wil e coyote

Our experience has been that the concierge can generally make things work out for dining reservations. Good luck!

At the risk of starting another debate - much of the back and forth on this thread has to do with parsing the sentence above and trying to determine the exact meaning of it. Does this mean that the DSC helps pay salary, or that only the incentive programs are funded in part by the DSC? I have to point out we (the CC readers) may be putting a lot more energy into interpreting this sentence than NCL did in writing it in the first place. Despite the strident arguments on both sides, there is no way to know for sure without asking NCL. I agree that punctuation matters ("Let's eat grandma" vs. "Let's eat, grandma"). But I have also seen many examples where what was meant was not exactly what ended up being written. English is a hard language when you are trying to be precise.

This. Exactly. There are plenty of posts on this board that will tell you to run far-far away from NCL Air, but those are people who have had problems. I believe (but don't have the data to prove) that there are many more people whose flights have been just fine. That has been our experience. Just a little data: Airline on-time performance in the US is running about 77% right now. So every time you have a connection, there is a nearly 1 in 4 chance that your inbound flight will be late, and that might cause a problem if you have a tight connection. That also means there is a 1 in 4 chance your flight to the port city might be late, and if you have a tight connection to the ship, that might mean you miss the ship. In addition, the airlines have gotten much better at filling their planes, so there are fewer empty seats. That means that if you do miss a connection, or your flight gets cancelled, it's much more difficult (in general) to get on to another flight quickly. All this is why many folks (rightly) suggest flying in a day or two early, so there is time to recover from delayed or cancelled flights. I also find that flying in a day early simply reduces my stress level. NCL Air will do this for you if you request it. Enjoy!

I'll chime in - thanks for starting this thread! As others have said, I am thankful to be able to even consider the topics that are so hotly debated on this board.

Right...so here's the deal. The "MSRP" is listed at $998 per person, so they are "giving" you 50% off which is $499. But that is still per person, so the fare is $998. Add on $700 in port fees and taxes and $400 in beverage and dining gratuities, and voila! $2,100. So is the second person really free? Well yes, if you look at it as 50% off of two passengers equals one person is free. But no, if you look at it as having to pay $499 twice. The website portrays both of these facts in a way that makes it look like you're getting 50% off and a $499 fare, but you're not. I agree that other cruise lines (and other businesses) do this all the time. 25 years ago, there was a department store in upstate New York who got sued because they always marketed their products at some %% off "regular" price. The AG took them to court and argued that since the merchandise was never offered at the "regular" price, the regular price wasn't real, and they were engaging in false advertising. A judge agreed. I'm surprised no one has gone after the travel industry for that. Regardless, as others have said, you need to get to the final price before you get excited about something that looks like a great deal.

We've sailed Haven twice, once in a forward-facing balcony (deck 9) on Getaway and once on deck 14 on Breakaway - neither are in the Haven area but we were fine with that. We felt like we still got all the butler service and other perks. Even the cabin on deck 9 was only a few minutes from the Haven area. And as others have said, a little walking helped us feel like we were burning off some of the food! We'll be in the Haven area next month so I will be able to give a more informed answer then - maybe. So much depends on the ship/crew/fellow passengers that it's really hard to make an objective comparison. Bottom line, if you're willing to pay the fare, you can't go wrong in a Haven room, in my opinion.

There is an excellent post on this (which I can't find right now) which explains how the tag labeling works. The color is specific to the ship - every ship in NCL's fleet is a different color. Everyone boarding the same ship gets tags that have the same color. The words/letters/numbers on the tag tell the porters where to deliver the luggage once it is on the ship. Hope that helps.

Congratulations on booking the Haven. I am sure you will love it. If you book inside 130 days out, you may not be contacted by the concierge desk, however, you can contact them and that works just as well. You can send an email to the address suggested by @FLcruisergrl, or you can call 1-855-625-4283 and talk to the pre-cruise concierge desk. Enjoy!

Hi @BeachBecky - no, you cannot make reservations in Syd's. It is first-come, first served.

@Sthrngary - I want to give you a shout out for this thread. Much as the Haven is a "ship within a ship", this thread is a "board within a board." It is informative and respectful, with no snark at all. I know everyone on this thread makes that happen, but you set the tone with your first post and continue to support it with all the subsequent responses. If all of CC or social media were like this thread, it would have a much better reputation. I have just read through this entire thread in preparation for a Haven cruise in January. I have learned a ton, and it's making me really excited for the trip!

LOL - this is exactly what happened to us last year. We were supposed to go to GSC but due to high winds we went to Nassau instead. DW and I were both like, "been there, done that, don't want to do it again" and so we had a wonderful day on the ship. Regarding Rumours - the Haven concierge should offer to escort you to Syd's about 45-60 minutes prior to the show so you don't have to stand in the line. Check with him/her once you are on board.

Thank you for your posts! We are on the same itinerary at the end of January, and reading all your trip prep is helping me get excited for our cruise! While it is only DW and me on this trip, we are having a lot of the same debates about things like shore excursions. We have been to all of the ports on this voyage except GSC (we keep getting winded out), so we are seriously having the debate about just staying on board for every port except that one. That would be a first for us as we typically do at least a couple of active excursions and then a couple of more relaxed ones. We just upgraded to the Haven yesterday (have been watching prices for weeks, and they finally dropped enough that it was less $$ to upgrade than we had put in for our upgrade bid). So maybe we will just stay in our cabin all week and have the butler feed us peeled grapes. JK!!! By the way, the Rumours show in Syd's is fantastic! We saw it on the Breakaway in June and it was a highlight of hte cruise.

We sailed on the Getaway in Jan 2022, in one of the Haven forward-facing cabins. So our room was not in the Haven area, but we had access to all of the Haven facilities and amenities. That was our first Haven experience and we thoroughly enjoyed it. The Haven bar and restaurant were so good that we didn't feel the need to go anywhere else except for our specialty dining nights. You'll get a lot of opinions on butler service - it is useful, etc. In our experience it all depends on who you get for a butler. SthrnGary has a fantastic thread on this forum about what to expect when you are in the Haven, and that does a better job of describing the experience than I could here. Enjoy!

@AnitaVacation, this was June 2022.

"...all its perks." This is it exactly. We've only stayed in the Haven twice, and so we are still learning what is and is not included. Since getting into Syd's was one of the perks (by virtue of having paid quite a bit of money) on our first Haven sailing, we thought it would be on our second one. When it wasn't we stood in line like everyone else.

We thought the Rumours show on BA in June was fantastic - so much so that we went back and saw it again, and then went to the 80's show later in the week - even though we had to stand in line like everyone else to get in... 🙂 I'm pretty sure there are multiple teams doing the same shows/on different ships - so YMMV.

Yeah, we were really surprised when we got told "we don't do that" on Breakaway. Thought maybe our earlier experience had been the exception, but it sounds like they got it right on GA.

This seems to depend on the concierge. We had the same experience as graphicguy on the Getaway in February. But when we were on the Breakaway in June, we asked our concierge about this and he said they didn't do that for Syd Norman's. We couldn't seem to change his mind so we simply went down early enough to get a decent spot in the line. Bottom line, check with the concierge in advance. Enjoy!

So the lesson is that I just need to know when you are cruising and then avoid the subsequent sailing! 🙂

This! All day long. I really don't miss the other comforts of home for 1-2 weeks, but I do miss good beer. Definitely a first-world problem! 🙂

My take-away from this thread is that some people are catching COVID around the time they go on a cruise. But that is not surprising - people all over the world are still catching COVID all the time (though, thankfully, much less than 1-2 years ago). The responses here simply confirm that COVID is still out there, but we already know that. This isn't a statistically meaningful sample to say whether you are more (or less) likely to catch COVID on a cruise than at work, at the grocery store, or in your own home. I do recognize that some people have particular conditions that would make catching COVID especially dangerous, and they are keenly interested in the risks associated with activities including cruising. But a discussion board isn't a credible place to make a good assessment of that risk.

We have fond memories of the Norway - we cruised on her in 1997. We were able to get our 7 day Caribbean cruise added to our Latitudes log - but that was several years ago before the current "12 month look-back" policy. But as others have said, it never hurts to ask!

We've cruised a few times post-COVID shutdown, and I don't remember any of the nights being announced in the dailies as dress-up/formal. It seems like there are some people dressed up each night, but I have never paid attention to whether those are the same people or different ones. You do you...

To build on comments by @Sthrngary and others - it's certainly possible that these slides will turn out to be a horrible idea, ala New Coke. But there are a whole bunch of people at NCL whose job is to create a great new ship, and they are paid to succeed in that and to avoid building things that people hate. I wasn't in any design meetings, but it seems really unlikely that nobody on the Prima team thought about the concerns that folks have listed here. So I'm reserving judgement until there is actual data from passengers (and not just the ones trying to make headlines) on whether these slides are a big deal or not. That said, if I had booked a cabin near one of these slides and no one had informed me they were there, I'd be nervous too at this point until there is data.

I like the Nepresso coffee/espresso as well. We don't have one at home so it is nice to enjoy on the ship. One thing to keep in mind is it is LOUD - so if (like me) you want a cup of joe before your SO is awake, the Nepresso machine isn't a good solution...