Sunseeker1001

We just got off an NCL cruise and was  S H O C K E D  to learn that cabin stewards to NOT share in the gratuity added to your statement.  We pre-paid of $20/day/pp.  We asked our cabin steward and he confirmed that the policy changed in October 2023.  In addition they assigned him an extra 11 cabins to service each day.  The only compensation he gets is his paycheck and gratuities individuals give him.  If we had not pre-paid, we could have adjusted our gratuities at the desk and given him what we deducted.  Alas....we just gave him an extra $40 and our sincere thank you for his great service.

My husband and I would be interested in joining a M&G on the Pearl on Jan. 17th.   Are you keeping a list or do I have to complete the form??

On 12/30/2023 at 2:04 PM, mstigerlilycruiser2 said:

Can you bring Distilled water on board for my sleep apnea?

 

If you want but if you are flying in, water must be in the original container.  NCL supplies distilled water if you ask ahead of time but if not, if there is any left, they will give it to you.   This is true for every cruise line I've ever sailed on.

I am very disappointed with Viking for this trip.  Made reservations 7 months ago to celebrate our 55th Anniversary,  Paid for custom air and even for the upgrade in seating on United.  United cancelled the flight two months  so Viking moved us to Delta.  Delta has changed the flight times  but we can live with that.  They were to book our ticket with Delta and Swiss International Air on Friday but they did I nor my travel agent can upgrade our class of seats for more leg room.   I've been checking available seats and each time I do, more and more of that class are now unavailable/occupied.  Grrr.   Delta will not allow us to upgrade and pay for it before the tickets are issued.   And I am still waiting for the refund of my money from United.  

I am not looking forward to 8 to 10 hrs. in main cabin's 'sardine can'. 

VIKING.....   You have disappointed me this time.  Our other trips have been much better handled.

Thank you Budget Queen. 

Suggestions for MUST see places in Buenos Aires.

Please explain to me the difference and reliability of taxi and the radio taxi.  Does radio taxi mean I simply call the taxi from the airport?   I do not speak Spanish 😉

All of these posts are YEARS ago.   We will be arriving at the EZE airport on Jan 8 at just before noon.   Our ship leaves 7 p.m.  We would like to arrange for a pick-up at the airport and a city tour prior to being delivered to the ship.   Does anyone have any recommendations of how to do this and with what transportation company?

On 3/18/2020 at 11:21 AM, Beachvue said:

Just returned from a 17 night cruise in South America.  Had booked tours with Defrantur Tours as we had planned to extend our stay in BA.  Unfortunately we were caught up in the corona virus pandemic and had to cancel our tours.  While we were on the cruise, Ricardo, the owner of Defrantur, kept us informed of the of the situation as it was evolving in Argentina.  Ricardo gave us a short tour after picking us up from the cruise terminal and taking us to our hotel.  Had a pleasant ride to the airport with his son, Tomas.    This is a family business and they are very knowledgeable.  I highly recommend them.  

Thank you for the referral.   I am hoping to get a guide to take us from the cruise terminal after we are brought there from the airport then bring us back to the terminal in time for the ship to depart.  I will check with this vendor to see if he can accommodate us.

6 hours ago, LHT28 said:

There is  a roll call that you set up on the 19th

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2750053-marina-jan-8-18-2021/

THANK YOU, thank you!!   I was unable to find this until I followed your link.  🙂 🙂  

17 hours ago, schmerl said:

 

Find the "roll call" for your cruise. Sometimes you can share tours with other passengers on the cruise. 

GRRRR with trying to set up a Roll Call.  I've tried multiple times and even tried to get help from Jen who works for CC.  She gave me a description of how to do it and I've again tried.  I do EXACTLY what she says and it always says I've forgotten some 'tab' but I cannot see what tab they are talking about.  Jen @ CC says she cannot do it for me; I have to do it myself.   I am hoping that someone else will be more successful in getting a Roll Call done.  The two cruises after ours are already posted. ;)  

1 hour ago, ORV said:

Just an aside, you have seen the news coming out of Brazil?

YES, I have :(   I'm hoping that changes before January.

18 hours ago, Mura said:

I haven't checked out your specific itinerary but in 2013 we used Manu Peclat in Rio.  He was excellent. <rioprivatetourguide@gmail.com>

 

We were in Buenos Aires in early 2002 but didn't use any official guides there.  At the time I was in regular email contact with a resident there and he took us around one day, the rest of the time we managed on our own.

 

I just checked your itinerary and other than Rio we haven't done your ports.  We did visit Montevideo on our 2002 cruise but we did it on our own.

 

Mura

 

thanks for the name.  I will try to find out if he guides for a company or is independent.  The only real thing I want to see in Rio is the Redeemer statue.  I'd like to see it after disembarkation and before being taken to the airport for a flight home to the US.

 

 

14 hours ago, CintiPam said:

Usually there are many recommendations for private excursions or places to go DIY on the Ports of Call forum on these boards.  I check it out for all my cruises and used its recommendations for several of my port days on my early March cruise.  
 

Alternatively, sister website TripAdvisor offers many suggestions as well.

 

I never thought to look at the Ports of Call Forum;  I will do do.  I do also have Travel Advisor and will try there.
 

 

On 8/14/2019 at 8:17 PM, bunzini said:

You are right!  But I didn't know that.  I called my TA and yes, I can just cancel that part which is likely exactly what I will do!  Thanks!

thank you for the suggestion.  this is so foreign to me.  ALL our other cruises have offered a number of free excursions and I  could choose which ones I wanted and it was first come, first serve for the excursion and time and the higher category you had, the sooner you could choose.  Viking, for instance, offers one or two free excursions at each port and also ones that do cost.  I was always pleased with the ones they offered for free.  

We are already booked on an Oceania cruise on Jan 8 to 18th from Buenos Aires to Rio.  I would prefer to do private excursions at the ports but I have found NO information or suggestions/recommendations of reputable vendors.  IF anyone has any, I would LOVE to have them.  This is the very first time I have not found copious information on these on all our 16 cruises.     

Sadly, I have found that Oceania 'offers' only 1 or possibly 2 excursions at each port that fit into their $600 per cabin offer.  

I am attempting to organize a meet-up for young adults who are too old for the teen-club and too young for the bar scene.

We board the ship on June 13th in Rome and there will be passengers who boarded in Barcelona June 10th and others who will board in Barcelona on June 17th.

I am trying to get the message out of about a proposed meet-up on June 18th - a day at sea - on the 13th deck in the Bridge View at 11:00 a.m. on the port side of the ship. NCL is not providing any food or beverage so it will just be a meet 'n greet. I have asked NCL to put it in the Daily Calendar but to date, they have not agreed to do so.

IF you have youth of that age and they would be interested, please reply on this post or on the posts of June 10th and June 1th Roll Call. I have not been able to connect to one for June 13th sail.

Mea Culpa. :o I was wrong about the country when talking about Antigua. It was in fact, as the OP said, in Guatemala...not Nicaragua. I am not wrong about the review of the tour in Antigua. I had brought along my map from the internet but I wanted the hostess to show me on the map I provided, where the sights were that I especially wanted to see; she would not and disappeared. I was able to glean some information from other visitors. The picture shown are similar to the ones that we took. Again, HAL advertised the trip as the hostess would give us a map and would explain where various places were; she did not. I did report it to HAL and they responded that they would look into it. I also know that other people on our bus complained to her at the time.

AryMay. We did Dora de Explorer in Columbia and it was wonderful. Great guide, not crowded and got a wonderful tour through the city by a woman, Mercedes, who was a teacher who immigrated from Europe during the Hitler era. She seemed to know all the vendors and merchants, some of whom had been her students. She kept us from being bothered by the roving people begging us to buy their wares. One thing is that they don't have 'made in XXX' anywhere in Columbia. All products are made in the country.

If you are asking about Nicaragua, we did the Antigua on our Own sponsored by HAL. Our bus guide was AWEFUL. She forgot the maps and she did not give us any instructions, she just took us to the central place where we were encouraged to hire a private guide to take us around. IF I had wanted to pay to have a guide, I'd have gotten on the tour that HAL sponsored with a guide. I had done extensive research on Antigua and knew what I wanted to see. I did find a map but it did not show me the places I wanted to see so we were lost and spent the time wandering around. The bus ride to and from the ship was fine but she didn't point out any points of interest, tell us about the flora or what was growing in the fields. As a matter of fact, I didn't hear anyone say that they had a good experience. Perhaps your cruise line will provide you with better service. As I said before, would not recommend Antigua for children or even anyone under 25. There was one shining positve, however, we ate at a wonderful restaurant called La Tiempo just outside the large yellow arch. Pleasant, quiet eating and great, interesting food served in a most unusual way.

Did the cruise in December 2017 on HAL and you do NOT have to exchange any currency. EVERYONE, even the vendors love to take US$$. We did Antigua in Nicaragua and it was NOT a good excursion and definitely not one for small children. If your itinerary takes you to Costa Rica, I think the two young children would LOVE Jose's Crocodile tour and the bird viewing there plus there is a monkey farm nearby that our shared tour guide took us to private monkey preserve where the monkeys live in the wild and when the owner calls them, they come and consume banana pieces out of your hand. The baby monkeys are so cute. They ride on their mama's back and reach out for the banana just like their mom. Our shared tour had 8 people and the cost was $60US per person....and worth it. If you get to Cartegna, we loved our shared private excursion but I know that the kids would love the parrot/monkey and small zoo right there at port that you can walk through and get up close to the animals and if is FREE.

I have been completely unsuccessful for finding a Roll Call for this sailing. I am aware that it goes back and forth from Barcelona but can't locate that one either ;)

I would like to ask anyone who has been to the various ports of call for recommendations for excursions they have found of great value and those that have been 'bummers'. I would be especially interested in obtaining recommendations for private tours and if there is anyone who would like to share such a tour with the four of us - one is 18!]

Our ports of call are Livorno [Florence/Pisa]; Cannes, Palma Majorca, Barcelona, Naples/Pompeii and Rome.

Yeah, sometimes sub forums are slooooow to load on my computer. If I clear my cache, shut down and restart it helps.

THANKS for that suggestion. All I want is to get onto the Roll Call for the NCL Epic leaving Rome on June 13. So far, I have not been successful in getting the Admin. for CC to help me figure out how or creating a link for me to follow.

Last Fall for my TA, I used SmartCruiseTours for a direct bus transfer from FCO to Civitavecchia Port. Cost was only Euro 20.

That is a WONDERFUL idea. I was seeing prices for a taxi at about $400e. I also read that there was a train into central Rome but was a little leary since comments on Travel Advisor warned of extreme pick pocketing on the train and on the subways in the City. That would ruin our vacation to lose something important, of course.

Thanks, Len. I have TRIED repeatedly to get onto the threads about Italy on CC but it won't let me open the links. Frustrating. Have written to CC help and they have doublechecked my login and it is correct. I am hoping that somehow something can get posted that I can pick up the link and get on.

Yes, we are doing 1.5 days in advance and staying a little over 2 after. We have chosen to stay in B&B's both times. I am not sure exactly where they are in relation to where we want to go 'cause my daughter took on that part; it was frustrating me. I do not have a map of Rome and the ones off the internet expand but I can't tell where I am. Until my daughter stepped in, I was about to throw in the towel.

I will definitely try to book the Vatican with your suggestions. I'd read there is a 2-3 hr. wait to get in and that doesn't do it for me...esp. with the heat we are anticipating.