FlaMariner

Not seeing anything worthy of a "Black Friday" deal w/our big online TA site on the HAL cruises we are tracking for 2025. Also, our booked HAL cruises (before final payment) in 2024 are all priced higher. I will keep checking next week.

And you have it again... If any questions, I'd contact my TA before boarding and then once onboard, check your keycard for the table number and sitting.....We like to scope out our table after we board so that we can just go to it once it's dinner time. Enjoy the journey......

Yep. LOL. But lately, the Harvard folks have been a little more quiet....Seems like we are learning they may not be the brightest bulbs after all. And it has been exposed. LOL.

I'm counting on my Bank of America Premium Rewards card travel insurance that is included with my card and includes cancel insurance.......so not lost expense there. I appreciate you bringing this topic up...good points....I use it to check my plans to make sure I'm still "keeping it between the buoys" as Alan Jackson and the late great Mr Buffett sang.

Agree....high school drama continues......

I'd like two of those....Agree.....Yummy.

Good point but if I cancel because of a covered reason (health, family health, hurricane hits house, jury duty, etc) I've got insurance for that. So far, we have never cancelled just because we wanted to do something else. As long as I book a cruise I plan to take, I should be good....And if I did "change my mind" (which would be hard to imagine), my walk away from using a FCD is only $100 per person....(not outrageous). What am I missing? I actually always thought deposits were non-refundable anyway.

Looks delicious. Thanks for sharing.....

We've received the shareholder OBC and the Welcome Back OBC together w/no problem....as recently as this year. (We worked for private companies and not the government so we do not qualify for the additional government employee benefit of OBC (teachers/firefighters/military/ambulance drivers etc).....and we are not members of AARP so no experience there either)

We did, sort of..... During Black Friday last year we were able to "refare" our October 2023 cruise to include a slightly lower fare and added "included gratuities".....Our OBC from the original booking somehow remained. We have our pencils sharpened and remain hopeful....and if not, wave season will follow shortly.

FYI I got the email with the "welcome home" promo today 11/13/23. About a month since we dis-embarked on 10/15/23. The offer is good until 1/9/24....that's just under 90 days since we cruised.

Yahoo! And can't I jump in the hydro pool for free on one day w/when I have 5 stars on my belly?

Proud card carrying member of said club also....and we think we "won the lottery" when we got our 4th star on our belly......FREE LAUNDRY and HALF OFF WINE rocks! (If I could turn my medals and pins in for $2 in OBC I would)

Agree w/above, you need to ask your TA. We use a big internet online only TA and I wanted to stall on a final payment by one week (to hit the next month's credit card statement) and the TA allowed because (I learned) the TA final payment deadline was actually a week prior to HAL's "drop dead" deadline. Ask.

Yes, We dis-embarked from the Westerdam 10/15/23 and the email survey was received 10/17/23.

I always compare the HAL (online) prices to the big internet TA and the big internet TA always has had the lowest fare and does offer OBC and the "free gratuities" if available (Sometimes, the big internet TA will have an even lower price than what is listed online once I ask for a quote....for instance, their online balcony price is for a VH guarantee but if I ask for a quote for a VF specific cabin, the price is sometimes the same....not sure if this is the case with HAL as I only use their online price). Also, prices that include HIA are available on the big internet TA (but never buy that so clueless on the price comparison w/HIA). When comparing prices, I credit back OBC or other perks to equally compare the different prices. Then, the lowest "cruise fare" wins and for me, it has always been the big internet TA. YMMV.....enjoy shopping for cruises.

and there is a library onboard w/lots of good books

3pm on Sea Days.....

There was a cooking demo on our March 2023 Oosterdam cruise.

Sharpening my pencil......hoping for the best.

I would wait..... I'm tracking two cruises and in the past, I've found Black Friday and February/March of 'wave season' to be lower cost times to book....but of course, past performance does not guarantee future performance. When I compare costs, I stick to a per day cruise fare......and do not consider HIA.....so if HAL/TA is offering OBC or free gratuities, I subtract the $$$ value of those items to find my "cost per day" for comparison. You could do the same with other perks so you can compare apples to apples. Good luck.

We were on the Chile to FLL cruise this past March. Fantastic cruise. I'd recommend pre-cruise to Machu Picchu. Our original plans were to fly to Lima and do Machu Picchu (4 days, DIY) and then fly to Santiago and begin the cruise (Latam had a nonstop flight from Cuzco to Santiago).....but....civil unrest in Peru axed that plan....IMO, not enough time in Lima to go to/from MP and there is so much to see in Lima that you would be missing out. Our plans now are to one day just fly to Peru and tour MP. Some folks took the HAL tour to MP during the cruise but very $$$$ and very rushed from what I read and heard.

Nothing standard about the MDR menu....Changes nightly. But.....there will be "dressy" nights in the MDR (3x on our recent 13 night cruise) and the menu is kicked up a notch.....That's when they serve filet, escargot, etc. So on those nights, we would not book a specialty restaurant.

When we used tri-rail last year, there was a free shuttle to/from the FLL airport to/from the Dania Beach tri-rail station. The Dania Beach/FLL tri-rail station is (obviously) very close to FLL. Easy peezy. No problem for us with luggage.

Thanks for passing along the codes...... I think anytime I book a cruise I'll just pass that along to the TA and see what happens.