robmtx

18 hours ago, RobInMN said:

That sucks!

I Google searched your sail dates, and it looks like you got bumped for the Atlantis Cruise group. Now I wish I had used Incognito mode.

 

Wow our 2/4/23 Harmony cruise was chartered by this same group, less than a year before sailing, forcing us onto another cruise ship.  They must have endless funds.

38 minutes ago, The Scurvy Pirate said:

A day or so ago I booked a cruise for Feb 25 that is going to nassau, falmouth and labadee.  When I go to the planner for excursions, it is also showing excursions for Georgetown.  The only excursion for Labadee is a "coastal adventure", while there are several listed for Georgetown.  I have seen nothing about a change in the port but thought this was interesting....

If you choose to filter excursions by day of cruise, does it show which day G'town is, and is that the same day as your Labadee scheduled stop?

I am of mixed opinion on this one. 

While I whole heartedly agree that any fees collected and kept by the seller should be included in the advertised pricing, I think tax is an exception. Anything that is collected on behalf of an agency (whether that be sales tax, or other Government imposed fees) is an expense passed directly to consumer on behalf of seller. If a fee is charged by a seller and not something you can opt out of, then it should be included in the price shown. I actually liked the way Royal did it always showing that number on the same page and not hiding it (some suppliers made you put in your info before you ever say your final price...!)

The best example I like to use is Spirit airlines many years ago. They advertised a rock bottom airfare ($50). But when you went to pay, they had a $99 customer fee that you could not opt out of. When I asked Spirit about this fee, they said this fee goes to help offset costs for running a customer service call center. I asked to have the fee waive since I booked online without calling in, and they refused. This means that $99 was a mandatory fee that was kept by Spirit. They placed this fee in the "Taxes and other fees" section of their pricing summary, so that consumers believed these were all Government imposed fees. This has been dealt with and while Spirit vehemently fought the new laws, they had to comply. Optional fees like a seat, bag check, etc. can all be avoided so they didn't count in this case and that's their right as a business to sell optional add ons.

I liken this to Cable TV and their mandatory fees (regional sports and local access fees?) - They were not optional add-ons, applied evenly to all customers, and thus should be included in the cost of the package. They have been dealt with as well finally.

6 hours ago, snaefell said:

I don't for one minute think they would be daft enough to use their own card,likewise with ships now capable of holding 7000+ people that there isn't likely to be at least one dodgy person among them,hopefully it is a holiday from their 'day'job!😆😆

How about a random Passenger who walks into a room while the door is opened by the crew for cleaning. In an actual case, the attendant was in the bathroom cleaning, and pax went into the open stateroom and out onto the balcony to sit and relax.. This wasn't a matter of rummaging/looting/theft but rather a day-drinker who went back to the wrong cabin.. But, could it happen where a pax intentionally takes someone's ipad if it's out in the open when they walk by? 

Yeah ok there's probably less than a 1% chance of that happening.. I dunno I just prefer not to leave stuff out in the open.

1 hour ago, Pratique said:

That's good to know. Did you have a case on the tablet, or was it just the tablet.

It's just a thin case, nothing bulky. And yea, had to angle it in there because of the door hinges being in the way.

Was on Radiance in Nov. My Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 (11 in) fit in the safe as long as I slid it in at an angle. We have a locking suitcase so I put my laptop in there and lock it up for the week under the bed. No one is going to bother it, but I'd prefer no one deciding to be nosey 🙂

I'm an ex-pat Texan living far away at the moment. Loved seeing the Texas flag on Liberty. Looking forward to seeing it on Harmony soon!

And for those asking, yeah it's a Texas thing.. If you know, you know...

You'll also see things like Texas edition pickup trucks, and Texas logos (stars, flags) on mainstream beer cans/bottles like Bud and Miller.  We took an Adventure on Adventure from NJ that had just repositioned from Galveston and they still had Texas branded beers onboard so I felt right at home!

3 hours ago, Biker19 said:

Right, Captain Ban was the alternate Captain, my mistake. I believe Claus Andreson was the captain and he moved on to other ships after the incident.

I was on said cruise. The Captain (Andersen) was reassigned to 2nd in command (forgot what that title is) of Ovation for the Summer 2016 season in Asia before resuming his Captain duties after the dust had settled. Not sure what happened to him later on. 

Check your travel insurance. Certain policies cover "missed ports" and some do/do not cover things like insurrections. We missed a port once and got $100 from our insurance company by sending them the letter from Royal that we were missing the port. Wasn't much but hey $100 was $100!

11 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

Because that is the only route to the eastern shore of Maryland. Adding a new bridge doesn't alleviate that bottleneck. Other proposals had a completely different location providing an alternate route. But it got NIMBY'd.

Yep we were hoping for a location that didn't go thru Kent Island.. So then we'd have multiple options for crossing the bay.

I'm grumpy this morning...

Good for NCL, sticking to policy. The moment one domino falls and exceptions are made, the moment we are all sitting around for hours waiting on the scheduley-challenged. 

Am I the only who was trying to figure out what this has to do with Virgin Voyages?

That's what I get for reading before I've had my coffee.. ugh

Since we have some knowledgeable people here today let me ask.

What is the likelihood they could quickly move enough debris from the main channel to permit ship traffic? There must be enough heavy lifting equipment on the East Coast that could at least help get the lane open? Vision isn't due for 9 days? Could they get the channel open by then?

2 minutes ago, Scottdalfonso said:

Why is Philly out of play? We had the smaller cruise ships sail out of here in the 90's, the Navy Yard COULD handle it, and its a straight shot back down 95. I think Wilmington or Norfolk are more likely, but don't think Philly would be completely out of the picture for any reason- no low bridges, in fact we just had the biggest and highest container ship to ever sail on the East coast come through 2 weeks ago. 

Actually I think Wilmington and Philly have the same prob: The Del Memorial bridge has a 166ft clearance below.. That's fine for massive cargo ships but not so much for tall cruise ships like the ones in Baltimore 😞

8 minutes ago, happyshelly said:

Another possibilty would be the Port of Wilmington.

We have deep water... We don't have a bridge to clear. 

All we'd need is a shoreside setup with tents or something to help accommodate the operations. If Royal and Carnival teamed up, I think they could have this ready by the weekend when Carnival is due back.

10 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

No, it's the 695 bridge. 95 is a tunnel under the harbor.

They referred to the bridge as I95 bypass around Baltimore.. Not 95 itself. Lots of people bypass the tunnels when transiting the Baltimore area and use this bridge instead.

10 minutes ago, DRGrammy said:

Has anyone brought on a folding footstool?  I’ve seen recommendations for inflatable ones, but that won’t work for me and I need to be able to elevate my feet.  They come in a range of heights and I’m not sure what works best for a balcony chair.

Oops deleted

you said foot stool - my bad

Although you know what, you could possibly use this is a foot stool so I'll repost it lol

https://www.amazon.com/Retractable-Folding-Portable-Camping-Activities/dp/B08C2D57ZW

1 hour ago, Neosophy said:

More concerning is CoCoCay.  Anyone been there with two large ships before? 

Who,ever gets in first gets the head start on best locations at the beach and pool. So you're right in planning a ShoreEx so that you have plans and aren't just one of the minions trying to find the best place to hang out. The island can accommodate 11k people, but the "first come first serve" advantage lies solely with the first ship to open their gangway.

16 minutes ago, wampuscat7 said:

I have a couple of questions about our upcoming Oasis cruise related to the specialty restaurants. My daughter is 9, and our cruise is over Spring Break, so I assume we will see kids everywhere. However, are there any venues that are more upscale and kids might feel uncomfortable (150 Central Park perhaps)? Our most recent cruise was in NCL’s Haven and we ate at the Haven restaurant most evenings but no specialty restaurants. 

 

Also, I know there is a kids menu, but my daughter is an adventurous eater. She loves steak, venison, lamb, seafood, etc. Can we pay the adult price for her and/or could she order the kids food but also share some of my food? Would this also be possible with the dining packages? 

Hard to say. If she likes to adventure with her dinner, I'd say any of the restaurants would be appropriate. 

1 minute ago, Biker19 said:

Use a site like cruisemapper, which uses sat positioning info in addition to AIS.

I did. 46 mins ago it showed EoS far off the coast but it has since updated. 

Explorer is there today, but seems to have turned off AIS Tracking?

6 minutes ago, PhillyFan33579 said:

At Labadee right now. No issues so far, but it’s early. 😎

Do you have a squirt gun with you... just in case ??

1 hour ago, Charles4515 said:

 

Well good luck on that. What is more vulger and less vulger mean? Also how do you find out who is performing? There are two comedians at each comedy club show and the shows are for adults. OP should probably skip the comedy club if they are easily offended. The headliner shows might be tamer but there might be some jokes offensive some. Audiences expect jokes.....

That's why I recommended checking out the acts online ahead of time. If you start to hear something you find offensive, it's easy to shut it down right there rather than walking out of a club during the skit (although those usually produce very funny moments from the comedian).

To see who is performing, about 1-2 weeks before the cruise, your cruise compass will start to populate. I knew the comedians on our last two Oasis cruises prior to sail date. 

And yeah, I agree, OP will probably need to sit that one out...but still wanted to share how we do our intel on talent prior to boarding. We don't do it to get a temperature for vulgarity, but rather to see if we know them from other cruises or on tv somewhere.

Also for good clean comedy, check out Dry Bar Comedy online!

Also - once you know which comedians are performing, it might be worthwhile to Google them, possibly check out Youtube or wherever, to get a feel for their level of vulgarity.  You may have someone who is more vulgar, or less vulgar, on your sailing. 

14 minutes ago, knbcruisers said:

Hi we have a San Juan stop, itinerary says 11:30 arrival, anyone have experience as to earliest time get off ship to meet your guide?   Working on reservations for private van and ziplining plus other stops.  11:30 ? Closer to noon -1 pm?

It's just really hard to predict with many factors that can change the scope. But, typically you're looking at a gangway opening 60 minutes after arrival. We got into San Juan like 2 hours early the last time we went, and so we were off the ship an hour before the original arrival time.