localady

Could I hazard to guess that the price discrepancy is because the vendors cost to HAL is different as they could be different vendors providing the tours ?? Other than that, it makes no sense.....

Thank you for sharing your adventures with us!

Appreciate the time and cost of your doing so.

Welcome home! :D

You seem to sometimes have the worst luck on HAL ships.

If anyone is going to get a HORRIBLE sandwich, it seems to be you. I'm

so sorry so many things don't go well.

 

We've been more fortunate. We've had a number of delicious club sandwiches and seems others here have as well.

 

I also like the Thai wrap sandwich. I've had that a few times. :o

 

I'm with you S7S, my luck with room service has been stellar, only a couple of problems in years of ordering room service in cabins ranging from an outside to a suite. I absolutely love the club sandwiches and thai wraps, always a nice option for a light dinner if you had a large meal while on land (as happened to us in Europe, we love eating a late lunch in port after touring). We have had great luck with breakfast orders also, only having them not arrive on time or incorrect a few times.

Another tip- I didn't know that you can order breakfast in the morning if you choose. We forgot to put our order out one evening, so I called. It arrived hot within 30-45 minutes, we were impressed!

As your epic voyage winds down I want to once again thank you so much for sharing your delightful commentary of the world cruise. Your wonderful attitude toward life shows through your writings and I looked forward to it daily. I don't expect that I will ever take the voyage, and I appreciate having you so graciously take us along. :D

Safe travels back to California, thanks again for sharing your amazing journey around the world with us. :D

(P.S. I already look forward to the 2015 world cruise, should you be inclined to share that with us also. :cool:)

I didn't post this Friday as Sails is intensely private and I didn't think it was right to bring it out in public until she was ready.

 

However, since it is out here, our deepest sympathy to Sails and her family.

I agree totally.

My sincere condolences, my heart is breaking for you Judy.

I am deeply saddened by your loss, you are in my prayers.

What wonderful cruise adventures for all, BON VOYAGE!!

RuthC- May you get double chocolates each and every night! ;):D

Thank you for your update! :D

Sorry to hear you will be missing some of the scheduled ports, but it seems a wise move on the Captain's part. The luncheon sounds like a hit, wish that they would offer something similar on all cruises during a day at sea. I do love the Pinnacle for lunch.

Continued safe seas and thanks again for your reports!

I would have said to drop the art auctions and the Mirabella shop. Never saw anyone buy anything there. I guess it's there for a big casino winner to hide their winnings. Now if they had a HAL store selling real memorabilia I might be interested. Like old tiles, posters, other things not available in the current gift shops.

I have to agree with you there. The older HAL posters are amazing, and would be something that even I would consider purchasing. :D

I would like to see HAL bring back higher quality shirts with the ships names. We used to be able to get PGA branded polo shirts which DH really loved, we still have one from the Oosterdam. But HAL discontinued those for a cheaper brand that wasn't something DH would wear and likely wouldn't last.

Looking forward to your reports from Africa!

Thank you so much for "taking us along"!

Continued safe travels! :D :D

Bon Voyage to all! :)

Happy Birthday to Tom, we wish we could be joining you and Lisa!

Bon Voyage to all!!

I am truly green with envy, I so miss PV and the "Mexico" run!!

Have a lovely time together, Bill and Virginia, and Ine and Ton! :D:D

Have a great cruise, sure wish we Yummers were joining you!! :D :D

It's disappointing to hear that your Caesar salads are not being served table side. :( Others have reported that the decision to eliminate table side prep had been reversed on some of the ships, and table side Caesars were again being offered at the Pinnacle. It is truly disappointing to hear that this is not the case on the WC.

I do hope that the Amsterdam also reverses course on the foolish decision to do away with my favorite offering in the Pinnacle soon!

Continued safe travels.......

The return of the wonderful table-side Caesar Salad would cause me to book a couple more Pinnacle dinners on our upcoming cruise. ;) :D It is my favorite thing about the Pinnacle!

The new "Caesar Salad" sounded dreadful as experienced by friends on recent cruises....... :eek:

Fingers crossed! :D:D

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I would suggest to you that 98%+ of the crew members are HORRIFIED (as much or more than we are) about what happened. They are hard working, honest people who work harder than most. I have the utmost respect for these folks and do not plan to change that opinion based upon one mentally unstable violent individual. No doubt the crew are all under even more scrutiny than ever before.

I too would have no fear ordering room service.

$2.49/minute. It will appear on your phone bill. Cellular at Sea charges for the satelitte time.

Actually when sailing portions of Inside Passage we were able to get Verizon service on our balcony while sailing as well as being able to connect in port. We were not charged for Cellular at Sea satellite time, we connected directly to a Verizon cell tower. Since it was in the US, there were no international or extra charges.

Hopefully this will save you some cost also. Have a great cruise.

Great reminder Copper!

Many cell phones and tablets have apps that are "flashlights". I have one loaded on my cell phone as well as my Kindle. Both were free apps.

How frightening it must be to hear the fire announcement for real. Especially to be awakened from slumber, when you might not really be sure of what you thought you heard.

 

I expect I would be half dressed for muster stations by the time the captain came back on with another announcement. That, and have my meds and jewelry tossed in a bag.

 

Glad the situation was taken care of so quickly and easily. Nice to know they are on top of such things.

In our situation, we were up and fully dressed with passports and meds in hand by the time the Capt. announced all was well but I had to gather everything together. It was chilling to hear the fire crews running down the hall responding to the initial call. Now I never unpack the bag that has my passport, meds and other small valuables. Each night they are ready to go just in case.

We were on one Holland America cruise and there were 2 of those the same night. One was a fire in the incinerator room. I thought there should be a fire in the incinerator room, however, probably this fire was wasn't actually in the incinerator.:p The other was a fire in a crew member's cabin (i.e. smoking and a fire in his cabin's wastebasket, etc.). Apparently HAL has a "zero tolerance" policy on this; the next night our dining room steward mentioned that the crew member was now unemployed and on his way home.

We must have been on the same cruise, though I can't recall which ship it was. I remember this incident vividly. The crew member had taken a break from his duties during dinner, had a smoke, and set his wastebasket afire with the butt after returning to service. And as I recall it was the second fire alarm that day, the other one had been in the incinerator late the night before.

Moments like you described with your outrigger friends is what makes travel so wonderful! :D Thank you for sharing.

I would definitely let shore excursions know of your displeasure with your tour. I would think they should address the disconnect between the excursion description and the reality. :rolleyes:

Continued safe seas.

Enjoy your sunny albeit cooler weather in Sydney.

Happy to report that the storm door has opened wide here in California and many parts have received 5+ inches in the last couple of days! We need the rain for sure, but not this quickly. ;)

Thanks for your delightful reports!

:( I am offended by any HAL employee who would say this.

I'm not sure there is a reason to be offended. The demographics for a cruise like a 15 day Hawaii cruise do tend to run on the older side. The employee was just stating a fact. The average age on our Hawaii run on the Oosterdam a couple of years ago was 76 years old. :eek:

I think it is totally appropriate that the HAL employee shared the normal demographics for the Hawaii-California run. It was shared with us by the hotel manager on our cruise as common knowledge.

A caesar salad has a strict defintion. Their cutesy version of a few pieces of romaine sounds awful. If they aren't serving a real caesar salad they should not be calling it that on the menu.

 

Of all of the changes, discontinuing the Caesar Salad prepared at the table is the worst....it was a primary reason I looked forward to the Pinnacle. The salad they now serve isn't even close to the real thing! :rolleyes:

Sounded like a marvelous, and very memorable, way to celebrate a birthday. :)

Happy Birthday to you!:D