Granny DI

I handed our coupons along with are cabin card upon entering Cagney’s. I emphasized I was using the coupon for this meal and my dinner plan at the next visit. When it came time to sign the tab I realized the screw up. I told the waiter again...use the coupon for this meal. He didn’t know what to do at that point because he had already used a meal from the plan. He said he would fix it. He did .....he used the coupon and a meal from the plan. If you reserve anything other than ala carte online you will be charged a cover charge. It gets tricky when reserving restaurants when you plan to use both a meal plan and platinum coupons. In the old days the meal plan was for all dinner meals...Ours was for only 4 meals. After this happened zi saved the other coupon for our final meal at Cagney’s. 

We are platinum also. The coupons will be in your stateroom. Make your reservations online before the cruise but choose the restaurants with ala carte. If you also have the meal package use your meal plan first and when it’s used up go to the coupons. I made the mistake of using the platinum coupons first. What a mess. The waiter in a Cagney’s charged me one of my meals and also used the coupon. Took awhile to straighten things out. Three things to remember:

Reserve a’la carte restaurants online prior to cruise

Use meal package first

Use coupons last

We ate at OSheehans 3 times on the Breakaway two weeks ago. It was our go to place when our excursions arrived after 2:30. I loved their ruebens. I make home made ruebens with thousand island dressing...never mustard.

We tried the buffet once...took a bite....left and never came back.

We’ve cruised 90% of all lines in the last 20 years. We were most disappointed in the QM2 and Crystal. We don’t care much for Azamara either. Our go to ship is the NCL Breakaway in the Haven. The Haven is a small ship within the mega ship. No Haven no go.  We enjoyed the Regatta years ago.  Same ship as Azamara but didn’t like Azamara. We are booked on the Sirena for 2020. 

Not going back to Azamara or Crystal. Have booked Oceania in 2020 for a Cuba Cruise. Enjoyed the Regatta years ago. 

We are on the Breakaway right now. We are in a Haven Aft Penthouse. This is our 5th cruise on the Breakaway in an Aft Penthouse. It is about 700 steps from the AFT to the Haven. The walk is good for us. We walk several times a day to the Haven. No decline in service. The aft is the best of both worlds. 

We had the free Haven lunch after we boarded the ship in New Orleans. We enjoyed it but IMHO it’s not worth the $15 cover charge. 

We were in the Caymans on Thursday. We are staying in the Haven and we are platinum. We had reservations at Locked in Cayman for 11:30. We got in line shortly after 10:00. They use triple decker boats to fender into port. Takes forever to load and unload. We reached our destination on Fort Street about 11:00.

There were 8 cruise ships in port. This is our 5th visit to the Caymans. We will NEVER get off the boat again in the Caymans.

We  have played golf, done two island tours, done the stingrays and now Locked in Cayman which is an escape room.

There were so many people you couldn’t walk. We gave up 10 minutes after leaving Locked in Cayman and went back to the ship. We had a very pleasant afternoon on the ship.

We stayed at The Marriott Convention Center last night. They have a cruise parking special...$15 per night in their secure underground parking. We stayed using points and the valet parking gal tipped us off about the special. Today we dropped off the luggage at the ship and then walked back from the Marriott.  When we depart the ship  in 11 days we will just walk to the Marriott from the ship. The area around the Julia Street terminal is a nightmare! We have a system with 4 bags and 2 carry-ons. We’ve used it all over the world. Walked close to a mile in Sydney...Madrid was a nightmare on the cobblestones. We are not young so we are fine as long as we don’t have to lift the two heavy suitcases. Fewer headaches walking to the terminal than dealing with the traffic.

Oops.....starting bid for 2 bedroom suite is $600+. The starting bid for the Haven spa is $300+.

None of the offers are a good deal for us.

We booked our cruise through a travel agent.

We are booked in an aft Haven penthouse suite on the Breakaway for Jan 6. Three days ago a banner appeared after I signed into my NCL account. It invited me to upgrade. This has never happened before. The invite was for all the Haven cabins above the aft Haven penthouse. We were interested in the Owners Suite but the starting bid was $800+ to $2500 pp. There are 5 two bedroom Haven Suites available. The starting bid for the two bedroom was $300 pp.... The aft Haven penthouses have been sold out for a long time. 

We booked Locked Inn for our next cruise. It has 4 escape rooms. We chose the Pirate Room. TripAdvisor has the details. The reviews for the most part are 5*. 

We’ve done EVERYTHING in the Caymans including golf. Looking for something very different this time. It is very close to the tender dock.

We have done suites on RCCL and NCL. Haven on the Breakaway and owners suite on Liberty of the Seas, plus Grand Suites on numerous other RCL ships.  We will never do another full suite on RCCL. The suite lounge on the Liberty of the Seas was over run by a huge family with bratty kids. Grandma had the suite but invited the whole family. It was a nightmare. The kids were on the tables, tasting food and putting it back on trays. The staff looked the other way...guess GrandMa was a big tipper. My DH said the suites on RCCL offer nothing other than a large cabin. We’ll only do junior suites on RCCL. We’re the sailing the Breakaway in the aft Haven Suite again in Jan. 

We have done this 3 times. We will do it again in Jan. It is only offered once during a cruise. The play is silly but the wine and food are great. We always enjoy it. 

Can we make a 11:30 flight from Luxembourg once we dock? Are there transfers to the airport with sightseeing if we opt for a late afternoon flight.

We will be flying on British Airways to Heathrow.

We always fly in a day ahead. Last year our flight into Atlanta was delayed by 5 hours so missed our flight to Amsterdam. We were not able to get another flight until the next afternoon and we were in business class. Long story short after running through airports we arrived at our ship one hour before sailing. This year we are flying in two days in advance. The customer agent in Atlanta told us if you fly on a Saturday and experience a delay or cancellation you have a big problem.

Our cruise isn’t until June 2019 but airfares will be on sale soon.

Does AmaWaterways sell transfers from Munich to Nuremberg? We are not doing a pre-cruise or post cruise tour.

We will arrive two days early to prevent the near disaster we had last year when we missed our connection in Atlanta due to thunder storms. We arrived at our cruise ship just an hour before the ship was to sail.

We have never cruised with Cunard either, but what one can surmise, they are quite formal.

 

Not my style.

We spent 24 days on Cunard...NYC Round trip via the North Cape in Norway. Seventeen of the days were FORMAL! The other nights required Coat and Tie. We were in steerage and it was the most expensive cabin we’ve sailed in 50 cruises. The attitude on the QM2 matched the dress code. Every night was like the junior prom...ugh. We haven’t been back to Cunard.....we enjoy the atmosphere on the NCL ships.

The Breakaway goes to Caymans, Ocho Rios, Costa Maya, Cozumel, Harvest Caye and Roatan. We are booked on the Jan 6, 2019 cruise.

We just returned from a Canadian land tour and an Alaskan Cruise. We started in Calgary for the Stampede. We also visited Banff, Lake Louise, Jasper and Vancouver...then took an Alaskan cruise. It was wall to wall people everywhere but Calgary! Even the out of way places were wall to wall. You couldn’t move in Banff and Lake Louise was insane.

We took our last Alaskan cruise 18 years ago. It was wonderful. The cruise ships have destroyed the charm of Alaska. What a difference 18 years makes. We were very surprised. We thought going in May would be better, but posters here tell me makes no difference.

We just embarked yesterday on the Nieuw Amsterdam. We walked from the Marriott Pinnacle with 2 large suitcases, 3 carryon size bags, and two personal items. We left the Marriott at 11:50 and were in our cabin within an hour. We walked through the main doors of Canada Place not the hotel. Walked the short distance to the elevator. NO line at the elevator! Followed the signs.....very easy. We did a dry run the day before. We took the downhill route! Map doesn’t show elevation.

Paul,

Thanks for the excellent comments. Our cruise on the Symphony ended in Sydney...I agree with 99% of your comments as we had some of the same experiences. I was particularly interested in your comments about your fellow passengers. We found the other passengers very reserved.

Steve Forbes was on one of our excursions. He was totally ignored....probably for the first time in his life. We were shocked when he walked down the aisle of the bus. We nodded to him but let him enjoy his day being anonymous. BTW he looks much younger in person than on television.

We are just off the Crystal Symphony. We were told Crystal was the best at sea. Paid big bucks for a tiny ocean view cabin. Our cruise was 12 days and we had enough by day 6.

We can't wait to return to our favorite Haven Aft Suite on the Breakaway. We have been cruising for 20 years and have sailed all the lines. We enjoy the Haven aft suites the most!

We've sailed in 12304, 3 times on the Breakaway. It's our favorite cabin on any ship! Soot is not a problem.