Travelbug750

Jim, Not to confuse your options, my daughter and son-in-law took a National Geographic Expedition ship to Antarctica a few years back. It was run by Lindblad, one of the most revered expedition leaders. It was a photographic centric trip, with guides giving advice along the way. Given your love of photography, I think you'd love this king of trip. After each day, the guests came back to share photos and receive advice from the experts on how to improve. There was even a lending library of photographic equipment to borrow if desired. It sounded unbelievable. I don't think you'd be disappointed. I'd also like to add my appreciation for all your Live posts. I learn so much from you and now have a desire to visit destinations that I never thought I'd consider. I know the time involved in writing - it's truly a gift to the CC board. All the best for the New Year - Kathy

We've just returned from 21 days on the Rotterdam. Fabulous cruise, btw. We spent three days in Amsterdam prior to the cruise. We took the covid test through Qured on the Friday before a Sunday departure. All went well with that. Then I proceeded to try to upload everything in Verifly. It was very frustrating, taking many tries. Amsterdam was also experiencing a heat wave which made our room very warm and I was beginning to overheat. Many tries later and it finally took! It was a mystery to me why my husband's information went through and mine did not. In any case, when we went to the port on Sunday, the line was several hundred people deep. I kept looking for the Verifly line and couldn't find it - because there wasn't any line! We just zipped through the check-in process and were in our cabin within 15 minutes of arriving at the port. It saved us from the long line, with very few masked passengers at that point. My advice is to keep trying - it is so worthwhile once completed.

I forgot to add that when FE downgraded us to economy from the premium economy that we paid for, we are on the same exact flights. All segments have premium economy. It was just their arbitrary downgrade.

I want to thank you for publishing the phone number for FE. Supposedly, they are working on an issue that they caused for the past week but I still have not heard back from them. I purchased Premium Economy seats SFO/AMS, departing on June 5th. I made the reservations in January, paid in full in March. Sometime in the past few weeks, someone at FE moved us from Premium Economy to regular economy. I know this because Air Canada actually looked up the history of the record and saw that it was FE that made the change. We are booked through Costco and, I have to say, I am disappointed at their lack of help. The only thing on my agenda tomorrow is to sit and wait on hold until I get someone at FE to listen to me. We leave in less than two weeks now and I really don't need this stress.