CCJack

Just starting to plan a cruise to Greek islands... Never been there. Can someone advise on what ports to prioritize when choosing a cruise. I know there is personal preference involved but maybe there are a couple ports that are considered "don't miss" by most people thanks.

We did the Tay Mac walking tour about a week later than you... I agree, it was a great tour. Then spent a couple hours on the boardwalk and it makes a full but not overwhelming day....

Plan on a couple hours in the fjord. Roughly 50 miles, will depend on ship speed. You will be dealing with darkness in both directions. I would get up at sunrise at 6:45, you will already be in the fjord somewhere. Note that quebec city is not that far away. If you are at QC the day before, then the ship has time to kill so they have a lot of options on ship speed. They could be already near the dock by sunrise but hopefully they don't do that and allow some time for daylight sail in for the benefit of the passengers.

My wife is a non drinker and I am a light drinker... So I looked at the cost of the drink package gratuities vs what we would pay for drinks a la carte. I came to the conclusion it was about a wash so I kept the package. We have completed the cruise, and I think it was the right call. The virgin margaritas etc. went down pretty quickly ! It is nice to not worry about the cost a la carte. I agree that NCL plays games with the pricing, with fine print... free really isn't free cause they add the gratuities, etc. Also, the free 150 minutes wifi is worthless. It does make you a little frustrated. However, all told ....the total price was a bargain even with those add-ons. It was our first NCL cruise and I was impressed. The food was excellent. We were on the Joy and had a great time.

We were just there last week. I would say either side, it does not matter. Saguenay was our favorite stop (other than Quebec City which was our embarkation point). The sail into the fjord is not quite as majestic as in Norway (Flam as example) but it is close. For a North American fjord it is pretty impressive. We took the ships tour to the national park and hiked up the fjord, it was our favorite excursion.

Yes, we just went on quebec city to NYC cruise and we were in and out of cell service. Hard to predict though. Sometimes land in sight.. no service but at times no land in sight... cell service.!

For sure.... statement credit is the way to go, but I had already applied for the OBC before I knew that. Sometimes we learn as we go !

We were just there last week.... We took the 2 hour walking tour from Tours Voir Québec, and can highly recommend it. I think it was less than 2 miles total walking. I don't recall cobblestones being much of an issue but there was some walking up / down hills in the old town. It was a great tour. A Hoho bus will not to go to anywhere that our walking tour went.... Do you have time to do both? The walking tour was very reasonable priced.

We just got off of the Joy and we had some refundable OBC and also some non-refundable OBC from WorldPoints. I made 3 trips to guest services to understand the exclusions and the first two people told me gratuities (service charges) are excluded from non-refundable OBC. Finally, the 3rd trip I got the proper answer that there are 2 different kinds of non - refundable and the WP non-refundable can be used for service charges. Here is my understanding of the exclusions: refundable OBC: no exclusions non refundable OBC excludes: service charges gratuities casino cruisenext Starbucks gift cards Starbucks merchandise WorldPoints non-refundable OBC excludes: casino cruisenext Starbucks gift cards Starbucks merchandise

We just got off of the Joy. I would say the 150 free minutes are worthless. Not only slow, but very cumbersome. You need to login and it starts the 150 minute clock, then you need to go to a logout page to stop the clock when you are done browsing. If you don't logout properly, the clock runs whether you are browsing or not, your phone could be off and at the bottom of the ocean, and the minutes will still accumulate. The system is so slow, the logout page sometimes doesn't load properly, so you have no way of turning the clock off. We did not try the upgraded package, but I would be real skeptical on that too...

Thanks. We are boarding today but currently in hotel in departure city. I downloaded the app and found our reservation, but having lots of trouble with the app such as "this page did not display properly" errors, and others. Is it possible errors will go away when connected to ship wifi? I already tried re-installing the app. It is currently unusable with these errors....

Thanks. Do you know if i can make changes to reservations in the app on board? I was able to make all of our reservations online ahead of time but i cannot make changes.

Where do we go to make changes to our dining and entertainment reservations right after we board? This is for the Joy. Thanks

I can recommend the hotel Abruzzi, we stayed there and the view of the pantheon from our window was exactly as shown on their website.

Our departure from Amsterdam was delayed several hours ( 4+) as the lock traffic controllers sometimes hold the big ships at their pier to allow other traffic to go through the lock first. With an at Sea day the next day for most cruises heading North, it is not a big deal as they know the ship can make up the time. However, that put is at the lock after dark, which was unfortunate as I am really interested in locks and how they work. On our Danube river cruise we went through more than 20 locks some with very large vertical displacements !

In general, I like the plan, especially the 3 full days in Rome post cruise. For the pre cruise just be aware of the drive times to Rome and then to the port the next day. An 11:30 am arrival means you may not be leaving the airport until 1:00 arriving at hotel at 2:00 and you will lose daylight around 6:30. Seems like the day might slip by pretty fast. If it turns out to be a nice dinner, shopping for wine and a hotel, you may be better off doing that in Civi. rather than Rome.

What transportation options are there to EWR. I assume taxi is the easiest but wondering if there is a shuttle bus service or other. We have a 1:30 pm flight after debarkation, so I think we will have plenty of time to work with.

This topic is covered extensively on these boards..... There are pros and cons of each. DYI offers much more flexibility and most people recommend that. I am the exception in that I really enjoyed our cruisetours - I hate driving while on vacation. Also, I enjoyed the company of the other tourists in our group and our tour guide. But it is personal preference. We did have kids on our bus about the age of your kids. You mention the cost of meals, note that unlike on the ship your meals many not be covered in a cruise tour, you need to check. Have fun.

Are the OBC from World points "redeemable for cash" at end of cruise, or "not redeemable for cash"? I believe most cruise lines have two different types of OBC. thank you.

As others have said, no real drawback to booking early since you can get a refund or re-book before the final payment date. However, I did run across one big drawback to booking too early on a Viking river cruise. We booked about 14 months out. Turns out we were the first cabin booked. A couple months after we booked our TA called and said Viking had contacted them to tell us every other cabin on the boat (except ours) had been sold to a single group. We would be the only people not part of the group. Viking offered us nothing for the inconvenience other than we could cancel and take another cruise if we wanted to. We did that. It was quite inconvenient for us as we had scheduling issues we were working around with work, flights, family, etc. even a year out. I will never book the first cabin again.

We are on 9/13/23 NCL Joy out of QC, we live in Michigan. We booked on our own - Detroit to Quebec City. No direct flights, but at least we fly into QC. If you look at our roll call, those that booked through NCL are getting mixed results. Some are being flown into Montreal with a transfer to QC, others fly into QC. If you book flights through NCL, you won't find out the flights until 30 days or fewer before the cruise. That also makes planning for your time in Montreal or QC difficult.

Agree.... timing is too tight for my liking... Last summer we flew out of Schipol and the airport recommended arrival 4 hours ahead of flight. Many, many people missed their flights in that airport. Better now, but things could change again. I would take the lower stress option and spend the night.

If you are going to hire a guide anywhere... the place to spend the money is at the Vatican.... They can get you through in an efficient manner.. Other than that you could basically walk Rome on your own for the other full day. If you are good walkers, it is doable to walk colosseum, Pantheon, Vatican, etc. Just do a little pre planning on what order you want to walk to things.... I would also buy tix to Colosseum ahead of time. Have fun....

I agree with others, I would vote for a Norway Fjords cruise for your situation. A great kids destination in my opinion. A separate land based vacation to Iceland would be good. However, if you did want to choose a cruise that goes to both Norway and maybe just 2 stops in Iceland you could get a taste of Iceland. However, our cruise in Iceland resulted in quite a bit of bus or van time from port to the inland sites. That probably would be my biggest concern with kids... a long car ride. I would prioritize the Norway part. I cruised a lot with my kids when they were young, and I think lots of other kids on the ship is not something that is necessary. Especially if your kids are good travelers. I would not prioritize that part of the decision. Either way you can't go wrong with these destinations... have fun.

right at the port you can walk through the cannery / shopping / museum type building. Looks to be build for cruise passengers so it is not a historic building or anything, but it is very nice, clean and worth a walk through. Also the nature hike just in back of the building is very pretty with giant trees and a good view of the ship from the rocky beach. You can spend a couple hours just in the port area. ISP has excellent whale watching if you change your mind on an excursion....