The Traveling Man

NCL used to use activity cards prior to the COVID shutdowns, but on the several post-COVID cruises that we have taken, they just hand out prizes as soon as a winner is declared for each activity. As @casofilia mentioned, the quality of the prizes has suffered lately. Frequently it's just a T shirt or a deck of cards bearing the NCL emblem.

I don't have a good answer for you, but it isn't likely that every tour is sold out. More likely it's a computer issue. Keep checking back and they probably will reappear on the NCL website.

We were on the Prima last September on a similar itinerary. We had weather delays that caused us to miss one port and reduce our time in port at two others. If you have similar weather issues, it could result in some tours being cancelled and others being modified.

If you are booked on the same reservation, you probably need to be together in one group to check in. If you're booked under two different reservation numbers then you can check in whenever you want.

That's a lot to unpack. Don't know why your tour hasn't shown up on your reservation. Call NCL or your TA and ask. Length of tours can vary from one port to another. Sometimes there are two tours to the same location with one being short and another taking the full day. The use of radio headsets also varies, but is more common with larger tours that use full size buses. Tours using smaller vans usually cost more per person than larger bus tours, but they have the advantage of more personal contact with the tour guide. The smaller groups give you a greater opportunity to set your own pace, spending more time at the interesting points of the tour, and cutting short the less interesting parts. There's less wasted time while the guide tries to round up all the stragglers. At many locations a large bus has to park at a bus lot on the outskirts of town, meaning you may have a 10 to 15 minute walk (or more) to get to the main attraction. The smaller vans can sometimes make their way through narrow streets to get you closer to the action.

We have stayed at both the Hotel San Giorgio and Hotel De La Ville along the waterfront in Civitavecchia several times. They aren't the Radisson or the Marriott Marquis, but they are very nice seaside resort hotels. There also are some nice restaurants in town, just avoid the touristy ones along the waterfront and walk a couple of blocks into town. You can find some great seafood there.

Well, it didn't take long to hijack a question about drinking water into a monologue on dress codes.

The last several times we have been there our hotel arranged a shuttle bus for us. It picked us up at the front door of the hotel and dropped us off at the front door of the cruise terminal next to our ship. As I recall it was ten Euros per person. It's a couple of miles from the center of town, so too far to walk. On a previous occasion we took the train from Rome to the train station in Civitavecchia, then caught a city bus at the station that took us to the front gate of the port area, then got on the free port shuttle bus to get to our ship.

We were on the Prima's second cruise, Copenhagen to Southampton, last September. We were in a Balcony stateroom and experienced the same creaking and popping noises coming from our balcony door. It sounded like a 20 year old, worn out, ship. We mentioned it to one of the ship's officers who shrugged it off by telling us that he didn't believe it.

We have sailed a half dozen times since the post-COVID restart. Out of more than two dozen excursions I think we have had maybe two that met on shore, with most of the rest meeting in the theater. I suppose different ships and different ports have different procedures.

Were those at ports where the ship actually docks, or were they tender ports like Santorini?

When will this conference take place? Or has it come and gone?

Horse hockey ???

Thank you Mike. I remembered that you had issues with that cruise, but I misremembered the exact details. I thought it bore a closer resemblance to the matter under discussion here. Anyway, I believe the info you presented here about your experience is valuable and enlightening. Thanks. As to NCL no longer offering cruises as either / or two short cruises or one long cruise, I have noticed that they haven't done that in the US market for a long time, certainly not since the return to sailing after the COVID shutdown, and possibly not in several years before that. It did seem possible that they might still offer cruises that way in other markets. You also mentioned Sydney - my mistake - I thought that since you live in NZ you booked through an NCL office there. Thanks for pointing out that you book through the OZ office. James

It seems to me that the only thing consistent about NCL is its tendency toward inconsistency.

Years ago NCL would offer some itineraries as either a series of several separate cruises or as a single long cruise. If you planned on being on board for the duration, you had the choice of booking it either as one long cruise or several segments. We always chose to book as several separate B2B cruises so we would get our Latitudes benefits on each segment. As I understand it, NCL still does offer some cruises differently in different markets. You may be able to book it as a 21 day cruise if you book through NCL's UK office, for example, while in the US the same itinerary would only be available as three seven day cruises B2B2B. I think I recall @casofilia reporting some difficulties with this when he booked a cruise through the NCL New Zealand office a few years ago. They offered him one long cruise on the Spirit which those of us in the US had booked as two or three separate cruises. He not only came up short on Latitudes perks vis-a-vis other passengers, but also had some troubles with refunds when COVID cancelled the last legs of the cruise. Mike, could you comment on this?

The 1:45 time listed may be the meeting time of the tour, the time you need to be in the auditorium (or wherever the designated meeting point is) prior to taking the tender to the island. The ship does not dock at Santorini. The 1:30 time is the estimated time for the ship to drop anchor in the harbor.

The Star has cruises scheduled for every day from July 3, 2023 through October 3, 2023. That covers the entire third quarter of the year without any break. It may be possible that it will be pulled from service for refurbishment and one or more planned cruises may be cancelled, but it seems more likely that its next refurb will occur at a later date.

Thee have been several threads and numerous posts on CC detailing the difficulties with getting into certain shows on the Prima, Viva's sister ship. Reports of standing in line for an hour and still finding SRO at the comedy club and Syd Norman's are frequently posted. Perhaps things may smooth out by the time the Viva sails, but be prepared for crowds at some of the more popular, and somewhat smaller, venues.

As @MeHeartCruising has indicated, you can reprice your cruise as often as you like prior to final payment. If there is a price drop after final payment, you can still reprice, sort of. Let's say you originally booked a Balcony for $3000 pp and had NCL reprice it to $2500 when the fares went down. Now it's past final payment, but the fare has dropped again, let's say to just $1500 pp. You may not be able to get any additional price reduction on your Balcony, but you may consider upgrading your stateroom to the Haven. Suppose there is an available Haven Suite for $2750 pp which originally was out of your price range at around $6000 pp when you first booked your cruise. It now looks like a real bargain at $2750. So, call NCL and ask if you can upgrade. They will apply the $2500 per person that you already have paid, so you only pay an extra $250 pp to splurge on the Haven. We have done this a couple of times. On one occasion, about a week before we were set to depart, we got into the Haven on a 14 day cruise for just $75 more per person than we already had paid. Please note that this repricing works in the US, but not everywhere else. Many UK passengers have said that they have been unable to reprice after making their original booking. There are different consumer protection laws in play outside the US, so results may vary.

When we did it a couple of years ago we took a taxi from the pier to the Southampton station, then a train to London (Victoria Station IIRC), then a taxi across town to the Euro Star terminal at St. Pancras Station. I tried to find a train from Southampton that made a direct connection to the Euro Star, but none was available at that time.

Welcome to Cruise Critic. You can select a check-in time when you complete your e-Docs, but I've never seen any cruise terminal personnel checking the time or delaying anyone from entering the terminal early. NCL allocates arrival times in an effort to spread out the crowds. Despite their efforts, many folks arrive around the earliest available time, regardless of what time they are assigned. If you happen to get there early, you may be able to scoot through the check-in process without delay before the crowds arrive, but then you probably will be directed to a seating area where you will wait until the actual boarding process begins, usually sometime between 11:00 AM and Noon. Those who arrive a bit later, say around 11:00, are likely to find the terminal jam-packed and the check-in time may take an hour or more. The advantage is that once you do finally work your way through the line, you may be able to head straight for the gangway and get on board. If you don't plan on having lunch on board and you don't need to hurry to the reservations desk for entertainment, tours, or restaurants, you can wait a bit later, say 1:00 or 2:00, and allow the crowds to thin out. You do need to begin the check-in process not later than two hours before the scheduled departure time.

I really don't care for the in-person drill, either, but I think it does provide one advantage - muscle memory. At the very least, each passenger actually stands where they would need to be in the event of an actual emergency.

Thanks for the explanation. I think I get it now. I guess my misunderstanding was why choose to take a cab when it's less than a half mile walk indoors, about as far as one lap around the ship. I'm also in my 70's and a half mile stroll through a mall, even dragging luggage, doesn't seem unreasonable.

Julia Street ends just after crossing the tracks, where it becomes an alley or driveway as it passes under the River Walk Mall. The cruise terminal entrance is on the South side of that alley. On the North side of that alley, directly across from the cruise terminal entrance, there is an elevator that goes up to the mall. From there you can walk the length of the mall to a hallway which leads to the Hilton. Both the cruise terminal entrance and the elevator are at ground level on the East side of the tracks. You may have to dodge some taxis or baggage carts to walk the 100 feet or so across the alley, but it is not necessary to cross the tracks. The shops in the mall are on a couple of levels, so it is necessary to use an elevator or escalator to get from one level to another when walking with luggage from one end of the mall to the other. It's a walk of several hundred yards, but it's indoors, air conditioned, with wide aisles making it fairly easy to roll a suitcase from the ship to the hotel. The doors to the Hilton take you to a walkway over the tracks. That walkway has never required an access key on the dozen or so times we have used it. We have taken this route several times without problems, even doing some window shopping along the way. I'm sorry for the delays you encountered on your trip, but if you sail in or out of New Orleans and stay at the Hilton again, you may want to take advantage of being able to walk through the mall to reach your destination.