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CruzinfromFL

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Posts posted by CruzinfromFL

  1. We are doing the Seattle R/T Alaska cruise in July. We are flying out the same day the cruise ends, my sister's flight leaves Seattle at 11:30 and mine is at 1:45. Our TA said 11:30 is plenty of time to get to the airport on our own.

     

    I'm wondering is it better to use the Princess transfer to the airport, or take an Uber (if we Uber we would carry off our own luggage)?

     

    Anyone have any experience with one vs the other in Seattle?

    Thanks!

  2. 18 minutes ago, Nola26 said:

    I am a big fan of NCL, I hope you have a good experience. My advice would be not to sweat the small stuff and go with the flow. Our Nassau change was annouced onboard, no way I would have let that ruin my vacation. A bad server, but good company didn't ruin our meal, just added some funny eyerolls and head nods are the table.

     

    Thanks for the advice. That's how we feel too, we are on vacation, small stuff doesn't matter. And we have joked about missing GSC because of the weather, since this has happened to us twice on Royal Caribbean cruises, we missed Coco Cay due to weather (before the built the pier). But I was glad to see NCL stopped at Nassau instead, and we've said the next time we got to Nassau we would do the Atlantis tour 😊

  3. My husband and I are planning on upgrading to the PPBP on our cruise in March for a few reasons:

     

    1. We like to order bottles of water when we order drinks and while we could bring a case of water onboard we don't want to carry around multiple bottles or run back to our cabin all day
    2. They have my favorite wine as 1 of the available wines with PPBP so I foresee us getting multiple bottles
    3. My husband likes high end whiskeys and I like some of the rums included
    4. I like specialty coffees
    5. We like having the peace of mind knowing we can drink freely (alcohol and non-alcohol) while on vacation and not have to worry about a large bill at the end of the cruise
  4. We are booked in a veranda cabin for our Alaska Cruisetour in May 2020. If I can get a deal on an AQ cabin we'd love to upgrade, so when I got the email from Celebrity about this latest sale I did an AQ mock booking and it came out about $200 less with 3 perks than what we are paying now which includes 2 perks. I took a screenshot and sent it off to my TA. She couldn't find the same deal so after a lengthy conversation with Celebrity she was also told it was a mistake and that it would cost us $500 more to upgrade to AQ and get the 3rd perk.

     

    But, we could keep our existing veranda cabin, pay $43 more (total, not per person) and get the 3rd perk. Since the 3rd perk we wanted was the prepaid gratuities ($210 for our cruise), I took it. Now we have the classic drink package, $300 OBC and prepaid gratuities.

    • Like 1
  5. 46 minutes ago, What A Market said:

    Follow up testing in July, and for the first time in just over ten years her blood work comes back ALL CLEAR.  We’re all still in shock.  For ten years I’ve been traveling with Shannon. Enjoying life. Savoring every moment of these shared experiences.  Many of them cruising.  So I booked this cruise to celebrate. Every other trip was to celebrate recovering from some shitty, life sucking treatment.  Needless to say, this one is a bit more special.

     

    Gottes Liebe

    2C7BE5C6-18F2-43FF-B986-59B59E316E91.jpeg

     

    LOVE this picture and LOVE the reason for this celebration cruise. Thank you for sharing the story with us, and I hope for a lifetime of All Clear for Shannon. 

  6. I will start by saying we haven't taken our Alaska cruisetour yet, we are going next May. But having a great travel agent is what helped us choose ship & itinerary.

     

    We knew we wanted a cruisetour, because for our first trip we didn't want to have to do all the planning and liked the idea of seeing different parts of Alaska without us (meaning me) doing all the research and planning.

     

    We actually had a cruisetour booked with a travel agent we used in the past, but we weren't really happy with her in general, and she just booked us based on what we thought we wanted, but she never gave us any guidance. It was REALLY expensive, and I just wasn't feeling like it was the best option for us.

     

    So we went to another travel agent who a friend had recommended, and she spent a lot of time on the phone with me talking about what my DH and I like to do, what was really important to us in Alaska, and the kind of vacations we like. I told what we were booked for already and she said it probably wouldn't be the best for us and she made a couple of recommendations. With several phone calls, lots of emails and some guidance from the new TA we are now booked on a less expensive trip that I think we are going to love every minute of.

     

    Good luck!

  7. I am really looking forward to the rest of your review. DH and I are going on our first Alaska cruise next May, we are doing a land tour first and the cruising from Seward to Vancouver on the Millennium, so I"m soaking up all the Alaska info I can find 😊

     

    I'm glad you showed your shoes, I'm already stressing about what shoes to pack and trying not to over pack the shoes I'll need for two weeks LOL!

     

    Nothing wrong with going to a naturalist talk with an adult coffee, my DH and I know we are really on a cruise when we go to what we call "buzzed (sometimes drunken) muster" 🍹

     

    Hope your honeymoon trip is fabulous!

  8. Thanks all! 

     

    I have booked the Anchorage Marriott for our pre-tour stay, but of course I can always change that if the hotel changes.

     

    For the distilled water, since we will be there early we'll find somewhere to buy a gallon when we arrive. Once we meet our tour director, if they can't help us with distilled water at each hotel, we'll make sure we drink a couple of 1L bottles of water before the tour starts and then just use those to keep the distilled water from the gallon we buy when we first arrive. I'll also probably bring some plastic wrap just to ensure the water bottles stay closed while in our luggage on the bus/train.

  9. We are doing an cruisetour next May/June and from all I've seen here we will plan to dress in layers. But my main concern was getting good rain jackets (yes, I still have 10 months and 5 day, but I like to be prepared LOL). Today at Gander Outdoors both my husband and I found our rain jackets. He got a Columbia for $70 and I got a Huk for $83, both on sale. If anyone is looking for rain jackets, go to Gander.

     

    And now I'm ready to go to Alaska! And since we live in FL, these will definitely be put to use during the summer here too 😀

  10. 9 hours ago, ErLee said:

    This is one reason I want to write this review. There were a few great reviews of the Connoisseur tours, but not many and not super recent. The overwhelming majority of regular posters on this board talk about how doing land DIY is better. I just want to offer a different perspective and report back whether it was great or whether it was not!

     

    Thanks for doing this. We are doing a cruisetour on Celebrity next year and lime you said most people here recommend DYI, so I appreciate any cruisetour info I can get.

  11. We are also doing a cruisetour and the only way I have figured out how to see details of the land portion is to bring up the specific cruisetour as if I was going to book it. My online reservations don't show anything, and the info I have from my TA only show where we will be each day, but doesn't give details about what we are doing or timing.

  12. We are doing southbound with the land tour first. This was recommended to us by a couple of people because on the land portion you are changing hotels every night (at least when done through the cruiseline) so its nice to have the unpacking/repacking at the start of the trip, and then when you are tired from the land touring you board the ship and can just relax and not have to keep moving rooms.

  13. I asked this on the Celebrity forum, but didn't get any responses so thought I'd try here.

     

    DH and I are going on an Alaska cruisetour in May 2020 and I have some questions that I haven't seen addressed in any of the cruisetour reviews I've read.

     

    1. Does anyone know approximately how many people are typically on the land portion of the cruisetour?

     

    2. My husband uses a CPAP machine, I know on the ship they will provide us with the distilled water, but what about in the hotels on land?

     

    3. We are planning on arriving 1-2 days early and would like to stay in the same hotel that we are in the first night of the land tour (we are on land first, then cruising). As of now the information we have says we are staying at the Anchorage Marriott, however I know that could change. Does anyone know when the hotels are finalized?

     

    I know I have plenty of time to get this all figured out, but I'm a planner and like to have as much info as I can get as early as possible 😊

  14. DH and I are going on an Alaska cruisetour in May 2020 and I have some questions that I haven't seen addressed in any of the cruisetour reviews I've read.

     

    1. Does anyone know approximately how many people are typically on the land portion of the cruisetour?

     

    2. My husband uses a CPAP machine, I know on the ship they will provide us with the distilled water, but what about in the hotels on land?

     

    3. We are planning on arriving 1-2 days early and would like to stay in the same hotel that we are in the first night of the land tour (we are on land first, then cruising). As of now the information we have says we are staying at the Anchorage Marriott, however I know that could change. Does anyone know when the hotels are finalized?

     

    I know I have plenty of time to get this all figured out, but I'm a planner and like to have as much info as early as possible 😊

  15. We are doing the 3B cruisetour next year (May 2020) on the Millennium. I would love to hear about your trip and any tips you learn. On the Alaska board I have seen advice to upgrade the Denali tour, and would also like to know if we can do that ahead of time. If you don't want to do a review on here, I would be happy to send you my email.

  16. We are taking our cruise May 2020 so I'm still in the planning phase for excursions. I'm leaning towards a company called ShoreTrips, which was recommended to me. They have several tours that don't include flying. My husband and I definitely want to see Totem Poles and learn about the culture and history, so we are leaning towards one of those tours.

  17. We worked with a travel agent to decide which Alaska cruise to book. We have only sailed on Royal Caribbean to this point, but for Alaska next year (May 2020) we are sailing on Celebrity Millennium, and our itinerary includes the ports you listed as well as Skagway. We are also doing a land tour before the cruise where we'll be in Anchorage, Denali, Alyeska and Seward. Our cruise is southbound, Seward to Vancouver.

     

    This is also our first trip to Alaska so we were open to seeing pretty much anything, as long as we get to do some whale excursions and got to see Denali. Our travel agent helped up pick the Celebrity trip because we don't have children and we like a more relaxed atmosphere. The TA advised us that Celebrity tends to be geared more towards adults and is more relaxed without all the water slides, surf riders, rock climbing walls, etc. Plus we are in our early 50s, the target demographic for Celebrity.

     

    I've always been happy with Royal Caribbean, but since this cruise is so port intensive I'm looking forward to a more relaxed atmosphere on board.

     

    Good luck, I'm sure whichever you choose you will have an amazing time!

  18. 9 hours ago, mosleyman said:

    We are going in August 2019 and are very excited to go.  I will tell you that I kept checking the prices by doing a "fake" booking on line.  No price reduction showed up.  Additionally, there were no cabins showing up as available for the deck that we choose.  On the off chance I called celebrity and asked them if there was a price reduction.  To my surprise, there was ($180) even though the "fake" booking showed no availability.  I then called every single day until final payment.   In addition to the original $180 I received another price drop of $280.00.  All this to say call them and see if there are any price drops.

     

    Did you book directly with X or through a TA? It is my understanding that if you booked through a TA then you have to work through them to get any discounts. I'm fairly new to cruising and have my first X cruise booked for May 2020 so I'm not totally sure how everything works (but I'm learning a lot from this board).

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