AMommyof2

3 hours ago, Ourusualbeach said:

On the website there is rarely the option.  Most time is just says balcony guarantee and the invoice does not show XN or XB.  It is really only those booking through a TA that get that option and only the TA invoices that show the actual categories

I've checked our booking and it only shows balcony GTY without a type.

6 minutes ago, patty1955 said:

I can access the site, I just can't sign in.

Same is happening on RCCL website.

We've booked a short getaway on Allure this fall. DH booked a balcony guarantee, which we understand could be a neighborhood balcony. What are your thoughts?

I was just reading a thread which was discussing the fact that if you have an excursion booked when you arrive in your state room there will be an envelope with your excursion documents and tickets for boarding the tender to take you to the beach. My question is how much earlier do you get on the tenders and is it worth it to book a snorkeling package (we were planning on bringing our own snorkeling stuff anyway) just to get an early departure on the tenders. :) Also, my wife just had a really good question. Will the snorkeling eat up the entire time we are at GSC? Will we have any time on the beach?

Last year we took our personal gear for snorkeling at GSC...no excursion needed. We snorkeled right off of the beach and saw lots of fish. The rock formations are great, too. We were on the far side of the beach past the area where lunch is served, near the peninsula that juts out into the water. Just be super careful...we found out the hard way that the tide can be really strong.

This is a fantastic excursion. I would say one of the best we've ever done. You will have a great time. Be sure to take some good sunscreen!!!

You will meet the other people on the excursion at the excursion desk on the island and then you will be escorted to the boats.

Last year on Sky our family of 4 requested to be seated by the window. The hostess told us window seats are on a first come first serve basis and there were no window tables available. Many of the tables were empty and the group that checked in right behind us were seated by the window.

Taxi to BW Seabrook from Hobby airport: $56 +tip. (Based on CC person who did that last week)

Best Western Suites Hotel: $125 + 17% tax = $142

Transfer to port: free on hotel shuttle

Super shuttle from port to Hobby airport: $60 + tip.

 

Do you have contact info for the super shuttle that you mentioned?

If the stingray city tour is offered during your visit to Great Stirrup Cay, I highly recommend it. We were taken on a short boat ride (less than 5 minutes) to a sand bar enclosure. The rays were super friendly and rubbed up against us like cats do, trying to get attention. The wranglers showed us how to hold and feed the rays and we each took turns doing so. Everyone on our tour was commenting how much fun they had during the ride back to the island.:D

Thanks for the review !

Curious as to your previous cruise experiences and your expectations. It seems on the surface that other than the things NCL couldn't control due to weather, time of year/passenger mix and your choice of cabin, the cruise was not that bad. Can you elaborate ?

Our other cruises have been on Royal Caribbean, Disney, Princess and Carnival....between 3 - 7 day sailings mostly in the summer. Prior to this sailing we had cruised in outside, balcony, jr suite, owners suite, and penthouse suite categories. For us the room type doesn't matter because we prefer to be out of the room as much as possible. Yes, we made the best of our vacation in spite of the weather and cabin location. On prior cruises we've been able to find plenty to do....even on 3 nite sailings. We were turned off by NCL not enforcing the kiddie pool being for KIDS, childrens activities not being age appropriate, trash laying around in the floor, the rude hostess in the Palace dining room, and the slow service and lack of meal choices in the main dining rooms. It was easy to see why they pushed the specialty dining so hard. Since returning home we've spoken to friends and family who have sailed various NCL ships and each one has said they would not recommend NCL. Luckily cruising offers many line and ship options. We just happen to prefer some of the others.

My family and I were looking for a last minute, inexpensive vacation. We hadn't cruised in a while and had not ever been to Freeport so we decided on the 4 night Sky cruise. We had arranged a private airport to cruise terminal transfer and arrived at the pier about 9:30 Monday morning. We were allowed to take a seat just inside the terminal building and then proceeded through security at 10:00 AM. With so few guests at the pier at that time check-in went very quickly and smoothly and we proceeded upstairs to the waiting area to board the ship. We were given a pass for boarding group 1, so we were among the first people to board once the ship had been cleared for embarkation. :D Once onboard there wasn't anyone to direct guests where to go. I'm certain that changed quickly though, as I heard an officer of the ship demanding that someone be stationed just inside the gangway area. We made our way up to the buffet on deck 11 for lunch. We were pleased by the selection of food on the buffet, but found the taste to be average at best.

During lunch, an announcement was made that staterooms would be available around 2:00PM. Therefore, we walked around the ship to familiarize ourselves and played a game of shuffleboard. We also signed up the kids for the youth activities for ages 10-12 and teens. DS used went to the activities for 10-12 only one evening for the "Survivor" game. DD did not attend any of the teen activities. The itinerary we were given for the teens seemed more age appropriate for our son's age group and his itinerary seemed better suited for the 6-9 age group.

We had booked two guarantee interior rooms and we were assigned staterooms 9349 (for me and DD) and 9350 (for DH and DS). The rooms were ready about 1:30 so we made our way to the rooms to view our accomodations. The room sizes were fine for a short, port intensive cruise. However, we do not recommend the location. 9349 backs up to the service stairwell and the staff was often slamming items around in there, it seemed based on the noise level at all hours of the day and night. We had 5 checked bags between us and received 4 of the right away. DS, DD, and I put on our swimsuits and made our way to the pool deck. The bag that had not yet arrived contained my husband's swimsuit so he stayed at his room to wait for the bag....it eventually arrived after dinner. Since DS isn't a really strong swimmer we opted for the kids pool. We were sad to find both the pool and the hot tub in the kiddie pool area filled with adults. This was the case each day, and the adults did not exit the pool/hot tub even when small children came up to swim. We never used the regular pool area because they were constantly filled with teens and young 20somethings.

At 4:30 the alarm sounded for muster so we made our way to deck 6 for the safety drill. No surprise it started storming in Miami about that time, and continued as we pulled away from the pier. We stayed on deck 6 for a while until the rain was just too heavy to stay outside. We decided to freshen up for dinner and decided we would go to the Palace dining room. As we made our way down we noticed lots of people gathered around the balcony looking down into the atrium and on the stairs. At first we thought they were making pictures as they entered the dining room, but we quickly determined that was not the case. It turned out that the heavy rain had overfilled the pool and the water had come in through the sliding doors and spilled over down into the atrium like a giant waterfall. What a sight to see. We were shocked to see guests being allowed to still use the glass elevators as water poured down, even through the light fixtures. The ship came to a complete stop and alarms started to sound. For a bit we thought we might return to the Miami pier but we headed on toward Freeport. Guests were not being allowed into the deck 5 atrium so we headed to the Crossings dining room for dinner. We were seated right away, but the service was pretty slow and the food was OK at best. Average wait times between ordering and receiving our appetizers were between 15-20 minutes each night. Monday evening we went to the officer meet and greet and comedy show. Cruise director Bobby announced that the officers would not be attending as they were all busy cleaning their flooded staterooms. The comedian was fantastic, and we knew right away that we wanted to see his show later in the week. We headed up to the pool bar for a drink after the show and watched a very intoxicated fellow dancing with his shorts around his knees. After a while we headed back to our rooms to call it a night.

Day 2 - Freeport

This was the port we were looking forward to since we had not been to Freeport before. We had booked the ship's beach hideaway with open bar excursions. However, it seemed then Tropical Storm Arthur had different plans for us. All ship excursions were cancelled and very few people left the ship. The Daily was updated to add more onboard activities but still very few were appealing to us. The Texas Hold 'Em tourney on the new list caught the eye of DH so he headed down. The kids and I just stayed in the stateroom watching television and trying to avoid the heavy rain and wind. DH hadn't been gone too long before he was back knocking on the door. He said about 10 people had shown up for Texas Hold 'Em only to learn it was an error on the sheet. So he joined us for television watching. Our once adequate stateroom was starting to feel a bit like a jail cell (no I've not ever been in one -just assuming what it might be like). That evening we headed back to Crossings for dinner. The service was a bit better but we were disappointed to find that the menu had not changed much from the night before. Looking forward to better weather in Nassau, we called it an early night after dinner. DD and I had fallen sound asleep and I was awakened by a very loud group of girls in the hallway just outside my door. After a while I opened the door and asked them to quiet down some....nope..more girls joined and they got even louder. After about an hour I called the guest relations desk about them only to learn they had already sent security up to talk to the girls. The second visit from security must have done the trick because they finally got quiet.

Day 3 - Nassau

After much back and forth about what to do we settled on Junkanoo beach follwed by some shopping. We grabbed our pool towels and snorkel gear and headed off the ship. I had been in Nassau twice prior to this cruise but had not been to Junkanoo. We asked for directions inside the information center at the pier. The walk to the beach was super easy...just exit the straw market and exit the gate at the far end by the scooter rentals. Go up one block and turn right...follow the sidewalk around just past the Colonial Hilton until you see the sign for Junkanoo. There were vendors offering chair and umbrella rentals. We got two chairs for $10 each for the day. Food and drinks were also available for purchase....we opted for the 3 beers and 3 shots for $10 and sodas for the kids. Once we got our fill of the HOT sun we made our way back to the ship for lunch and then back off again for a little shopping.

In the evening we went to the Newlywed Not So Newlywed show. All 3 couples were great and had the audience in stitches. Cruise director Bobby was a hoot and really added to the show. Immediately following the game show was the comedy show. I guess a lot of people heard about how funny the Monday night show had been because it was standing room only. After the show we gathered DS from the kids room and headed off to bed after our very busy day.

Day 4 - Great Stirrup Cay

Aside from those with early excursions, guests weren't tendered over to the island until about 10:00. DS wanted to play on the inflatable slide so we purchased him a day pass. Clamshell shades and two chairs were available to rent for $29.99 or uncovered chairs were plentiful at no charge. DD had decided she had gotten enough sun on Nassau and opted for the shade of the clamshell. DH and I grabbed our snorkel gear and were allowed to snorkel in the same area as those who had purchased the ship's snorkel excursion. Once we had swam out a bit we started seeing lots of fish. The tide was pretty strong and in no time we found ourselves being pulled out farther and farther. We changed areas and snorkeled a while longer before time for our stingray city tour. We had never swam with stinrays before so we were a bit nervous. The wranglers showed us how to hold and feed the stingrays and shared their vast knowledge about these amazing creatures. We took turns holding and feeding the rays as other rays swam around us brushing against our legs like cats. We had an amazing time and would highly recommend this excursion. Once we got back to the island we decided to head back to the ship. We got cleaned up and headed down to the Palace dining room for dinner. We had also eaten in Palace the night before. The lady checking in guests told us there were no tables next to the window but offered us a pager if we wanted to wait for one. We told her we preferred not to wait and would take whatever was available as we had not been seated next to the window the entire trip. She commented that the window tables were first come first serve. Of course we knew this wasn't the case as window tables would be empty as we were seated and groups coming in immediately after us would be seated at them. Again, we were disappointed to find little, if any, change in the menu from the night before.

After dinner we headed upstairs to pack. Throughout the night I heard bags being banged around in the service stairwell. Between that and the loud drunk passengers going up and down the hallway I didn't get much sleep.

Day 5 - Disembarkation

We opted to carry our own bags off the ship. After breakfast we gathered our belongings and headed out. With almost no line, we were off the ship and had cleared customs in a matter of minutes.

Overall, we have decided that based on this cruise, NCL is not the cruiseline for us. We understand that they can't control the weather and there will always be drunk and/or rude people. However, we had been looking forward to booking with NCL for a while and they just didn't provide the level of cruising experience we've enjoyed on other cruise lines.

We were in Nassau this week staying at the Melia. The Wyndham guests had use of the Melia property because their pools were closed. I'm not sure what is going on at the Wyndham but it may have something to do with the Baha Mar construction project which is huge and right next door to the Wyndham.

 

The construction did not impact us while at the Melia.

I thought I had read on another thread that Wyndham is also $30. If it is $20 but you use the Melia pools what is the benefit of paying the extra $10 per person at Melia?:confused:

Does anyone have an estimate of the cost of food/drinks at Melia?

DH and I booked a last minute interior guarantee on the Sky....2 rooms to accomodate our family of 4. We received our room assignments and I'm afraid the noise level will be awful. One room is immediately beside the elevator and the other across the hall next to the stairs. Has anyone had any luck having room assignments changed?

Is the Melia close enough to walk? If we need to take the jitney, where would we board?

Are these day passes purchased directly through the resorts? What is the cost and how do you get them? Both locations sound wonderful. My kids are 10 and 15, so either sounds perfect for them.

Does the Melia Resort in Nassau offer day passes? If yes, how do you acquire them and what is the cost?

Posted over in the St. Thomas forum about my experience (bad--felt dangerous) at Coki Beach. Am wondering from RCI folk--are there snorkeling / beach excursions offered specifically by RCI that I would have liked better than Coki?

 

Here's the thread:

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1013166

 

Follow-ups can go here (RCI-excursion specific), or directly to the St. Thomas forum thread.

We did an independent excursion to Sapphire Beach. Absolutely beautiful there and we all felt very safe. DH took his snorkle gear and saw lots of fish. Small shack to rent floats, beach chairs, etc. There was a lady taking food orders and would bring the food to your beach chair. Cab fare was $5 each/each way. The same driver that dropped us off scheduled a time with us to pick us up and take us back to the ship.