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WildWanderers

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  • Posts

    120
  • Joined

About Me

  • Location
    Gatineau, Québec, Canada
  • Interests
    cruises, reading, travel
  • Favorite Cruise Line(s)
    Oceania
  • Favorite Cruise Destination Or Port of Call
    North

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  1. Hi @Stockjock, In the past my application for the shareholder credit has gone through smoothly at times, and only after much frustrating follow-up, at times. My Oceania representative advised me once to wait until 30 days before the sail-date to apply, and since then, it goes through within a business day In case this helps, Greg from the WildWanderers.
  2. Hi John, I can't imagine having to deal with COPD, not fun I am sure. Difficulties with breathing would be my nightmare. Smart to have the rescue pack. We are fortunate that one of our best friends is a doctor, only an email away, so no need for us to self-diagnose. In these days of few doctors around, and decreasing numbers of family doctors, we are so lucky. I swear the cipro prescription we had on hand in Cuba one time saved my life. Cheers, Greg from the WildWanderers (Big fan of Coronation Street and Heartbeat, and addicted to BritBox. Such is a good life.)
  3. Hi @JYDCruise, Thanks for your concern. We have the take or not take decision in hand. Totally understand that this will not fly in some jurisdictions. Cheers, Greg from the WildWanderers
  4. Hi All, The only excursions available in Colon were seemingly the Oceania Select called the Colon Oscopy, and the special at the Montezuma race track, called the Trots. Many people stayed onboard, however, enjoying the newly renamed Terrace Café, now the Poop Deck. Butt seriously, if you have yet to take your trip, consider asking your doctor for a just-in-case filled prescription of ciprofloxacin. We never travel without it. Cheers from Greg of the WildWanderers
  5. Hi All, Upgrading, Downgrading and Bidding, o my! We started cruising with Oceania in 2014, and in the following 4-5 years used to receive offers of upgrades and downgrades, for various costs and benefits, and sometimes several offers on a given cruise. Since then, crickets. We did ask our Oceania representative before an August 2023 cruise what the cost of an upgrade from a concierge level room to a penthouse would be. The price he quoted was pretty much what was posted, but he suggested I contact him a week before sailing and he would check what kind of a deal he could get then. We did and his offer was still beyond our comfort level. When we boarded and asked the executive concierge for an upgrade on the second of our then two back-to-backs, she said she would put us on the list, and warned me that if we got an offer, it was a fixed amount, non-negotiable. The next day we got a letter from her on our door with an offer far too good to refuse. As a result, for the second of the two cruises we had a shower in which we not only fit, but could turn around. This Spring we are taking a transatlantic Oceania cruise, and eventually returning on the Queen Mary 2 - our first time trying this. We noticed that the cost was the same to do this as two business class fares, so why not. A couple of weeks ago we received an offer to bid on an upgrade. I looked online to see if there was advice on how to play the game to get what you want, and found little. We bid on what is called a Princess suite (we would dine in a different dining room - with presumably a more special menu) and are currently in a Britannia suite that looks like an Oceania concierge level suite. The bid was good for three days and at the end of the three days we heard nothing. I now know (had to contact Cunard on another matter) that they kept the bid alive and we may hear that we got the upgrade up to three days before sailing. This will complicate the printing of their luggage tags for us, but this too is solvable. In case any of this helps, Cheers from Greg of the WildWanderers
  6. The language on their Oceania club benefits website says, "10% SAVINGS ON THE PRESTIGE SELECT BEVERAGE PACKAGE", which in a SimplyMore world is just the upgrade. We have been given the 10% discount for our last two cruises, once we could prove that we had booked and paid in advance. I do not doubt you were told that it applies only if you book the full package, as I had 3 different interpretations of whether I was eligible or not from Reception / Executive Concierge staff. My feeling is that if it no longer applies in a SimplyMore world, remove it from the list of Oceania Club benefits. Clearer language would not hurt. Cheers, Greg from the WildWanderers
  7. As I am sure you saw, they are selling the full drinks package, the upgrade, the buy a bunch of bottles deal, the wine tastings and the spirits tastings. We purchased a whisky tasting and a wine tasting on our last cruise from one of these booths and the young man who sold it to us was pleased as punch, as he got a commission from it.
  8. Hi All, Be careful about planning to book onboard an upgrade or full drinks package if you are at the Oceania credit silver level or higher. I raise this only in light of the preceding discussion in which it is suggested to book the upgrade to the drinks package onboard rather than in advance. On our last three cruises we were told (onboard at Reception) that we were not eligible for the 10% discount (available to silver + folk) as we had not booked and paid in advance. We were able to prove in all three cases that we had paid in advance. Unfortunately on the first of the three, the book and pay in advance was on an immediately preceding of a back-to-back combo, and this was deemed to be enough to make us not eligible. We were told at reception that we had to be on land when we booked the upgrade. (Which sounded at the time as arbitrary as saying that we had to be wearing a red shirt when we booked.) I haven't found this rule written (book-in-advance rule, not wear-red-shirt rule), and would not be surprised to hear that others had different experiences. Nonetheless, just to be safe, if you are silver or higher, or becoming silver, I would recommend booking and paying in advance for the drinks package upgrade (or the full drinks package if you have a legacy OLife booking in which you did not OLife-choose the basic drinks package), just to ensure that you get the 10% discount. When you do book in advance the key card is already set up to recognize the upgrade on embarkation day, which saves you a step (no need to get a new card at Reception) on day one. Hope this is useful, Cheers, Greg from the WildWanderers.
  9. Hi @MEFIowa and @Vallesan, I guess we had better be prepared to pay more than I thought; thanks for this! Cheers, Greg from the WildWanderers.
  10. Hi @MEFIowa, Thanks for the reminder about the transit system. Very useful. I may still have our transit cards from our stay in Istanbul in 2019. We will stay in Beyoglu after our cruise for a couple of weeks, and can walk down a very steep hill to get to the trams. We take the transit system to higher up on the hill when we go back to the hotel so that we can walk downhill both coming and going. Our hotel is on a street with restaurants, and antique and other shops. In 2019 we were shocked at how inexpensive everything was except for fish and wine. The exchange rate for buying Turkish lira with Canadian dollars is even more shockingly favourable now that it was in 2019. Cheers from Greg of the WildWanderers.
  11. Hi back to Gary, I am glad that you had a good experience with an Istanbul taxi driver. We visited Istanbul for a couple of weeks in the spring of 2019, and found the taxi drivers booked for us by our hotel to be great, but every time we tried to hire a cab to get back to the hotel, the cab driver angrily waved us off, often the distance was not enough to be worth his while. OK the distance was not always huge, but it was quite uphill. I would have offered him more to make it worth his while but we really couldn't communicate, and it would have been hard to calm him down with my lack of Turkish. When you can find a driver for the day, they are gold. Cheers, Greg
  12. Hello All, When I booked a PH1 on Turkish Ovation (on the Vista, departing July 23, 2024) on June 26, 2023 the gross amount was $16,288 for the two of us. I asked for subsequently announced sales prices to be taken into account, and at one point migrated to SimplyMore as a result. I also bought a culinary experience ($240) for the two of us and the upgrade to the drinks package for two ($718), and bought shore excursions exceeding my SimplyMore allotment by $1054.50. So notionally you can add all of these expenses to the $16,288. After all of this the gross amount on the latest invoice is down to $11,041.50 for the two of us, even including those additional expenses. All of this is in Canadian funds, but the latest gross amount is substantially less than the original, even with culinary, drinks and excursions added in. In roll calls there has been a lot of speculation about whether the Turkish ports will be cancelled as they were on other 2024 cruises, but this has not as yet happened. Not sure that it would make sense to still call it Turkish Ovation if you stuff the Turkey portion, so to speak. Is this one now a bargain? Yours to discover. I remember our Oceania representative saying that he didn't think the application of the last sale to this booking would make a difference, and when he tried it out, he said...OMG...look at this. Cheers, Greg from the WildWanderers.
  13. Hi @Sthrngary, Before I answer your question about favourite things on (in our case only Oceania) cruises, let me just say that I am so pleased that you overcame your stroke to become a person who enjoys life, shares your wisdom, calms the rough waters and brings logic to every debate. These are a few of my favourite things. (Do you hear music?) I enjoy reading the GDR and Terrace Café menus each day for lunch and dinner to figure out where to go when There is a lot in common between the two menus for each meal, but sometimes it is the difference between the two that informs the decision of where to go, sometimes it is whether we want to be served or not, and sometimes it is that we want to eat outdoors. My better half prefers to be surprised by what is on the menus. Sometimes it takes a while before the menus on posted on the in-room system. I get teased about…*you’re not looking at menus again are you?* We enjoy at-sea days as we get to read and relax, with where to eat being the biggest decision of the day. It’s not all about food. I enjoy not having to do grocery shopping and cooking and dishwashing. A lot. Soon after embarkation and our visit to our muster station: - we used to go to the Library to find books by our favourite authors before the big arriving crowds (whom we never saw by the way) took them. Things change. We prefer reading books on our Kindles, and a book has to be compelling for us to read paper now. - we used to go straight to Reception to buy the upgrade to the drinks package, but now that we are silver level on Oceania points, we have to buy the upgrade before embarkation to be eligible for the 10% discount. - we still go straight to the Terrace Café for bubbly, sometimes a couple of types of bubblies and a taste-test, and lunch. We enjoy a pot of afternoon tea at tea-time, to accompany a game of Skipbo. And maybe a scone with clotted cream, as it’s been already a couple of hours without eating at that point. We enjoy keeping an eye out for crew we have met and / or befriended on previous cruises. We revel in the luxury of our penthouse room, having found the smaller rooms too small. Imagine my avatar trying to shower in a less-than-penthouse sized shower. We enjoy the welcome, willingness to assist and attentiveness of our butler, actually of the team of butlers as they all pinch hit for one another. I enjoy becoming familiar with the wines, while I enjoy matching them to the food myself, it is also fun to figure out which of the sommeliers know their stuff, and make good and at times unusual pairing suggestions. I enjoy choosing a glass of wine for the appetizer or starter (that we call entrée), and a different one for the main course (that Oceania calls entrée). Did I mention that it is not all about food? We enjoy ports where we can wander around on our own either near the port or after an Oceania-provided shuttle to the city centre. We enjoy. Not sure if there is much here to provide inspiration, but we board our 12th Oceania cruise in four weeks from today, and can hardly wait. I am recovering from an operation to remove a nickel-sized and deep cancer toward the tip of my nose, with a hunk of tissue from next to my ear stitched in to fill the hole. Although I now have ear tissue on the tip of my nose, I don’t hear any better. I had hoped for a Sean Connery look, but alas, am converging to W.C. Fields. I will have to figure out how to add a “greater than” sign to mimic my scar on the nose of my avatar. We will enjoy. Cheers, Greg from the WildWanderers
  14. Hi @rheasue38, We recently booked a Southampton to London transfer with Empire UK Chauffeur. I was impressed at how quickly they got back to me and how thorough they were in gathering the info they needed to make sure we could be in contact at the time of the pick-up. Hoping that the rest of their service is as good. I had tried a different firm first but found their quote to be exorbitant. Cheers, Greg from the WildWanderers.
  15. Hi @thebsinmiss, Thanks for this. I was hoping - that the actual language would be a clue as to why Oceania left Turkey ports in some of the itineraries, including Turkish Ovation, the one we are on; and - that I would be more confident that Turkey will not be dropped from our cruise as well. Oceania didn't do themselves any favours by implying that Turkey ports are part of - the "safety and security" considerations, and - the "Holy Land" region when there are still cruises with Turkey ports included. Is it possible that Turkey ports were dropped from cruises only when there were planned ports / stops in Israel? And even if that were the case, the text in your letter does not help to clarify why we still have Turkey in our itinerary. I'm confused too. Cheers from Greg from the WildWanderers.
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