Brentt_M

21 minutes ago, likeadisguise said:

The people on the collector are probably getting the OBC given to the people on just the canal transit criise plus the OBC being given to guests embarking for the 7 day voyage.

Makes sense as their cruise was impacted on both segments

3 minutes ago, Cyberhwk said:

 

Here too.  Probably based on cabin class would be my guess.

Not sure about that as I have a suite.

The email I received from HAL is only offering $250 obc.

I have the a lot of the same complaints about craps on HAL and that is my primary game too. I agree there are better options out there if that is your only focus, but I keep going back to HAL cause I find they onboard experience to align better with my personal preferences than some of the other lines.  I generally just switch to placing numbers vs come bets while on HAL and yes higher play definitely can attract a crowd watching the table. 

1 hour ago, IPB4IGO said:

OK, but he is embarking in San Diego on a 15-day cruise, followed by a Caribbean cruise. I don't understand how the 15-day repositioning cruise differs from the regular 14-day cruise. What am I missing?

Repositioning is just moving the ship from one area to the next. So in this case they are leaving from the summer Alaskan cruise season and repositioning for the winter season in the Caribbean. Otherwise not much else different than any other  panama canal cruise. They will be transitioning some of the stuff like menus and drinks from alsakan themed to Caribbean and that transition period can be interesting for some and can make the onboard experience slightly different than what you would get once the ship is full setup for their season wherever.

Hope the repositioning part goes well! We will be joining you in FLL.

Vig is paid up front.

I use the navigator app to make my reservations and to look at menus. I find it much easier than their terrible website. 

This is pretty much how Rolling Stones Rock Room ended each night on my last cruise...

21 minutes ago, MisterMatthew said:

Ok.

Im slightly confused.

 

Let me offer more clarity---if it helps.  Is it "reqd" if you want TO GO ASHORE at Victoria?  

 

--Matthew

No it is not. 

15 minutes ago, Gsel said:

It is my experience when sailing this itinerary a passport is necessary. Check with HAL!

My personal experience on 5 different occasions since 2017, including July of last year is that it is NOT. Several people in my party do not have passports 

17 minutes ago, cicadas said:

Yes, you will need a passport for your Canadian port, even if it is just on file with HAL for them to clear your going ashore.

 

I don't recall seeing much at the port, but then I live near Seattle and was just dropped off at embarkation time. 

This is not accurate. You do NOT need a passport at all for this closed loop cruise. Even to go ashore in Victoria.  However, while not required it's always recommended to have a passport.

2 hours ago, ChinaShrek said:

I am sailing solo on the Koningsdam on 12/22/22 out of San Diego. I received a free ocean view cabin but I hope to receive an upsell offer for an obstructed Verandah. (I did not upgrade my cabin at time of booking because they wanted over $800.) When do folks think I should call?

See you onboard! 

Just now, kochleffel said:

There is a long thread about $200 inside offers. It appears that you will only receive them if you have cruised on HAL before, but not recently, and don't have any future bookings.

 

Well the not recently isn't true, as she sailed July 16-23rd (1st cruise ever) and started get the offers almost immediately  afterwards. It is true she has nothing else booked currently 

10 minutes ago, kazu said:

 

They sure look like casino offers to me - even the phone # is for them 😉 

Her's says "Special" offer at the top and the Casino ones say "CASINO" offers at the top. Also the fine print at the bottom of each is slightly different. The casino ones reference casino offers numerous times. Her's never mentions casino anywhere.

1 hour ago, kazu said:

 

If your Mom played Bingo - that is now run by the Casino and counts towards the casino discount.

Her email offers look like this.. 

while casino offers normally look like this....

So I really don't think it is a casino related.

26 minutes ago, FlaMariner said:

 

Yep, no $200 rate for me either.....

 

....for me...a lowly 3 Star who does not frequent the casino, I can pay for an inside:

 

• $864 for the 4/22 7 day Europe and
• $999 for the 2/24 South America

 

You should grab all you can........meanwhile, back in the real world.......

I am not sure it's a Casino offer. My rates look very similar to yours and I frequent the casino a lot. However, I took my parents on their 1st ever cruise in July and when I log into my Mom's account and look at the same cruise the pricing matches the OPs. My mom did not spend a single cent in the casino. She has also been getting emails almost weekly from HAL offering free cruises for the last 6 or so weeks, and not just basic cruises, but some rather long ones over 30 days etc.. 

Couldn't sleep and decided I would log into my account and price that same cruise and I got some interesting pricing. 

Inside- unavailable 

Ocean view-$99pp

Verandah-$49pp

Insomnia has me about to book another cruise...

7 hours ago, cruisemom42 said:

 

The only content type I am interested in searching for is Topics. When I put in a search term "Rome restaurants" and select Topics as shown here:

 

 

 

This is what I see under options:  a very few forums are not grayed out. I know that there are many threads on the Italy Ports of Call forum on restaurants in Rome, yet that forum is not available to select. Nor are the specific cruise line forums. 

 

 

 

Did you expand those grayed out entries?  So you could select the specific forum(s) you wanted?

1 hour ago, cruisemom42 said:

One of the things that has frustrated me since CC's last major update is that Search appears very differently for me (using Chrome on a MacBook Pro).  I so far have not found any way to narrow search to a single forum. It is not an option on the drop-down. What I see is this:

 

 

Under the content type try selecting different options. As you do the page dynamically changes and gives you additional options.

Icy strait point was an ok stop last night.  I really did not take many pictures and the only thing we had planned was for my mom and daughter to ride the ZipRider.  

We has dinner from the MDR served in the suite and we're off the ship by 6:30. We walked over to the cannery and bought some souvenirs. My son also got a couple dozen mini donuts, butterscotch and raspberry I believe. He has been talking about those donuts since he found out we were visiting ISP again and he was a happy camper.  After the cannery we walked back toward the ship and got on the transporter to take us over to wilderness landing where my mom and daughter checked in to the ziprider. I decided not to spend the $50 to take the skyrider up the mountain with them since it was really cloudy/foggy. (I did find out the skyrider is free for crew and thought that was nice )

The ZipRider took forever! They were ticketed for 8:30pm and even though the actual ride down only takes about 75seconds they didn't get done until 9:27pm. All aboard was supposed to be 9:30pm, but there were at least 2 more groups from the Eurodam behind them. They said once they got to the top they said there were signs posted stating it could be 30-60mins after your ticketed time before your turn.

Outside of the wait they both very much enjoyed the zipline and would do it again. 

We got back to the ship right at 930 and the computer system went down for checking people in and we had to wait 5-7 mins for them to get it going again. The crew said it has been happening every night at 930 for the last week or so...

I went to the casino last night, but they did not open the craps table at all which made me very sad. I played a little bit of roulette and slots for a bit then called it a night.

My daughter tried to sit at billboard again last night but gave up pretty quickly. Her words were "it was like listening to bad karaoke."

Glacier bay cleared up a little bit for us.  It really is one of my happy places. I just love it.  We did get see a bunch of otters, birds, a seal, and a bear.

Last night for dinner 4 of us ate at Tamarind on a Casino comp and my stepdad and son went to the buffet for salmon night.

Tamarind is by far my favorite place to eat on the ship.  Service was so friendly and amazing and most of the food was excellent, but a couple of items were below normal.

We had some enjoyed a cold sake, our shrimp crackers and Jasmine tea along with the spring rolls, Thai beef salad, vegetarian ramen and potstickers for appetizers.  I also ordered a spicy tuna roll and spicy scallop roll.  All of that was amazing! Will definitely getting more sushi rolls throughout this cruise.

For our Entrées we had Dan Dan noodles, 2x Wasabi and soy crusted tenderloin, szechuan shrimp, and the wok seared lobster (I ordered the lobster and since it was a supplement item they said it was not included in my comp and encouraged me to order a 2nd entree that was included. That is why we ended up with 5 Entrées between 4 people.

The noodles and tenderloins were very very good. The ladies both agreed that the tenderloin was better than their Petite Filets from Pinnacle a couple nights ago and my daughter said she would be completely happy with the Dan Dan noodles for dinner every night for the rest of the trip.  However, both the shrimp and lobster were just so-so. Flavor was good, but it was as if both were prepared to early and sat in the back too long before being served and the tempura was extremely soggy/mushy which kinda turned me off from them.

For desserts we ordered one of each to share between us.  As much as I love the apps and Entrées here I really don't care for the dessert options.

My mom and daughter

spicy tuna roll

spicy scallop 

dan dan noodles

wok seared lobster 

tenderloin 

Szechuan shrimp 

mushroom side 

passion fruit cloud

manfo posset

Yuzu cheesecake 

Glacier Bay is a little foggy this morning...

Yesterday was our stop in Juneau and it was a long day, but an very good one. We had a private whale watching trip booked with Jayleen's Alaska and it was absolutely amazing!!  We got into Juneau and the ship was cleared about 12:15pm, 45 mins early.  This allowed us to visit a few of the shops before we were supposed to meet Luke from Jayleen's at 2:00pm.  Luke called my cellphone about 1:30 to let me know he was on his way and was about 15 mins out.  As soon as he arrived we loaded up and head toward the marina at Auke Bay.   Luke kept us entertained the whole drive. Once at the marina we were encouraged to use the facilities as the marine toilet on the ship was available it would be small and tight.

Our boat was a 21ft Hewes Craft named Island Girl. It is a newer ship to Jayleen's fleet and it was beautiful and pristine.

Once aboard we headed out to the Saginaw Channel and the whales immediately started putting on a show!

While we were in that area we saw 7 different whales including a mother with her calf and a male escort.  We saw a lot of tail, some waving at us, a full breach and 2 partial breaches (missed then with my camera, but got to see them with my eyes). The boat also seemed to be like a magnet and the whales kept popping up right next to it.

After spending quite a while in that area with out even having moving the boat and getting our fill of whale watching Luke ran us a bit farther north to see some stellar sea lions. They were being extremely lazy and napping on a navigational body.  After a few minutes there we headed a bit farther and tried to find some Orca, but had no luck. Luke said they usually only see orca on less than 10% of their runs.  After that we headed back to the Marina. Our excursion was scheduled for 3 hrs and we actually got about 3hrs15mins on the water plus the 15mins of drive time each way so around 4 hrs total time.  When I booked this last year it cost me $895 to reserve the entire boat for our group. I do think prices have went up a touch since then (like everything), but at my rate that was basically $150 per person and I consider that a bargain especially compared to the ship options.

I cannot give Jayleen's Alaska and Captain Luke enough praise. Highly recommend to anyone looking for a more intimate whale watching tour!

I have some other videos, but will probably try to upload those when I have a better wifi connection.