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On the cruises I’ve done so far the ship has sync’d to local port time but apparently it’s up to the captain. The freestyle daily will specify it each day and there should be a card left in your stateroom the night before any time changes.

For me it depends on the itinerary and the excursions I’m doing . On a western med itinerary a lot of the excursions I picked involved a lot of walking so being able to go to the hot pool and use the jets as a massage action was great, I’ve not really been a convert to the heated loungers as they just aren’t hot enough for me. my next cruise has a lot of time at sea so the thermal spa pass will be a purchase for that one as a place to get away for a while and as it’s an Alaskan cruise in October I’m not going to be getting in the water any other way.

Definitely a good idea to have the basics as I find the folks in France are more willing to admit to understanding English if you make an effort to speak French to them. If you stick to excursions rather than wandering on your own the guides will all speak English anyway, but that may not be the case if you DIY. I’ve been to France lots for a variety of reasons and a lot of areas and it is very much a basic rule to at least try to speak some french. I’m lucky enough to speak a decent amount and understand more, so much so that I’ll speak it to french customers in my shop in Ireland. I don’t have as much experience of Spain as I do for France but the locals always appreciate even a minimal effort at speaking their language. I understand a reasonable amount of Spanish but can’t say much more than thanks or order a beer in speaking it.

I’d go along with this, I used to travel a lot more than I do these days. In particular for European rugby matches, the supporters of the club I support used to have an effective race against the airlines and hotels to get bookings made before the fixture details became public, we were lucky enough to have a connection inside the main tv broadcaster. The moment major sporting, music or conferences events are scheduled then hotel rates shoot up. Seattle has an effective captive market for Alaska cruisers every weekend so I’m not surprised rates at hotels in proximity to the piers are high. I was pleasantly surprised when I spotted the Black Friday rate for the Belltown Inn and the good reviews. Any of the hotels I’d seen with economical rates previously had very patchy reviews or were miles away from the main attractions and the piers. Even Air BnB rates seems to have risen steeply from when I first looked at them (they weren’t available to book that far out at the time).

Walkers are more like Pringles than Irish style crisps, Tayto are a bit thinner cut and a bit more oily. there’s Tayto’s both in Northern Ireland and in the republic, once upon a time they were the same company but no longer. I’ve had the northern version and they’re very very similar to the republic version. Tayto Cheese and Onion are my favourites (red and blue packet in the south, yellow pack in the north). If you’re a fan of crinkle cut then Hunky Dory’s are good too, they actually own Tayto these days. There was near riot in Thomond Park at the first rugby game after its’ revamp because some dope had stocked Walkers instead of Tayto’s. An American comedian called Josh Pray (YouTube link included) was introduced to Taytos and the Tayto sandwich concept and fell in love. Mark Hamill of Star Wars developed a taste for Tayto BBQ flavour when he was filming the latest trilogy in Kerry. btw default Taytos = cheese and onion, if speaking about a different flavour this will be specified.

I’ll join the crisps club, specifically Irish crisps, the Tayto brand was the first in world to do flavoured crisps (potato chips for the heathens) and they’re still the best, so good you can use them as a sandwich filling. Also Irish/uk version of Cadbury chocolate bars, hersheys has too much artificial sweeteners or something, it’s just not the same and cadburys from other countries has some weird additives to stop it melting. I resort to buying a big bag of Cheetos, red or rainbow vines and galaxy chocolate from a local store when I get stateside to bring onboard for snacking. I do have a corn intolerance so that severely limits the amount of those I can consume per day. I’m one of those oddballs that actually loses weight on a cruise ‘cos I can’t indulge in my normal snacks.

There were rumours that Priscilla would be replaced when Epic was due to go for refurbishment in 2020 but covid put paid to that plan. Getting the bus off the ship would apparently be a major project. I suspect someone realised they could just cut it up if they didn’t want to re-use it for a different ship. It does however seem a bit odd that 6 would be on multiple ships, it’s not like the dance show that’s on getaway and breakaway as that evolves with different casts bringing different dance styles and choreography.

Pre covid there was a plan for NCL to redevelop another pier entirely for San Juan embarkations but they’ve wound up sticking with the Pan American pier.

I’m honestly not surprised about a lack of refunds, many cruises would have been booked months ago, before all the oil price increases. NCL are actually entitled to add a fuel surcharge above the original cruise price and they haven’t done this, they’re probably using any port fees excesses to defray the increased fuel costs. However, if they skip a European port and don’t provide any compensation for it you could probably haul them over the coals with EU regulations, the airlines in Europe all got smacked for not refunding airport charges to customers who missed flights regardless of cause. The airlines are now supposed to provide such refunds but they make it as difficult as possible by requiring calls to a premium rate phone number where the time you spend on hold will probably cost more than the refund would be worth, but they are obeying the letter of the law.

The pricing varies by cruise, if there’s higher demand for studios they will be more expensive, generally the inside prices you’ll see before drilling in are the sail away prices without Free at Sea. Access to the studio lounge if staying in a cabin other than a studio is hit and miss, it seems to depend on the policy of individual managers or coordinators on the ships. Sometimes the coordinator will wedge open the door into the studio lounge for the daily meet-ups, others will set a meet up location at one of the bars because they’re not allowed to give access to the lounge. Generally the very first meet-up on embarkation day will be set for a bar accessible to everyone and then migrate to the studio lounge to collect the solos hanging out there. there aren’t studios on all the ships and the ships without studios do still have a solos meet-ups in one of the regular public venues.

Before the free WiFi minutes were included in FaS you could prepay and avoid a connection fee that you had to pay if buying it on the ship. When I booked my next cruise the FaS included 250mins so the upgrade to unlimited is a fair bit cheaper than is the case with the current FaS. Personally I’ll pre-purchase the upgrade just in case the on-board system decides to charge the upgrade price as if I only have the 150/120mins. Also looking at recent dailies that have been posted none seem to show the option to upgrade to unlimited after day 1.

Being in Ireland I always have at least one pair of waterproof boots or sneakers, I have hiking boots and high waterproof warm boots that I use very rarely. My day to day boots are from timberland, a lot of the boots in their range are waterproof and I usually top that up with a waterproofing spray. At the moment my waterproof runners are Asics but in the freezing temperatures we have in Ireland this week they are definitely not warm enough without heavy socks. We recently started stocking Etnies at work and they have a few winterised high top sneakers in their range which I will be picking from for myself.

ah but was there driving rain? That is what gets through weather seals every time, it the joint between the body and lens that’s the infiltration point.

Maybe NCL should consider ditching some of the cheapo brands if the concern is about consolidating the range offered. The reality is probably due to the terms offered from the various alcohol parent companies and distributors like Diageo. Btw $26 for a bottle of baileys is about normal in Ireland as our government introduced minimum unit pricing on alcohol.

It would probably be a good idea to check the cruiseline forums to see what the reports are from folks that have been on ships that went to glacier bay in the past. I have a cruise booked on Norwegian Bliss for October next year that includes a day in Glacier Bay. However, some of the late season trip reports have said Bliss didn’t get particularly close to the glaciers so if getting close to the glaciers is a priority you may want a cruise line using a smaller ship on such an itinerary, or be careful with your sale dates.

I’m planning for an Alaskan cruise in October next year. I have a sneaking suspicion it’ll be cruiseline or diy only because the sailing is so late. I’ve tried looking up the independent vendors and most don’t list any availability for October and of the few with pricing listed online seem to be the same price as the cruiseline . I’ve also noticed a lot of them basically say book via your cruiseline.

Could be possible works planned at one of the piers or there’s more ships arriving earlier than breakaway. Be warned tendering from breakaway can be a mess depending on your fellow guests obeying their ticketed times or not. Basically if you have an early tender ticket walk straight past all the idiots in the queue who didn’t bother to get a ticket and are blocking your access to the assembly area.

They generally knock 10% off the prices when the ship is in-port

Remember you can book excursions independently and on a European itinerary there’s plenty of public transport too. The only time I stick to cruiseline excursions are if it involves a boat (no backup transport) or there are local restrictions in place requiring me to stick to a cruise line excursions. Occasionally there are excursions that may be exclusive to the cruiseline, I’m doing an Alaska cruise in October and it’s looking like cruiseline excursions may be the only option because it’s so late in the season.

On my last cruise there were 2 groups of passengers whose NCL booked flights didn’t make it in time for embarkation, one group still arrived on embarkation day so departure was delayed a couple of hours to let them make it to the ship. The other group hadn’t a hope of making embarkation so they got re-routed to our second port of call as there was no flight availability for the first port. They got 2 nights hotel accommodation at that port while waiting for the ship to arrive (first cruise day was at sea). the roll call before that cruise had folks all over the northern US changing flights or opting to drive to their connecting airports to avoid flight cancellations due to an incoming storm. on my first cruise another guest travelling from Ireland was supposed to get to Miami the day before the cruise but the flight from Ireland to New York was delayed so he missed the connecting flight, luckily the airline got him to Miami the morning of embarkation so he made it to the ship on just 3hrs of sleep. I’m in Ireland too but have been travelling to the USA semi regularly since ‘94 so I always plan to arrive a couple of days before my cruise. I nearly got scuppered on my return home after my first cruise when the airline had an IT meltdown, luckily I was at the airport early enough for them to get me the last seat on another airline’s flight that would make my connecting flight to Ireland possible. I’ve seen pretty much all possible causes for flight delays at this stage. I had a flight to New York delayed by 8hours because the originally scheduled pilot dropped a dumbbell on his head in the gym so we had to wait for the incoming pilot to have his mandatory 8hours rest before he could fly again.

I haven’t cruised on any other line but there are some tips specific to NCL pre-booking specialty dining - opens 120days before sailing but only a proportion of reservations will be released pre embarkation, a majority are held back for embarkation day. Depending on the itinerary and how busy it is aboard there may be reservations available throughout though at less ideal times. the MDRs are not super noisy/chaotic unless you hit rush hour and you can always go to a different one, the menu is the same in all 3 on Escape. O’sheehans does get busy/noisy when one of the popular game shows is on in the atrium as O’Sheehans overlooks the atrium in Escape and there’s not enough seating/space in the atrium to accommodate everyone wanting to watch. As for Viva no-one has direct experience of that ship but the initial feedback on Prima (her sister ship) is that entertainment *has* to be booked as capacity is smaller than on Escape but even then you can sometimes get into a show on waitlist as they release seats 15mins before the show starts if people fail to arrive. Vibe - other than good bar service due to limited numbers it may not be worth it on Escape, Spice H2O on escape is a *free* adults only area at the stern with hot tubs and a cold waterfall area for cooling off. There is a bar in spice as well but because they’re dealing with bigger numbers than vibe service can be a bit slower. In the evening spice turns into an activities area, family stuff early evening then adult parties later. my first cruise was on Escape and she’s still my favourite of the ships I’ve been on.

Anyone stayed at Belltown inn? The reviews I’m seeing online seem to be good for the price except that there’s a few homeless folks hanging out at the dog park nearby. I prefer not to stay at airport hotels unless I’m arriving or departing at some stupid hour of the night.

Just one thing to watch out for on those eastern med/Greek isles itineraries is that quite a few of the ports don’t have the docking capacity for every ship size so there is a big chance of having to tender to shore from the ship. It’s what has put me off a lot of those itineraries, I’d much prefer they used one of the smaller ships so docking is possible. I’ve experienced the disaster that is tendering to great stirrup cay from Norwegian Breakaway which took *hours* even with the earliest non-excursion tender ticket.

I’m seeing it on mine too, but mine will be an Alaskan cruise in October so I don’t think I’ll be bothering with it. The spa will be far more preferable on that itinerary at that time of year.

Just one gotcha with this approach, if the pricing promotions terms change from when you originally booked and when you re-price before final payment your “new” booking will have the the new t&cs. for example when I booked my next cruise the Free at Sea promo still had 2 specialty dining credits and 250mins of free WiFi, if I was to ask for repricing now I’d lose 1 of the dining credits and 100mins of the WiFi as the free at sea terms have changed. I deliberately booked that cruise ages ago when the rumours of the Free at sea changes were mentioned here. When you re-price before final payment you effectively cancel your original booking and move your existing payments to a new booking along with all changes to terms and conditions which could include a higher cost on free at sea and daily service charges. So I’d strongly suggest checking exactly what is included in your existing reservation costs v’s a new reservation cost before making that phone call.