SKSMIKE5

Thanks everyone. Maybe someone on a cruise recently experienced this and can let me know. We just got off TA on Harmony. Only had 1200 passengers, the MDR and Anytime Dining room were empty. The windjammer wasn't open for dinner. I am assuming it's because the ship was sailing with such a low number.

On 12/4/2021 at 9:09 PM, firefly333 said:

How is this steak?  The one on carnival for MDR was too tough for me. I couldnt eat it. Boarding rcl in a week and hope rcl is better, but I'm not a big beef eater. Picky. Has to be tender or I wouldnt eat it.

Just got off Harmony in November and one gentleman in our group got the sirloin steak A LOT and said it was very good.

We are going on an Alaska Cruise in June and have 5PM seating for dinner every night in the dining room. When we are in Juneau our excursion gets back after dinner. Are we allowed to make a reservation in the "Anytime Dining" dining room for say 7PM? Thanks.

Just reached Diamond and understand there are 4 drink vouchers loaded per day. What does the Diamond lounge provide? I've seen "happy hour" but I'm not sure what's included. Thanks!

On 12/2/2021 at 10:18 PM, travelbug11 said:

There is a company called “scooter around “ that you can rent from. They will have the scooter in your cabin or hotel when you arrive and then pick it up from your cabin at the end of the cruise 

Thanks. I'm researching scooter around and Special Needs at Sea for a rental.

Don't-Use-Real-Name -- thanks for the tips. I did get my parents a handicap room so I'm hopeful he can take the scooter inside there and charge it. Dad can walk some, just not long distances for long periods of time. I'll have to steer dad clear of the Autobahn! LOL!

THANK YOU so much everyone for the great information. It's very helpful. Next step is to actually rent the scooter! 

My extended family (20 of us so far!) are on Quantum of the Seas in June 2022 roundtrip from Seattle. My parents are celebrating their 60th anniversary and this will only be their 2nd cruise. While they're in good health, my dad (who will be 93 in Dec, mom will be 82 in Feb!) can't walk long distances so I plan to rent him an electric scooter.  My husband and I are avid cruisers but I don't have any experience with the scooters ability to get off the ship at the different ports.

When we stop in Icy Strait I was hoping we can just get off with the scooter and explore the town, does anyone know if that will be possible?

We are also stopping in Juneau, Skagway and Victoria British Columbia. Any information about getting off the ship at those stops would be helpful too. 

Also, I've booked excursions on our own in Juneau and Skagway. Does anyone know if I can get a wheelchair to get him off the ship and down to the shuttle or will he have to walk? Sometimes the pier is very long, although I know they may offer shuttle service for a small fee to take us down the pier at some locations.

Thank you in advance for any information!  

Kathy from Ohio

22 hours ago, roger b said:

The hop on bus runs all year every day , they will be less frequent  in November but will step up on the day of a cruise ship arrival. 

Thanks so much! There are 8 of us on this cruise and we've not been to any of these stops so we're trying to balance relaxing and enjoying the ports with seeing the sights!

We will be in Palma de Mallorca in Nov 2020 and on a Monday. I was looking at the Hop-on-Hop-off bus information and am trying to be sure the bus runs on Mondays in November. Maybe Roger can verify for me. Thanks! 

We stayed in an Airbnb for a night before leaving on our cruise. Easily walked to the port in the morning. Was way less than staying in a hotel.

6 hours ago, mncruiser84 said:

Are you sure you're boarding Wednesday and not Thursday?

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk
 

Oops you're right, we are flying into San Juan Wedneday and boarding Thursday!!! :) I'm just a bit excited to get this vacation started! 

On 1/31/2020 at 6:11 PM, Sweetnspicy said:

I’m having a really hard time posting anything to CC with the internet here on the ship. I also caught a head cold so I slept for 16 hours the day/evening we were in Curaçao and into Bonaire. Not a ton to report but I do have photos and will recap those days when I can. 
 

We are in St.Lucia now. We came in about 30 minutes lates so they pushed all aboard time to 7:30. We spent the day at Reduit beach. I wish I would have know that I would be hassled endlessly by people selling stuff. The beach itself was okay but I wouldn’t go back there. 
 

Definitely take a water taxi if you can to wherever instead of a land based one. The traffic is terrible! 
 

They enacted the “virus” protocol today so no self serve in the buffets. The captain said it was more a recommendation from NCL and the CDC because of Caronavirus. I guess it will be that way for the rest of the cruise. It created quite the jam for Breakfast today. I was pretty Hangry by the time I was able to get a little bit of food. 
 

Most of the Specialty restaurants are booked all the way out now so we are just trying to play it by ear and we have to eat at 9:30 each night but that’s okay. 
 

Tomorrow is Barbados and we are snorkeling! 

Sounds like you're having a great time! We are boarding Epic this Wednesday for a 10 day Southern Caribbean and can't wait! I was wondering if they gave you the laundry special at some point during the cruise? If I recall it's usually been a "fill the bag" for $25. Thanks for the information.

Following as we are on same cruise leaving early February. Can't wait to hear how embarkment is in San Juan! 

I read on the Bonaire website about a "Nature Tag". Suggests you have to have one to enter the water around Klein Bonaire. Tags are $25/pp but I haven't seen anyone mention them here on cc. We are landsailing in the morning and thought about taking a ferry over to Klein Bonaire and didn't know if we needed these "Nature Tags". Thanks. 

We have a late flight home after our Feb Sourthern Caribbean cruise and are looking for something to do. Would be nice to find something that would take our bags/transfer us to the airport after the "excursion". We have never taken a cruise out of San Juan and while we have been to San Juan many times and are familiar with all the things to do, we've never had luggage! Thanks.

We did the cabana's on Columbus Cove. We got two of them so technically they would hold 16. We had 22 in our group and the attendants gave everyone a wrist band. They dragged extra chairs out for us and we shared the float mats... We really enjoyed the proximity to the bar and food too!! Great day. We tipped them extra cash and all was good. 

We did that tour and went to the mud baths. We enjoyed the whole day. The boat had an issue so they picked us up in a different boat but it was still great day. The baths were not exactly what we expected. Thought we would submerge in a pit of mud. That doesn't happen. You go into hot water then come out and they have buckets of mud that you put all over your body. Then once it's dry you go back into the natural hot water and rinse off. Skin felt awesome afterward and we loved the total excursion. The beach stop is beautiful. Have fun!

12 hours ago, KeithJenner said:

There is no fixed time. I've seen them listed years out and other times not until a few months. Your situation, where they are just listed for some ports is not unusual at all.

Thanks. It seemed odd that only a few would be posted and thought maybe it was because they gave us the port credit and wanted to wait until we got closer. This is only our 2nd NCL cruise and we usually DIY . I don't want to go book DIY if the port credit and excursion option offered by them is just as good/better. I know the ship excursions are usually more expensive but would still like to compare. Thanks for the response.

When does NCL post the excursions? Our Southern Caribbean on Epic in Feb 2020 only has 3 stops posted out of 9.

Saw some reviews for Land Sailing in Bonaire that look pretty fun. Has anyone been there lately? Is it close to the Port? We will be there on the NCL EPIC in Feb 2020 but only from 7 AM to 1 PM so we don't have a lot of time and don't want to go too far away. It looks like the excursion is from 9 AM - 11 AM so it seems like it would work. 

Just off Allure in June and my daughter in law has a dairy allergy. They were extremely accommodating.  Gave her the next days menu every night and she picked what she wanted and they made it dairy free. When we told them we had reservation at Chops they called ahead and told them too. She was very impressed and LOVED everything they made for her. 

There were 22 of us on Allure earlier in June and we ate at Chops Grille and had a GREAT meal. No one had any complaints. We had one vegetarian with us and they made sure he had plenty of options!

After Jamaica we had a day at sea and the second formal night. Followed that with a stop at Cozumel. We went snorkeling with Go H2O. Reserved the boat for the 18 of us that were going and made stops at 4 different locations. It was overcast that day but it was still beautiful. Saw star fish, turtles, barracudas, and lots of colorful fish. Our first time snorkelers loved it! The company was very helpful and responsive to all my questions while I was planning. Would go with them again. Since our excursion was over around noon we took taxi's downtown for lunch and shopping. The skies opened up after lunch and absolutely poured on us but it was still a great day.

That was our last stop, and the next day, Saturday, was a day at sea. It was a sunny day and the pool was jamming!  Packing is always sad! The week just flew by. Having the Grand Suite was AWESOME! Will definitely be looking to do that again!! When we disembarked it was a breeze. Had no problem getting off the ship, through customs and to the air port for the flight home. 

That's it for this trip. Next one is with NCL on EPIC in Feb 2020.  

Wednesday we were in Falmouth Jamaica and all 22 of us were off to Ocho Rios - Dunns River Falls. I booked in advance with Cool Dave based on reviews I read here on CC and on TripAdvisor. The directions we got in advance from Cool Dave on location pickup and trip details were spot on. They met us at the prespecified location with two  vans and after a short wait we were loaded into the vans and off to the falls. We made a few stops on the drive over for some pictures and once we got to the Falls Cool Dave took all our money and went to get our tickets. We breezed in, got our tour guide and proceeded with the tour up the falls. It was a little crowded but our guide was good about keeping us together and making progress. We all had a great time! After the falls we had arranged for Cool Dave to take us to Scotchies for lunch. It was close to the falls and was very good. Just got the bill today for that meal and it was only $26 for three of us and our drinks! Planned to go river tubing after lunch but ran out of time so we just went to a small shop that folks in the group wanted to stop at that was close to the ship and then we headed back to the ship. Unfortunately after the first van pulled away from the shops we discovered our van had a flat tire! YIKES! We were about 70 minutes from "all aboard" and I was not happy! We insisted our driver call Cool Dave in the other van to tell him to come back immediately to get us after dropping the first group off at the ship. In the meantime the guys in our van went into Pit Crew mode and changed that tire in record time! Needless to say we made it back to the ship with time to spare!!  In the end the ship didn't leave on time anyway. It appeared there were about 3 RCCL tours that were delayed getting back to the ship so we left about 90 minutes after posted time. There was also an ambulance at the pier around departure time so that probably contributed to the late departure. Since we were going to be in port until 7pm we decided to forgo dinner in the MDR and made reservations for all 22 of us at Chops. We thought the meal was excellent. The steaks were tender and HUGE and all the sides were very good! All in all it was a great day -- even with the stress from the flat tire!