donaldsc

Because they can get it. If people stop booking at those prices they will find some way to reduce. In a competitive market you raise your prices until demand starts dropping off. Then you either reduce your prices or more likely leave your prices alone and have sales. That way you can easily get your price up again. DON

We found ours by talking to a friend who has done a lot of cruising. Have you tried the word-of-mouth approach? DON

This is a more general question but you seem to be a Clipper line fanatic. We will be doing a back-to-back Greek Islands cruise fall which will be our 1st Clipper cruise. I am really looking forward to it. We are doing the Northern and Southern Cyclades cruises. I do have a few questions. 1) I am trying to set up some non ship tours but the arrival time at most ports is around 12:00 which makes it difficult. Do you take Clipper tours at ports? How are the Clipper tours? How large are the group sizes? Are they rushed or do you have time to see things? Do you feel they are worth the money. 2) Do most of the passengers prebook private tours or do they book Clipper tours on board or do they just land and just enjoy themselves in port? I tend to be a structured type of person. 3) I would like to do tours from ToursbyLocals and other similar companies. I usually list the tours on CC and generally there is enough action on the roll calls that I fill them up. Not surprisingly my roll call posts for the 2 Star Flyer cruises I am doing are totally dead. I was thinking of trying to fill them on board which I know is usually frowned upon by the ship people. Will I get in trouble doing this and am I likely to be successful? 4) Is there anything special that I should be doing at my ports that I might not have thought of? 5) Most important. What sort of wonderful things can I expect on my cruises? Sorry to be a pest but I love sailboats and this will be my first large sailboat trip. Thanks for helping. DON

This is what CC says about bumping on their guidelines - "Bumping Please do not manipulate postings on the boards by "bumping" topics to the top of the forum. Members will assume something of value has been posted, only to find that the newest posting is nothing more than a "bump post". This only wastes everyone's time." DON

Good point. I didn't realize that it was 10 years old. It is a fun show. I looked up current laws and recreational is now OK but your suggestions are good ones. DON

From the time we got off the ship until we were on the streets of Vancouver it took us maybe 20 minutes. We did not need another Covid test to get into Canada, I don't know how they handled the people who were positive because we were not tested on board and we were not positive. I can't tell you what the total time from ship to airport gate was as we got on a bus at Canada Place which took us to Seatac and we flew out of Seatac. I don't see why getting to the airport w an AQ transfer should take less time than taking a cab. DON

I occasionally watch this border customs show on TV. It is about border people in Canada. They often show people coming into Canada from the US carrying stuff like medically prescribed narcotics. They find that medically approved in the US does not mean medically approved in Canada. Normally the people are given 2 choices - return to the US and they are banned from Canada for at least 1 year or else stay in Canada and be arrested. DON

Stopping at Prince Rupert is a plus. It is a great place to visit. We spent 3 days there on the way back home on one trip to AK. DON

I found a Safeway in Seward (I think) that sound like they do rapid tests. You would need to call them to be sure however and you might have make an appointment. Also couldn't you test in Anchorage before you leave for Seward? DON

Unless I missed it everyone is ignoring one big advantage of a TA - how they handle it if things go wrong and trust me they will occasionally go wrong. If you deal w the cruise line directly or even with the supposed TAs employed by the cruise line they basically do give a hoot about your problems. If you deal w a TA they will fight for you as they know that you won't come back if they ignore your problems. Sometimes with regard to fare issues the response that I get my very good TA is that "what the line offered me was not as good as what I already have" when you analyze the offer but I know that she tried. I like that attitude. DON

Actually they are both good and are different. Glacier bay has a lot of glaciers and you are guaranteed to get in because there are almost never weather problems. You don't get that close to them however. Hubbard is one really large glacier which you get closer to as long as the weather is OK. However often you just get into Hubbard because of bad weather. The 26 Glacier cruises out of Whittier are also excellent. The trick is to find a cruise that does both glaciers and then ends in Whittier so you can do 26 Glaciers. DON

Love it. WONDERFUL IDEA!!!!! Just remember that you have to fill it after you get off the plane or the will confiscate your "bear spray". DON

I have bought my ticket so I hope that I am OK. My ticket is for train TGV INOUI 5166. It leaves Avignon TGV at 12:48 and gets to Aeroport CDG2 TGV at 16:02 for a trip time of 3 h 15 m. Since you have obviously done this before, Viking docks at 28 Boulevard de l'Oulle, Avignon which according to Google Maps is 4.6 km from the Avignon TV station at Gare de Avignon TGV. Avignon. I am staying at the airport overnight at the Ibis Paris CDG Airport hotel to get a flight the next morning so it doesn't matter if I get to the airport late. I assume that there is some way that I can get from the train station to the hotel and I am going to contact the hotel to see how. I have done a lot of traveling but dealing with what seemed to me to be a simple train connection has driven me crazy. I was going to do the trip on the alternative cheaper train option but their site just did not seem to like me!! Please tell me that I am OK with my arrangements. Thanks. DON

Thanks for the info. The WEB sites for European trains are virtually impossible to use. We booked on a TGV partly because of your suggestions and partly because it was easier to book. Paid twice the price but got it done. DON

They sent it to my TA about 3 or 4 days before we left which is really useful if you have to go out and buy some stuff or if you have left home early. I would call them directly and ask for it. DON

We are getting off our river boat cruise in Avignon and we plan to take the train from Avignon to Charles de Gaulle. I know that there are direct non-stop trains that do the route but I get lots of WEB hits and I am a bit confused. I think that SNCF is the official WEB site but there appear to be a bunch of other WEB sites that sell train tickets. Also there appear 2 types of trains - SNCF TGV trains and Ouigo trains that are a bit cheaper. Are they different rail systems running on the same tracks. Can someone sort this whole mess out for me. DON

As I am sure that Northern Aurora can attest to - if you get between mama bear and her cubs you can spray all you want and it will not do any good. You will be dead. DON

Your wife and my wife must have been hugging each other and have also gone to the same doctor. She came down Covid 2 days after she got back and also got Paxlovid. I didn't get it. I guess that both of us have good immune systems. DON

+1 on that. Welcome back. I trust that your cruise experience was as good as ours. Our next one is a bit different - 2 weeks on a full rigged sailboat in the Greek Islands followed by a week on a Viking river ship in southern France, DON

Hindsight is 20-20 and "I told you so" will not help you but this is is an example of why having a good aggressive TA who is on your side and not working for the cruise company helps. You are not going to like this suggestion but Sept 2 is not far off and the airline industry is totally bonkers and you are way past the no fee cruise cancellation time so you might think of getting backup airline reservations just in case. Keep us posted. DON

There were not any wet landings. We wore them so that our feet would not get wet if any water splashed on our shoes in the zodiacs. In reality there was no water on any of the zodiac trips that we took so we really did not need the muck boots. Some people just wore hiking shoes (shoes - not boots) which I assume were waterproof. As far as clothing we had very warm weather on our cruise so we certainly did not winter clothing. I thought that they went a bit overboard on the clothing list but as I said our weather was not normal. I have gone on a number of expedition trips of this type and this one was one of the best. The ship is wonderful and the expedition staff was superb. Couple of additional thoughts. 1) Food was good but not great. If you are into lobster, this is one of the things that you can get every night. On a number of my meals I ordered one of the mains with 1 or 2 lobsters as a side dish. 2) They supply enough binoculars for everyone and they will check them out so you have them in your cabin. They are pretty good Nikon binocs and not the $19.95 Walmart binocs that most ships have. I brought mine but I really did not need to have done it. They even have spotting scopes on board although the tripods that they are on are pretty bad. 3) If she is still on board, Olga is a wonderful bartender. The is from the Ukraine and she was planning to go back home so she might not be there any more. She makes one of the best bloody marys I have ever had. If you like bloody mary drinks and she is still there don't let anyone but her make them for you. Bet you thought that you would not get a bartender recommendation on CC. 4) You have not said if you have done any of the AQV Mississippi riverboat cruises. A number of the people on board had done AQV riverboat cruises and they were expecting the same type of cruise and the same ambiance as the riverboats. The Ocean Victory is a great expedition ship and I have been on a bunch of them but it is not a riverboat. Hope that this helps. If you have any more questions feel free to ask. DON

This is a really late response but it might be useful for other people. I am absolutely sure that whatever personal PFD that you take would have to be approved by both the airline AND the cruise company. I seriously doubt that any cruise company will allow you to bring your own PFD even it is fully approved by the local maritime people. DON

The Alaska State Museum in Juneau us excellent - https://museums.alaska.gov/asm/. DON

Although we have not done it yet we are doing a B2B 14 day Greek Island cruise on the Clipper Cruises Star Flyer. She is a full rigged sailboat that holds about 180 passengers. Should be interesting. We just came back from a small ship AK cruise and one of the couples on the ship did the same cruise that we are doing. They loved it. DON

Tracy Arm is not a port. The ship does not dock in Tracy Arm. There is no governing body at Tracy Arm that could levy a port tax. There is no port tax in Tracy Arm? DON