nacdcruiser

It's good to know some of the information I shared has helped others and I truly appreciate the kind gesture John!!:D Have a great trip and let us know if you tried the app and what your experiences were with it. We have a 19 day TA coming up in October 2015 and we'll have our 15 year old daughter with us so we'll want her to check in with us, so the Divina App hopefully will allow us to do that.:)

Will do, Mike -

John

Nacdcruiser,,I completely forgot all about using it. We didn't travel with the kids so we didn't need a way to stay in touch with them,,and we usually left our phones in the stateroom whenever we went out anyway.

Appreciate the reply, Mike and thanks also for all the info you've shared regarding MSC over various threads. We've learned a lot about MSC and Divina from you and are looking forward to being on her for the first time next week!

John

It worked great on our i-Phones. It uses the ships ship's intranet like gaddgie mentioned. It tracks your daily spending, excursions, ship activities, and more. Since we were only on-board for 3 days, we didn't get the full use of it,,but just a little taste. We'll be back on Divina in August where we plan to use it a lot more.

Curious if you had similar success on your recent cruise?

Thanks, moondance55!

We're on in a couple of weeks and our edocs have one luggage tag for my wife and one for me - but we'll have a total of 3 bags and a garment bag. Tags say "do not duplicate" and that we can get more filled out at the port if we need.

Is there a problem created with the bar code if we duplicate?

We have the cabin about 4 or 5 down from the standing people in about a month. So excited to finally have a prime aft balcony.

Houston - thinking we're likely neighbors on the 10/4 sailing! Pretty sure we're 5 cabins down (10262) best I can guess . . .

. . . and now, back to Mike! (thank you so much for this review and all the awesome info)

To all you MSC gestapo ready to pounce on anyone who dare makes any negative remarks about your beloved cruise line, I am ready to heave myself onto the sacrificial pyre:

 

I kept trying to enter information to my web check-in and it would not allow me to enter my state which is a required field. I finally called MSC support and was told that you need to enter 00 before your zip code. Yes, that did the trick but w-t-f? When I mentioned to the techie that this was something that needs to be fixed I got no reply. Just another example of how MSC is the worst in operating a cruise line.

If you can figure out how to post a picture on cc all by yourself - the MSC website will be a piece of cake.

Didn't have a cabin below the gym on our March Eclipse sailing, but using the gym in the mornings there were a handful of the treadmill machines that were roped off with signage they couldn't be used until after 8:00 a.m. for the benefit of those in cabins below. A nice touch I thought. At 8:00 the attendants removed the ropes & signs.

The free cruises are by far the best “potential” value – but the restrictions and limits are many. I’ve done 4 or 5 of the free cruises (either 50k or 125k) and every time the frustration has exceeded any additional value we’ve squeaked out above the 1% minimum points value.

You’re doing the right thing by asking lots of questions. Good luck!

John

Depends where the Alaska sailing ends. If it ends in the US, then it's illegal.

Helpful and timely info - had just been considering this with the new 2015 Alaska schedule now out. Thank you!

Does the same apply if the B2B were Hawaii to Vancouver and then the 1st leg of an Alaska sailing?

On the Enchantment our first time recently and LOVED it! Three days with 17 of us (kids, spouses, and friends) and just my wife and I stayed on for the next 4 days.

The Freedom/Oasis/Allure had been our family summer outings a few years back but now that our kids are out of college, married and working - it’s harder to get a full week coordinated with everyone. The staff is awesome and we’ll be back for sure.

When I booked in October 2013 for my free cruise I was told I can only book the ocean view room and not upgrade to a balcony with those points. Now not things might have changed. I could not pay the difference. Good luck.

Our experience doing this a few times has been if we made the upgrade request at the time of the initial booking using points redemption, we could do it. Trying to do it after the fact is where we failed as they had reduced our "base rate" by the points and it made it impossible to upgrade later. YMMV

Correct. You'll still have the taxes on top of that. If you place the booking direct with Royal Caribbean, ask the agent to get the VISA rewards people on the phone for a 3 way conversation and they can take care of the entire process for you in one step.

We can pick you up @ the Orlando airport and take you to the ship (& back) - come a day or two early and stay with us! FB message if you end up doing this sailing! John & Debbie.

I thought I'd return just to tell the outcome. We did have Elmer and I thought he was especially great and really friendly. We liked him a lot. He did a perfect job on our room and we had plenty of interaction but nothing that was too much - he was very pleasant and always had that Filipino smile.

 

Gina

So great to hear, Gina - thanks for the follow up!

Thanks. Do you know if he went all the way forward to Owner's suites? Was he especially good at his job? Adequate? Friendly? Assuming he'll be there for a few more weeks...I realize anything can happen.

 

Gina

Assume he goes all the way forward, we were in 8034. He was pretty quiet and did just fine. We loved the steward the previous leg, Rhinehart (js 8056 just down the hall). We continued to have more interaction with him the 2nd leg than we did Elmer, but in both cases we were well cared for.

Was your cabin steward port side or starboard?

Port side early December was Elmer (sp).

Our Liberty sailing next month has the following option for the 1st night (for the inquiry on a party of 8) –

Dining with a large group? You can save big at select specialty restaurants onboard when you make your dinner a sail-away event. Book your group of 8 to 10 guests for dinner on the first night of your cruise, and your entire party saves 30% off the regular cover charge at some of our most popular restaurants!

The Set Sail Dinner Party Deal can only be reserved online before your cruise, so book now to enjoy these amazing savings.

How to reserve:

•This deal is valid at Chops Grille, Portofino, and Giovanni's Table specialty restaurants.

•Make your dinner reservation for Day 1 of your cruise, for a party of 8 to 10 people, and enjoy 30% off the regular cover charge!

•Groups of 11 to 14 can also enjoy this deal. Simply call our 1-800-398-9819 and we’ll be happy to place the reservation for your party.

Chops ends up $21 pp or Giovanni’s Table is $17.50 pp. Not sure I recall seeing this option before – others can maybe help with whether it’s a common offer on other ships. Looks like pre-pay would be required.

Nicely done, RCcruisinfamily! Hope you'll let us all know how it goes!

My recommendation would be to obtain liquor box(es) the last night of your Celebrity cruise and put your bottles in their liquor boxes and seal them. Carnival was fine to give us a couple of empty boxes - assume X would do the same.

Carry them to the Indy security screening area where you let them know your intent and they’ll mark your cabin # on the boxes, keep them at the security screening station and you should get them back at the end of your 2nd cruise. They'll only do this for unopened bottles. Anything they find that is open will be discarded.

For a second (and better) opinion, ask the screening people at your first cruise if this would be acceptable.

Enjoy you B2B!!!

For the 8 nighter, it sounds like good advice to wait until you’d be ready to commit to a booking as it is an exception to the listed benefits. Others will respond indicating you can’t do this on a 8 nighter and they’ll likely be absolutely correct.

However, if you’d be ready to commit (or walk away) immediately to the 8 nighter, give it a go with your RC Vacation Planner and Visa Rewards all together on a three way call and see if you can reach an agreement acceptable to all. Doesn’t hurt to ask, and they’ll probably say no - but be ready to jump on it should you get a positive result as it’s unlikely if you wait to think about it you’ll get the same response if you call back later.

As for the 3rd & 4th person, I believe you’re correct that they’ll be at the 3 & 4 rate however, remember the 125,000 points only covers the lowest available oceanview category. Not every cabin can accommodate a 3rd or 4th person. If you have to move to a higher oceanview category to get a 4 person configuration, you’ll have to pay the difference between the lowest category and a higher category if necessary to meet your need.

Hope this helps –

John

I have never done a "live" review, so may need some help. I will try! please send me your email so I can ask you questions along the way!

send to sasysutler@aol.com

Hi, sasysutler - we're on the 9/7 Dream sailing as well - have LOVED Mike's review, hope you do a review for this sailing and look forward to meeting you along the way!

John & Debbie

p.s. Thanks, Mike for the Allure review! We were on her a couple of years ago and can't wait to be back!