Tom O.

19 hours ago, Crew News said:

 

I measured the temps in the minibar with an infrared thermometer:  43 degress at the back and 46 degrees in the door.  Not as cold as a refrigerator but good enough for a few days for meats/cheese. 

Thanks for that info! But I suspect that the temps vary from fridge to fridge. Those hotel type refrigerators are made very cheaply - probably cost less than $100.

19 hours ago, crystalspin said:

Nice to see you Tom! Someone recently linked to a cruisedeckplans (I think?) page with your covered balcony data shown as a color key, so I was just thinking, "I haven't seen Tom O around!" 

 

 

Nice hearing from you too. I am doing an Alaska Land/Sea tour in  late August. I have never done a Land/Sea tour before. They were always too pricey for us, but now in our retirement we seem to be better off than ever before. I guess that is because our children are no longer dependent.

I believe I am the person you are thinking of. I used to have a website, that helped people with issues of privacy on balconies on Princess ships. The free service that provided me with access to a free website discontinued that service, so I had to abandon it. I still have the info stored on my computer. 

Yes, I am a librarian, now retired.

I used to do a lot of posting here, but haven't done so lately.

I used to cruise exclusively on Princess, but now cruise on HAL. Princess ships were getting too large for me. I prefer the size of HAL Vista Class ships.

12 minutes ago, bowsprit said:

To set the record straight.

"My favorite beer is Guinness"

 

Guinness is not beer, it is STOUT :)

From Wikipedia, "Stout is a dark beer. "

8 hours ago, GCHAN said:

Thanks. I am same as you and assess whether the private tour is worthwhile/safe etc. 

 

In this case the only excursions I was seeing on my cruise on the HAL site were the private tours for $1300 a person so I thought I might have been missing something. I thought there was a range of tours for each port but in this case there is only one tour for each port and they are all the private tours.

 

I will keep an eye on it to see if more excursions are released.

More excursions will appear on the website as you get closer to the sailing date. There will probably be many that cost much less. I have never been on any cruise that didn't have some cheap bus tour type excursions available and many other excursions that were priced in between.

It takes a while for HAL to make their contracts with the tour companies who actually take you on the excursions.

The HAL website is terrible, but I would not switch cruise lines, just because of a poor web site. In my view, a website has little to do with cruising. The experience on board is what makes a cruise line. Sure it would be nice to have a decent website too. But their website is of little importance once you are on board.

People did cruise before there was an internet.

This is what HAL needs to do. Hire some one who has never seen their web site. Then ask them to navigate around in it. HAL will then see exactly how disorganized and difficult it is to use. I suspect they are having the same people who designed the website to evaluate it. Someone at HAL needs to get some fresh eyes on it.

The old website was not perfect, but it was far superior to the new one.

Items that I have had problems with:

Trying to find where I could pre-order beverages to be delivered to cabin. I had to ask here at Cruise Critic where to find this.

I recently wanted to check the latest price for the Pinnacle Grill - I could not find it anywhere. Again, i used Cruise Critic to get this info.

There doesn't seem to be any logic over which tab a subject can be found. After using the website for many hours, I got better at finding things, but you shouldn't need to practice for hours to use their website.

10 minutes ago, SFO PETER said:

 

I have had SPG for years and never get this offer.   I even called Amex a couple months ago and they said if it is not there you ain't got it.  Still love the card because stay in Luxury Hotels using points!

 

Peter

It looked like I didn't have the offer available either, it was not listed anywhere on the website. But when I used the link that someone posted here I was able to add it to my card. This is the link that I copied here:

http://americanexpress.com/wlcl

11 hours ago, utahtea said:

 

I see you have already booked your tickets.  Did you check the price of New Zealand Air?  We did the reverse cruise in 2016 and the priced for Premium Economy seats on New Zealand Air was half of what Holland America was offering.  That said, we are flying home from Copenhagen in May 2019 after a cruise and Holland America Flight Ease was half the price of what I could find on my own.

 

Utahtea

This was our experience too. The last time I checked cruise line air line prices, I discovered I could book flights myself for half the price. That was 2015. But this year when I booked I found Flight Ease to be about 20% cheaper than anything I could book myself or through any online agency.

The only airline that flies to my hometown is Delta, so I don't have much flexibility when booking, but I was happy to see that every flight I had found on the Delta website was also on Flight ease.

I have never wanted to bring a flat of water onto a ship, so I don't have an answer for you, but I would trust Krazy Kruzers knowledge over others.

I have seen flats of drinks taken by the porters, but that was some time ago. Things change.

31 minutes ago, frankc98376 said:

 

We always do the Sel de Mer night and have enjoyed it very much.  Previously the special night was Le Cirque Restaurant.  I believe Le Cirque may have gone under- I heard that their main restaurant in NY closed.

That is right, I couldn't remember the Le Cirque's name.

I will avoid the Sel de Mer as I did the Le Cirque. The reason being, it is just too expensive for me. I always figure that not only am I paying $49 pp, but I am also giving up an included dinner in the main dining room. I figure the main dining room dinner to be worth approximately $40. That would make the Sel de Mer actual cost to be around $100 per person. I know a lot of people don't hesitate spending that much for a dinner, but I do. I will do the PG once or twice per cruise, but that is my limit.

I know that part of the pleasure of eating in the PG is having a real table to yourself. I don't really care for making small talk with strangers in the main dining room. But I have solved that issue by having all of our other dinners brought to our room. We just pick items from the main dinning room menu, and have room service deliver them for free. I just have to give the delivery person a decent tip.  

13 hours ago, frankc98376 said:

We eat dinner exclusively at the PG.  Have never had a night when it was closed.

 

Usually special events in PG are daytime events.

This is what I understand, someone please correct me if I am wrong:

On some ships, there are nights when the PG is converted into another restaurant. I don't remember the name of the French restaurant, but it used to appear once or twice on a cruise. I think the French Restaurant is now gone. But mow there is a seafood restaurant that appears on some cruises. On these nights, depending on the ship, the PG is not available.

So you are right, the restaurant is not closed, but the PG menu (and prices) will not be available.

While making reservations for the PG online, the nights that PG is converted to another restaurant will appear as not available.

I guess as Kazu and Krazy Kruisers say, it can be variable. I know that one issue is that some nights the Pinnacle Grill is closed, because they may have something going on that night. I will just have to wait. I don't think it will be a problem for me, we like to eat early. On my last cruise we ate in the PG twice (both early times), and there were many empty tables on both occations.

I believe your partner would get the credit too, as long as his card is his own and you are not on that account.

I also believe that the charge has to be a single $500 charge. Be sure to add the offer to your card(s) before making that $500 charge. There are various things you can purchase to total $500. Just be sure to add them to your online cart and pay for them as a single charge. You can purchase excursions, beverage packages, premium dinners, on-board credit, etc. It is pretty easy to find things to spend $500 on.

I had a problem when I tried to use the charge I made on the cruise deposit to satisfy the offer. This was a glitch caused by HAL, and may not happen to you.

Like Kazu said, it could be that they were guarantees.

When you go online and pretend to book so you can see what cabins are available, Cabins that are not assigned to guarantees yet look like they are unsold.

For example, it could have been that 7 sets of passengers had purchased  guarantees, and there was still one suite that hadn't been sold yet. If you were looking at these suites at that time while you were doing an incomplete booking, it would look like there were eight available, when actually only one was available. If you had booked it at that time, you could choose any of these 8 suites. But as soon as you did, they would all disappear because the other 7 would have to go to the 7 sets of passengers that booked guarantees.

So if this is the case, since you last looked, the last remaining suite was sold.

The same thing happens when looking at airline seating. I often look at the "change seats" option just before I fly. Sometimes it looks like there are lots of seats left. But, actually it is sold out. What looks like empty seats are actually held by people who have purchased tickets without the option to choose their own seats.

Thanks everybody. I will just have to keep my eyes open and check the website often.

I think I asked this same question before my last HAL cruise, but I have searched the HAL board, and can't find the answer anywhere. I have found the search function on this new version of the CC website to be inferior to the old advanced search on the old site.

At any rate I have an Alaska cruise booked for late August, and it is too soon to book specialty dining on the HAL web site. Any idea when I will be able to do so?

6 minutes ago, boulders said:

I've never found lower prices with a TA, including a big box TA. I sometimes get "private fares"  on the HAL website which are very good deals. On my last HAL cruise, I let my PCC know that I was looking for an upsell and was able to upgrade to a Neptune suite for about 1/5 the going rate a couple of weeks out. Count me as a HAL PCC loyalist. 

I just booked an Alaska land /sea tour. The best price I could get direct form HAL was $3089. I booked it with a TA for $2813. Same room, same packages. When you book with a TA you get all the freebies and specials that you get by going directly with HAL.

But you have to check around, I have found that small independent TAs, that specialize in cruises, have better deals than big box agencies.

I have never been in a suite, we are perfectly happy as long as we have a veranda. But we are very fussy about location. Our favorite location is on the very back of the ship (aft facing verandah). There are a lot of suites back there too.

The aft facing cabins are not for everybody, but we love them. Most of these cabins have larger verandas than the ones on the sides. And if you are doing some scenic cruising you can see scenery that passes on both starboard and port sides. Also there is less wind while under way.

Some people complain about the noise of the wake. But we find it soothing, reminds me of a mountain cabin we rented once near a rapidly running creek.

On 12/7/2018 at 9:21 AM, Tom O. said:

After waiting several days the $100 never showed up on my AMEX account, so I started a chat session with AMEX.

So, AMEX is going to contact HAL and try to solve this problem for me, because this was indeed a payment for a new booking. 

If AMEX can't resolve the problem, than I will see what my TA can do.

Update: After not hearing from Amex, I called them and I found out what the problem is. Apparently HAL has more than one Amex merchant number. The charge for our cruise deposit was on a merchant number that was not registered with Amex as qualifying for this offer - this was an oversight on HALs part.

I called HAL, and nobody there knew how to resolve this. Amex and my TA didn't have a solution either.

I also made some purchases online for excursions. Amex told me that the charges for the shore excursions were on a merchant number that qualified for this offer. But, since I purchased them on separate days, each purchase was less than $500, and therefore didn't qualify.

So, here is what I did. I cancelled my shore excursions, and as soon as they disappeared from my itinerary, I booked them again. I added them to my shopping cart, made sure they totaled $500 or more, and charged them to my Amex card. 

And success! I immediately received an email saying that I had taken advantage of the offer.

None of this should of been necessary, but it was the easiest solution I could come up with. A $100 credit is worth the trouble.  I could have added other items to my cart to equal $500 if I had to, but our excursions were enough to reach that goal.

Thank you to the OP and others who posted. I would not have known about this offer if i had not seen it here.

You will find that many TAs have lower prices than buying directly from HAL.

And if you think the people who work for HAL know their ships better than a TA, you are mistaken. If you choose a TA that specializes in cruises, they usually have a wide experience in cruising, much more experience than HAL's employees.

1 minute ago, richwmn said:

This only works if your booking is held by HAL, not a Travel Agency. If your booking is held by a TA, this option does not appear and you will have to check with your TA to get your OBC listing.

Thanks, I was thinking that also, because I did not have a choice of Manage Payments.

It's OK, I will just do as POA1 suggests and print out my confirmation from my TA.

1 hour ago, POA1 said:

If you booked through a travel agency, your TA will be able to provide a copy with your perks. They will don't show up on the website. 

44 minutes ago, kazu said:

If you booked with HAL or a PCC, go to make a payment on the website and you will see the shipboard credit listed.

 

However that shouldn't be necessary.  You should have gotten a confirmation when you booked by email either from HAL or your TA (whichever applies and lists the OBC and amenities.  The gift card will probably show on page 2 of the confirmation.

 

You may need to call HAL/PCC/TA to get the particulars on the gift card.  

1 hour ago, Krazy Kruizers said:

I have never seen our shipboard credit listed on HAL's site.  Our TA makes a list of all the different places that we are getting credit from and gives it to us.

 

Gift cards -- I have only heard about them being used on the ship.

I used to cruise on Princess exclusively, and I could look up my account on their website and see my ship board credit. So I was thinking I had that option on the HAL website as well.

I booked through a TA and she did send me a confirmation email that listed the credit and the gift card. I guess this gift card for the land portion of my tour is something new.

Thanks to all who replied.

I am having yet another problem with the HAL website, since I got interested cruising again.

The land/sea cruise I just booked includes $200 ship board credit and a $200 gift card for Denali.

I can find nowhere on the website where it will tell me how much ship board credit I have.

And I can find no reference to our gift card either. I would just like see in writing that I am getting these things.

Since we are doing the land tour to Denali before our cruise, I don't know when they will give us the gift card.

I also don't know where I can use the card. I am hoping we can use the gift card for our meals in Denali, I don't want to have to buy a bunch of cheap souvenirs with it. I don't need a stuffed moose.

59 minutes ago, DoggyDaddy said:

Interesting that Heineken (a premium beer) is cheaper than a Miller Light. Could it be that the Heineken is considered a “local beer” (brewed in Holland) while the Miller Light is considered an import?  🙂  😄

 

DD

Yes I found that interesting too. I don't drink a lot of beer, but when I do, I prefer a beer with a lot of flavor. I won't touch lite beer. I would pay extra for Heineken over Miller. My favorite beer is Guinness, but I will only drink it if it is on tap.I have never seen Guinness on tap on any ship.