jaapie

A couple of years ago we did a TA from Port Canaveral to Barcelona. First stop after leaving Port Canaveral was the Azores. One day before the scheduled Florida departure date a couple who was booked on the TA flew in to Miami from out of state. At about lunchtime they took an uber to the Port of Miami to start their cruise - hello, the cruise ship they were booked on was not at the dock in Miami. A frantic call to the cruise line determined they (the couple) had made a mistake and the ship was scheduled to leave from Port Canaveral and not Miami. They had to frantically get an uber from Miami to Port Canaveral and just made the ship by the skin of their teeth!

Abbott signed the bill today banning vaccine passports

Some other differences between classic and premium - with classic you get still bottled water, with premium you can get Pellegrino. With classic you get prosecco, with premium you get champagne. 

Before Always Included one person in the cabin could upgrade to premium and the other person didn't have to. Not sure if this is still the case with Always Included.

We sail with multiple cruise lines because they each have their pros and cons. We like Royal's entertainment the best (loved the ice rink on our first Royal cruise about ten years ago), followed by NCL. But we don't often sail Royal because when we do we always purchase the beverage package so it makes it more expensive than NCL. We became Platinum on NCL several years ago but over the last couple of years pre-pandemic started sailing Celebrity more as we found when there were issues with NCL such as delays, ship changes, etc, they do not treat you as well as some other lines. We will still sail NCL but only for the right itinerary and then cross our fingers that there are no hiccups. Entertainment on Celebrity is more sedate but food in the MDR is definitely superior to NCL.

We were caught out a couple of years ago with not being able to get the anytime dining we wanted. We were waitlisted but nothing came of that so immediately upon boarding we spoke to the maitre d' but he did not change our fixed dining time. Said he would during the cruise if he could but never did. Yesterday we booked a cruise on the Equinox for this December to replace our August Summit cruise to Greenland that Celebrity canceled. The only dining time available was 6pm and that is a deal breaker for us. We have for some years dealt with the same vacation planner at Celebrity and she knows we will cancel the Equinox reservation before final payment in September if we do not get anytime dining. She said that if by FPP we have not been allocated anytime dining, she will contact the dining room to arrange for us. Once bitten twice shy regarding hoping the maitre d' to do accommodate our request on board.

1 hour ago, kochleffel said:

Cannes: are you by any chance an admirer of Matisse? From Cannes it's possible to visit the Chapelle du Rosaire, which he designed late in his life, at Vence, inland from Cannes. However, standard tours don't go there, because the capacity is limited -- both inside the chapel and for parking. It requires renting a car, using a rideshare service, or commissioning a private tour.

Consider visiting Antibes from Cannes. We used to live in Antibes and love it, just a 15 minute train ride from Cannes to Antibes. Right in the center of Antibes is a Picasso museum, but just wandering the alleys of old town Antibes is wonderful.

25 minutes ago, happy cruzer said:

Those who booked Prima Oct 22, did you book air and transfers?  Wondering about the cost of the transfers?  To me that is one of the issues with Galveston or Houston, expensive and time consuming to get to the port.  Roundtrip allows options of parking at port which is affordable but leaving from Galveston and arriving Miami is harder.

 

Thanks.

One option to consider is to fly into Houston Hobby airport rather than Houston George Bush InterContinental airport. Hobby is much closer to Galveston and you could just Uber from Hobby.

32 minutes ago, JeanieTheMom said:

If I remember correctly, the reason cruises went out of the Houston port for a time was that a hurricane wiped out the port area in Galveston. 

 

I read yesterday, but I can't find it now to post a link, that there "may be negotiations" about having Prima sail out of Galveston after the 2023 season. I would like that!

Carnival and RCCL did cruise out of the Houston Bayport terminal for a while after hurricane damage in Galveston, but then moved back to Galveston after repairs were done. After the Houston Bayport terminal sat idle for ages, a contract was finally signed with Princess and NCL but was not popular with cruisers so no longer operates as a cruise terminal.

28 minutes ago, MichiganBound said:

Coincidentally, I was aboard the final Jade cruise out of The Port of Houston destined first to Miami and then TA to Barcelona.  We left Houston just as a tropical storm was moving in.  The first 12 hours of the cruise were quite rough. 

I was also on that final cruise the Jade made from Houston. The ship was only two thirds full as NCL had great difficulty selling cruises from the Port of Houston. The cruise MichiganBound mentions was 17 nights, I met someone on the cruise who had booked last minute and only paid $399 for her cabin (she was a single) - under $25 a day before grats, what a bargain. 

Australia Finance Minister Simon Birmingham told The Australian today that the country would likely not reopen its borders until well into 2022. The previous target date for reopening had been June 17 this year.

Several years ago we had cabin 8060 on the Jade. We loved the location but would not book that cabin again. The only way you could see over the lifeboat was by standing on the bed and could then only see a glimpse of the sea.

Last night it was reported on our local news channel that this Sunday two Carnival ships are returning to port in Galveston so they will be ready to start cruising from the US as soon as they get the go ahead from the CDC which they hope will be before November. 

Dessert on a sea day is always the same. About 2pm after completing lunch (minus traditional dessert), I head pool side and enjoy a mudslide for dessert as that is something I never have at home! 

1 hour ago, ziggyuk said:

So do we, unbelievable isn't it?

Been married 45 years. In the 'old' days (first cruise as a 20 something was in 1972) had no choice as cruising was very different then and tables of six/eight the norm. But for the last several years always request a table for two, will wait half an hour for a table for two rather than share. We are sociable people and happy to chat to people at bars, poolside, etc, but prefer to eat in peace and enjoy our meals without distractions. Desperate to cruise again, we've had our two Pfizer shots in January and February, but have resigned ourselves to just doing traveling within the US for the next few months visiting family out of state. Would jump on a last minute cruise if a suitable opportunity became available, but only if all passengers/crew had to be vaccinated/tested. Have made too many sacrifices over the past year or so to screw things up now by taking risks. 

I have also had both my Pfizer shots and have tucked the CDC card safely into my passport just waiting for the day when I can use that passport again. My next booked cruise is to Iceland and Greenland this August on the Summit but I am expecting that one to be canceled. 

I have a Celebrity cruise booked for August 2021 (although don't think it will happen as it is for two weeks transatlantic). We booked our long haul flight through Celebrity, they booked us on a United flight and we were given our seat allocation at the time of making the reservation (which I did over the phone). 

For us itinerary is more important than the ship. We have sailed on the Epic and would do so again even though it is not our favorite ship. For us the bathroom layout was not a problem but what we didn't like was the very enclosed feeling of the lounges due to the lack of windows so difficult to find a chair inside where you could look at the ocean. 

April 2019 on the Epic TA from Port Canaveral to Barcelona we had an hour long lecture every sea day. The presenter was a British lady who lived in Spain. Each day she spoke about a different port we were going to visit, it wasn't about shopping, it was about the history and sights at each of the ports. 

This type of lecture is unusual for NCL (have done at least 15 NCL cruises), a lot more Celebrity cruises have lecturers.

1 hour ago, podgeandrodge said:

 

 

Is this with NCL?

Celebrity Summit in August 2021

We love transatlantics, have taken more than a dozen. The best deal we got was the last NCL cruise from Houston before the cruise port closed in Houston in 2016  - it was a 17 night cruise to Barcelona and cost us $599 each (before DSC) for an ocean view cabin including beverage package (and there wasn't a service charge on the beverage package in those days), dining package of several nights (can't remember how many but it was 4 or 5), plus obc of $50 or so. We booked about four months before sail date. After sail date inside cabins went for as low as $399 each (without perks).

Our two transatlantics this year were canceled by NCL because of covid, but we are hoping the next one we have booked for 2021 will be a go - Southampton to Boston via Iceland and Greenland.

Two years ago we took the NCL bus from the airport to the port. Until there were enough people to fill the bus, we were assembled in a seating area inside the airport building near where the buses are lined up outside. The wait was half an hour max. At the port the bus first went dockside where our suitcases were removed from the bus, then the bus drove us to the front of the terminal building for us to get off the bus.  

39 minutes ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

After just under 60 days I finally got my cruise refund.  However, NCL did not refund the charge for the travel insurance fees.  Is this what everyone is seeing?  Should I expect a separate refund?  

A week ago I received a refund I requested on April 13 (for an April 19 cruise canceled by NCL). Two amounts posted to my credit card, one for the deposit paid last September, and one for the balance I paid in December. The balance paid in December included standard insurance thru NCL, and that was refunded last week, not listed separately but as part of the amount I paid in December. 

I also got the email yesterday detailing how much my refund will be and I will receive it in 7-10 days. This was for a cruise that should have departed on April 19, I put in my refund request the first day it was available to do so which was April 13. 

Funny thing about the 7-10 days - the refund was posted to my credit card last Saturday!

19 minutes ago, Dar & Bob said:

UPDATE - This morning I checked my account again and still no credit for the insurance portion of our cruise.  I called the insurance company and asked about it.  They told me it should be credited and that if we request a refund that the insurance would be a part of the refund.  She transferred me to NCL and I was put through to out PCC.  Our PCC confirmed that even though it didn't appear on my account that the insurance was credited and that it would be included with our request for a refund.  I am one happy cruiser 🙂

Thanks for the update. For one of my canceled cruises I had purchased the standard insurance thru NCL. When NCL canceled the cruise the 100% FCC and 25% FCC showed up on my account but not the insurance portion. On the cancelation letter from NCL this is what it said:

If you purchased our Essentials, Book Safe Standard or Platinum travel protection plan you will receive an additional future cruise credit, worth the value of your travel protection plan.

I decided not to bother about it and just write it off but good to know I should get it back when I get the refund I requested instead of the FCC. My other canceled cruise was with Celebrity and I got that refund in 5 weeks. I canceled another NCL cruise last month before final payment so only the deposit due back on that one but still waiting for that too.  

40 minutes ago, mugtech said:

There is a thread on here already about this.  Seems NCL too busy giving refunds to worry about such things, cannot figure out how to have NCL cancel a cruise without giving out the points. Wait 6 months for a "correction."

I wish is were true that NCL is too busy giving refunds. I got the double points for the cruise they cancelled, and would willingly give the points up in exchange for the thousands of dollars they owe me.