zzdoug

It's 10 am somewhere.

I think most airlines open their schedules about 12 months out. One thing to keep in mind is that many services in Israel that are provided by agencies of the government pretty much shut down Friday evening to Saturday evening.

Haifa and Tel Aviv are different cities, about 1.5 hours from one another by train.

We are planning on going out to a Cuban or Argentine restaurant. Possibly Versailles or Molinas if Cuban.

That seems very risky. If you weren't in a taxi by around 8 am, there is a decent chance of missing the flight. If there are flights out of Long Beach, you could get there in time.

This is the winner. Or even outside the fridge if it doesn't fit. You can add ice or consume at room temperature. Or a water bottle with a filter. Like this one: Brita Insulated Filtered Water Bottle with Straw, Reusable, BPA Free Plastic, Blush, 26 Ounce https://a.co/d/7lNQLoD ETA: or maybe I'll just spend $175,000 in the casino so I don't have to worry about it.

We are on Southwest also, so it's first come, first served once we are onboard, and the race to check in at T minus 24 hours to get in line. Normally we would join this virtual rat race by setting an alarm to log in exactly 24 hours before departure, but we will be asea. However I think one of our Southwest credit cards gives us a few A-groups per year so this may be the time to use it. Southwest has no baggage fees, so that is a positive.

We used the NCL air promo for the return flight home, and used our own airline points for the flight to the cruise. The return flight is probably the same flight we would have chosen if we had booked ourselves, so we can't complain, although might not be the choice of others. It leaves at 7:30 pm out of fort Lauderdale which gives us about 8 hours to get to the airport from Miami. We live in Utah and the only nonstop flights to here from Miami or Fort Lauderdale leave at 7am, so we would need to change planes in any case. We will rent a car near the port and return it at the airport so we can visit a friend if he is in town or do something else. My wife lived in Fort Lauderdale before we were married so that gives us the opportunity to check out some of her old haunts that she hasn't been in many years. And maybe relax at the beach for a bit.

Earnings miss today! Stock price down $2 despite higher prices and lower service. Or for 100 shares, that's 2x the onboard credit. Oof! Norwegian Cruise's rocky forecast after revenue beat hits shares (yahoo.com)

I am all for lifetime learning, and cruising, but a cruise is not where I would look to learn a lot of new things. Similarly, if I wanted to try a new kind of food, I would not go to McDonald's. I usually want to enjoy a cruise to relax and do nothing. If I want something more stimulating, I might go somewhere and stay on land. Have you considered some other type of vacation such as a visit to a university town or place of historic significance? There are all kinds of other vacation opportunities for people interested in lectures and tours. Some cruises might have educational shore excursions in places like Chichen Itza, Florence, etc. but nothing like spending a week on land in those places. I had an aunt who used to enjoy Elderhostel trips. I don't know much about them, or if it still exists, but I think she enjoyed lectures every day. Also, no homework!

Let's not forget... it's called Freestyle cruising for a reason.

Interesting. Meanwhile,I don't understand why someone would want to ruin a perfectly good portion of foie by unceremoniously shoving a steak under it. Some things are best when they don't have to share the spotlight.

Actually those sound pretty good. Arm twisted.

I have never taken a cruise in Europe but in some European countries - Italy for example - it is not customary to tip in restaurants. Usually a service charge is added to the bill. In those places do tour guides expect to be tipped?

Many travel-oriented credit cards will not charge a foreign exchange or transaction fee to charge in another currency. If you do this, be sure to purchase in the local currency and not your own currency, if given the choice. My understanding is that the best exchange rate for get cash is to use your atm card at an atm machine at a bank when you are there. Certain bank accounts allow you to withdraw without atm fees. If it's permitted to say it here, I use a Chase Sapphire credit card and a Capital One 360 online bank account which respectively have these features.

In December, we booked a cabin on the Escape sailing the first week of May and there were many classes of cabins that allowed us to choose if we had booked online. However we booked through a travel agent and he suggested a cabin that we agreed to. So maybe it varies with availability?

Also plenty of complaining about the increases in service charges coupled with service curtailments on the Princess and Carnival boards, and also on another message board I follow focused on Las Vegas hotels and resorts. Inflation and higher labor costs affect just about every company in the hospitality/resort business.

Ew.

If you have travel insurance, maybe call the claims number and ask them what to do?

Canadians wear underpants?

This has been an epic report with meticulous documentation. Thanks so much for writing it all down and posting the dailies and menus and photos. It has been a big help for planning our own anniversary trip on Escape in 71 days, and more importantly, an inspirational diversion from the drudgery of work. And congratz on your anniversary! Very cool. Your images of the dailies were really clear and perfectly cropped. Did you bring a scanner or did you crop them?

Yes, back in the day. The cheap ones barely worked but that may be due in part to the fact that there were so many on the ship. Like I could understand if someone was calling me but I usually couldn't understand the details of what they were saying. Also if more recent ones transmit digitally they would probably be more reliable. Or if there is some kind of walkie talkie device that could send a text message.

Useful information! Thanks for posting. I'd like to try the old fashioned. eta: What are your thoughts on the entertainment and activities?

That seems like a great routing. What flights would you have preferred?

We got ours today also, but on Southwest and not a nonstop leaving 7:35pm from FLL. We will be with friends and we will rent a car near the port to do a little exploration of Miami and return it to FLL airport, so this works out pretty well. Our only snag is that our friends fly out of Miami so we will need to drop them off a little early. The only nonstops to SLC from either Miami or FLL are at 7 am so I can't really complain and in fact I'm pretty happy about it. I had feared much worse, like we might end up on Spirit etc with a 5 hour layover. We only used the promo for return flights home since we used points to fly to Florida. I hadn't received anything, but I called Norwegian to find out if my flights were booked yet and they confirmed and then sent me an email.