Calif. Cruisers

Here is what it looks like (a different cabin but similar)

https://www.cruisecritic.com/photos/ships/empress-of-the-seas-1103/ocean-view-cabin-283989/

We have sailed the Grand many times, as we live in the Bay Area. It would be nice if ships could rotate around more between ports so we could enjoy some of the other ships. We like the Grand, but also enjoyed the Royal when we took it a few years back. We have also enjoyed many of the other ships in the fleet, so I wouldn't mind having them rotate every few years.

We have used Hoonah Whale Tours twice and highly recommend it! We couldn't have had a better trip. Bubble net feeding multiple times, humpback whales swimming right in front of us. We got the best photos, and memories of a lifetime.

Hoonah Whale Tours is the best- we have used them twice and will go back again we are sure. They are a different company than Hoonah Travel Adventures, so make sure you book the right one.

Hoonah Whale Tours is run by a young couple, Jordan and his family have been fishing for many years in Hoonah. His wife is lovely, and they have young children. They recently built a new home in Hoonah.

Best of all- the whale watching was fabulous!!! We saw bubble net feeding multiple times, and have the most fabulous memories and photos. Jordan does a great job getting you to the whales and positioning you so you have great views. The three hour tour is very satisfying and much better than the 2-hour ship tours.

A better coffee bar - frappuccino type drinks that are much better (in line with Starbucks, etc.) The current ones aren't worth paying for in general.

A coffee card program like Princess

I am willing to pay for a good coffee drink (after all, I do at home too) but NCL doesn't do a good job of this yet. (At least on the older ships)

We deposited our cabin as a Guaranteed Oceanview, used points to upgrade to a Balcony, and still got an upgrade offer. The Mini-Suite bid started at $50 pp minimum, the other categories started at $500 pp minimum. We are happy with our balcony but I put in a $50 bid just for fun. Not expecting anything. We are booked with a Travel Agent but we were able to submit the bid ourselves.

Finally got this straightened out by calling back and asking for a supervisor. This is something that some employees do not understand, and others do- so keep pursuing if the first person you talk to doesn't seem to understand.

You CAN upgrade from OX to BX.

Initially I was told we couldn't upgrade because they had assigned us a cabin already, so 'had already been upgraded', so I asked them to move me back to guaranteed. They then said I can't be upgraded. There are 'Guarantee Balconies' available.

Just want to be sure I am not getting an inexperienced employee, who doesn't know what they are talking about. I have made several calls and at one point was told that their 'supervisor' would call my travel agent to handle this. Never happened. We had to call them back.

So Guaranteed is not a category? Does it actually say this somewhere, that you can't upgrade from a guarantee cabin?

I will just keep watching the cruise, and maybe the cabin prices in other outside 'categories' will go down before final payment (they already have fluctuated up and then back down in the past month.) I am fine with where we are actually but thought since we had the points we might as well use them for the upgrade.

Has anyone ever booked a guaranteed cabin and used the 30,000 points to upgrade? We are being told that we cannot upgrade from an Oceanview Guarantee to a Balcony Guarantee. We would have to pay for an assigned Oceanview cabin to upgrade to a Balcony at a cost of $1800 to us PLUS the 30,000 points. Does this sound right?

Is there a way to 'pre-order' the diffuser scent they put in your room? What are the options?

Yes, I have decided to sell my stock also, after being turned down for my upcoming cruise. I always get my shareholder benefit from Carnival, no matter what price I pay for cruise (we usually sail Princess as we are in San Francisco area.) I will happily take the profits I have made, however, holding on to it all these years.

I would buy a coffee card too- and always put this on my surveys at the end of cruising. They would probably need to make a more specialized bar to serve coffee drinks though if they do this, as they'd probably get more coffee business. Right now, the atrium bars make these specialized coffees but also serve all alcoholic beverages/sodas for everyone in that area also. Often when I am walking around with my coffee drinks (blended ones like 'frappucinos'), people ask me where I got it.

Does anybody know if the NCL Pearl has the Thermal spa package available. I don't see any spa info listed to book.

Yes, I pre-purchased 2 passes for my Sept. cruise on the Pearl

Does anyone have experience with 3 Latitude members in a cabin? I know we will get 3 certificates for dinner for 2. Since we won't be inviting someone else to dine with us, has anyone ever managed to 'split' one certificate over two dinners?

I received an email to prepay my gratuities and it said I had to pay before final payment- but the final payment date had already passed!

It is a good idea to contact the zipline company directly. One time we did not sign up our son due to the limitations but when we got there they said they would have taken him, so now I always email ahead of booking and let them know his height and weight (and they have pre-approved him ahead of time.)

Too bad they didn't schedule an LA to Portland cruise- would have been fun to sail in to Portland (I did this about 20 years ago on the Windward.)

Where did you park for the length of the BVE?

Our adult son slept on the sofa. We were going to add the egg crate topper but he didn't end up needing it. It was more comfortable than other ship's sofas.

We did the last Cruisetour of the season a few years ago. The Tundra Tour was not offered (even though we signed up for it ahead of time.) Please note that this can happen on these end of the season trips as the road is opened up to locals to drive on, so the buses don't take the tours out.

We signed up for the evening wake-up call for the Northern Lights on the first night in Denali. The lights were out the second night but we didn't get the wake up call (don't know if we needed to sign up each night, or if it just didn't work- Bummer!)

We had an absolutely fabulous time otherwise, and can't wait to do this tour again. We did Anchorage (1 night), McKinley (1 night), Denali (2 nights) and train to Whittier.

There appears to be some parking right outside the terminal. Is that only for dropping off passengers, is there a time limit? Obviously wouldn't be doing long term parking there, but could someone on the Bon Voyage Experience park there?

We went to the spa drawing and they offered a visit to the enclave if you purchased a massage for that day. We didn't think the enclave was worth paying for. We agree that the beds were not warm, and the pool was just so-so.

They didn't offer any scrapbooking on the Royal last week. The closest they got to any type of a craft activity for adults was inviting crafters and knitters to meet.

We were on the Sapphire in a Mini-Suite with the two new TVs installed. We were sharing the cabin with our son. We had to laugh at the dueling TV remotes. The remote from one TV would affect the other. We could change channels or the volume on the other TV. While it isn't really optimal to have both TVs going with different programs, sometimes we would be watching the bridge cam while he was watching a show, etc. The only solution was to point our remote towards the cabin door instead of at the TV. Nice big sets though!