eileeshb

Oddly the guarantee class wasn’t always listed when I was looking at booking cruises, was there most of the time but occasionally not. they used to sometimes be called “just cruise” which was a guarantee without FAS, but now they offer a Just Cruise pricing on specific cabins. I was booking a studio cabin for a friend and wanted to change it from the assigned to a different one but it kept saying no other cabins available. Yet when I checked later another cabin number was listed. I wound up giving up on it and just took the suggested cabin.

How much of this is trying to reduce the number of ships and how much is it the shortages of both staff and supplies in the hospitality industry post covid? NCL have already opened up 2 new “ports” at Ward Cove and Icy Strait Point and they switched to ISP when the landslide reduced dock capacity at Skagway last year. As long as demand for Alaskan cruises remains high the cruiselines will figure out ways to keep it going even if they have to be more creative with alternative ports.

That means it’s different to the NCL cards as they just tap against the door since covid.

The cruiselines can and do adapt when security issues arise. On one cruise I had that included Cozumel they cancelled all of the excursions which used the local ferry service due to a bomb threat the week prior. I remember the days when American tourists were scared to visit Ireland due to the terrorism in Northern Ireland. It was one fairly small area of the country impacted but thanks to lack of knowledge those overseas thought the whole country was a dangerous place. I would say American news coverage of problems in other countries tends to be a bit alarmist, I’ve been to the USA a lot and spent a few months in Chicago as well as upstate Massachusetts so I’ve seen how things get reported.

If you are overnighting at a hotel the night before the cruise the hotel should be able to print and staple your labels if you haven’t been able to print them in the advance or don’t have the plastic tag holders. I got the plastic holders and use them as well as leaving my normal luggage tags attached and a card inside the bags just in case it goes wandering.

I got a wheeled pelicase eventually and much to the amusement of the other rugby photographers it’s bright pink. My view is that anyone that tried to run away with it would be spotted from a mile away. I did bring it to the states once when I was doing photography for a multi-sport event, and it was marginal in getting it into the overhead bin on the domestic connection flight so I’ll stick with a backpack for Alaska. But I’ll probably take the padded innards from the peli-case and use them in my carryon spinner, the other aspect is that peli-case predated their fly-weight range so it adds another couple of kilos to the haul of gear.

I can imagine.. I went through my lens collection yesterday, it's ages since I used the dSLR kit and I'd forgotten how heavy some of them are. I used to get a collection of pin-head sized bruises on my shoulders when I carried the full set in a backpack. I still have a backpack that will fit everything but there's no way I'm hauling the whole lot long haul. I got a couple of my late fathers lenses to add to what I had already built up, luckily we both used Canons and my brother took his camera and the lenses I wasn't taking. I'm going to have start using them again now so that I'll be up to speed for alaska in October. It's properly wet and windy here at the moment so it should be good practise.

Just put down peppers as an allergy when you're booking or say it at the first MDR you visit. They'll keep a note whenever you visit any other restaurant on the ship, the buffet is the only place you won't be able to get them to remove it. If it's a case that you'll be ordering the potatoes every morning you can talk to the maitre'd on embarkation day. Personally I can't stand the taste of cucumber and can always tell when anything else has been beside sliced cucumber (most deli's here keep it with the tomatoes). But it's not dangerous to me, thankfully. When I did the behind the scenes tour the head chef told us that any food for folks with allergies is prepped in a dedicated area of the galley. They usually have the people with allergies give them their orders for the MDR the day before . I did see one person get an entirely separate plate of food at Teppanyaki from back of house as she was allergic to shellfish, so they can cater for allergies around the various eateries.

Wow .. only thing missing that I bring is a hanging toiletries bag rather than the over the door storage thingy. Obviously I have to bring socket adapters but I have a mix of European and Irish plugs for most of my stuff so normally don’t need adapters for everything. I will also be bringing at least one hanger with me for hanging my coat on the laundry line in the bathroom (Alaska cruise), but I would bring one on a warm weather cruise too for hanging my change robe as I found it didn’t dry well when hung on a hook and my wardrobe didn’t have any proper hangers that could hang on the line. I’ve recently come across folding hangers on Amazon that I’m going to order and test before deciding if I need a normal hanger or not

Interesting…. I haven’t yet been on Bliss but I ate the pad Thai at Food republic on Escape pre-covid and my immediate reaction to it was that it was exceptionally mild. But then my local Thai place regular gets recognised in the take-away food awards here. As @BirdTravels peppers issue, I’m actually allergic to the flesh/seeds of peppers but no problem when it’s dried powder form used (like cayenne) and that gets very complicated to explain to servers in the restaurants. I wind up avoiding dishes that might have peppers in them as a result though I did manage to get it through to the folks at Shanghai on Epic and they adapted my choices accordingly. It’s excellent fun being allergic to sweet pepper (capsicums) as the red ones often blend in with tomatoes so I have to be wary of stuff that should be tomato based. I really wish teppanyaki would ease up on the soy sauce in their rice, the last time I ate there 2 of us on the table requested low sodium but the way the chef cooked the rice if you wanted it without soy it would be completely plain.

For Dublin there’s a few options that would be kid friendly, the Viking splash tour with an amphibious vehicle, the Natural History Museum has recently re-opened it’s nicknamed the Dead Zoo. When I was about 11 my school brought us to Dublin for the day and we did: the book of Kells at the long room in Trinity college, the Natural history museum, the national history museum, the wax museum and Dublin Zoo. Apart from Trinity college all the others have been overhauled in the decades since I did that tour. The Viking splash tour didn’t exist back then as the major Viking archeological discoveries in the city hadn’t been made yet. There’s also Epic which is a new museum in the financial district concentrating on the Irish diaspora and more modern history than the other museums.

I would second the recommendation for more of items you wear daily. I like the heat but I also “glow” a lot, so I bring a t-shirt or tank for each day of the trip and double up on underwear numbers as I usually wind up with 2 showers a day in hot weather. I’m in the throw dirty laundry in your suitcase under the bed school of thought but I’m usually in a studio on an NCL ship and there isn’t much space for a dedicated laundry hamper. Heck I usually have 2 suitcases, one gets souvenir shopping and the other gets the laundry. On the footwear choices I travel in sneakers, have at least one pair of flip flops/sandals and something with a bit of a heel/wedge (my Achilles object strongly to flat footwear for more than 3 or 4 days in a row). prescription sunglasses are the single best investment for anyone that needs prescription eyewear. I’ve had laser correction done but before that I had 2 pairs of prescription sunglasses, one pair lived in my car and the other in my camera or sports bag. Proper sunglasses will also help ward off early cataract development. flordia and the Caribbean were perfect for me in February coming from damp and cold Ireland. My very first cruise was eastern Caribbean in May and there was a day and a half that were stiflingly hot but apart from that it was fine. The full day that was stinking hot was a sea day so I spent most of it in a shady spot where I could duck back into air conditioning at regular intervals.

Some of the Norwegian Cruise Line acronyms NCL = Norwegian Cruise Line, aka Norwegian NCLH = Norwegian cruise line holdings, corporate level which includes Regent Seven Seas (RSS) and Oceania FAS = Free At Sea, catchall term for a bunch of perks which varies depending on when you booked and what grade of cabin you picked but generally includes: PBP (Premium Beverage Package aka as many drinks as want costing $15 or less but only 2 at a time, some other exclusions apply), SDP (Specialty Dining Package, numbers vary from 1 upwards depending on itineraries), internet minutes, excursion credits. FAS+ = Free At Sea Plus, upgrades FAS package to include PBP+, and extra dining credit or more, excursion credits for the second guest in the cabin, unlimited (non-streaming) WiFi.. this may change over time. DSC = daily service charge aka gratuity/tips , there are separate service charges of 20% for the beverage packages and dining packages. OBC = on board credit, sometimes included in FAS promos or by your travel agent CN = cruise next, these are credits worth $250 each that are purchased on the ship at a discount of up to 50% to be used on future cruise bookings. The number of vouchers that can be purchased varies and the number that can be used towards a booking varies based on the grade of cabin and how far out you make the booking. I think that’s the main ones that will appear in posts in the ncl forum.

NCLH have signed a contract to roll out Starlink on all of their ships this year, they’ll also be adding it to the Regent and Oceania ships. Rumour is it will be on all the ships by the end of October.

I dunno what size Pete uses but a 5Lt is plenty big enough for most cameras unless you’re using a big lens. I bring a 5Lt and a 10Lt with me, the bigger one for wet swimming/snorkelling gear particularly if it’s sharing a space with my camera. There are all sorts of grades of those bags, some with just the roll top Clip, others with backpack straps or a single shoulder strap. I have a few as I work in watersports so I know how handy they can be for keeping stuff dry.

I had one sailing with GSC as a port, the tender ticket management was absolute rubbish and a bunch of people missed their excursions as a result. Honestly I’d prefer to avoid GSC being on my itinerary after that experience. I hadn’t booked an excursion and had a relatively early tender ticket but it was still 1.30pm before I got to the island so just enough time for lunch and a bit of a swim then back to the tenders to return to the ship before the rush started.

It’s finicky about when it shows up, I have one that expires this April and has to be used on a sailing by that expiry date. So I’m just running searches every so often to see if a bargain appears, bearing in mind that I’ll probably have to fly long distance to use it.

I travel solo so My policy has been as follows 1. If the excursion is on a small boat and involves being in the water then it’s phone and imitation GoPro 2. If the excursion is primarily sightseeing then the mirrorless camera kit comes with me unless the weather is atrocious 3. If it’s Alaska and whale watching then the dSLR kit is coming I’m going to post 2 pictures from San Juan Puerto Rico, one from the mirrorless camera (Panasonic lumix gm1) and one from my phone (Samsung s21)

Barcelona is a port of call as well as an embarkation/disembarkation port. I did a med cruise in 2021 and embarked in Rome so Barcelona was a port of call for me whereas the majority of guests on that cruise were disembarking there.

MSC can be hit and miss, I met an Italian couple at Costa Maya who were on an MSC ship while I was sailing with NCL. They said the food was terrible on that caribbean cruise but they'd cruised a lot with MSC in Europe and said it was an infinitely better standard on the European itineraries.

If you happen to be in a studio there is a coffee machine in the studio lounge that the coffee addicts seem to love. I only use it for hot water for tea.

I'm definitely booking it for my Alaska cruise in October as there'll be a lot of time on that cruise not in port.

I'll hopefully have 2 full days in Seattle pre-cruise and I'm hoping to avoid renting a car, so if you know any tour company that does NOT charge and arm and a leg I'll certainly consider it. There are a couple of places pike place market that offer tastings from local wineries and I came across a mention of another but I couldn't track it down on google maps. There's also the copperworks distillery to visit on the waterfront. And I think I spotted another distillery in Skagway but unfortunately their products are based on corn spirits so while I could taste I wouldn't buy as I have a corn intolerance and yes it kicks my butt even after distillation.

They're tooting that horn here in Ireland too. They're about to add health warnings to the labels of all alcoholic bottles and cans here and the Italian wineries are losing the plot objecting to it. Previously I think it was only the unit measure and a note that alcohol could be bad for you written on spirits and beers. I'm seeing a growing section of non-alcoholic variants outside the drinks areas in the supermarkets here. It's only a matter of time before we start seeing alcohol-free rum and gin on the ships, I think there's already one alcohol free beer aboard.

BTW the wifi location issue can affect payments using your watch/phone. I work in retail and our wifi constantly tells devices they're in a different location so when they try to tap pay and their account has location based security it rejects the payment. I regularly have to tell people to turn off the wifi on their phones and re-try the tap payment, I've even had it happen to me at a local gas station.