notscb

That's the question. HAL's policy only allows service dogs, and they have the right to ask what service the dog is performing before being allowed on the ship.

Your post is giving r/thathappened energy. The first sentence (quoted above) is the appropriate response. The rest of it sounds like you'd be going out of your way to ruin your own cruise by targeting these other guests.

For me, specialty dining has to be considered carefully as I've already paid for food onboard. My thought process tends to go "is the experience/food/etc. worth $XX above what I've already paid for MDR/Buffet/Etc." I try to consider what the cost I've already paid for food that day is, add i whatever the cost of the specialty is and decide from there. For me, $150 for a tasting menu p.p. for a chef's table experience isn't worth it- especially since they've started limiting the included alcohol pairing. Even the steakhouse at $50/p.p. isn't worth the product they're giving, unless it's maybe the first night and you get a free bottle of wine (even if it's cheap) and the MDR is a mess (because it's the first night).

We stayed in an airbnb in the romantic zone (called the Zenith). We were able to cook some of our own meals and the rooftop pool was a nice touch. We don't usually do hotels.

Update: thanks again to everyone who suggested fun things to do and see in PV. We went for a week and a day and it was amazing. Stayed in the Romantic Zone- 10/10, will be going again. Did Mantamar, Diana's Boat tour, saw some whales, and had a ton of excellent food. Also felt safer there than we have walking around NYC or Toronto.

Which is honestly what matters to most people. If someone is comparing a cruise side by side, price is likely going to win over brand.

Every cruise on every line is what you make of it. While Carnival advertises the "fun" vibes onboard, I've had some of my most relaxing cruises onboard Carnival ships. Not to mention that most mainstream U.S. cruise lines (Carnival, RCL, Norwegian) offer essentially the same experience with different branding and carpet colors. A transatlantic experience will likely be similar across lines as well- by day 3 everyone is just kind of relaxing anyway. The Mardi Gras itself is Carnival's newest product on offer and will give you a good sense of what Carnival is hoping to offer going into the future. If it's your first time on Carnival, it's a great choice of ship.

Got my refund for the 12/9 sailing today- finally. Hopefully others get theirs!

I might be wrong, but don't specialty restaurants onboard already come with a gratuity added to the bill. I'm wondering if this is part of your conundrum in that you've been adding onto what already exists in the past.

That's not entirely the case. Most airlines in the United States (the majors- Delta, United, American at least) have gone back to offering the lowest level of economy tickets which are non-refundable and non-transferable.

We really enjoyed the Dream and would do any of her sister ships. If you're looking for similarly sized ships to the Mardi Gras and Celebration, you might want to look at other lines offering larger ships (i.e. Royal's Freedom class).

/s right? It's like a 10 minute drive depending on when you get in and whatever else might be going on in the port that day. I certainly hope it's not 45 minutes for you that day!

If that were true, you'd think RCL would be all over telling the guests who were screwed in this situation exactly that. It'd be much more reasonable for a guest to understand why there wasn't a cabin available vs. telling them they just cant be assigned a stateroom. From a PR perspective, it's a no brainer.

Same here. Weird how quickly one refunds but the other doesn't. I'm also having difficulties getting them to honor their offer for air change reimbursement. It's honestly disappointing, but not surprising.

Just an update for y'all: My cruise on the panorama got cancelled so we decided to just go to PV and take the week there. I'm very excited and appreciate all of your positive suggestions 🙂

GAH just got the notification about the 9th. sucks (even if it's out of their control somewhat). Now back to the drawing board to figure out what to do with flights booked already.

Yikes. I'd just delete this post- I wasn't asking if you personally thought mexico was safe.

That MDR reminds me of the classic MDR design on the QM2. It's gorgeous 🙂

At 14kn that's going to take a bit of time 😵‍💫

I think that's what I'm looking forward to experiencing- thank you for pointing this out. I'm excited to see the balance between the beach vibe and the town itself with the shops and food

Sure...and parts of the USA should be on the USA terrorist watch list. Mazatlan (the port)- was briefly discontinued until it got back under control. For the most parts, these ports rely heavily on the tourism dollar and are going to do what is needed to make sure tourists are safe.

Thank you for the recommendation and for that seafood place- we will definitely be adding it to our list. It seems like there's a lot to visit in the romantic zone alone- we're hoping to do the boardwalk and take the day to just take it all in at this point.

@chengkp75 going above and beyond as always. Thanks so much for giving us such detailed info!

Am on the 12/9 sailing and am feeling bad that four weeks of sailings had to be canceled. What a nightmare for those who are already LA bound for what would be this weekends sailing. Fingers crossed she's back in the water and ready for 12/9 for us.

Aw shucks. Was always hopeful we'd get to see a partner (boyfriend or otherwise) behind the camera for that guy.