Whose Booking New Cruises? I did!

[Iris5383]

23 hours ago, emmantedd said:

We have just put a deposit on the Jan.20.2021 32-day cruise to Peru on the Rotterdam

Really, really hope your cruise sails and is not Covid restricted. That's because, next week, we're going to book the cruise following yours to Hawaii, Tahiti and Marquesas also on the Rotterdam!

[Cruisin Kay D]

Booked 14 night Zaandam Apr 17, 2021 up east coast to Montreal.

Going to book a 10 or 11 night Zuiderdam to Panama Canal roundtrip FLL in late Jan or early March 2021.

[KroozNut]

On 5/11/2020 at 7:39 PM, The-Inside-Cabin said:

I may have to move onto the Koningsdam this Nov as she does Mexican Rivieras till April.   Nice to live in a cruise home port town.  

Couldn't agree more! We live in San Diego as well, and as soon as our cancelled cruise refund and FCC were in, we booked a sailing to the Mexican Riviera from SD on Koningsdam for next March.

 

Can't wait! 😀

[txstephie]

We’re booked for Jan on the Zuiderdam for a partial canal and really seriously considering the Koningsdam for Oct this year for my 50th bday! 

[KroozNut]

1 hour ago, txstephie said:

We’re booked for Jan on the Zuiderdam for a partial canal and really seriously considering the Koningsdam for Oct this year for my 50th bday! 

 

If that Oct Koningsdam sailing is to Mexico from San Diego, we highly recommend it if you haven't already done it. We've done it several times already, and have it booked again for next March!

 

Of course, the fact that it departs from San Diego where we live helps too.. 🙂

[Reagan0712]

Yesterday I booked the Ryndam transatlantic for October 2021.

[NapTown Jim]

We booked the March 13 Tropical Caribbean cruise on the Nieuw Amsterdam.  Looking forward to it!!

 

[AtlantaCruiser72]

I posted earlier about recently booking a Panama Canal Cruise for March 2022 on the Volendam.  Seeing how that is so far in the future I have taken a leap of faith and booked Enchanted Princess for January 9th 2021 on a 7night Eastern Caribbean as well.  If by final payment in November we don't think we'd be comfortable sailing in January we'll just cancel.  The deposit is small enough that we can live without the $ for the 722 months a refund would most likely take - lol

[KroozNut]

22 hours ago, AtlantaCruiser72 said:

I posted earlier about recently booking a Panama Canal Cruise for March 2022 on the Volendam.  Seeing how that is so far in the future I have taken a leap of faith and booked Enchanted Princess for January 9th 2021 on a 7night Eastern Caribbean as well.  If by final payment in November we don't think we'd be comfortable sailing in January we'll just cancel.  The deposit is small enough that we can live without the $ for the 722 months a refund would most likely take - lol

 

Please come back in November and let us know what you decided to do. Would like to hear your thoughts then as well, and why you made the decision to go/not go. We will have a similar decision to make in December for a March '21 sailing to Mexico. Not sure about Princess, but with HAL we also have the 'Book with Confidence' offer which allows us a little extra time after final payment (up to 30-days prior to sailing) to make our decision to cancel or not.

 

"For new and existing bookings only made by August 31, 2020, for Holland America Line cruises sailing on or before December 31, 2021, consumers can cancel up to 30 days before the Eligible Cruise’s departure and the consumer will receive a Future Cruise Credit ("FCC") equal to the non-refundable amount paid to Holland America Line."

 

[AtlantaCruiser72]

3 minutes ago, KroozNut said:

 

Please come back in November and let us know what you decided to do. Would like to hear your thoughts then as well, and why you made the decision to go/not go. We will have a similar decision to make in December for a March '21 sailing to Mexico. Not sure about Princess, but with HAL we also have the 'Book with Confidence' offer which allows us a little extra time after final payment (up to 30-days prior to sailing) to make our decision to cancel or not.

 

"For new and existing bookings only made by August 31, 2020, for Holland America Line cruises sailing on or before December 31, 2021, consumers can cancel up to 30 days before the Eligible Cruise’s departure and the consumer will receive a Future Cruise Credit ("FCC") equal to the non-refundable amount paid to Holland America Line."

 

 

Same offer on Princess and we also are getting the Platinum Plan insurance - so really we can cancel anytime up until departure and get a 100% FCC for everything except the trip protection $$, which for this trip is minimal in cost

Edited June 6, 2020 by AtlantaCruiser72

[dfish]

We booked the 15 day Atlantic Coast from Montreal to Ft. Lauderdale for September, 2021.  We decided it might be safer to stay closer to home next year and we'll look at Norway again in 2022.  We booked the 2021 cruise with FCD, so no additional out of pocket expenses for now.

[TYMAN]

Just booked the 04/04/21 Eurodam. Haven't cruised HAL in many years, (strictly RCCL), anything new I need to know? Looking forward to sitting in my Lido deck cabana!!! 

[janmcn]

Lido Deck Cabana? Those have been a joke (imo)...just partitioned off part of the Lido area with fabric curtains...not private...only really allows you to be guaranteed a place on the Lido near the Lido pool...but definitely not fancy. The aft cabanas are a lot nicer, but pricier too and are open to the air...just don't get your hopes up. The Eurodam is a favorite ship of ours though, so you WILL enjoy it!

[chisoxfan]

3 minutes ago, janmcn said:

Lido Deck Cabana? Those have been a joke (imo)...just partitioned off part of the Lido area with fabric curtains...not private...only really allows you to be guaranteed a place on the Lido near the Lido pool...but definitely not fancy. The aft cabanas are a lot nicer, but pricier too and are open to the air...just don't get your hopes up. The Eurodam is a favorite ship of ours though, so you WILL enjoy it!

Have to respectfully disagree with your Lido cabana assessment. We were on Eurodam and totally enjoyed our cabana.

Not luxurious? Not sure what your expectations are (air conditioning ?) but had padded loungers, table and extremely

prompt service to order drinks and meals! All of this for a nominal fee. Many passengers ogled the cabanas as they walked by

in a 'jealous' manner and we had many questions as to how we got a cabana. My wife and I felt it the best 'secret' on this ship and we purposely booked a HAL B2B (sadly decided to cancel) in a large part due to these. 

That said we like to hang at the pool and are tired of the daily search for seating.

I would think with the unknown COVID fallout, these could be especially valuable as pool capacity may have to be restricted.

JMHO

[iancal]

I don't get it.  Are you saying that the cruise line wants you to pay for a cabana because they do not provide enough loungers beside the poor OR they are not enforcing their rules on chair hogging/reserving???

 

Sounds to us like the reason MDR meal and service always seem to be the target of cut backs in order to encourage cruisers to pay for alternative dining venues.

[gigianne]

Those Lido deck cabanas are often empty (not sold).  They take up a lot of space that others could be using if they put back the tables and chairs.  HAL really needs to enforce their rules about lounge/table hogging.  

[TYMAN]

1 hour ago, janmcn said:

Lido Deck Cabana? Those have been a joke (imo)...just partitioned off part of the Lido area with fabric curtains...not private...only really allows you to be guaranteed a place on the Lido near the Lido pool...but definitely not fancy. The aft cabanas are a lot nicer, but pricier too and are open to the air...just don't get your hopes up. The Eurodam is a favorite ship of ours though, so you WILL enjoy it!

Sorry, disagree. We've been on the Eurodam multiple times and truly loved the lido cabanas. We actually have two this time for more room. I enjoy my eggs benedict there every morning with a Bloody Mary!! 🙂 

[TYMAN]

25 minutes ago, gigianne said:

Those Lido deck cabanas are often empty (not sold).  They take up a lot of space that others could be using if they put back the tables and chairs.  HAL really needs to enforce their rules about lounge/table hogging.  

Join us in the Cabana for a drink, my treat. 😉

 

[chisoxfan]

1 hour ago, iancal said:

I don't get it.  Are you saying that the cruise line wants you to pay for a cabana because they do not provide enough loungers beside the poor OR they are not enforcing their rules on chair hogging/reserving???

 

Sounds to us like the reason MDR meal and service always seem to be the target of cut backs in order to encourage cruisers to pay for alternative dining venues.

Yes, and I am more than glad to pay the nominal fee.  We moved to MSC Yacht Club and HAL ships with Lido Cabanas precisely because of lack of chairs around pools and that is the case with X, NCL,  Princess, and in reading postings, all the other mainstream lines.  I cannot imagine how this pool situation will play out with social distancing requirements.

 

I will agree the cabana space limits overall public spaces but welcome to modern cruising where lines seek profit by adding suite areas, specialty dining etc.  Like the ballparks adding suites and high end seating taking away from the 'regular' seats,  

I really cannot see this trend ending and it is possibly expanded with Covid where (IMHO) the direction will have to be to fewer and more profitable passengers.

[Cruisin Kay D]

On 5/30/2020 at 1:09 PM, Cruisin Kay D said:

Booked 14 night Zaandam Apr 17, 2021 up east coast to Montreal (from Ft. Lauderdale).

Going to book a 10 or 11 night Zuiderdam to Panama Canal roundtrip FLL in late Jan or early March 2021.

 

As I said over a week ago, I was "going to book" a Zuiderdam Canal, but my "special offer" expired quickly for those cruises.   Instead we and some "Veendam friends" booked the 7 nt western Carib cruise Veendam Jan 24-31 sailing from Tampa, with the Have It All amenities.  

We prefer the Spring sailings for the Atlantic cruises, whether going north or going to Europe, because those Aug-Sept-Oct sailings are subject to possible hurricanes.

 

 

[bouhunter]

23 hours ago, TYMAN said:

Just booked the 04/04/21 Eurodam. Haven't cruised HAL in many years, (strictly RCCL), anything new I need to know? Looking forward to sitting in my Lido deck cabana!!! 

We have always cruised RCCL (and a couple Celebrity).  Last March we tried HAL Nieuw Statendam, the ship was beautiful, and the food was across the board better than any RCCL ship.  In every way.  The entertainment was different, casino small.  I think our room was called a "Vista Suite".   Very nice, but not much larger than a standard balcony on RCCL.  Overall we were very impressed and won't hesitate to consider HAL in the future.

 

It was a March 8-15 sailing, we were lucky we even got to try HAL 🙂

 

Edited June 8, 2020 by bouhunter

[TYMAN]

15 minutes ago, bouhunter said:

We have always cruised RCCL (and a couple Celebrity).  Last March we tried HAL Nieuw Statendam, the ship was beautiful, and the food was across the board better than any RCCL ship.  In every way.  The entertainment was different, casino small.  I think our room was called a "Vista Suite".   Very nice, but not much larger than a standard balcony on RCCL.  Overall we were very impressed and won't hesitate to consider HAL in the future.

 

It was a March 8-15 sailing, we were lucky we even got to try HAL 🙂

 

Thanks for the positive views. We're D+ w/ RCCL and Three Star with HAL, but it's been a few years since we've cruised HAL. Really looking forward to the food. 😉 We also enjoyed our Celebrity cruises too....love the Martini Bar! 

[bouhunter]

34 minutes ago, TYMAN said:

Thanks for the positive views. We're D+ w/ RCCL and Three Star with HAL, but it's been a few years since we've cruised HAL. Really looking forward to the food. 😉 We also enjoyed our Celebrity cruises too....love the Martini Bar! 

We're D+ RCCL too.  One nice thing about that is meeting new friends in the Diamond Lounge.  But we honestly enjoyed the HAL cruise so much that we didn't miss it at all 🙂

 

[rotjeknor]

Just booked the 12 day Mediterranean on the Westerdam , leaving Barcelona april 20  2021.

Feels good to have an a active booking again 😊 .

Next booking will probably be a 7 day Norway out of Rotterdam ( done 5 of those already , but so convenient leaving from my hometown.... )  and looking at another European cruise in July or August 2021.

[tgetz]

We have booked the January 9th,2021 24 night Koningsdam from San Diego  and hoping My son and his wife will join us for the 17 day Hawaii portion.. I will be interested to hear yourthoughts on the November cruise Pete. You are always so thorough. 

Edited June 9, 2020 by tgetz
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