Journey to the Center of the Earth: An Asian Cruising Tale

[ARandomTraveler]

3 hours ago, Biker19 said:

While asking for C&A numbers, ask for the total as well.

Got the numbers: 

 

Total Passengers: 4,563

Total US Passengers: 1,060

Total UK Passengers: either 301 or 310

Total Crown & Anchor: 1,941

Pinnacle: 92

Diamond Plus: 228

Diamond: 310

Emerald: 149

Platinum: 314

Gold: 848

[ARandomTraveler]

Wow bands DO exist, I just had to keep asking until I found someone who knew what they were. There's 4 colors; white, black, blue and yellow. They cost about $10 each. 
 

Tendering today in Vietnam is a little bit of a mess. They told us to get tender tickets before 9:30am only if we were ready to leave the ship right away, and that after 9:30am it would be open-tendering, no tickets needed. By 9:35am they still hadn't called ticket #5 (out of 48), so everyone with an independent excursion booked is in a bit of a panic downstairs. Apparently there was a problem with the dock where the tender boats land. We're just doing this port on our own, so in no rush ourselves, though it would be nice to get off the ship before noon. 
 

They told us to turn our watches back 1 hour today, so at least we gained an hour. We'll be setting them ahead again once we leave. 
 

As long as you have the proper visa to leave the ship, you received a  "Landing Card" in your stateroom that you have to take with you off the ship. They'll stamp the card when you leave, and stamp them again when you return. You also have to bring your seapass card (the wow bands won't get you on and off the ship). The pre-cruise instructions told us we'd also need to bring a printed copy of our visa and passports with us, and I see some people walking around with them, but it doesn't sound like they're actually checking them, and they haven't told us we need them to leave the ship. I've got mine just in case. 
 

It's now 10:17am and they're up to tender ticket #13 of 48 👀.

 

[Lazirus65]

Great review we are on the 12 night 19th September sailing direct flight from London so fingers crossed no travel issues.

Visited Singapore many times but this will be our first cruise from there. Thanks for all the useful information so far. 

[aussierangers]

Yikes, hope they get the tendering sorted before our Sept 19 cruise, we booked an independent tour for this port which is supposed to start at 8.30. Normally I avoid booking shore excursions in tender ports, but the things we want to see in Nha Trang are a long way apart so a tour seemed sensible here.  Thanks for all the info, its been really useful so please keep it coming!

[Biker19]

9 hours ago, ARandomTraveler said:

Total Passengers: 4,563

About 108% capacity - just about the average reported by RCG (105%) for the last quarter in their SEC filing.

[bonsai3s]

ARandomTraveler, may I have your permission to share our experience in Nha Trang?

[ARandomTraveler]

10 hours ago, bonsai3s said:

ARandomTraveler, may I have your permission to share our experience in Nha Trang?

Yes absolutely! We had quite an interesting day ourselves (I'll share later, after I have breakfast).

[bonsai3s]

It was our third visit to Nha Trang yesterday(all DIY)...the first, over 20 years ago. During our first 2 visits, we gladly took the bicycle rickshaw to all the sights.

 

Much older now, we happily took an air-conditioned taxi to 3 sights...the Nha Trang Cathedral,  Long Son Pagoda (large buddha), Po Nagar Cham(towers). 

 

For $30, the taxi driver took the 2 of us to the 3 sights we wanted to see, asked if we wanted to eat lunch, and patiently waited for us....total time about 3 hours. He spoke very little english but enough to communicate. 

There was a 30,000 Vietnamese Dong per person ticket to enter the Po Nagar Towers. The lady at the ticket booth accepted $3 for the 2 of us. (Currency exchange: $1 = 23,600 VD) The 2 other sights were free to enter.

 

 

 

[ARandomTraveler]

The tender situation took a long time to resolve yesterday. They were supposed to start tendering at 8:30am, and said they'd be done shuttling all of the people with tender tickets by 9:30am. But by the time 9:30 rolled around, they hadn't even made it to tender ticket #5 out of 48. It took until 12:15pm before they called for open tendering. Once getting in line, it took a half hour to get to shore. The last tender back to the ship was going to be at 5:15pm. They used the ship's life boats for tendering, and they said there was an issue with getting them docked at the port. One of the employees told me they were supposed to be using a maximum of 7 life boats, but they were using 10 to try and make the process go faster.

 

This port is not set up for tourists. It's a very bare bones, industrial looking space. Some sort of town is somewhat walking distance if you're mobile and willing to walk for about a half hour until you get to a public beach and an area with some hotels, but it's hard to tell that from the port. There's no signs telling anyone which direction to go, or how long it will take to get anywhere, and even if there were signs, you wouldn't be able to read them unless you can read Vietnamese. Asking the dock workers how to get to a beach or a shopping area was met with blank stares (nobody spoke English). 

 

Some bicycle rickshaw drivers approached us with laminated pieces of paper that had photos of landmarks, and they spoke enough English to let us know it would cost $10, so we hopped on the rickshaws and set off for a harrowing ride through the Vietnamese streets; dodging motorized traffic, sometimes going both directions on the same side of the street. They kept taking us to places that required Vietnamese cash to get into, and they didn't understand our requests to take us to an ATM to get Vietnamese money. 

 

There were trinket sellers at each landmark, selling things like Japanese fans and bracelets etc. They were happy to take American money and sold fans from anywhere from $2/each, to $10/each, depending on how much money they saw come out of your wallet. If they told you a low price and then saw you had American money, the price automatically changed to something much higher. They also had a hard time understanding that a $10 bill plus 5 $1's was the same as a $20 bill and 5 $1's in change back from them. 

 

We eventually used a translator app to ask them to take us back to the ship, which they did, but then proceeded to try and get $50 out of us for a ride they originally told us cost $10. We kept handing them money and they'd hand it back and yell at us on Vietnamese. We finally handed them $20 and walked away, but one of them followed us to the port entry, hitting my daughter and yelling at us the whole time. A port policeman was at the port entrance and so the rickshaw guy turned around and left. We jumped on the lifeboat back to the ship. 

 

We later spoke to a woman who had taken a ship excursion (a landmark highlights tour) and she described a very lackluster tour that didn't go any further than 10 minutes out from the port, took them to an ocean museum that you could have walked to from port, only showed them one landmark and then brought them back to the ship. It sounded very disappointing. I will say that as precarious as our "excursion" was, it made for a much better and funnier story in the end, however, I have no desire to ever visit Vietnam again. 

 

For those of you who will be on this ship in the coming months, I would suggest booking the ship tour to "Vinpearl beach" which was on the opposite side of the tender port, but looked like a developed resort with a Ferris wheel, some sort of small amusement park and a pretty beach. It will be sold out if you wait until you're on the ship. 

 

We went to see the Silk Road in 270. It was entertaining enough to kill 45 minutes, but nothing to write home about. It was more of an interpretive dance set to American music (Beyoncé and Katy Perry). You can tell they worked hard on the choreography, but it was a little silly. 

 

Today is now Thursday, a sea day. The time was set forward 1 hour but our phones aren't updating so we have to remember to check the app for the time. We woke up to a notice on the app about having "heightened covid precautions," and there's a noticeably high number of people coughing and sniffling throughout the ship. We went to a sushi making class at Izumi which was fun, but the family of 3 sitting next to us was visibly sick. Coughing and sniffling and talking with very stuffed-up voices. Only one was wearing a mask. I thought it quite rude that they came to the class. 

 

Despite our adventure in Vietnam and missing out on the beach day we had hoped for, we're still having a good time and really enjoying the trip. There's no lack of seating outside but that's mostly because the temperature is a level of hot that I never knew existed. You walk outside and are immediately drenched in sweat. I'm enjoying it because I like the heat, but my daughter prefers to sit in the solarium where it's air conditioned.

[ARandomTraveler]

2 hours ago, bonsai3s said:

It was our third visit to Nha Trang yesterday(all DIY)...the first, over 20 years ago. During our first 2 visits, we gladly took the bicycle rickshaw to all the sights.

 

Much older now, we happily took an air-conditioned taxi to 3 sights...the Nha Trang Cathedral,  Long Son Pagoda (large buddha), Po Nagar Cham(towers). 

 

For $30, the taxi driver took the 2 of us to the 3 sights we wanted to see, asked if we wanted to eat lunch, and patiently waited for us....total time about 3 hours. He spoke very little english but enough to communicate. 

There was a 30,000 Vietnamese Dong per person ticket to enter the Po Nagar Towers. The lady at the ticket booth accepted $3 for the 2 of us. (Currency exchange: $1 = 23,600 VD) The 2 other sights were free to enter.

 

 

 

Looks like you guys went to the same places we did. But we weren't able to get into the one in your second pictures (the ancient looking building). First we couldn't get in because we didn't have Vietnamese money. And then once we got some Vietnamese money, they wouldn't let us in because we had shorts on, which seems odd since so many other people were wearing shorts. 

[aussierangers]

So I'm wondering how people managed who had pre-booked excursions, that were several hours late for them. Did the operators wait, or did people just miss out and blow their money?  I'm concerned because we wont have any mobile data for Vietnam (not planning on buying an internet package for this cruise). Ah, the joys of cruising ... 

Were there lots of taxis at the port? Maybe thats a better option.

[Lazirus65]

I’ve just ordered a small amount of Vietnam currency for our cruise  next month 

[ARandomTraveler]

1 hour ago, aussierangers said:

So I'm wondering how people managed who had pre-booked excursions, that were several hours late for them. Did the operators wait, or did people just miss out and blow their money?  I'm concerned because we wont have any mobile data for Vietnam (not planning on buying an internet package for this cruise). Ah, the joys of cruising ... 

Were there lots of taxis at the port? Maybe thats a better option.

Hopefully they'll have the kinks worked out. I think this was the first time this crew has ported in Vietnam. 
 

I did hear some families trying to get help with making phone calls to their tour companies, but I'm not sure how it worked out. 
 

When we got off the ship there were no taxis. It's not that kind of a port. It was literally an industrial space with a couple rickshaw drivers and one golf cart tour. Maybe the people who got off the ship earlier had more options, but when we got off there was virtually nothing. It didn't seem like a town set up for tourism. Most of the locals were traveling by moped, sometimes 4 people to a moped, including children and babies. 
 

Edited August 3, 2023 by ARandomTraveler

[bonsai3s]

On 8/3/2023 at 1:09 PM, ARandomTraveler said:

Looks like you guys went to the same places we did. But we weren't able to get into the one in your second pictures (the ancient looking building). First we couldn't get in because we didn't have Vietnamese money. And then once we got some Vietnamese money, they wouldn't let us in because we had shorts on, which seems odd since so many other people were wearing shorts. 

That may have been the

 

On 8/3/2023 at 1:09 PM, ARandomTraveler said:

Looks like you guys went to the same places we did. But we weren't able to get into the one in your second pictures (the ancient looking building). First we couldn't get in because we didn't have Vietnamese money. And then once we got some Vietnamese money, they wouldn't let us in because we had shorts on, which seems odd since so many other people were wearing shorts. 

That may have been at the Po Nagar Cham (towers)...my wife and I were wearing shorts and stayed outside.

 

Ticket price was 30,000 Vietnamese Dong per person. The lady at the ticket booth gladly accepted our $3 for 2 tickets to enter. ($1 = 23,600 VD)

 

* Really sorry to hear about your dishonest rickshaw driver. Cruise passengers reading this will now avoid using the rickshaws. Not a good way to treat visitors.

 

* On the positive side, we have a friend who decided to get a massage. She said it was an hour long massage...her entire body, front and back...with a surprise hot oil! She said she was "in heaven". Cost: $8...she was so happy, she gave him a $20.😊

[ARandomTraveler]

6 minutes ago, bonsai3s said:

That may have been the

 

That may have been at the Po Nagar Cham (towers)...my wife and I were wearing shorts and stayed outside.

 

Ticket price was 30,000 Vietnamese Dong per person. The lady at the ticket booth gladly accepted our $3 for 2 tickets to enter. ($1 = 23,600 VD)

 

* Really sorry to hear about your dishonest rickshaw driver. Cruise passengers reading this will now avoid using the rickshaws. Not a good way to treat visitors.

 

* On the positive side, we have a friend who decided to get a massage. She said it was an hour long massage...her entire body, front and back...with a surprise hot oil! She said she was "in heaven". Cost: $8...she was so happy, she gave him a $20.😊

With some planning ahead, people can probably do a better job than we did at getting around. My plan was to walk to the  local beach, which was supposedly 5 min from the port (according to both google and the girl at the shore excursion desk), and possibly take a water taxi to Vinpearl beach. 
 

With the delay in getting off the ship, taking the water taxi to Vinpearl became an option that could have put us in a time crunch (I'm not really sure how we would have gotten over to the water taxi area anyway, but we would have tried to walk there with more time). 
 

The rickshaw seemed fun, and it was for the most part (just for the experience of it), but it was really dangerous, and ended up poorly with the man hitting my daughter. There are probably more honest people there, we just didn't happen to hire them 😂.

 

An $8 massage sounds heavenly. I wouldn't have known where to find it, but wish I did.

Edited August 3, 2023 by ARandomTraveler

[bonsai3s]

On 8/3/2023 at 4:44 PM, ARandomTraveler said:

Hopefully they'll have the kinks worked out. I think this was the first time this crew has ported in Vietnam. 
 

I did hear some families trying to get help with making phone calls to their tour companies, but I'm not sure how it worked out. 
 

When we got off the ship there were no taxis. It's not that kind of a port. It was literally an industrial space with a couple rickshaw drivers and one golf cart tour. Maybe the people who got off the ship earlier had more options, but when we got off there was virtually nothing. It didn't seem like a town set up for tourism. Most of the locals were traveling by moped, sometimes 4 people to a moped, including children and babies. 
 

We were off the ship and out by the port entrance/gate by 10am...taxis were lined up to take passengers...we were very lucky.

 

* Yes, numerous men with laminated pictures of various sights, approached every passenger and offered excursions. We selected 3 sights for 3 hours.

 

We got back at 1pm and met a couple from Toronto who just got off the tender...they said they were a bit overwhelmed by the chaos at the port gate and decided to just get back on the ship.

[ReneeFLL]

What an ordeal you had to go thru to get there. Thanks for the review and the pictures.

[bonsai3s]

Sailing into Hong Kong this morning, Day 5...docking at 11am.

 

 

Edited August 4, 2023 by bonsai3s
* photos failed to load.

[JamesEM]

Following along, very interesting.

[luv_crusing]

1 hour ago, bonsai3s said:

Sailing into Hong Kong this morning, Day 5...docking at 11am.

 

 

 

Welcome to Hong Kong!

[little britain]

4 hours ago, bonsai3s said:

Sailing into Hong Kong this morning, Day 5...docking at 11am.

 

 

Beautiful view 

[aussierangers]

Would love to know if you can see the light show from the cruise terminal.  Looking forward to hearing about the overnight visit - its the main reason we chose RC for this cruise.

[luv_crusing]

3 minutes ago, aussierangers said:

Would love to know if you can see the light show from the cruise terminal.  Looking forward to hearing about the overnight visit - its the main reason we chose RC for this cruise.

 

Kai Tak Cruise Terminal is quite a distance from Victoria Harbour where the nightly light show is shown... You can just about see the buildings on Victoria Harbour from the cruise terminal, but I doubt  very much you will be able to see the lights at all.. 

[ARandomTraveler]

1 hour ago, aussierangers said:

Would love to know if you can see the light show from the cruise terminal.  Looking forward to hearing about the overnight visit - its the main reason we chose RC for this cruise.

I don't think we'll be able to. Our tour guide today said that if we wanted to see the light show, we needed to get to the Peninsula Hotel, and Google Maps says it's 5.6miles away. The light show happens every night at 8pm and lasts for 12 minutes, and she said it's only good if you can also hear the music that goes with it. 
 

There's also some sort of night market that happens from 6pm - midnight with 4 blocks of stalls selling trinkets and food. It's called the Temple Street Market. We're gonna try and stay awake long enough to have dinner and then go there. We haven't made it much past 9pm yet 😂

[bonsai3s]

We waited for the "Symphony of Lights" show...from our balcony, Deck 9...regrettably, the Spectrum, docked at Kai Tak cruise terminal, is a bit far to hear the music and much of the light show.

 

Our view...it's now 8:40pm.