Eli_6

Oh geez. Didn't even think of that!!! I have more faith in that one going forward, though, because at least she is on the Port schedules. When a cruise is not on the website AND is not on any of the schedules for her ports of call, that is suspicious. Highly suspicious.

Well, we booked the pride and the air fare before we knew anything about the Venezia sailing. If I change to the Venezia, I then have to try to get back my return air fare. Plus, there are substantially more ports on the Pride sailing.

I just talked to my TA. She has contacts in Carnival. She told me to reschedule to Venezia and implied without directly saying it that the 28th was going to be canceled. However, she DID say the rest of the summer sailings were going forward.

EXACTLY! That's why they need to be honest about the state of affairs of this cruise. Already, the Venezia cost has gone up about 1k from the Black Friday sails so if I do change over, I lost a good rate because of Carnival not letting us know.

If it is canceled, you could do an MSC cruise for a week out of Barcelona to the med then take a cheap flight up to London and catch the Carnival Norwegian Fjords cruise. MSC has some really affordable rates and it has 2 or 3 ships going out of Barcelona.

Yup. I just looked and I currently have an upgrade offer on BOTH of my balcony cabins for this cruise. How is that possible when the cruise is sold out? And I recall looking a few months back shortly before it disappeared from the website to see if the Deck 4 Vista suite with adjoining balcony (we like adjoining rooms) was available and while those particular rooms were not, there was a plethora of other rooms available in every category. Then, almost overnight, it disappears and is "sold out." Nope. Not buying it.

As an aside, I am not trying to be an alarmist because it may go forward. At this point, I would give it a 50/50 chance. All I am suggesting is that I would consider alternatives if it gets canceled and you have already booked airfare and made other arrangements. We are either going to switch to the Venezia which departs a day later or take an MSC cruise out of Barcelona.

To put off having to provide the refunds. Or to postpone it until after final payment. They did the same thing with Europe 2021. Royal, NCL, etc. had all canceled their sailings and John Heald was saying it was a definite go. But the writing was on the wall. I don't think John is purposefully lying. I think he just repeats what the "beards" tell him. And who knows? Maybe it will go forward. But why is Venezia on the port schedule and Pride isn't? Why is Pride on the port schedule in Dover for the rest of the summer but not on ours? And why is ours the ONLY Europe cruise that has been removed from the website for 2+ months? My opinion is that I don't think they could get the dry dock for when they wanted or they suspect it will run behind schedule so they have pulled it from the ports and the website. Also, the fact that they are offering room upgrades means the sailing is NOT sold out!!! They keep saying it isn't on the website because it is sold out but clearly that isn't the case. And I feel your pain. 4 business class roundtrip airfare tickets booked from Houston to London. And 4 more tickets booked from London to Barcelona. Even using miles for upgrades, we still have about 9k-10k (or maybe more) invested. And we have my husband's alternative coverage for his medical practice arranged.

Carnival Pride is NOT on the schedule for Barcelona, but the Carnival Venezia is for the next day: https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/barcelona-port-82?tab=schedule&month=2023-05#schedule The Carnival Pride is NOT on the Port schedule for Lisbon (but the Venezia is😞 https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/lisbon-port-65?tab=schedule&month=2023-05#schedule The Carnival Pride is NOT on the port schedule for Porto, Portugal: https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/porto-leixoes-port-3739?tab=schedule&month=2023-06#schedule The Carnival Pride is NOT on the port schedule for Vigo, Spain: https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/vigo-port-745?tab=schedule&month=2023-06#schedule The Carnival Pride is NOT on the port schedule for La Coruna, Spain: https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/la-coruna-port-564?tab=schedule&month=2023-06#schedule The Carnival Pride is NOT on the port schedule for Bilbao Spain: https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/bilbao-port-697?tab=schedule&month=2023-06#schedule The Carnival Pride is NOT on the port schedule for Le Havre/Paris (in June): https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/paris-city-port-378?tab=schedule&month=2023-06#schedule And, of course, the Pride is NOT on the port schedule for Brussels: https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/zeebrugge-port-50?tab=schedule&month=2023-06#schedule The Carnival Pride IS on the schedule for the rest of the summer in Dover starting June 9th: https://www.cruisemapper.com/ports/barcelona-port-82?tab=schedule&month=2023-05#schedule The fact that the Carnival Pride IS on the schedule for later in the summer AND the fact that the Carnival Venezia is on the schedule in the same ports for a day or two later that the Pride is supposed to be visiting (but the Pride is noticeably absent) would lead one to believe that the Pride is going to be canceled. @TxTeach79

I just looked and the Carnival Pride is NOT on the schedule for Barcelona on May 28th. The Carnival Venezia IS on the schedule for May 29th. I find that HIGHLY suspicious! Highly.

Ok, I checked and the Pride Transatlantic over there is April 13-26. So, basically, it appears that Pride will be in dry dock for just under a month. How much are they going to be able to do in a month? I honestly don't know the answer to that because I don't know how quickly they can make these changes. It certainly makes me think that they won't be remodeling all of the cabins...

Actually, I thought about it some more and I *think* they canceled after final payment was due...which means it was within 90 days. I remember this specifically because I felt like it was so clearly aimed at getting those final payments. I had this happen more than once during the shut downs. It didn't bother me as much with the domestic cruises, but it really irked me for the Europe cruises because the amount of time and money (beyond the cruise fee) invested in planning those vacations is on another level. The problem is that for international airfare, you really have to buy it well in advance or you are going to be paying a premium or not able to get the flights you want. And if you (like me) fly on miles upgrades and/or business and are booking for 4 people, you pretty much have to book is soon as the airline posts the tickets to get everyone on the same flight and sitting together. My husband will not do two 10+ hour flight with our kids in coach. He will tell me to cancel the entire trip before agreeing to that. The thing that annoys me about this is that if Carnival is going to cancel, they need to tell us as soon as they know. I feel like they play this game of waiting to get more money/keep our money longer and it just isn't fair to us. I had them cancel a Vista sailing out of my local port of Galveston last minute one time and I didn't really care because I was out no money. But a TON more time and money goes into planning a Europe cruise as compared to one here in the states and their pittance of a 25% FCC doesn't come close to covering that. (Nor does buying insurance help in my situation.) The cruises are longer and require more time off and away from home. (For me, arranging my husband's time away from his business is the biggest deal.) The flights are several times the cost of domestic. Making other travel arrangements (like cabs and hotels) is much more difficult and time consuming because of things like language barriers, the fact that some places don't have Uber/Lyft, time differences, etc. Getting travel documents together, etc. I had to get passports for my children for the first time, and it took me 2-3 months to even get a passport appointment. (The process of getting minor passports is more involved than getting adult passports.) Some places were booked out 6 months and not even taking appointments. I am going to get on some of the port websites and check them again to see if the ship is showing up. The TA over there to drop off the Pride was showing up and it seemed to me like it didn't allow much time for the Pride to be in dry dock.

The "upsells" are in your booking manager on the carnival website. I got one recently for an inside room to balcony for like $30-40. I obviously took it. I also got an offer for one for about $50 on my Europe 12 day cruise to go from a regular balcony to an extended balcony on a higher floor, but I did not take it because we have two adjoining cabins and upgrading would have meant our cabins were no longer adjoining. My kids will are 8 and 10 (almost 11) so adjoining is preferable...although, actually, what really happens is the younger one sleeps in the room with us and the older one shuts the door, ignores the rest of us, and plays video games.

Pre-Covid, FTTF could arrive whenever they wanted to. They just brought FTTF back so no one knows exactly how it will work.

No, it was canceled due to Covid restrictions in Europe. Other cruise lines (Royal, NCL, etc) were canceling their 2021 Europe seasons and Carnival was still saying they were going ahead. I needed to book airfare and so asked John Heald and he swore they were definitely cruising that upcoming summer in Europe. So, I booked 4 business class roundtrip tickets based on his promise. Aaaaannnd two weeks later, the entire Europe season was canceled. I *think* it was about February if I recall correctly for May/June sailings. After that, I take what John Heald says with a chunk of salt. It isn't that I think he is being dishonest. I just think he doesn't always know and only says what the "beards" tell him to say.

Also, John Heald said on his page there will be mini bars in the rooms in a reply to the post.

At 21:00 on the video on John Heald's page it says there is a mini bar in the staterooms.

There is a video on John Heald's page from corporate about the Venezia and Frienze (sp?) and I thought they said it would have a minibar.

Anyone hear when she will be ready to sail for Carnival? And if there will be a transatlantic?

John Heald told me Europe 2021 was definitely sailing less than two weeks before it was canceled. The only thing that makes me think it may not cancel is that they did recently add additional excursions about 2-3 weeks ago that were not on there before and I don't know why they would do that if they were just going to turn around and cancel them. I am on that same sailing and already have decided that I will switch to Venezia TA if it cancels.

Paint! Bigger TV's, please! And update the cabins! Paint the balconies or do something so they don't look so dirty and in disrepair. The common areas didn't bother me, but some of the cabins are in rough shape. The shower in our Vista suite didn't work the entire time even after three visits by maintenance. We gave up after that. And my son's cabin next to our suite was in terrible shape.

That sounds cool! I am wondering how the spritz bar will work, though...

100 percent agree!

When I went on a Christmas cruise in December 2019, I said that I would absolutely NEVER do another Christmas cruise. I went back on my word and cruised right before Christmas last year and it was fun...BUT the boat was still sailing at partial capacity.

The one in Belfast, Northern Ireland was not tender and in one of the stops in the Orkney Islands (the islands far north of Scotland)...either the Isle of Lewis or Isle of Sky. I can't recall which one, though. One was a tender port and one had a dock. Edinburgh, Wales, Dublin, and the other port in the Orkney Islands were all tender. I think most of the ports in Iceland are tender as well. From what I heard from people on the ship, the Iceland cruise had even more problems with tender waits than our cruise. The med cruises apparently don't have this problem, though, as most of them are not tender ports. The problem was that ALL Carnival had to transport passengers from the ship to shore were a couple of the life boats off the ship that were not very big. And, in a couple of instances, it was a 20 minutes or so boat ride into the port. Plus, a lot of the passengers on the Europe cruises are older or mobility impaired and take a long time to load and unload...and they have to deal with their chairs, scooters, walkers, etc. Not bashing anyone for that because my mother is the same way, but just explaining that is why it sometimes takes awhile to load and unload the tenders.