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How does one know when the dining booking opens? I don't remember having an issue before I guess.

I wish! We are platinum and haven't been able to book dining on our upcoming Sept 2024 sailing on the Sun. Maybe after final payment? 🤷‍♀️

Annnd, having just spent some time in Italy last fall, and on the Viva… everything made in Italy is better! It’s true!

Enjoying this thread, but wow, so sorry to hear of your mom's injury @OrcaGirl! As someone getting back on the Bliss in the next couple of weeks, I'm curious about booking the thermal suite for the week. Is there any advantage to waiting until on board to get better pricing? The price right now to book seems a little steep for one week ($299pp) as I recall on our 15 day Panama canal itinerary it was something around that. Hmmm...Any advice?

No muster drill. You do have to go check in at your muster station when you get on board and they just scan your cruise card. We got that out of the way as soon as we boarded so we could get on with our day.

The pad Thai in the Indulge Food Hall is great! So is the Chicken Tikka Masala. Those deviled eggs are really good too. Oh, and don't forget to try the Totopos (nachos) in the Indulge Food Hall. They are the best!

We disembarked that day in Trieste and walked from ship to the train station. Was pretty wet by the time we reached the train station. The line for a taxi was long so we just walked. A little frustrating with two pieces of luggage in tow each, but we made it. The Viva was fantastic! So much to love about that ship! The rooms are gorgeous and the bathrooms are so roomy. The food was great! We steered clear of the buffet for the most part. It was pretty small. There was so much other great food on the ship though.

We did the Antigua on your own tour in Guatemala (puerto Quetzal) and it was a really cool trip. The drive is long from the port and the buses park at the entrance of the town since they can’t drive inside due to narrow streets. The town is very busy and there are many shops, restaurants, sites to stop and see. The drive to/from is quite scenic! Lots of walking and not for those with limited mobility.

So are you all saying that if you have travel medical it just pays the hospital bill over the phone with a cc for you? I haven't used travel insurance for an actual medical bill but I have used it for a trip interruption claim and it took over 3 months to pay and that was after much prodding since they were so backlogged with claims. Also, don't they require your medical insurance to be billed first and deny it since they are your primary before they will pay?

I am looking for recommendations for a small group of 6 to get from the cruise port in Trieste when we disembark our ship (with our luggage) to our hotel (or nearby) in Venice. Not looking to be dragging our luggage too much around walking on uneven surfaces if it can be avoided. I haven't been to Venice before so am thinking we don't want to be having to lift our large pieces of luggage on and off of multiple modes of transport. Anyone with expertise on this, please help! Thanks!

Hmm, I have brought my flat iron on every cruise I've been on and it has never been taken away and I've used it on the ship (we have mostly cruised on Princess). I've never heard they were prohibited. Oops!

Yes, my reservations are both missing. I keep manually adding them and they don’t stay. Must be a glitch.

Without naming names, is this an online based TA that is well known? Just wondering if I should try switching my booking to the TA that I use that is of the same group that I might be thinking of. That is a very good deal.

Anyone know if free shuttle buses into town are offered at any of these ports? Just doing some planning and seeing what our options are for booking excursions vs. going into town on our own. Thanks! Naples Palermo (Sicily), Italy Valletta, Malta Messina (Sicily), Italy Corfu, Greece Dubrovnik, Croatia Split, Croatia Zadar, Croatia

I can agree with you when it comes to the spa services. I had a voucher for a certain $ off from our travel agent on a spa service and was told after the service that I couldn't use it since it was already discounted. It seems like they make up the rules as they go. I don't like feeling deceived. That tip situation is complete dishonesty though. She should have been honest with you as that will stick with you. That might make me avoid giving an extra tip on subsequent services when I feel like I'm being taken advantage of by the overall "system". Sorry that happened to you.

The carrot cake in the local is really good too!

Was on the Bliss in January and yes, they have the soft serve option and hand scooped ice cream in the buffet with different flavors throughout the trip. There are also toppings that included sauces and sprinkles, nuts, etc. that you can add yourself. The choices were quite good.

Going to be on the viva in October. Is everything in the indulge food hall complimentary? Is it basically the buffet just reimagined? Is there any complimentary room service or is it all for a fee like on the rest of the ships? This will only be my second ncl cruise. Mostly sailed with Princess.

Our family went to Q one night just for dessert and everyone but me had the brownie thing. I had the banana pudding and it was delicious! Their desserts are huge. I couldn’t finish it by myself. I guess the brownie thing was pretty awesome too.

Yes, shareholder here as well. From the looks of their marketing and the latest in ship designs, they are looking to attract more cruisers than they have in the past and in order to do that they are really going to have to put their money where their mouth is, so to speak. I mean, we sure are in higher prices!

Looking forward to getting these on my next two sailings! I looked for one when I was on the Bliss and all they had were the Miami mugs. Of course I got one. Now I can get the Bliss mug when I go back on her next year! I love me a Starbucks mug!

I'm super excited that Princess has Starlink now! Although, I'm also concerned that it sounds like their onboard IT staff is not super qualified to deal with technical issues. At least, the scenario I'm reading about in the post by @outtoseacruise is not giving me any confidence in them. When we sailed on the Sky Princess in 2019 (obviously no Starlink) we had amazing internet when we did the inaugural transatlantic crossing. We were doing black friday shopping, streaming movies, facetiming, you name it! Maybe the bandwidth was better at that time when they were more flush with cash AND there were less people so heavily using the wifi as well back then. But ever since then it has been horrible. Our last Princess sailing last fall on the Majestic we just asked them to refund the internet portion of our Plus package because the internet was unusable. I now have hope! Yay!

We actually removed it onboard the Bliss on our second day. Decided I wouldn’t be drinking and hubs only drinks soda so we just turned around and purchased a soda package and had obc we used for excursions.

I was contacted by the TA that I use that is associated with a big online site and they said that this 3-day sale will include the best OBC offer that Princess has ever offered. Those are their words. I do not know what the OBC offer is yet. This timing seems to coincide with historically when Princess used to run their "Sip & Sail" sale so now that they have Princess Plus/Premier they have had to re-work their June sale. Should be interesting. We have booked through this sale and typically gotten good deals so it's worth watching. We book pretty far in advance though.

Glad I came across this thread. I was contacted by a Princess rep about Princesspromotions.com too. However, the deal I was quoted was slightly different. Mine was $3499, and the package includes $3,000 Future Cruise Credits, $100 Onboard Credits, $350 Hotel Credits (to be used any time), and one 5-night Stay Certificate you can use pre or post cruise. He actually let us login to the website using our Princess.com email login so we could view what hotels were available. It's not a bad deal considering I just booked a cruise that was more than $3k and plan on doing several days pre-cruise in a hotel stay doing some sightseeing. I just don't like the advance pay part of it all. It had the feel of of a cash grab by Princess because they are in financial trouble maybe? I don't know, but as a stockholder we are still at a loss and don't plan on giving any money away any earlier than I can help it.