terry&mike

We recently went down this road for a trip we depart on next week. We'll spend some time in northern Vietnam, and then go to Cambodia, and join a river cruise that will later sail into Vietnam, which required a multi-entry Visa for Vietnam. Post-Covid, these are very difficult to acquire, but can be acquired for a very high cost. There are some threads over on the River Cruise boards. After researching, our solution was to apply to 2 different Single Entry e-Visas.

Personally, I would not risk this. In January 2020, I was with a group of 29 friends sailing the Diamond Princess from Singapore to Tokyo for 14 nights (the sailing before the sailing that got stuck in quarantine). We had all booked on a special with a drinks package included, with the exception of just a few of us. My friend J had been occasionally getting drinks for friend M who did not have the package. On night 3 several of us were in the disco, dancing and hanging out together. J had just returned to the area we were all sitting in and slid a drink over to M. Shortly after that, a supervisor came over and asked J and M if they could step away from the group. He took them to the side of the club and we could see them all talking. Looked like lots of apologies from J and M. They then all 3 walked over to the bar area and M completed a transaction. Then J and M came back to the group to say that they had gotten in trouble for violating the drink package rules, and M was made to pay for 6 drinks (2 drinks a day for the past 3 days) and both were given a warning. They felt embarrassed, and felt fortunate that the penalty wasn't higher. They did not violate the package again. The next afternoon, my friend V, who did not have the package (and was not at the club the night before with us) asked if I would get her a glass of bubbly from the bar. I declined and relayed the story from the night before. V then just purchased herself a glass of bubbly, and we had an enjoyable time.

When your TA made your booking with Cunard, they would have received a confirmation email with the attached documents of "Deposit Confirmation - Guest Copy" and "Deposit Confirmation - Agent Copy". Please ask them to forward to you the Guest Copy Confirmation that they received from Cunard. If the cruise is paid in full, they would also receive Guest and Agent copies of invoices showing you are fully paid.

This. Agree. And to the poster's earlier question of has anyone ever seen a breakdown of the FAS charges, you should have a very clear breakdown on your confirmation invoice that you receive from NCL via your travel agent.

DH and I sailed an Iceland and Greenland itinerary on Princess in August of this year, and we sailed a Norway Intensive itinerary on Hurtigruten before Covid. Of the two, we preferred Norway, as it had more charm. We rarely do excursions, preferring to get off the ship and take a long walk into/around town when it's a port that lends to this (Reykavik, Icelend), or take a scenic/nature hike (Qaquortoq, Greenland). In Akureyri, Iceland we did a private tour with GoHusky where we went hiking with Husky dogs that was a lot of fun. We also missed one port in Greenland due to the weather. In Norway, we did similar things of strolling through the charming little towns with a bit of shopping and stop for a snack, and nature hiking, depending on the port.

DH and I, along with a group of our friends, were on the Diamond Princess in January 2020. We sailed an amazing 2 week itinerary that started in Singapore and visited 3 ports in Vietnam, 2 days in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and several stops in Japan. It was such a fabulous trip. We also spent some time in Bali pre-cruise, as it's a short flight from Singapore. We debarked in Tokyo on January 20, 2020. The sailing after ours was due to sail the reverse itinerary from Tokyo to Singapore, but we all know how that played out, with the ship sitting in the Yokohama Harbor for several weeks in quarantine. We were all thankful we chose the earlier sailing, for sure. DH and I are excited to return to Asia in a couple of weeks for a 5 week trip. We'll go by land first to Thailand, a return visit to Vietnam to spend more time there (Vietnam was everyone's favorite from the cruise), and then sail a river cruise down the Mekong through Cambodia and more Vietnam. Our return flights from Ho Chi Minh City connect through Haneda in Tokyo, and when I first booked the plane tickets back in March 2022 there was a rule in place that we could not layover more than 12 hours in Tokyo and that we had to stay airside. This rule was lifted a couple months later, and now there are no restrictions on our connection through Tokyo. Wishing you all fabulous travels in Asia - enjoy!

I have an upcoming 2 night cruise in December that I organized myself, for my husband and I. It is on Orchid Cruises, and I booked it through halongbaytours.com which is Blue Dragon Travel based in Vietnam. I did not put together a group, but booked onto a sailing that will have other guests onboard. We are actually choosing to sail on Lan Ha Bay, which is next to HaLong Bay, just as scenic but less crowded with tour boats.

Someone pointed out that what I was given was a 10% Quarterly Azamara Circle member discount, not a Discoverer Platinum discount. I did not realize these were different things.

Ahhh, that's what it was, a 10% Quarterly Savings Discount for Azamara Circle members. I didn't realize the 2 were different.

On a booking made on Tuesday (while not onboard a ship), a 10% loyalty discount was applied to the booking.

I believe that Azamara has plans to upgrade it's internet systems onboard - Azamara Alert Due to technology upgrades, we expect Wi-Fi connectivity to be affected on a portion of three Azamara voyages: Azamara Pursuit- 11/19/22 Azamara Journey – 1/15/23 Azamara Quest – 2/19/23 Only these voyages will be affected. Wi-Fi will be available in The Den. For the inconvenience, every stateroom will receive a $300 Onboard Credit.

For travel agents, it is a bit easier as payments can be posted online rather than called in. Currently, it involves logging in through the CruisingPower site (Royal, Celebrity, Silversea, Azamara), then accessing the reservation and posting payment; Azamara is working on it's own site and will be moving away in the near future. There was some sort of glitch on the website on Thursday for most of the day in to late at night that gave an error message when trying to post a credit card payment, but it was resolved by early Friday morning. Other functions available for TA's through the site are making bookings, adding CruiseCare, checking air prices/routings, and so on. Whether you book direct or use a TA, that is a personal choice and everyone has their own preference, but it is certainly easier to send a quick email to your TA saying "please go ahead and post my final balance to the card you have on file", and then receive back a Booking Confirmation email showing you are paid in full, than to be on hold for several hours.

Thank you. We do use one credit card for the both of us. That would be great if it works out this way.

A further question in regards to purchasing the Experience More package when we board. We have a $1000 OBC from Azamara, it is applied on the booking as $500 OBC for myself, and $500 OBC for my husband. If the Experience More package costs $699, will they be able to take $500 OBC from one of us, and the other $199 OBC from the other of us? Or will one of us use our $500 OBC towards the package, and then need to pay the additional $199 fee with a credit card, leaving the second one of us with $500 OBC still intact?

Thank you!

In regards to the "Experience More on Short Voyages" plan, the cost is $699 usd, and it lists several items, the last being "Chef's Table or 3 Table Tour". As this does not specify that it is for 2 guests, am I correct that it is just for 1 person? For example, is it that we will receive 1 Chef's Table dinner credit, and then we would be buying the second Chef's Table dinner for $95? Thank you for the information in this post. As I have a $1000 OBC from Azamara it was helpful to learn that I need to wait until I board to be able to purchase the Experience More package, and then use it's benefits.

Agree. We did not take them up on the option to have backpacks mailed when they become available, as we have had them before and gave them away. While the Scenic ones are very nice backpacks, my husband prefers to travel with one he specifically chose for trips.

Follow up: in yesterday's mail, November 10, 2022, we received a Priority Mail envelope from Scenic that contained a small bound paperback book, titled "Vietnam, Cambodia & Laos Complimentary Guide". This looks to be a wonderful book filled with geography, history, cultural discussion, facts, travel tips, recommendations, maps, and so on. There is also a small section in the back on Thailand. There was also a letter enclosed welcoming us on our upcoming journey, and stating that usually backpacks would be a part of the welcome packet, but due to supply issues, they are currently out of stock. It gives the option for us to request backpacks be sent to us when they become available.

Thank you for taking the time to write a review of your trip. We will be joining the Scenic Spirit in late December for a similar journey, and are looking forward to it. This will be our second sailing with Scenic.

No. I filled out the claim and provided receipts and explanations for the expenses that occurred during the period of our travel delay. I left it to the insurer to decide what they would cover. For example, I did not know if they would cover the original hotel in NY that we didn’t stay at, or if they would prefer to cover the substitute hotel in DC we had to book when the flight cancelled. Didn’t matter to me; I provided all the information and let them make the call.

Yes, as I said, this was a resolution that was acceptable to us. We found the process relatively easy and the end result satisfactory.

As I know there has been some discussion on Scenic corporate not being efficient in some of the pre-cruise prep recently, I wanted to post our positive experience. We are sailing the Mekong on a program that has 3 nights in Siem Reap at the Raffles Hotel Siem Reap, and 7 nights Siem Reap to Ho Chi Minh City on the Scenic Spirit. The program starts on December 31, 2022. I contacted Scenic about 2 weeks ago to let them know that this is part of a longer Asia trip for us, and that we are departing the U.S. on December 8, and that we would like our final documents emailed early if possible. I am happy to report that we received our final travel documents with detailed information on meeting points, transfers, and various other details, via email yesterday, November 7, 2022, well ahead of our departure. This will be our second time sailing with Scenic, as we did the 11 day Beautiful Bordeaux sailing with them in October 2021 and had a fabulous time.

I received a resolution on my Chase Sapphire Reserve travel delay claim yesterday, so wanted to post a real time experience. We have carried Chase Sapphire Reserve cards for several years. We love the card and the many benefits that come with it such as Priority Pass Lounges, point accrual, the travel credit, and the insurance coverage (that we hoped never to need). We also buy the Geoblue Trekker Essential annual policy, that we carry for travel insurance coverage of major expenses, that we also hope to never use. On August 4 we had flight delays and cancellations that spilled over into August 5, in trying to get from IAD Dulles Washington to New York LGA. We were trying to board the QM2 for a transatlantic sailing from NY to Southampton UK, departing on the afternoon of August 5. By the time the August 4 flight was finally cancelled at 8:45pm, it was past the time to cancel our NY hotel room, so we lost money on that booking, and had to book a hotel near Dulles for the night. After our rescheduled flight on August 5 got cancelled that morning, we ended up renting a car on August 5 and driving the 5 hours from DC to NY to make the ship on time. United refunded our cancelled flights, and the rental car cost about the same amount, so no loss there. When I returned from our trip, I filed a claim with Chase Sapphire Reserve for trip delay, to see if they would cover anything. I filed the claim on August 30, 2022. There were 4 communications from them requesting additional documents, some of which I provided more than once. On November 7, 2022, I received an email saying that my claim had been resolved, and they were covering the cost of the hotel night in New York that was not refunded. Although I had filed for more (rental car, hotel near Dulles), this resolution is an acceptable one to us, as truly that is all the money we are really out for this delay. So, from filing to resolution, about 10 weeks.

The knives with the bee on the edge are Laguiole, they are a well known and loved knife company from France. DH and I bought a set in the Burgundy region of France more than 20 years ago and still use them.

This strikes me as an excellent time to use Apple Air Tags inside your luggage. That way you can follow your bags along as they travel to meet you.