Torquer

We love having a private whirlpool tub on our balcony when on a cruise, but there are only a very small number of cruise lines that have them.  Oceania was one of them that had them in their top suites, and the balcony tub is the main reason we are willing to spend the small fortune to stay in these suites.

We were devastated a while back when we learned that Riviera had removed them at it last refit.  So now the question is, did Marina retain her whirlpool tubs in her just-completed refit?  When we were in an OC on Marina a couple months ago we asked our butler, and he had not heard they were going to be removed, but we want a definitive answer from someone actually staying in OS, VS, or OC on Marina post-refit.

Suppose I want to research specialty restaurant reservations.  Here are the steps I use:

• Be on the main Oceania board:  https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forum/29-oceania-cruises/
• In the upper right hand corner there is a search box.  Type in:  specialty restaurant reservations.  On the right side of search box, make sure it says "This Forum" to search just the Oceania forum, rather than all forums.
• What will come up is search results containing ANY of those words.  You want results that contain ALL those words, so you want to use AND connectives.  You can type in the AND between your search words, but right below the new search box Cruise Critic has done it for you, and you can just click on: specialty AND restaurant AND reservations

If this doesn't work for you, tell us what you want to search for, and we can show you how to do the search.

We have had great butlers, and some not very good.  The worst one happened to be when we were staying on a cruise in the owners suite...it definitely detracted from the experience.

Interestingly on our last cruise, there was a 5-day art scavenger hunt where you were given 50 photos of paintings and other art work on the ship, and had to identify where on the ship it was located.  It was quite challenging since each photo only showed a tiny portion of the artwork.  Anyway, we saw one couple who had their butler touring the ship with them to try to complete the scavenger hunt.  Although it was nice to see a butler willing to do that, we thought it was cheating.

This is definitely one of the most remarkable sagas I have ever read on the HAL board.  It is incomprehensible that this error could have been made in the first place, then that the captain would publicly admit to it, and finally that HAL would offer compensation is also amazing.  I am guessing the fact the captain admitted to the mistake is what drove the compensation.  I am speculating that only people who complained actually got that letter offering FCC.

17 hours ago, clo said:

And a generic Nautica brochure.

Wasn't the Nautica brochure customized for you?  In February/March we were on a cruise on Marina.  The brochure we received had our names on it on several pages.  For the page about our accommodations it showed a photo and other information about our Oceania Suite including the room number for our suite.  We were highly impressed by the brochure....just like the ones on pre-covid cruises.

1 hour ago, Skicruiser55 said:

Can the sparkling wine that you get with a Neptune Suite be exchanged for a regular bottle of wine?  I can’t remember if we did that last time.  

Absolutely.  We stay in the PS, where HAL gives a bottle of real champagne.  On one cruise, in addition to HAL's bottle of champagne, our TA gave us a bottle of sparkling wine.  We drank the champagne, but asked the Neptune Lounge concierge and they were happy to exchange the sparkling wine for a bottle of wine.  I didn't actually look up prices, but just asked for a bottle of red wine...I assume it was less than the value of the sparking wine, but don't know for sure.

I was pretty shocked when I happened to read this thread.  Having to upload bank statements does seem crazy.  So I then investigated what the US requires of foreign visitors.  Indeed, unless you are from about 50 visa-waiver countries, you also have to produce bank statements to visit the US.

Obviously, if I needed to do this to visit a foreign country, I would black out the account numbers.  So it would seem the risk of fraud is pretty low...unless I am missing something.  It is good that at least NCLH is providing a way for its passengers to avoid having to do this.  Anyone who can afford to take a cruise to South America certainly has more than a few thousand dollars in their bank account.

A few years ago on a HAL cruise, we had a Reba McEntire impersonator as a guest singer.  Not only did she sing Reba's songs, but she looked, acted, and sounded like Reba.  It was one of the most memorable performances we have seen on HAL ships over our many cruises.

We have not been on Riviera since before the refurb, but I can tell you about the Oceania suite on Marina.  This was right before its upcoming refurb a few weeks ago, so things could be different on Riviera.  The media room in the suite did not have any games.  You could watch many on-demand movies built into the TV's GUI.  I tried to plug my laptop into the TV's HDMI port but was unsuccessful.  You can read about that attempt here:

I think it is only NS & PS that have umbrellas on all ships, but they may be on lower suites/cabins too on some ships.  We have had them on every cruise in the top suites.

We bring along one folding umbrella plus a couple of the cheap disposable plastic ponchos you can slip in your backpack to use for an unexpected rainstorm.  But on a recent cruise to Scotland, we had heavy rain on two port days and we took along the huge orange HAL umbrellas from our suite and we were thankful to have them.  They are good quality and held up fine in heavy wind.

2 hours ago, babysteps said:

Most ports I'm assuming this is waay more expensive than DIY, but if you have SM credit and hate group tours, it might make sense for some folks in some situations.

 

If you're traveling with a group a mini-bus might not be a bad price pp option, but it would still mostly make sense ONLY if you had SM to burn. Note that only 1 person reserves the private car, so only 1 person's SM can be applied.

In most ports, if you have 10-12 people the mini-bus is very competitive with any local tour company; $170 PP with 10 people.  Remember it is for a full 8 1/2 hour day and includes your driver plus a private guide and you can customize the itinerary to see anything you want to see in the port or nearby.  Of course, I agree the 2 person private car is very expensive PP. 

We had originally booked a cruise on another line for this summer to the Middle East and we had reserved a private van for just our family of 4 to see the pyramids from Alexandria.  It was similarly priced to the O private van but we felt is was worth it due to the long distance and security concerns.  Unfortunately that cruise was cancelled due to events in the region.

FYI...we experienced this on a cruise in 2023.  I will mention that those in a suite (NS & PS) were given priority and could come to the World Stage whenever they wanted to.  I don't remember if this applied to Club Orange also, like it does for tendering.

1 hour ago, Bolt. said:

Could you let me know how you find out whether you are docking or tendering at each port? I'm on the Zaandam in May, and I wish I knew which ports would be done which way.

All you have to do is look at your cruise's itinerary on the Holland America website and it will clearly say tender required.  If it does not say anything then it is a normal docking port.  For example, I just pulled up a random cruise:

That is surprising for HAL to be tendering in Ketchikan, but with 6 ships there, some ships will have to do it.  If I remember there is space for only about 3 ships. 

However, with CO there should be no problem getting off the ship.  There will be no need to get a tender ticket.  You will just get in line at the stairs down to the tender deck by showing your CO room key card.  You still may have to wait for the next tender, but you will not have to wait until all HAL tours have left.  Now getting back on the ship could take a while since there is no priority for return...on a couple recent cruises we had to wait nearly an hour in line to get back, but this was not at Ketchikan so hopefully it will go quickly.

Can someone refresh my memory on how far in advance you can book flights through Flight Ease?  I seem to remember something like 330 days before the disembarkation date for the cruise, but I would like the exact number.  When I try to book through Flight Ease, I get the infamous error message:  "We are unable to process your request. Please try again later or call us at the number listed on the page for assistance."  I have seen this many times in the past, for just about any problem, but I would like to know if I am trying to book too early or if something else is wrong.

We were recently on a tour in Puerto Chacabuco that we booked directly with a private tour company for $150 pp and there was no advance deposit required.  At lunch, the tour guide came up to us and asked for their fee and we gave them the money.  We then found out that everyone else at our lunch table had booked the tour through Viator instead of booking direct like we did.  They paid $200 pp plus they had to pay Viator in advance.  Needless to say, they were not happy with themselves for overpaying for the same tour. 

My point is to make sure Viator is really providing some value over what you can get by booking directly with a private tour company.  We have never used them, but I understand that in some cases, they may have a better cancellation policy than the tour company and they provide some protection in case the tour company goes out of business.  But in the case I described, it provided the Viator customer absolutely no extra value and just cost them more money.

23 hours ago, kathynorth said:

I was wearing an apple watch and I clocked in 16,000 steps while riding in the vehicle on the way to Volunteer Point.

That's funny!  It was quite a bumpy ride, but no worse then most amusement park rides, although much longer.  I would also highly recommend Patrick Watts tours which we used last month.  It was a very memorable experience, and much cheaper than the cruise ship's tour.

We were very disappointed about this on a recent cruise on Marina.  We were in an Oceania Suite and also just had two small and low tables on the balcony.  We asked our butler and he said they don't have bigger tables anymore.  This was our first post-covid cruise on O.  In pre-covid times, there was always a big table on the balcony in the top suites.  Some photos on the O website still show dining tables on the balcony, so it may be that just Marina no longer has them.

2 hours ago, sciencewonk said:

On Noordam, you also get breakfast in the Pinnacle Grill every morning.  It was one of our favorite activities on our recent cruises.

No that is not correct.  The breakfast in the Pinnacle Grill is only for those in the NS/PS suites.  If you are not in these suites and paid to upgrade to CO, you will not be able to eat breakfast in the Pinnacle Grill. 

The only exception might be sea days where they change times when it is most convenient.  For example, If you have a late night in port and the next day is a sea day in an earlier time zone, they might wait one day before changing the ship time to allow passengers to sleep in.  We have had that happen a couple times.  But on a port day, the ship time will absolutely always match the port's time.

@CafeBruno I think what you are looking for is very reasonable.  We are in a similar situation, that when we book a cruise we know exactly what we want and the only reason we use a TA is for the discount/rebate we get from them.  We always book the top suites on our cruises, so the TA gets a much bigger commission from the cruise line than someone who books an inside cabin for no more work than their booking, so we think we should get a large discount/rebate.  Like you, we have had trouble finding ones that meet all three of your criteria and we have changed TAs several times and now use a couple different TAs based on the best discount they can give us for that specific cruise.  The only point I would quibble about is your expectation of a 10% discount.  We have looked around a lot and have not found that recently.  8% or so used to be pretty common and one time we got a 9+% discount, but post-covid the best we can find is a 6-7% discount.

7 hours ago, cbr663 said:

You don't get access to all CO benefits.  Neptune and Pinnacle cabins do not get the complimentary free upgrade or the special onboard event.  

It is true that NS and PS don't get the free upgrade but you are already in one of the top suites, but there is always a special cocktail party in the Neptune Lounge or somewhere else just for NS/PS.

And obviously, NS/PS suites get other perks that are not available to non-suite CO guests.

I'm a big person, although I wouldn't say huge, and the normal robes fit fine.  This thread talks about requesting XXL robes from your cabin stewards, but I have never done this myself:

Glad it all worked out with what sounds to be a pretty satisfactory conclusion.  Actually to me, a 1.25 hour call sounds very reasonable for what is a pretty complex transaction.  Hope you can go on another cruise soon.

If you plan to be out on your balcony a lot taking in the sights, I would strongly recommend the aft-wrap NS.  You will have a 270 degree view from there.  You didn't say where you were going, but if it is a cold weather cruise, it will be a lot warmer sitting out facing the rear of the ship versus the sides due to a lot less wind.