Morgsmom

Are you flying in same day? To Venice? It's still quite far from the cruise terminal in Trieste. You can drop off your luggage around 10am. Can't say what there is to see there but if you are just arriving after travel I imagine you'd rather just get onboard the ship.

Lord have mercy. How about instead of all of those requested onboard donations to "save the oceans" (or whatever) we all chip in a few bucks to FIX MSC'S IT Department?? I'm in for a $20 😆

He's on the Seascape right now.

Read the part about the website allowing you to do something... then question it. The MSC website? WHAT? It's always perfect 😉

The do NOT do price adjustments. YC has non refundable deposits and you can make one change, but not on the same booking, per se. Given the $ of YC, I would absolutely use a TA as you can get 5-10% of the price (pre taxes) back in onboard credit.

Likely because you were "sat with" others. In the case where reservations are deliberately linked the official cruise policy is that all must have the drink package, otherwise there might be collusion ("oh, only half of us need the package and we will all just share")

You absolutely CAN link reservations ahead of time; you just can't do it by yourself. You need your TA to handle or to call MSC

The OP was reporting about Hola. The drink package is certainly covered in L'Atelier and Kaito.

Correct, No Covid testing to get on a the ship. As an aside, we now pack 4 "at home" Covid tests in our First Aid Kit. They take up little room and we figure that if we start feeling sick on a cruise we'd like to self-test FIRST before heading down to medical to report ourselves and be put in quarantine 😞

They won't replace the Pringles :(.... My guilt late night cruise pleasure

You are missing the part where it excludes signature venues... which Hola is *The Premium Extra Package can be enjoyed in our bars, buffet, main restaurant and specialty restaurants as well as on private islands, but does not cover our signature venues. Add to y

If you bid to upgrade and win an Aurea upgrade you should get all of the benefits

So true.... That so-called lawyer is an ambulance chasing - er... ship chasing... Hack. I've read the report and all of these items are common on every single cruise ship. Too little staff, maybe some training issues, but nothing to grab your pearls about. The romaine was at 47? Oh, my. Do you know how nearly impossible it is to keep lettuce below 42? I'm happy it's bug free and clean, thank you. Piled up dishes? Well maybe if the guests didn't take so much food and waste so much there wouldn't be an issue. At the end of the day any inspector can walk into any restaurant --- ANY RESTAURANT -- and give them a 100 or a 67. There's always something to be found. A good inspector will point out issues and ask for immediate correction (when possible), a pissy one will get a pair of tweezers and look for ... well, anything. Food is (for now at least) produced by humans. Ok, off my soapbox. My point is that the inspector seemed to be overstepping and the cruise lawyer is a whack-a-doodle (all respect given for fear he files a slander suit or something equally frivolous)

I still don't think it is possible without moving cabins, but you could try.

Yes, I do get priority boarding either b/c of status or booking YC, however I don't assign a very high dollar value to that. Aurea would only be allowed to eat in the MDR with permission of the Maitre D', so, yes Aurea has to eat in the Aurea dining room. As far as the thermal suite, if that is of importance it is cheaper to do this 'a la carte' and purchase that as an add-on vs adding $500 pp (give or take) to go to Aurea experience. I would have said differently before when the package came with drinks and an 80 minute massage though 😉 .

I honestly don't think that this is possible. And why would you want to go to Anytime dining when the other cabins couldn't join you? Just for the thermal spa or solarium access (which they can't join you). You can buy a weekly/cruise-length thermal spa access.... the other benefits have been stripped down to almost worthless (IMO)... a $3 bottle of prosecco and some macaroons. Woo hoo.

Well that's fun! Congrats and enjoy!!!

1. Don't be a jerk 2. See #1 🙂

bwhahahahahaaah, thank you for the good belly laugh! As if a cruiseline could/would give refunds right down to the last minute for fare changes... or an overworked room steward should stalk around all day waiting for you to rise and shine on a sea day.... and like @cruiseny4life said "just eat lunch, yo!" I get up really early, why can't I have my eggs benedict at 5am ... jkjkjkjk Sorry, but this is not reasonable for a main stream cruiseline running a for profit business.

Newbie to NCL here. We currently have a cruise booked (and paid in full if that makes a difference) for September. I have the NCL app downloaded and when I go to enter my name/res # on the Room Upgrade section it says that my reservation # is not found. Thus my questions: 1) are the bids to upgrade emailed to guests, 2) do first time guests (potentially) get the emails, 3) how far in advance would such a process happen? I'm very familiar with the process on MSC, but this is our first NCL. Thanks in advance.

It could be as early as 8am for self-walkoff, it could be delayed depending on weather, strikes etc. If it were me I wouldn't bank on anything too early. Rather leave your stateroom, enjoy breakfast, and arrange for a 10am or so transfer. Too many things can happen. (*was on the Meraviglia once that came into port 3.5 hours late; so many people missed flights. not worth it IMO)

Many times there is the opportunity to bid for cabins that are not available. Some believe it is just to collect data as to WHAT people are willing to pay so in your case you have inadvertently raised the bar on what you are willing to pay to upgrade. So you have sent the message that even the Max Bid is still acceptable. What "lower tier" would you bid on - Aurea? In my mind NOT worth it for what it offers now (access to thermal spa, solarium and anytime dining). But only you can determine the worth. If it were me on a 4 night cruise I'd just stick with the balcony.

In Butcher's Cut you can get a Filet (which is quite delicious) and far superior to the steak in the MDR, IMO. For the prices they are charging for the package it might not have been reasonable to think that you could order a T-Bone or Tomahawk. The cruiseline wouldn't even recoup their food cost 🤷‍♀️

While I agree with all of these comments, if you are an MSC cruiser you recognize that these are KNOWN pitfalls/downfalls of both the cruiseline and the ship. Their IT is the worst in the business, their Credit Card policy is odd, but it is what it is, they will likely not upgrade the Divina to be a "smart" ship, and their communication 100% stinks. However, the Divina is our favorite ship. Love how cozy it is.

So if this is what the cruiseline is telling you NOW (in May of 2023) may I ask WHY you might expect something different? YC has no bearing, neither do tales of what might have happened in year's past. (Last year the ships were at 30% capacity; they are sailing full now). Just sayin....