wgeo

Wasn't able to read anything on the RC forums yesterday, got in a for a few minutes today, but I'm back to the MYSQL errors again.

FWIW I booked Radiance Alaska for June 2019 back in August - got an incredible Black Friday sale and our OV room for the 4 of us dropped by around $1500.  So there's still lots of time for you to catch another sale.  Good luck

On 12/28/2018 at 12:28 AM, petuniaflower said:

Hoping someone has insight into these 2 itineraries..we know we will not be able to see everything on our first trip and are ok with that..

 

1) Seattle-Ketchikan-Juneau-scenic glacier cruising-Skagway-Victoria-Seattle

 

2) Seattle-inside passage cruising-Juneau-Skagway-Endicott glacier-Victoria-Seattle

 

I assume scenic glacier and inside passage just means cruising slowly to admire the scenery? 

We are taking a first cruise to Alaska with a 13 and 15 year old next summer.  For what it's worth I focused completely on the itinerary and what we wanted to do in each port.  Since the ships that sail in Alaska aren't quite as "exciting" for teens as the huge ships in the Caribeen it made sense to me that I wanted to focus more on Alaska and what we would be doing off the ship.  We ended up choosing a one way cruise because it had 4 port days and gave us more things to do.  I have also sat the kids down and talked about the kinds of things we can do in each port to help make plans - I am absolutely going into this trip with detailed plans for each of the 4 port days - this doesn't always mean "excursions" on 2 of the days we've actually chosen to do a car rental and go our own way because I think my teens would hate the tour bus pace of seeing things.  I am personally assuming that the scenic "seeing the glacier day" on the ship means that hubby and I will be in awe and taking a million pictures and the kids will be like "that's great mom" and then go off to the teen clubs or hanging out in the room.

I think you are totally right - there is too much to Alaska to see in one cruise/trip so whatever you end up doing will be awesome.  No matter what you pick, if you make good plans you'll end up having a great time.

I didn't link any reservations, but when I went to make the reservations for our MTD on an upcoming cruise, I was able to book dining together for us and my parents that had booked seperate from us.  All I needed to know was their confirmation number I believe to book them with us.

Seems like if you can book the summer before, when the offices are still open you may get a decent price.  But I tried booking at the end of September and coulnd't get anyone to make a reservation as the offices were all closed for season.  Just finally got them to reserve this week and the prices are higher.  Pretty crazy that you have to book things almost a year in advance to get a decent price.

I've just booked one day rentals for minivans in Juneau and Skagway - not happy with the price, but can't find any coupons that actually work in Alaska and Costco won't even price those cities for me.

I don't check very often - but I swear everytime I look the prices are the exact same - doesn't matter what the wording is - the deluxe drink package is $47, refreshment is $17 and soda is 9.99 (why can't they just say 10?)   Wish they would actually lower the refreshment or soda package - but I dont see it happening.

8 hours ago, cmich068 said:

I understand why said big box retailer doesn't accept Amex for transactions they process themselves, but never understood why they won't accept it for cruise payments that are processed by the cruise line directly. Should be irrelevant to them what the method of payment is. And I say that as someone that generally books cruises through them. 

Yeah me either, they are really just a pass through, but I'm sure it's in some language with their "exclusive" contract with the other cc they use.  Not all that big of a deal of course, would just rather get the points for this large purchase.

8 hours ago, Coralc said:

If it is for your own cruise, or someone that you have a booking number for...why don't you just purchase onboard credit instead? 

Not sure I'm following you - I'm looking to pay off the entire amount of the cruise, but wanted to do so on my Amex card - not sure how buying onboard credit can cover the cost of the cruise.

1 minute ago, Host Clarea said:

 

I'd read the fine print, but there are some gift certificates that can only be used when booking a new cruise.

Yeah, I've read every term and condition it lists - and it doesn't specifically say that it has to be used on a new cruise only.  I checked because I've heard that about some of the gift certs from 3rd party vendors.  But it doesn't seem that RC has that stipulation on the ones they sell.  But I'm still nervous and was just curious if anyone has used these ones before and what their experience was.  I'll call RC and my TA before I buy them, but we all know that sometimes what you're told by someone on the phone doesn't always end up working.

I'm sorry in advance, I'm sure there are old threads on this but I couldn't get the search function to work at the moment.

My question is about the gift certificates that you buy directly from RC's website - not the third party vendor certs/coupons.  I've heard sketchy things about the fine print on third party ones, but haven't seen much about the ones direct from RC.   I booked my cruise with Costco and for points want to pay my cruise on my Amex card, which Costco doesn't accept.  So I was thinking I could buy the gift certs directly from RC and then have Costco apply them to my cruise?  The RC website does say that they can be used thru a travel agent, but I was hoping someone here had direct experience with these before I sank any money into this or made any mistakes.

Thx

We thought about doing 2 cabins - it was actually a little bit cheaper than the larger family stateroom on RCL Radiance, but I liked the location better of the larger room and I liked having the kids in the room with us. If you are booking 2 rooms and you want them next to each other you'll need to book farther out as it's harder to find that unless you're ok being on Deck 2.

On the Radiance we're in room 8000 which sleeps up to 6, we didn't have to call to book it though, we booked it online through Costco, never actually had to talk to anyone. There aren't very many of those category rooms.

We did call them, and a guarantee would have been totally fine! But Royal said they will not sell a cabin that has a capacity of 3 people to a party of only 2 people - and there were no more 2-person balconies available.

FWIW I just went through this and it took calling Royal 3 times before they agreed to book my parents in a room that had a capacity for 3 even though there were only 2 of them. First person flat out said no. Second person said no, but then finally waffled and said maybe but that we'd have to talk to the Revenue department to see if they'd make an exception - but they weren't open then. Called back a third time and the rep said no but I asked her specifically to call Revenue dept and ask them and after a 20 min hold she came back and said it was approved.

If you've gone thru a travel agent you'd have to convince them to keep calling back for you of course.

That's an incredible price - what airline is it on?

I'm looking for flights from Anc - Tpa for our June trip, not seeing anything great right now, around 400/pp for the 1 stops.

Good news for us - after only 30 minutes on hold today the "revenue" department decided to let them book that room. The first rep I spoke to said it would never be allowed on an Alaskan cruise, so we must have gotten lucky. Guess it pays to keep calling back.

Agreed. If they DO lift it, it is often not until after the final payment date.

Thanks - that was my original question - Do they really lift occupancy restrictions and if so when? If it doesn't happen until after final payment date then we can just accept that this isn't going to happen for them.

Why don’t you change your cabin to deck 3 and then if or when 2 cabins open on higher decks move the bookings.

We're currently booked in 8000 - which is a larger family oceanview, we can't switch to a smaller cabin. I even checked to see if we could put one of our kids in the grandparents room, but then according to the Royal rep on the phone we'd "probably" get moved out of 8000 as we wouldn't have enough occupancy for that room anymore.

Decks are only an elevator ride away. Do you HAVE to be that close by? I'd book the 2 person cabin, and get on a waitlist for something on your deck.

Believe me I've tried to convince them - but they refuse to book on 3 when I'm on 8. They've never cruised before and are elderly. I could probably get them into something up or down 1 floor but I can't find anything. (Also my mother has an irrational fear that deck 3 means she's in the "bowels" of the ship - nothing I've said has changed her mind.)

I'm stuck between Royal's room occupancy and my parent's inflexibility.

Have you checked with any TAs to see if they may have some doubles available?

 

 

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I checked with Costco and then through Royal themselves, is it possible for other TA's to be holding rooms? I'd gladly book with one of them if I could figure out who might have a room available.

If you wait you risk not getting a cabin.

Yes, that is very much my concern, so I asked here to see if anyone had experience with them opening up the booking. I'd like to book and be done but there are no rooms in any category at all for 2 person occupancy anywhere remotely close to my current booked room/floor.

Book it for three, wait until last week to cancel third person without penalty and get a refund.

I thought about that - but read on here about Royal changing people to a different room when their occupancy changed and we don't want to chance that.

Also - isn't there a penalty for canceling a person?

Trying to book a room for my parents but it's a 3 person occupancy. Royal said we could wait and see if they open up the rooms and let 2 people book them. Does that really happen? Is it something that only happens very close to sale date?

This is for an Alaskan cruise next June, so we have time, but we don't want to wait around if it's never actually going to happen. There are a couple of 2 person interior rooms on the ship left but only on Deck 2 and 3 which my parents won't book since we're on Deck 8. Anyone have experience with this? thx

You are, of course right, I was going off of memory and confused my Seattle hotel with my Vancouver hotel. The Seattle hotel considered 2 people as standard occupency and everyone over 12 was charged as an extra adult.

I double checked my email and it is listed as a triple, but both kids are listed as free - and I was only charged the $230+tax Canadian that is the normal price listed for that room. I clearly have let all of this planning get me all confused.

It does still have that odd thing - where in the room descriptions it always lists the triples as 3 twins, but then offers the choice that we booked for our group of 4 and labels it as a Triple. No worries, I'm sure they know what they're doing, clearly more than I do at the moment!

We went ahead and booked the Y as well - interesting that our booking is listed as a triple - with a double and two twins. I checked and double checked because everywhere on their website it always lists the triples as 3 singles, but this specifically says double and two twins - and I had to pay extra for the 2 kids as they are considered "adults" so it is very clear there will be 4 of us in the room. Best rate we found in the area even with paying the extra adult charge.

We've never been to either Seattle or Vancouver and we're also flying from FL. We're Southwest fliers so it is much cheaper to fly into Seattle - and we figured we may as well get over any jet lag in Seattle. So we're going to spend a few nights in Seattle just to see it and then train to Vancouver and spend time there before the cruise. Based on all the things there are to do, I could imagine us some day returning to Vancouver to spend a longer amount of time, but see Seattle as more of a one and done visit. I know we won't be able to see everything, but imagine that everything that we do have time to do will be lots of fun.