Lucinarei

Just talked to my husband on board- he said the itinerary for the day indicates a 4:30 departure from OR today. He says they also offered excursions in Jamaica today.

52 minutes ago, Knights on the Beach said:

 

Are you still docked in Ocho Rios? Have they given you any info yet?

According to Marine Traffic, they are still docked in OR. I haven’t heard from my husband on board yet to see if they have any updates on itinerary or ship assessment.

Just got the word that my husband is back on board, so things seem to finally be moving. According to the update that was recently sent out, they are docking overnight in OR and GC is canceled. 

My husband is on that cruise and is currently at the port in OR. The captain is attempting to line up the ship at a dock recently vacated by a Costa ship. Fingers crossed that they will be successful and everyone can get back on board without incident. 

On 4/10/2022 at 11:29 AM, Candy Apple 12 said:

Who do we speak to about arranging a meal of Indian food in the Haven?

When we were in the Haven in February, we spoke to the Haven Restaurant Manager and she had an Indian meal prepared for me in the MDR (she was very specific about us having to go to the MDR for it, not the Haven Restaurant). I told what night I wanted it and she made the arrangements, including a reservation (not that we needed one). We gave her a day of notice (spoke to her at dinner on Monday about dinner on Tuesday). I'm sure the concierge could also help you.

2 hours ago, susiesan said:

You and always cancel now, keep your air and hotel reservations in place and then  rebook closer to sail date if you decide to go. But you woild likely lose the 20% discount unless NCL substantially lowers the price for new bookings. All Baltic cruises this year will be very lightly booked. 

This is what I did for our July 2 Dawn Baltic cruise. It was just too unpredictable for me with a March 4th final payment date, so we canceled the cruise, but are keeping flights and hotels in place for the moment.

The price of the cruise has shot way up since we booked ($2k more for the same room), though, so I'm thinking this will likely turn into a land vacation for us.

2 hours ago, cdld10210 said:

If we don’t win an upgrade, do we receive some type of communication saying “sorry, but you’re a loser!”? 😂

For cruises I took in 2019, I did receive emails letting me know that my bids were not accepted. Don't know if they are still doing it.

44 minutes ago, 3bamboo said:

I'm sailing in the Haven on the Encore in a couple of weeks and am super excited at the thought of being able to request food and drinks to be brought to you while lounging on the Haven sun deck. 

 

Is this common or should I taper my expectations? Are there frequent roaming servers that can bring food and drinks?

We were on the Escape, so it may not apply, but there were at least two servers who roamed around the Haven sun deck every day taking drink and food orders. The snack menu was not extensive, but we found it perfect for lunch and always delicious.

11 hours ago, momofjohnjr said:

I wish I had known there was a pool menu when I went. We would have totally tried the falafel. Hope the next time it's there. 

I ate the falafel every day for lunch- it was absolutely delicious! 

On 2/11/2022 at 9:02 PM, Crazy planning mom said:

Can you post your sail date, ship name, and approximate passenger count?

According to a few of the bartenders, crew on the 2/19 Escape sailing were told to expect fewer than 1600. There were no lines for anything and lots of open tables in the specialties. It was not hard to find loungers by the pool whenever we went. It was lovely to experience, but I hope it doesn't last too long.

On 3/1/2022 at 11:46 AM, Lionkingrichard said:

If you like the fruity rum drinks(who doesn't) then tell them to add a double of Zacapa 23 rum. They will look at you funny until they see your card. After the first day my wife was a pro asking for 23!

Ahhh... the Zacapa 23 was delicious! I was drinking it by itself by the end of the cruise... so good! Definitely one of the best parts of the P+. The cappuccinos after dinner every night were also wonderful!

11 hours ago, bmwnurse said:

Was it worth it? 
Definitely for us, for the experience. We had free range to try everything without having to sign a receipt at the end. The access to sparkling water without a fee each time kept us well hydrated. I don’t imagine we’ll be able to go back to the regular drink package again. 
 

This exactly. We just got off the Escape and upgraded the drink package for the first time. There were some issues with getting the wines we wanted (mostly the whites), but the ability to drink whatever we wanted and try all of the whiskeys made it plenty worth it to us. I drank Veuve and Moet until I could drink no more- it was really wonderful to not worry about keeping under the $15 per glass. I also very much enjoyed the fresh juices in the morning and the San Pellegrino at dinner. I really can't see ever going back. 🙂

Thank you for updating us and I'm so glad the situation was resolved while you were still on board to enjoy! We're on the Escape Saturday and upgraded to the Prem+ package for the first time.

DH and I decided to upgrade to the Prem+ package for our cruise next week. I noticed that it says it includes sports drinks- where do we get these? Are they available at bars or elsewhere? Thanks for the help- I'm excited to live the "Plus Life."  😃

1 hour ago, kenzie said:

I am in a club balcony for Mexican riviera 6 March and bidding for the 2 bed starts at $1200pp, wonder why there is such a huge difference? None of the bidding for any haven is as low as your bid here, I cannot fathom it out why the bidding is so high for my cruise 

It started out as $1600/p minimum bid but went down to $650/p a few weeks ago. There was a little red notice next to it that indicated it was a special price that would expire on Feb 17th. That happened again a few days later for the Haven Aft Balcony room, which went down to $450/p (I don't remember the original minimum). We actually put a larger bid in for that one, since the minimum was so low... but I guess the 2-bed was in the cards.

Just got the notice about an hour ago that we won our upgrade bid for our 2/19 Escape cruise. We went from Club Balcony Suite (MA) to Haven 2-Bedroom Family Villa with Balcony (H6) for $750pp- which was not much over minimum bid (I think minimum was $650/p) and well within the 'poor' designation. VERY excited to try out the Haven, although the 2-bedroom is WAY more space than we need (just two of us). But we'll enjoy it!

1 hour ago, RBrowny said:

Hi, this is my first post so sorry if I have missed anything. I have the Gem booked for September, we had to go for an inside room - when can I bid on a window room or balcony, and what are the prices? I want to upgrade, but unsure how the process works. Thanks!

Usually shortly after final payment you'll get an email that invites you to upgrade. You'll also get a banner on your NCL account that gives you a link to upgrade.

Not all bookings are eligible to upgrade and I'm not sure if there are different rules/practices for those bookings made outside of the US. Good luck if you do get the email! 🙂

Edited to say: Welcome to Cruise Critic! 😁

45 minutes ago, sbaker said:

I'm new to NCL and new to this whole "bidding for an upgrade" process.  I received an upgrade offer email a few days ago for our cruise in May.  I followed the link in the email and made a bid.  We did get an email confirmation of the bid, but is there somewhere I can see the bid and its status when I log into the NCL website?  I've tried logging in to our trip details, but I can't see anywhere that has the bid informaiton.

When I click on the "Click here to get started" link on the upgrade page, it takes me to the page where I can bid on the upgrades available to me- the page with the sliders. I can also view my previous bids there- next to each of the available rooms for which I submitted a bid is a "Review Your Bid" link. If I click on that link, it takes me to a page where I can review and modify/cancel my bids. Hopefully that helps!

Just now, Rad60 said:

Thanks for replying! I had gotten to the page where I put in all my personal info so I'm guessing you keep going? I don't want to wind up booking lol!

It's before that. I definitely didn't enter any information. Once you choose the category, it should assign you a room. Once you see the room it has assigned, look for the teeny link that lets you choose a different room. That should let you in to see the rest of the available rooms in that category.

38 minutes ago, Rad60 said:

Where do you see rooms that are available on a sailing?  I started to do a booking but didn't see where you can see what rooms are left? the page I was on went to complete booking. Thanks!

The website has been updated since I last booked, so it took me a little while to figure it out. When I've gone in, when I get to the page where it has assigned me a stateroom, I click the link to see other available rooms. That lets me see the rest of the staterooms available in that particular category. I hope that helps!

5 minutes ago, mduffy1834 said:

thought you were responsible for pre-cruise covid tests now?  not sure when that takes effect.  For my May cruise, I will do test 2 days prior.

They extended the pre-embarkation pier testing through February 28 embarkation dates.

I sailed Sky back in July of 2019. She was great for our 4-day Bahamas cruise (we were supposed to go to Cuba... but that didn't work out). Not much to "do"- but it was perfect for relaxing. I do think she would start to feel small if the cruise was longer. However, if it was a longer port intensive cruise, she'd probably be great. 

I'm thinking back to that cruise now and it's funny to think that we got on the Breakaway two days after getting off of Sky... talk about a change of pace! 😄 

2 hours ago, Kclovesken said:

How much are the passes approx now? 

I booked a pass for my 2/19 Escape cruise and it was $199. I love the peace and quiet in the Thermal Suite and can easily spend a few hours in there most days of the cruise. No upselling of any kind- you are free to relax.

58 minutes ago, mertziek said:

We are sailing on Feb 19, too, and received our letter today.  We’re on the Joy.  What about you?  And like you we are sailing even if at sea for 7 days - in our case 14 days since doing a b2b - but we’ve also made backup plans just in case.  This would be backup plans to our backup plan B since the Feb 19 cruise is in place of a Jade cruise for early March we canceled due to concerns about getting quarantined in Europe.  We are vaxxed and boosted, will wear masks and bringing our own test kits onboard just in case.  Traveling should not be this tough but it is and we are going through the hoops required in order to travel again.  We’ve been stuck at home for 2 years and are soooo ready to travel again.

Escape for us. We're booked on a Baltic in July that I'm hoping goes off with as few hitches as possible. With all of the testing requirements, it's sure to be quite complicated, but still looking forward to traveling. We did a land trip to Ireland this past August because we just couldn't wait to travel and it was wonderful! Well worth all of the hoops! This will be our first cruise since Covid started, so fingers are double and triple crossed! We're also vaxxed and boosted, so here's hoping for more wonderful vacations! 🙂

We got our letter this morning for our 2/19 cruise. I saw it mentioned on the boards yesterday, so I figured it was coming. I know things are still fluid, but I'm glad that our cruise hasn't been cancelled (yet). Fingers crossed! DH and I said from the moment we booked that even if this ended up as a masked cruise to nowhere that we would go just to get away.