND steak.  It was  $19 upcharge.  I was surprised because so many people had encouraged us to eat in the MDR (we prefer “grazing” at buffets, pizza, burgers, salads, sandwiches,  etc).  We were told by family who had cruised previously that you can order as many entrees as you want.  Well, that was not our experience having a $19 upcharge because we wanted lobster AND steak.  We are going on another Princess cruise, a different ship, next week an will check this out again to see if maybe it was just the ship that we were on.

 

You paid the $19.00 for the steak not the lobster, cause I ordered the steak in the MDR on our last cruise and was charged $19.00

Thank you for your review! We are going on the Sky Princess Feb 22, first time to the Caribbean for us, only been to cold places 🙂

I can't agree with you more about Captain Tuvo. He was on our 2017 Coral to Alaska and he was hands down the best! Like you I never paid any attention to who the Captain was and I still couldn't tell you any of their names now without looking at the patter. He is one of the reasons we book the Sky instead of the Regal. 

Thank you both so much!! I was able to get the deal!

Hi 

I was wondering if someone could help me find the post about the American Express Deal on Princess with the spend $500 and get $100 back? I was reading it yesterday and now I can't find it anywhere. I need the backdoor link please. Thank you!

13 hours ago, ceilidh1 said:

I'm not disagreeing with that at all and, as I said, it makes no difference to me. However, from what I've read the Royal hasn't made the Inside Passage at all thus far...so it would make more sense to show the route West of Vancouver Island. That way, no one is disappointed and, on the contrary, it's a huge bonus if they make the Inside Passage. Just my opinion....

I agree, they shouldn't be stilling selling and showing to route for which they are not taking! I was upset too because I was on June 1st sailing and we went West of Vancouver Island. I have been on the Coral and went the inside passage and that's what I thought I booked this time. If I wanted to go west of Vancouver Island I would have booked round trip out of Seattle as I done before also. I have complained to Princess when we got home and no response whatsoever from them. We was not given any notice that this was the route they was taking even while onboard the ship.

We just went with Jayleen again on June 5, 2019!!It was great and I highly recommend her!! There was 4 of us so we had our own private tour!!

1 hour ago, Coral said:

Many of us predicted it and spoke out about the ship due to this. Sorry if you were not on the boards to see this.

No, I didn't see it and it isn't listed on Princess as taking that route and I have messaged them and told them about it. I could have went roundtrip out of Seattle with airline prices a whole lot cheaper if I had of wanted to go out in the open ocean. That was the only problem I had with the Royal, plenty of places to see onboard and take pictures.

I was on the June 1 south bound on the Royal and it went out into the open ocean all day Friday . I am very upset about this cause this is not what they sold it as and still selling it as.

So sad!! Prayers for all!!

8 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

Renting a 18-400 lens might be the best option, especially if you don't foresee much additional use for it.

Thank you! I think that is what I'm going to do is rent to try it out before I buy it.

1 hour ago, Heidi13 said:

Can't help with the pros/cons of both cameras, as I shoot with Canon products.

 

Whether I purchase a lens or a new camera would depend on how often I use the DSLR and how many other lenses I had. If I used my DSLR body extensively and had a couple of additional lenses, I would be more inclined to purchase an additional lens, especially if the bulk/weight of getting the gear to/from Alaska is not an issue.

 

However, if the weight/bulk of camera gear was an issue, or I was a rare camera user with only the standard lens, I would consider the smaller bridge type camera.

 

The other consideration is how do you consider your photography use in the future. If interested in developing over the years, I would stick with the DSLR body and purchase additional lenses.

 

DW recently wanted a new camera for our next cruise, as she has no desire to use either of my Canon 5D bodies, so purchased a Canon equivalent to the Nikon P900 - compact, fairly light and impressive optical zoom.

I really only use my Nikon D3200 when we go on vacations and I only have the 2  lens that came with the camera when I bought it. I wanted something with more zoom that's why I was looking at the Tamron 18-400 lens and I don't want to have to change lens all the time and I thought this lens might be perfect for that.

We are going on a whale watching tour and I wanted to shoot video also I have found plenty of video's about the Nikon P900 for zooming but wasn't sure how good we could video with it. I have also thought about just renting something, instead of buying it to see if I would like it

I am a amateur when it comes to taking pictures  but want something with more zoom to take with me to Alaska. I am trying to decide which would be the best to buy

I have a Nikon D3200 camera now wondering if I should buy a lens to fit it like the Tamron 18-400 or to buy a Nikon P900 camera. Which would you choose? I can only buy one.

17 hours ago, martincath said:

It's possible, but unlikely - cruiselines *can* take luggage to the airport legally but they *cannot* put it on your flight for you (due to preclearance methods used, cameras track you putting your bag on the conveyor so when it comes to customs declaration your boarding pass/ID links to your bag, and a picture of it pops up on a screen - if CBP don't like what you declare the bag is sent to secondary inspection, if they have no problem it's released for the luggage minions to take it to the plane) liek they can at a US airport. Folks who buy the overpriced 'bags to airport, HOHO, and SkyTrain ticket' combo from cruiselines have the bags taken to YVR, but them you have to collect it from a big pile and then go check it in yourself apparently.

 

If you were a solo traveler the markup might be worth it - but for 4 of you it's a LOT cheaper to just assemble your own package using CDS to forward bags even if you only want to take the HOHO and SkyTrain. Last time I did the math, even a couple ended up about US$30 cheaper going DIY - and your bags get taken to a manned office, not just a cordoned-off bit of floor someone could snag them from much more easily.

Thank you so much for your help! I really appreciate it!!

Thank you everyone!! I'm am checking all the options you've given me!

martincath not so sure about renting a car now didn't think about smash & grab! Mainly I think we would just be doing things around downtown maybe Stanley Park and walking around in town.

Does anyone know if the cruise will take our luggage that we put outside our room the night  before and take them directly to the airport? I am wanting to think we did this before on a cruise but I think it was in Seattle and we had a earlier flight

I need help on what we should do with our luggage after the cruise? We disembark on June 8 and our flight doesn't leave until 10:30 pm from YVR.

We would like to sight see in Vancouver. There will be 4 of us. Would it be better to rent a car for the day? or take some kind of tour?

Great videos and amazing photos! Thank you so much for sharing them with us.

 

We are doing this excursion in June. Ours will start and end in Juneau since the ship will be there from 8:00 a.m. until 6:00 p.m.

 

We did this excursion in 2006 on our first Alaska cruise, and we have wanted to go again since then.

We went June of 2017 with Adventure Bound and it was the highlight of my whole trip. Tracy Arm is beautiful and being on a smaller boat, we saw whales, bears, seals, sea lions & eagles. We left from Juneau and was gone the whole day. If I knew how to put pictures on here I would upload mine

Just testing my knowledge after reading this very informative thread:

 

Outbound we're flying ATL>SEA>YVR. If I understand correctly, we will clear Canadian customs and immigration as we deplane in YVR.

 

The next day we're cruising to Alaska. If I understand correctly, we will pre-clear US customs and immigration at the cruise port before embarkation.

 

A week later we're back from the cruise. If I understand correctly, we will clear Canadian customs and immigration at the cruise port on debarkation.

 

That evening, we're flying YVR>ATL nonstop. If I understand correctly, we will pre-clear US customs and immigration in YVR before getting on our flight.

 

4 out of 4? :)

Yes on all 4.

We flew from ATL to YVR Clear customs in YVR

Before boarding the ship we cleared customs at Canada Place

We flew back from Anchorage to Atlanta so we didn't have to go through customs again but what I have read you will clear customs at YVR before boarding the plane to Atlanta

Tracy Arm was a priority this year for us. So I looked for a cruise that I would be in port long enough to go with Adventure Bound so we booked a north bound cruise with Princess we was in port from 8 am till 9:15 pm that gave us plenty of time to go. I LOVED it!! We already decided when go back we will definitely go on this tour again with Adventure Bound

Our last cruise we didn't book our flight with EZ air but we did use another company to book our flights and we still got the 1 free bag each for myself and my son