20165

thanks for the responses, but i saw two answers to my question. One they give you coupons to get the wine at any bar or restaurant and another said they deliver it to the cabin. Does anyone know which one it is or possibly both are options?

thanks

Need some help with my memory. When we were on Epic a couple years ago and ordered the wine package, i believe all of the bottles were sent to our room that first night? Is that still the case? I think on RCL they would get them for you when you were at the restaurants but i may be getting the two mixed up.

thx

do it while we can. There was a news article on TV last week, stating that Carnival will be disallowing water-bottles to be carried on their ships by passengers. Why, because people were smuggling booze in the water bottles.

 

OH MY.

I kinda understand that. We were on carnival dream a couple years ago and people were bragging on how much booze they smuggled on where when we were on Epic, we didnt hear those comments. Maybe the UBP reduces the need/want to do that.

thanks for everyones help with this and we'll give it a try this saturday. Ill let you know if we get sent to the 'naughty' room. Not big deal though, the bag will only have water in it so we'll get to it when we get to it...

thanks again.

Last time I sailed NCL I spent sail-away in the naughty room picking up my luggage because I had packed water bottles in my suitcase. It was not a good start to the cruise and I'll never put water bottles in my luggage again.

Did they say why because i was more concerned about the packaging, not the fact that it wasnt allowed. I havent seen anything on NCLs website forbidding bottled water.

You really are not limited...no one is counting! However, they do want the baggage folks to be able to lift your bags...so don't make them too heavy!

 

If you can put your beverages into a suitcase, then that works better...they like handles!

 

Frankly, the ship's water is fine and included...you will never go thirsty and really don't need to lug a case of water!!!

Good, its been about 2 years since our last cruise, and i never saw them counting bags. Wondering if that was a new thing or something.

Yes, i wasnt thinking this morning. We are going to pack a duffle bag to put the water in. Sounds much easier than trying to make the case the water comes in porter proof...

Thanks for the info.

I think it's 2 - 50 lb. bags pp...In the past we would take a case of water and a case of Coke (pepsi products on board) tape them together and drop them with the porter...No problems

Wow, i didnt realize there was a restriction on how many bags you can bring on. And a weight limit too. Im actually allowed to go up to 75lbs on the airline i use...

I know this question has been asked/answered, but it seems problematic to me so i wanted to make sure I can really do this. I have carried water on board, but never put a luggage tag on it and given it to the porters. However i would love to because we have a lot of other stuff to carry on so my question is has anyone ever had an issue doing this? Seems like it could be an issue given the way they stack that luggage up in those carts, not to mention the whole package coming apart given some aren't packaged real well. Of course we will pick a case with good packaging, but it still seems like it would come apart given how they handle loading luggage on the ship.

We sale getaway next week out of miami.

thoughts?

thx

Yes people, Colin has spoken, there no need to continue using CC, he will answer everything with a concise link as to where to find the answer.

love it. And yes, its a chat board Colin so people, believe it not, tend to chat...

I agree with this. The ship will have the same number of people on it during "high season" as it does during "low season". The cruise lines adjust pricing to make sure they are at 100% or more capacity (they get to higher than 100% by having an average of more than two guests per stateroom). On one of the Travel Channel's shows about cruising they stated that the goal was to have the ship booked at 110% of capacity.

 

[/size][/font]

I dont know if thats totally accurate. For example, a cruise during the holidays or when school is out will have more kids on it meaning more passengers per cabin so you may have an average of 2 people per cabin during non peek season and possibly 4 people per cabin during peek season.

There is a liquor store after you clear security. Bottles bought there can be carried on if that helps.

The question is can anyone recommend a st thomas liquor store that ships back to the US?

Guys,

 

I am all good. I got the info I needed. Appreciate all your help.

Have a nice weekend😃

i think Planefixer thinks they are going to stop the responses... Funny.

Anyhoo, has anyone ever done this and if so, what store did they use? Im not looking to save any money here, but even if it turned out to be a bit more expensive, there are some liquors we saw there that we cannot get in the US, or at least not our immediate area. So it would be great to have them shipped back rather than have to pack it in our checked bag and hope it doesnt break on the flight home.

thx

Oh thank you!!! I've never used it, wanting to on our upcoming Miami trip. But never had the opportunity to really use it, its illegal in our town. I am thrilled to try it!!

 

But are they allowed to drop off in the port? Like if I need a taxi from downtown to POM are they allowed to do that?

There may be restrictions on picking up at POM or MIA, but im pretty sure there are no restriction on where they can drop you off. Plus if i remember POM correctly, there is no security you go through to drop off passengers and luggage. If you park, thats different, but i dont remember going through any gates to drop off my luggage.

I am a uber xl driver i have a yukon xl most have mini vans etc

 

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk

Perfect, thank you. Either of those options would work for us.

We would like to try uber xl from our hotel in miami to the port and wanted to see if anyone has used the xl service and what kind of car we can expect? We are a family of 4 and have way too much luggage to fit into a regular car/cab and was wondering if a full sized suv or similar is the norm in the miami area?

thanks

Warning, do no book cabins without at least 1 adult in them if you plan on booking any type of shore excursions, shows, gifts, etc prior to the cruise. This has been a total nightmare. Let me tell you, and remind myself in the future when i book another cruise next year and i go back and read this what a nightmare this has been.

To recap, you cant book anything online for the cabin with no adults. Ok we understand that so we call to book some shore excursions, shows, dinners, etc. Heres how it goes down each time you call. Our first mistake was not booking everything all at once and calling multiple times.

Recap.

10-15 minutes explaining to the NCL rep why we booked the cabin that way. Even through they, NCL travel agent, told us to.

15-20 minutes waiting for the NCL rep to book whatever we are trying to book at that time. Long pause, then they come back and tell us they cant book anything for the kids cabin either.

15-20 minutes convincing the rep that they need to get a supervisor to override whatever they need to to book the excursion. Finally found out that the secret was they change the birth date, book whatever we are trying to book at that time, then change it back.

10-15 minutes for the supervisor to actually do the change.

Result is about an hour on the phone with ncl and a lot of pain. We had one rep that said there was no way to do this and we need to cancel our reservations and rebook, possibly loosing our connecting cabins. We would actually be ok doing that and loosing the UDP if we were guaranteed not to loose the cabins because this has been such a nightmare. and to make things worse, we are traveling with a larger group so when they decide to book a dinner, show, etc, we get to do the phone thing again, see above timeline...

So moral to the story and future note to self, never book this way again if you plan on booking any pre cruise activities. Ugg

i will say, the timing of charging for room service and not being allowed to take food plates back to your room is not good, or at least to me, makes it look like they are trying to bolster room service charges. Although they are nominal. However, whoever is running their marketing department may want to rethink some of these policy rollouts or at least space them out a bit.

From USAToday article

The new policy comes the same month that Norwegian has implemented an extra charge for room service for all items except for morning coffee and Continental breakfast. Room service long had been free at the line, except late at night.

We are on the Getaway next month out of Miami and i wanted to find out if anyone knows the earliest time we can drop off our luggage at the port? We are traveling with a group of about 14 people and would like to drop everyone's luggage off early in the morning and tour around Miami for a couple hours.

thanks

I promise you, not doing the online check in was no big deal, we had zero issues; even not having luggage tags, etc. The porters helped us out, the check in NCL people had no issue, I can't imagine it being any different if we had done online check in. I was still able to book things, etc. beforehand

I do agree that the port check in shouldn't be a big deal, however, we are now finding we cannot book an excursions or make dinner reservations online for the cabin that has the kids only in it. Get an error saying that one person must be 18 yo to book shore excursions or dinner reservations. Ugg. We are back to one adult in each cabin next time regardless of the promotions...

thx

So, we received the email given we are now 60 days out, and signed it meaning we replied to the email as stated in their email accepting responsibility for the cabin. However, we are still not able to check their cabin in online. We also received acknowledgement that they did receive our email. I know some of the posts above say you cant checkin until you get to the terminal, but 1 said they did so im wondering if anyone else has been able to check in online once they 'signed' that document?

thanks

bump

So, we received the email given we are now 60 days out, and signed it meaning we replied to the email as stated in their email accepting responsibility for the cabin. However, we are still not able to check their cabin in online. We also received acknowledgement that they did receive our email. I know some of the posts above say you cant checkin until you get to the terminal, but 1 said they did so im wondering if anyone else has been able to check in online once they 'signed' that document?

thanks

thanks everyone for the responses. Sounds like its not that uncommon which was my main concern. Trying to make this a seamless as possible... Also, i didnt mention that the cabins are connecting and that seemed to be a requirement as well so i think we are all set.

Thanks again

We usually book 2 cabins for our cruises, one for us, one for our kids, both kids under 18. The configuration we have booked in the past was one of us, adults, in each cabin with 1 kid. However, the current cruise we booked over the summer through NCL, they recommended that we book the kids in one cabin and us, the adults, in the other. They said there was a better promotion for doing that as well as the fact that all of our room keys would match our cabins meaning we wouldn't have to get the kids a separate keys for their cabin when we get on the ship. Ok, all good so far.

However, we are now 3 months out from the cruise when when i went to make my final payment on both cabins, i found that they way they booked the kids cabins was to change one of their b-days to make him 21. They said that once i paid, i would be able to change that which is true, i can change it online now that i made my final payment, however, i cannot accept the final contract in online checkin because he is under 18 so i cant complete the online checkin.

So, NCL now tells me that we need to sign some forms that say that we, the adult cabin, takes responsibility for the kids cabin, however, we cant do that until we are 60 days out. We are concerned we are going to continue to have issues and were wondering if anyone else has had this experience and how it turned out?

Now, the obvious quick answer is to just put 1 adult in each cabin like we always did, and when trying that, they said that since we are past all of the promotion timlines that we originally booked under, we would loose them up with turns out to be $1-2k of promotions.

Any past experience info on a situation like this would be greatly appreciated.

thx

Good news is you now have it straightened out, so all should go smoothly! :)

Im sure we will. Never had an issue with NCL, although booking through them this time was a little less seamless than i remember. Other than that, we're excited. Also, i see your in statesville. We are in Greensboro. Small cruising world...

thx

thank you for the reply and im glad i asked. wasnt on the reservation and had to call ncl and speak to two different people to get it resolved. Not sure why so difficult, its all over their website and im working directly with NCL. Frustrating...

Thanks again