mowogo

Juneau is remote and everything has to arrive via ship or plane.  Hoonah is a very small town that is in the process of transitioning from commercial fishing to tourism.  Last year I was able to get a discounted tour with Alaska Whale Tours for a small 22 person boat for $120.  And even was able to get a glimpse of Mendenhall Glacier when returning to the dock (Which is on the other side of Juneau from where the cruise ships dock)

On 11/3/2023 at 6:27 PM, DaKahuna said:

 

Maybe not but I keep hearing how on Carnival he is the King of Burger.

 

People like Velveta.  I find the cheese concoction ruins the burger.  

7 hours ago, JT1962 said:

I expected that to be added as well, but I’m glad it wasn’t mentioned. Doubling the passengers on the island would ruin the experience.

2 Musica class ships isn’t really that different than 1 world class ship.  

1 minute ago, Happily@Sea said:

Kdam passing Grand Island - Royal Pr is ahead of her - so we will have a 'interloper' breaking up the sail-in of the 2 BHBs. 🙂

Stalkers

At least it has cleared up enough for those of us on the Eurodam to actually see the land around us. Couldn’t see much when we were in Tracy Arm. 

2 hours ago, Dobby36 said:

Thank you! I was looking forward to the cooler temperatures up north but my weather app has so many days showing 80-plus! Oh well, excited nevertheless and  thankful for HAL superb laundry in the event of some sweaty days! 😄 

Sadly I know from my days having to work in Toronto and Ottawa that Canada does get warmer than everyone expects.  Fortunately looking like it is going to be nice and cool in Alaska next week.  

4 hours ago, UPNYGuy said:

 

kind of like when NCL re-did the loyalty tiers back in the late 2010's. I have platinum, which (at the time) was the highest tier on the NCL loyalty totem. You could get 4x points per day by booking certain cabins, certain destination offers, enough time in advance, and something else I am forgetting. NCL ended up with a very top-heavy loyalty program, so they made platinum the mid point. I matched in (I think) 2017, and got black (now diamond).

 

Two years later, a woman next to me on seaside was being insistent about her match not being done properly while I was trying to book another sailing with the FCC. She was platinum on NCL and was matched to gold. I kept my mouth shut, but started wondering if MSC was doing the same thing and re-evaluating the matches. 

And in general they have been trying to lower the hotel status matches. I was happy when last year I was able to match Hilton Diamond to MSC.  

They probably used the tender for ease of transferring the patient.  NPS is ladder down to the boat and from a post I saw today from a ranger in a Princess group, it was a rough transfer.

2 minutes ago, Haljo1935 said:

Is there a browser that seems to be more compatible?

No, it is just like the MSC status match page, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.  

10 minutes ago, crystalspin said:

It's not you, it's them. Just not a very robust platform. Try again tomorrow. Back in fall of 2022, gift cards were not available to be purchased for several weeks, and in fact, before they "came back", HAL made their own gift cards available and I paid up my cruise(s)!

And then once you are finally able to purchase your first gift card, you have to have fun with customer service so they can approve the release.

12 minutes ago, PaperSniper4 said:

Regarding requesting the AARP OBC to an existing booking.....

 

Never hurts to ask it to be applied to a current booking. I had a military OBC added to a current booking after I learned that HAL was offering the military OBC. I booked the cruise almost a year ago, and used SheerID <through HAL> to verify my military status only a few months ago.

 

Things could be different with how HAL will handle the AARP, or perhaps there is a reason HAL granted my request for the booking made well before I got my military status verified.

 

I will probably request the AARP OBC in my wife's name in a few days. I am not an AARP member....although at my age I certainly could be!😆

 

 Doug

I’m 38 and joined for the gift card deal.  10% off is 10% off, especially with the other deals.  

11 minutes ago, PaperSniper4 said:

Regarding requesting the AARP OBC to an existing booking.....

 

Never hurts to ask it to be applied to a current booking. I had a military OBC added to a current booking after I learned that HAL was offering the military OBC. I booked the cruise almost a year ago, and used SheerID <through HAL> to verify my military status only a few months ago.

 

Things could be different with how HAL will handle the AARP, or perhaps there is a reason HAL granted my request for the booking made well before I got my military status verified.

 

I will probably request the AARP OBC in my wife's name in a few days. I am not an AARP member....although at my age I certainly could be!😆

 

 Doug

I’m 38 and joined for the gift card deal.  10% off is 10% off, especially since I was able to get 5 years for $45

2 minutes ago, zelker said:

Hi, Elizabeth.

 

I think the "wait 2 days before booking" has to do with the AARP info getting migrated into one's Mariner account.  NOWHERE does it state that it's only applicable to new bookings and the woman I talked to at HAL this morning didn't tell me I couldn't apply it to our existing bookings, just that she had been told to tell me to give it a few days to get in our Mariner accounts, then call back, give them our Mariner numbers, and ask them to apply it to all our bookings.  So we'll see ....

Hopefully this works, because I’d love $100 OBC on my Eurodam cruise in just over a month.

2 minutes ago, wallyj said:

I went to Guest services about another issue, but mentioned about the APP only having the 3 new choices of pizza.

 

The agent said it was implemented 2 sailings ago and will be permanent till it is not and will be going to other ships.

 

Yes, you can still go to Lido deck and get ‘free’ slices, but you cannot get a whole Pepperoni or cheese thru the APP or room service anymore. 
 

Was told room service could not keep up with the demand, so this change was implemented. 
 

I will try and talk to the F&B manager if he is at the MTG event this cruise and see if he can give me anymore info.

It sucks, but after my experience on the Discovery in April, might not be the worst idea.  It was an hour and a half for the pizza to arrive, 45 minutes after my drink arrived.  If ships at full are having issues getting room service pizza in 30 minutes, then they have to do something to depress demand.  

On 7/20/2023 at 9:16 PM, Illbcruzn4life said:

agreed usually takes 24-48 hours. I've done it about 4 times. very quick. That's one of the few things they seem to get right a good percentage of the time.

They get it right, when the form actually lets you submit.  

27 minutes ago, Banditswife said:

We did the behind the scenes tour on a Carnival ship post 9/11, pre covid- & were allowed on the bridge.  Very interesting & the view from the bridge was awesome.  On a recent Holland cruise, we watched the "city on the sea"  & we found it interesting.  This made it possible for mobility challenged folks to see what goes on behind the scenes.  Previously anyone who couldn't do the steps or had other issues were denied the opportunity.  Kudos to HAL for making the movie version.

The movie also allows for more people on a cruise to experience the peek behind the scenes.  When you hear tour groups of 12, that can easily be just 2 families.  

16 hours ago, PACD_JG said:

I don't know...am I the only one who thinks this sales gimmick is bad?  It reminds of me layaway at Montgomery Ward.  Serious customers can't buy merch because all the half-hearted customers stashed it behind the counter waiting until payday.

It is actually great for the line. People will just let their deposit expire rather than go through the cancellation process.  

4 minutes ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

I'm not sure how much of a setback this is going to be. We just don't have all the facts yet. Obviously MSC and their new brand have taken on the brunt since they are refusing ship delivery. 

 

I always wonder about human psyche. If the list of 45 ships sailing is released, will people flock to cancel cruises on ships that failed fire inspection? Some may. I doubt all will.

 

As someone that was looking to book a likely impacted MSC ship, I’m now seriously considering another itinerary on a slightly older ship to get out of the blast radius of any emergency dry dock work as I can see the lines doing it this January/February during the “low” season.  

While MSC is refusing the Explora ship, they are also hit hard by having 5 ships newer than 2020

11 hours ago, wandrr said:

A few years ago, we attended a presentation on board a cruise by the HAL president at the time. This matching question came up, but only asking about across the Carnival Corp brands. He said that the senior managers have often discussed the desirability of matching, but they could never agree on a matching system. In other words, for example, perhaps Seabourn said that one cruise day credit on Princess should be worth 0.75 days on Seabourn, but Princess forcefully did not agree. Multiply that by the combinations of all nine brands and you can see the problem. He said that the senior executives every time just gave up.

 

In my opinion, someone (the head dude at Carnival Corp) needs to clunk all their heads together. Get some worker bees tasked to create two or three options, present them to the seniors and then decide on something. This is a management problem.

Seems like a perfect point to how MSC has different points awarded based on experience which aligns fairly well with how CCL could easily divide its lines

Now with an integrated program CCL could start having some real fun with promotions and even borrow from Hyatt where they could offer some sort of special Brand Explorer award/status to encourage trying different brands (And encouraging those cruising Carnival to move up to other brands).

25 minutes ago, Stateroom_Sailor said:

I would like to see a Mega Fun Ship for those of us still young at heart.  Zip Lines and waterslides through the MDR, an Oprah themed VR maze, and breakdance competitions in the Crow's Nest.

 

This feels like HAL launching a MSC World class ship

Miami is a great port to spend time exploring during the layover of a back to back, and the city of Miami offers plenty of free transit around, including a trolly that runs from the port down to Coral Gables.  

2 minutes ago, Brighton Line said:

Yes but does MSC have Bacon Police? (Another American love, bacon and butter)

MSC happily indulges the American love of Bacon

25 minutes ago, miched said:

I booked my first MSC cruise less than a month ago.  
 

I now see that the 4th of July sale is about 10% less.   I called MSC and was told that they don’t do a price match or adjustment. 
 

Is this true or is it the agent I got wrongfully telling me that?

 

If I do cancel and rebook I may  be ahead a few dollars after losing the deposit and wouldn’t be worth doing.  
 

Happy cruising 🌊🚢🇺🇸🌅

MSC considers repricing your one change for Fantastica experience.  However the wonderful thing about inconsistent customer service is that hanging up and calling again is a valid method since you are likely to eventually get somebody that will at least try.

32 minutes ago, KINGBOBOFTHENORTH said:

However, Royal Caribbean is making HUGE profits from their water park on Coco Cay so it's possible MSC is looking at that and saying hmmmm. (But Ocean Cay is much smaller than Coco Cay so I doubt it.)

I’d say more likely the for profit water park island would be a new one.  MSC is starting to have enough ships in the area that all sailings can’t go to Ocean Cay so they are at the point where they would be looking to do another island like Carnival/HAL/Princess and Disney have done.

7 hours ago, styles27 said:

Had the same experience on Divina in January. 

On our cruise the passenger’s poor behavior and downright rudeness made the party crowd on Carnival look like rookies.
 

MSC seems to be attracting these folks in droves. I’m reading this daily on other social media sites. 

 

It’s been 6 months and my husband still won’t even entertain the thought of giving MSC out of the US another try. (It was our third MSC cruise and the first two were excellent.)

 

 

One thing to take solace in is that we are at the end of the booking window where people were getting bargain basement cruises from the early post pandemic sales with prices being much more in line with the competition instead of undercutting casino rates on old Carnival ships.  MSC is getting enough market penetration that they don’t see the need to discount as much as they were, and that shifts the customer base that is looking at MSC.  Vegas went through a similar shift coming out of the pandemic when the casinos regained pricing power over their rooms.