texasparalegal

Hope that we hear from people who arrived a bit later, like 11:30 or 12:00 and how long it took them to get into the terminal. My mom will need a wheelchair to board since the gangway goes back and forth, and standing outside in a line for an hour is not something she can comfortably do.

I had heard that at first the difficulty might have been because there were fraudulent passports being used and they had actual live customs individuals there and not the facial recognition being used.  Now that they are a few weeks into cruising, I'm hoping they are going to start using the facial recognition and things will be smoother but I'm hoping someone on this week's cruise will post a report.

Hope that you have a great time. I'm on Regal in January, my first time on Princess, it's been years for my mom. I'm hoping that you'll post the MDR menus if possible. Trying to decide what nights to hit the MDR, which to try for specialty and which to do the casual and buffet. I'd rather go for the menus that appeal to us the most so if you have that on your list to post, I'd really appreciate it.  Fair winds and following seas!

1 hour ago, cruisemom42 said:

 

The hotel is located very centrally, it would be considered to be located in the Acropolis (Akropoli) area; it is about half a block from the Akropoli metro stop, a block or two from the Acropolis Museum (and across from the museum is one of the entrances to the Acropolis itself). It is also very close to the Plaka.  The hotel should be eligible for the fixed rate taxi.  Just be sure your friend mentions it to the driver upfront. (And note that a premium is charged for very late or very early arrivals).

 

I have arranged at least twice with the hotel desk for a taxi, either to the airport or to the port; they are happy to oblige and IMO you are less likely to get a driver who tries to cheat you on the meter, as they have a preferential relationship with the hotel.

 

THANK YOU SO MUCH. I really appreciate this.

On 1/6/2023 at 10:53 PM, cruisemom42 said:

Athens Gate hotel -- have recommended it many times, always great reviews. They are close to the Acropolis and Acropolis Museum, Plaka, etc.  Great views from many rooms and rooftop bar where breakfast is served.

Cruisemom42, I have a friend going and she's looking at this hotel. Can you tell me where this is located (is there a specific area of the city that this hotel exists, if that makes sense) and can she expect that if she takes a taxi from the airport to this hotel, it's going to be a fixed price of 38 euros, as someone mentioned on a prior post? Also, I'm assuming she can either have the hotel get her a taxi to the port or she can arrange something with one of the taxi companies also mentioned on other threads? Since you seem to know this hotel well,  I'm hoping you can give me some guidance for her.  Much appreciated!

37 minutes ago, Rogueperson said:

These are per day prices.  If anything, shorter and holiday cruises tend to be higher, not lower.  9/24 was the 5 night leg, but its the same advertisement now on the 9 night.

Thanks. I'll discuss it with him. I saw that someone mentioned that they thought we could use Diamond and D+ drink coupons for Johnny Rockets milkshakes. Do you agree (not sure you've tried but the boy likes them). 

On 9/24/2022 at 2:21 PM, Rogueperson said:

 

This is the price thats on board right now

Excellent!  Thanks so much for remembering to check it for me. Since I forgot how many nights your cruise was, was this for 4 or 5 nights? I wonder if it will be the same per day for the 4 night over the holiday.

26 minutes ago, Rogueperson said:

 

You think your kid will drink $20.00 worth of non-alcoholic drinks on top of the 4 or 5 drinks he gets as Diamond every day?  That's a lot of drinks.  It might be cheaper just to pay per drink after he runs out, on the off chance he can't find one of you to use your coupons.  I think that's the price per day for the Refreshment package (plus tip) online at the moment.

I'd normally think not, but the package also includes the milkshakes at JR which he likes but I'm not sure it's going to be worth it in the end. Just figured I'd have the numbers to decide since we have OBC available to use and frankly we don't have much to use it on.

2 hours ago, Rogueperson said:

Sure, remind me later, as i may forget, but just take a snapshot in your head how much the packages are now.  My gut says it won't be discounted onboard, but i'll get the bottom line price.  

Thanks. We don't need it for boarding day, since by the time you get settled, and get going, he'll have 4 drinks on his D, 4 drinks on my D and 5 drinks on my mom's D+. He can wait a day so I was trying to figure out if buying it in advance for the full 4 days vs. buying it on board on the day AFTER boarding is significantly different.

Would you mind doing me a favor? I'm on her (again) for the Thanksgiving 4 night out of Galveston. I'm trying to find out whether or not they are discounting any of the beverage packages once you're onboard. I'm specifically looking at the Refreshment (non-alcoholic) package for my not quite yet 21 yo and while we have D and D+ coupons, he might not want to have to come find me or grandma if he uses up his 4 during any given day. We have OBC and I'm trying to figure out if they are pricing at full or they offer some discount once onboard that will make it ok to wait and see.

Thanks!

On 7/8/2022 at 2:53 PM, spunks said:

good news on the horizon....Europe is no longer requiring negative tests to board any cruise ship leaving any port in Europe(except for one damned port in Greece). That will allow early travel to Europe. The word is that this might put pressure on the CDC to lift requirements to lift negativ test results for cruises boarding in the US.

 

Currently, only the US, Canada, and that strange port in Greece are the only places in the world requiring the tests.

 

Hopefully the whole thing goes away by Sept 1st.

Yes, please can you post a link to where you found this? I have clients sailing in less than 2 weeks out of Rome and if they can forgo testing before they board the ship it will make their lives so much easier.

I'm going to post this since I never thought it would actually happen and as a TA I had not seen it happen before.

I travel with my mom, who has some mobility challenges. She needs to be able to walk in the shower, raised toilet seat, no lip into the bathroom, uses a cane, plus she does not sleep in a bed, we order a sleeper chair to be delivered to the room.  We book accessible cabins. We sailed on Adventure of the Seas back in late 2021 with an OV accessible room. Imagine my surprise when we were going through the last checkin point and someone told us that we had been moved.  

We went immediately to guest services, to find out that they moved us out of our OV accessible and into a standard OV because they were using the cabins in our area for potential quarantine cabins. This was decided by who knows who, ship staff, land staff, whomever made such a decision but never notified me as the agent or me as the client.  The sleeper chair was delivered to a standard OV and of course you can imagine that once it was put together and placed in the room, there was no way to even get past it to the bed. We spent hours at GS, trying to get this sorted out. There were no vacant HC cabins available (we were told) and no one seemed to realize that this was a BIG DEAL. 

We ended up in a JS to accommodate the sleeper chair, but this cabin has a tub and there is no way my mom could get her leg over the side. So they gave us the key to a vacant inside across the hall.  Imagine a 85 yo woman having to pull open a cabin door, walk across the hall, open another door and then use the shower on her own because they TOOK AWAY OUR HC CABIN! I tried as best I could to assist but she is pretty independent and tried to manage as much as possible on her own.

Needless to say, it was a stressful cruise. I never thought that it would happen, but it did.  I encourage everyone to make sure they fill out and submit their accessible needs form to the Special Needs department when booking an accessible cabin (and follow up prior to sailing to be sure they have it and have noted it). No one needs that kind of stress on vacation. 

5 minutes ago, Biker19 said:

Both the destination and date/time need updating in the ship's AIS system, since pretty sure both are wrong.

 

Biker, who expects the next step in the process is for Adventure to show up on CDC's ship listing.

I thought so too, since I didn't think they were going to make it from France to Falmouth by 8 AM tomorrow morning. But what do I know?

I just looked at CruiseMapper and Adventure appears out of the docks and on the water heading, according to the site, to Falmouth.  So maybe this is a good sign and the November 12th will sail as expected.

1 hour ago, sweettxcruiser04 said:

Hi all! I’m on this sailing! Has anyone else received two confirmations and two cabin numbers? 

We did.

I'm vplsh's sister (and travel professional).  We got assigned Deck 7 starboard aft earlier today, and then this evening got a totally different reservation number with a new cabin assignment (Deck 8 port on the hump).  I had heard that there were people getting their cabin assignments changed but to get a totally new reservation number was odd.  We had to do the check in all over again, and now have two Set Sail passes in our app.  Maybe third time will be the charm!