Storm Monkey

4 hours ago, Tonsoffun44 said:

What was his contraption design?  Loss - hope he changes it or fixes the flaws it had. 

It had a parachute made from a plastic bag if i recall correctly. 

I seem to recall his egg survived, but for some reason they thought it had cracked but it hadnt. I dont remember the details from that long ago, but there was some controversy at the egg drop that day. 

My husband just asked if i had anymore responses to my post and i realized i hadn't checked all week! Glad to see my post brought back some fond memories for a lot of you and nice to hear the egg drop was held recently on Sky Princess. We are taking our daughter on her long awaited, covid postponed first cruise and we think she will love it. My husband has been seeking redemption for his loss in the competition more than a decade ago! 🤣 

Thank you everyone for your replies. We hope they do have it on the Sky Princess for our cruise!

Does princess still do the egg drop competition? We will be on sky princess

On 4/30/2022 at 4:39 PM, Turtles06 said:

 

Reviews say this is very noisy (either the device or the air tube) --- sounds like your husband likes it, so could you please comment on the noise?  Thanks!

 

 

Just used it a few weeks ago for a couple nights at a hotel and I didn’t notice any noise coming from it. Even when he was full on asleep.

9 hours ago, kaymoz said:

 

 

I bought a travel CPAP years ago.  It required a one night only disposable part for humidification which was expensive and hard to obtain.  I gave up on that machine.  Perhaps the technology has improved and I should re-investigate!

his machine does have a disposable disc, however it lasts longer than one night. I believe it is 5-7 days once opened/put in machine? And they are easily obtained at the same place he got his machine. 
Definitely reinvestigate if you do a lot of travel and want to keep packing light! 
It’s also handy to be able to pack up the day before and not have to worry about packing the regular machine the morning of an early flight —- and then forgetting the machine and having to go back home for it when you are already mid-way to the airport. Not like that has happened here though 🤣

If minimal packing is your ultimate goal have you considered getting a travel cpap machine? My husband has the ResMed Air Mini and the machine and mask all fit into a small bag - he uses a toiletries sized bag. You wouldn’t need to worry about removing it from your carry on at that point. 

Yes. The FCC is posted to each cruiser’s own captain’s circle account. Even though your wife doesn’t have a myPrincess account she still has her own number and her credits will be attached to her. The same for your mother. 

1 hour ago, aussielozzie18 said:

Refund update

Booked direct with Princess

Alaska August 2020

Cancelled 20 March

Deposit cc expired May

Princess advised I couldn't update my cc details.

Was told I would receive a cheque in the mail.

Hubby just checked our new cc balance.

Full deposit refund of over $1k has been refunded to new cc.

Thank you Princess.

Good luck to those of you still waiting.

I had forgotten that our initial deposits for our cruise were paid on a different card than final payment. The card used for the deposit was an old number as we had upgraded the card to a different perks level and we also now have a new expiry date but somehow those credits showed on our credit card account. The credit card company back end must have some way to follow the trail when refunds are posted to old account numbers. 
 

I was so caught off guard that at first I didn’t realize they were credits and thought Princess had charged us money for something we didn’t buy!

and bonus- the exchange rate we got was excellent on the USD to CDN conversion. 

5 minutes ago, andydunn said:

How do FCC show up. I chose option 2 so expected a 100% FCC.

 

Instead I have got a FCC which is half of my cost (for one of us? Where did the other half go)

 

And then a bonus 125% of that single person refund which I think means they have done option 1 instead of option 2.

 

Does this mean I now have to spend a day on the phone getting it sorted?

FCC are credited to each persons individual cruise account. So you need to log into your sailing partners Captains Circle account to view their credits. 

Happy to report we got our refund today.

Our cruise was April 12 Regal Princess. We had two rooms under two separate booking numbers for our family group.

We cancelled two days before they announced Pause 1.

At the time we cancelled, we were happy to take the 50% refund and 50% FCC that was on offer so that we didn’t ‘lose’ any money. We were nervous about sailing because of the ages (young and old) of the members of our group. So we were glad to see this initial offer.

When the pause was announced, we immediately requested option 2 - full refund plus 25% FCC for both bookings. We received email confirmations for this selection for both bookings.

And then we waited, and waited, and waited. And then two weeks ago, we received the booking cancellation email that showed no penalty. We then proceeded to wait some more.

This morning, we now have the full refund on our credit card for both bookings.

And we each have our FCCs in our individual Captain’s Circle accounts. The ‘earned’ date is today’s date.

I noticed that we have until May 1, 2022 to book by and use by for the FCCs. I am happy to see that, as originally it was indicated 2021 for use. That gives us more time to see how this pandemic plays out and see what happens with cruising.

I was hopeful that we would eventually get our refund if we waited it out. But I was a little concerned seeing all the random Sail dates for refund processing. 

I’ve already requested the return of the credit card funds to the checking account, and hope that when that happens i can take advantage of currency exchange rates to come out ahead (I’m a Canadian who booked in USD using our US accounts). If the Canadian dollar gains on the USD, i will leave the funds in USD so I don’t lose money. I do wish we had been refunded when I could have taken advantage of the 1.40 exchange. It’s around 1.38 today so we will see what happens.

I hope others see their refunds soon!

7 hours ago, WYB! said:

Not long after I returned home (like 2 weeks), my entire cruise fare (100%) showed as refunded on my credit card so I have this huge negative balance on 1 of my credit cards. Princess also gave me an additional 25% per person FCC.

 

- WYB

in anticipation of getting our refund, I phoned our credit card company to ask about the large Credit balance that would appear. It will be returned to a USD card we don’t use that often and would prefer to have the cash back in Canadian funds. I was told that large refund balances To the credit card can be deposited back into our chequing account. I can not do this myself through online banking- I have to phone the credit card company and they will initiate the transfer and within 3-5 days it will be processed. 
 

so if you are concerned about your ‘huge negative balance’ on your one credit card because you don’t anticipate racking up other charges against it- you should try phoning your credit card company and ask them to return the funds to you. I was concerned that they wouldn’t be able to do this but they were quite reassuring that it can easily be done with just a phone call

My mother got a phone call from Princess asking if she wanted to book her next cruise and use the FCC she was getting from the refund- but we don’t actually have the FCCs in any of our accounts yet despite the rep saying they had been issued. No refund to credit card yet either. 
 

42 minutes ago, SouthAltaCruisingFamily said:

Transport Minister Garneau announces cruise ships transporting over 500 people won't be able to stop in Canada until July 1.

Transport Minister Marc Garneau says overseas international flights coming into Canada will be restricted to a smaller number of Canadian airports. Details to come on which airports.

i wonder how this will affect the Alaska season?

We weren't clear on what to do with this new cancellation policy becasue we had just cancelled on Tuesday to receive 50% FCC and 50% refund to credit card for our April 12 cruise.

The online statement didn't really explain this well

So we phoned, even though the notice said not to call.

The phone rep said they can not do any cancellations by phone and you have to fill out the online form.

When we asked for clarification on this because we had already cancelled - she advised to fill out the form using our booking number for the cancelled cruise. Good thing we had this written down and in emails, becasue the cruise was already gone from the personalizer.

The indication we were given is they will redo the cancellation so that we now get 100% cash back and a 25% FCC on our account. 

No refunds or FCCs had posted yet, so we still aren't sure if we will see this in two stages or if they will halt the previous cancellation in time to do this in one go.

But based on the info from the phone rep - we do now expect to get 100% refund and 25% FCC even though we had previosuly taken the offer of 50/50.

18 hours ago, Coral said:

I actually do check the local restaurants I eat at.

18 hours ago, Colo Cruiser said:

I don't

where I live the restaurants have the health inspection notice sign posted on the door/window and indicates the date of last inspection. Green means they passed. I think yellow means they had some issues to work on? But I’m not sure because I rarely see anything other than green signs

Just noticed several days of blog posts were added! And tons of great pictures too!

If you did end up with an FCD in USD you can book your next cruise in USD. Even though we are Canadian we often book in USD And pay with a USD credit card.
 

For our next cruise we actually got better pricing booking in USD. When we do our own conversion to Canadian dollars for payment it is less than what the Canadian dollar quote for the cruise was. 
 

we book direct with Princess and the first time we paid in USD was an accident because when the rep asked for the closest airport to start the booking, we gave an American airport (we live close to the border and the US airport is closer than a Canadian one) their system automatically switched to USD pricing. And as we were finalizing I clued into the currency and had them recheck in Canadian and it was much better to stick with the USD pricing. So now we price out both options. 
 

of course now we are just hoping for a better exchange rate!

I think I’ve seen more items on the regular menu that our daughter would prefer over what’s noted on the kids menu. 

22 minutes ago, MissP22 said:

The Regal hasn't been doing the egg drop competition. The Crown still has it. 

disappointing to hear that. Keeps the DH busy for a few hours on sea day. 

5 minutes ago, Paula_MacFan said:

I'm currently onboard the Regal too and there was a sign up for the escape room on the first day. We didn't participate though.

thanks for the confirmation on this. Didn’t read the first patter carefully enough. 

21 hours ago, richsea said:

Don’t know about the egg drop, but I saw the sign up for the Escape Room on the Patter that was posted on the first day. Sign up is at the Outrigger at 7:30 on the first night. I’m pretty sure the cost is $8 per person.  We’re looking forward to trying it next week. Never done it on board, but know a few who’ve done here at home, with good reviews.

thanks! I went back and reviewed the patter again and it was there. Missed it the first time. 

2 hours ago, Steelers0854 said:

I haven’t seen either mentioned at all. If I had to guess I would say the Concerts at Sea folks being on board may have effected this as they use a number of the spaces onboard for their program. But we have 2 sea days coming up. My guess if they were going to have one it would be then. 

thanks! I will keep an eye out for the patters for the sea days. Appreciate the info and time you are taking on your trip to post

I haven’t seen mention in the patters of anything relating to an egg drop competition or an escape room. Any info on whether these are offered on this ship and itinerary?

There is a lot more to do at Niagara Falls than just the hornblower boat ride depending on your interests. This part of Canada is very easy to do on your own with a rental car and booking hotels yourself if you are able to/comfortable driving. You could fly to Toronto and tour the city and Niagara Region on your own in a car and then book ViaRail from Toronto’s Union Station to Quebec City. You would see great scenery. And if you didn’t want to miss the museums and such in Ottawa you could do a stopover there off the train.
there are many places where I would do a guided bus land tour - but I don’t think this is one of them unless you are really not one to drive in unfamiliar places.