sanger727

Just an option to consider if you don't want to shift to 2024/2025. We took a land trip to japan through an organized tour company and really enjoyed it. This also gives you the ability to try many of the local traveling options like bullet trains, bento boxes, and luggae forwarding services. Japan is an extremely safe, clean, and developed country. we wouldn't hesitate to travel there on our own in the future.

The only trouble I had with customs in New zealand was with a wooden boomerang that I purchased in Australia. Apparently wooden items are only allowed in if you have them treated with a pesticide at customs. That cost was more than I spent on the boomerang so we threw it away. No issues with packaged food or meds.

I usually bring a paperback for beach excursions. All the reasons you mentioned: sand, water, and theft. While a used kindle may have little value, that doesn't take the bite of out of the fact that i would have to buy a new one.

Yes, without a question; This condo won't appreciate or have the security a normal home would. I'm not sure why the ship won't be maintained or insured like a normal condo would be. Are you suggesting that cruise ships don't have insurance?

The 4 million is for a home at sea; not an extended vacation. In many home markets $4 million is not crazy over the top. And clearly you would not make this purchase if it was a financial strain, this would be more like if you had $10 million and decided to sell your $3 million home and move to your new condo at sea.

not true. We dealt with this on American Airlines a couple years ago. They cancelled our flight and had no alternatives until the next day. We managed to get on the last seat of a delta flight leaving that day. Had no issues taking our American Airlines return flight. obviously if they cancelled you, it’s not the same as a ‘no show’; you can choose to not rebook with them.

Choosing to overspend on this because ‘you can afford it’; sounds generous in the moment - but it can have unintended consequences. For example, when we were on safari in the Serengeti, we saw many teenagers dressed up in tribal costumes standing on the side of the roads. Our guide told us they wanted tourists to pay them for photos. He advised us against it - the younger generations were choosing to stand on the side of the road looking for a handout instead of farming or going to school. I fully support shopping local in developing countries- but at the point that you are giving away money, it’s better to make a donation to a charitable organization.

Generally speaking, there's no way to know ahead of time if a food contains bacteria or has been contaminated by a virus. So, not sure where to really go with this question. I've had lettuce at my local kroger that was recalled for bacterial contamination. What I avoid in general is any uncooked meat. I suspect there is more risk of contamination, plus since I don't eat I'm not sure it would sit well. I've never tried carpaccio because a family member has tried it a couple times at perfectly safe establishments and found it really disagreed with her system. We also were out for a day once after a family member ate and exceptionally spicy dish. We were in Asia and it was much spicier than we are used to. She likes spicy foods so decided to try it. She had an upset stomach for a couple days after that.

1 hour would be plenty for an email or to check in for a flight. Hopefully it’s quite a bit less than 24 hours. by the minute is a great deal when it’s available. You can actually do quite a bit in 10-15 minutes

cruises are never the best way to hit a specific port. And things are unpredictable. We went to Peru and Machu Picchu in 2021, in 2022 it was inaccessible due to riots. No one, including celebrity can predict what may happen. But if this is your can’t miss spot; better to be on a land tour there that gets cancelled. Celebrity won’t cancel the cruise over it.

I haven’t done it on celebrity, but usually wifi is available per minute also. If you just want to check an email or text, per minute would be a much better deal than a 24 hour rate.

I agree w @jsglow that you won’t be offered an upgrade either way; many people celebrate special events on a cruise. I usually won’t book w a TA unless there is a pretty decent cost benefit. I’ve had good TAs, neutral, and a really bad one. A few dollars in OBC isn’t work the risk of a really bad one. If you book direct you can’t work out any price drops or issues directly with the cruise line.

All that matters to the PVSA is where YOU ultimately board and where YOU ultimately disembark. When you do b2b on one ship it’s considered one cruise. As long as you board or disembark outside the US, no issues.

I wouldn’t think twice about getting off in Cozumel. It’s an island, not a big cartel area. Progresso is in the Yucatán which the state department doesn’t have any alerts for. I wouldn’t worry about either of those ports

We have robot "servers" at one of our local restaurants. For now it's a gimmick rather than a serious means to replace servers. They are essentially a roomba with a shelf on top that goes to the correct table and says "please take your food". They can't take orders, can't ask if you need anything else, rely on a person to load them up with food. There is a very long way to go before robots could replace the hospitality side. But, for now they are a fun novelty.

there are certainly cruise lines that don’t have the casinos, shops, and beauty parlors. But they tend to be small ships since it is a smaller customer base. So they also don’t have the libraries, bridge tables, shuffleboards, and religious areas.

This sounds a bit like goat yoga. Pictures look great and sounds like they are fun and adorable. And they are, but it was really just yoga in a room where the goats were constantly peeing and pooping.

Perhaps the cruise line just realized that people who enjoy reading in 2023 are most likely using a kindle/tablet so the need to have a space for ratty used books is no longer needed. It's no secret that mainstream cruise lines maximize revenue space to keep prices down. It's a fair trade off. I've been on two small ship cruises. Once was a river cruise with 20 rooms. The other was a large yacht with 10 rooms. Sorry to say that they both still had a bar with free flowing drinks. I don't believe either had a "library", there may have been a bookshelf with loaners. And the cruises came at a heft price tag. they were also the most casual cruises I've ever been on. There was no requirement to dress up for dinner. The only request was to not show up to the dining room barefoot.

I can't think of any explanation for what you experienced. I've never been charged more by a TA than a cruise line for the same product. TA's could afford to be stingy back when you went into an office and looked at the "brochure" rates. But in today's price transparency, I would think that any TA consistently charging more than the cruise line would go out of business.

Keep in mind that the default is people paying the daily gratuity. The staff probably doesn't know and certainly doesn't care whether that gets paid before your trip or added to your room charges. What they would care about is if you remove that. Prepaying is just a convenience item for you.

I've had really good luck with BBB complaints on bad business practices. Once Hertz sold us an upgrade on a vehicle rental. When I went to return it they wanted to charge more than the agreed upon price. I had the receipt with the price quote on it with me, but there was no supervisor around to fix it before we got on our flight. Contact hertz direclty got me nothing. But after the BBB complaint they credited my CC back the difference. I also had a completely non-responsive TA. I called him and e-mailed him several times and never received a call back. I call the main number to ask if someone else could help me and she did briefly, but realized he booked us in the incorrect room category and send us back to him to fix it. Again, never received a call back or got him to pick up the phone. Finally a BBB complaint got the lady from the main phone number to assist us in fixing our booking and finalizing our payment.

I took a trip to Tanzania in 2016. My job does swearing in ceremonies for promotion. On the day that I left for my trip I was notified that I was going to be promoted and that the ceremony was scheduled for the first day after I got back. That was a 48 travel day - we started in a bush camp in the serengenti, went to the main city, went to the capital city, had to route through Europe coming back. That was a rough first day back to work 🙄

I use expedia often for bundling. Yeah, it won't work well if you want to pay with points but just to save money on a booking, it's usually a better deal. I've also found really competitive rates for hotels on booking.com. They don't do airfare but they have alot of rates where you don't pay until a day or two before you trip. I always a bring a print out of my confirmation that includes the room rate and anything includes (breakfast or lounges). I've never had a hotel deny anything that I have documented.

that may be. I can’t relate to those people. And what I’ve seen people on the board post about is generally financially responsible. If people are willing to overpay for convenience, so be it. When I graduated college I read ‘the million dollar homeowner next door’ and really related to it. My family has a decent chunk of money and it wasn’t made by overspending. Personally, I spent $100 on a coffee/espresso maker and get Starbucks once in a blue moon when I have a gift card. I’m the person that has a million in the bank but still complains when my cable company raises my bill by $30.

I've never had any trip where I turned around and wanted to do it all again with everything the same. The whole point of traveling is to experience new things. Even if I return to a place I've been before I would stay at a different hotel and see different things there.