Call from Seattle. I gave my two cents.

[coaster]

Got a call from a vacation planner yesterday introducing himself. Speil about great sales going on. Told him we have little interest in Holland since they pulled out of Tampa. 90 percent of our cruises are booked out of Tampa and don't see that changing. Port Canaveral is not even an option with this line. Celebrity is cashing in at both ports though. Shame this line can't do the same.

Edited August 17 by coaster

[POA1]

Tampa has that really low bridge clearance As the older ships are retired, there are fewer ships that can come into Tampa. I don't know if the port is exotic enough for Silversea or Seabourn.

[MISTER 67]

1 hour ago, coaster said:

Got a call from a vacation planner yesterday introducing himself. Speil about great sales going on. Told him we have little interest in Holland since they pulled out of Tampa. 90 percent of our cruises are booked out of Tampa and don't see that changing. Port Canaveral is not even an option with this line. Celebrity is cashing in at both ports though. Shame this line can't do the same.

We live in Port Charlotte and we love to sail out of Tampa, yes it’s a shame that HAL stopped sailing from Tampa. The choices are slim pickings with old ships with issues sailing out of there now. Eventually something needs to happen as they keep building bigger ships and the small ships will be gone, the big ships won’t be able to sail under the bridge, a new port will be needed.

[oaktreerb]

The Koningsdam will be moving out of the San Diego market from Nov. 1, 2025 to April 10, 2026.  She’ll be sailing the Caribbean with the masses.

She’ll be back through SD for the Alaska season.  We’ll miss the Hawaii, Mexico, and San Francisco itineraries on the Koningsdam during that time.  I’ve been spoiled by the amenities like Club Orange dining room and Grand Dutch Cafe on the Koningsdam.  I’m not interested in the other HAL ships.  We may finally try Disney for a short sailing to Avalon or San Francisco.  Time for a change for all of us.

Edited August 17 by oaktreerb

[CruiserBruce]

40 minutes ago, oaktreerb said:

The Koningsdam will be moving out of the San Diego market from Nov. 1, 2025 to April 10, 2026.  She’ll be sailing the Caribbean with the masses.

She’ll be back through SD for the Alaska season.  We’ll miss the Hawaii, Mexico, and San Francisco itineraries on the Koningsdam during that time.  I’ve been spoiled by the amenities like Club Orange dining room and Grand Dutch Cafe on the Koningsdam.  I’m not interested in the other HAL ships.  We may finally try Disney for a short sailing to Avalon or San Francisco.  Time for a change for all of us.

N. Amsterdam will be covering San Diego for that winter. Nothing you like about her, or her sailings?

 

KDam is going for a drydock as well.

[oaktreerb]

1 minute ago, CruiserBruce said:

N. Amsterdam will be covering San Diego for that winter. Nothing you like about her, or her sailings?

 

KDam is going for a drydock as well.

No.  The cruise has become more about the convenience and ship than the itinerary.  

[Kay S]

1 hour ago, MISTER 67 said:

Eventually something needs to happen as they keep building bigger ships and the small ships will be gone, the big ships won’t be able to sail under the bridge, a new port will be needed.

My question is always when is bigger too big?  I don't plan to sail on a ship the size of a small city with 25000 of my best friends. 😝  Will all ports become at anchor with smaller tender boats for every ship on every cruise?  With lines for the tenders to get the many thousands of people on and off the ships?  I've done Kdam out of San Diego a few times, and that ship was big enough for me.

[Mary229]

I appreciate that the OP wants to sail from close to home but I am fairly certain that embarkation port desires of the customer are pretty low on the list of priorities.  If you consider any sailing I would imagine no more than 5% of the pax are from that specific home port. 

Edited August 17 by Mary229

[coaster]

Ooosterdam, Westerdam, Noordam, Eurodam, and New Amsterdam ships can clear the bridge out of Tampa. Had Ooosterdam and Westerdam here in Tampa in the past. Not really a question of size. Royal's Radiance class ships are larger and they have been porting out of Tampa for years.

[Cruising-along]

1 hour ago, Mary229 said:

I appreciate that the OP wants to sail from close to home but I am fairly certain that embarkation port desires of the customer are pretty low on the list of priorities.  If you consider any sailing I would imagine no more than 5% of the pax are from that specific home port. 

I would love it if all the cruises I wanted sailed from Seattle (the city, not HAL the company) 😉 

We have to fly for 99.9% of our cruises.

[asebastian]

1 hour ago, Mary229 said:

I appreciate that the OP wants to sail from close to home

Give a thought to us from "down under"...we're typically 24 hours of travel from most EU or US ports!

[Mary229]

3 minutes ago, Cruising-along said:

I would love it if all the cruises I wanted sailed from Seattle (the city, not HAL the company) 😉 

We have to fly for 99.9% of our cruises.

I fly for 100% of my cruises and I would think that 95% of cruisers travel by some form to their embarkation.  To design a cruise business around only those living in embarkation ports seems to me to be defeating. 

[coaster]

Florida residents help fill up ships departing from here. We tend to just cruise from our nearest Port also. It is a lazy Florida thing for sure. 

[leerathje]

3 hours ago, CruiserBruce said:

N. Amsterdam will be covering San Diego for that winter. Nothing you like about her, or her sailings?

 

KDam is going for a drydock as well.

 

I personally prefer Pinnacle class.  BB Kings,  Club Orange dining room and Dutch Cafe.

 

L.

 

[oaktreerb]

2 hours ago, Mary229 said:

I appreciate that the OP wants to sail from close to home but I am fairly certain that embarkation port desires of the customer are pretty low on the list of priorities.  If you consider any sailing I would imagine no more than 5% of the pax are from that specific home port. 

I think SoCal might be different.  Lots of people drive to the port of San Diego from neighboring states because they don’t want to board an airplane.  The cruises are pretty ordinary itineraries including Mexico and Pacific Coast to San Francisco.  When it includes Hawaii and the South Pacific they come from farther away.  With Panama Canal cruises there will be flights involved for most.  I’m in the “I don’t want to fly” category these days.  The population is getting older.  

[Haljo1935]

2 hours ago, oaktreerb said:

...I’m in the “I don’t want to fly” category these days.  The population is getting older.  

I'm also in the "I don't WANT to fly" category, but like @Mary229 I fly for 100% of my cruises as I'm land locked w/the closest port being almost 6 hour drive.  And that doesn't get me on a BHB since HAL doesn't port there.

[pengu1n]

Our closest port is New Orleans, a 10 hour drive. Better than flying though!

 

When will the cruise lines bring ships to St Louis - you could go right up the Mississippi! 🤣

[Gail & Marty sailing away]

13 hours ago, coaster said:

Got a call from a vacation planner yesterday introducing himself. Speil about great sales going on. Told him we have little interest in Holland since they pulled out of Tampa. 90 percent of our cruises are booked out of Tampa and don't see that changing. Port Canaveral is not even an option with this line. Celebrity is cashing in at both ports though. Shame this line can't do the same.

It's good that you told him.

[rodndonna]

10 hours ago, coaster said:

Florida residents help fill up ships departing from here. We tend to just cruise from our nearest Port also. It is a lazy Florida thing for sure. 

 

As a land locked cruiser I am always envious of those who live within driving distance of a cruise port (or multiple like your Floridians). That being said though, the positive side of having to fly for every cruise really opens us up to all cruiseline and itinerary options.

 

Ironically enough, even though we do at least 1 Caribbean cruise annually (winter is too long here), we have only 1 cruise ever booked from Tampa which is coming up next year, and it is a Celebrity cruise which is a rebook of a Celebrity cruise that was originally sailing from PuertoRica (favourite embarkation for Carib cruises). It looks like Celebrity has moved a lot of their cruise to the Florida market.

[Bobpell54]

We rented a condo near St. Petes and decided to take a cruise out of Tampa . That area Tampa, St. Petes and Clearwater is suspectable to fog during late Jan. and Feb.

We arrived at the terminal around 10am and noticed the thickening fog settle in.

The ship was held off shore and we did not board till after 1:30pm

The people on board were running down the gangway due to flights booked at the nearby airport.

Cruising out of FLL since 2010 has never caused us a delay due to fog during that time oeriod.

 

[0bnxshs]

7 hours ago, Bobpell54 said:

We rented a condo near St. Petes and decided to take a cruise out of Tampa . That area Tampa, St. Petes and Clearwater is suspectable to fog during late Jan. and Feb.

We arrived at the terminal around 10am and noticed the thickening fog settle in.

The ship was held off shore and we did not board till after 1:30pm

The people on board were running down the gangway due to flights booked at the nearby airport.

Cruising out of FLL since 2010 has never caused us a delay due to fog during that time oeriod.

 

Fog has often caused delayed dockings in Tampa.  We've been on a few of them and finally decided it was easier to use FLL as we can at least get off the ship and home sometimes as quickly as we can from TPA, just due to the fog issues.  I think even for the Vista class ships, tidal issues can come into play with the bridge for clearance, especially in fog.

 

At one time there was talk of a new cruise port in the Tampa/St Pete area, outside of the bridge and in an area less susceptible to fog.  Anything new on that?  We are happy that Princess will now be using Port Canaveral at least; so much easier for the Orlando market than TPA is.

 

To the OP, 👍for telling Seattle your thoughts; they are shared by many.

Edited August 18 by 0bnxshs

[MzTeaze]

Many of the cruises we were interested in have moved out of the NY/NJ area.  We finally relented and will fly to Florida for a cruise.

[atexsix]

On 8/17/2024 at 3:03 PM, Kay S said:

My question is always when is bigger too big?  I don't plan to sail on a ship the size of a small city with 25000 of my best friends. 😝  Will all ports become at anchor with smaller tender boats for every ship on every cruise?  With lines for the tenders to get the many thousands of people on and off the ships?  I've done Kdam out of San Diego a few times, and that ship was big enough for me.

I'm with you, I'll switch to river cruising if I need to before ever setting foot on the latest RCL style monstrosity.

[ontheweb]

7 hours ago, atexsix said:

I'm with you, I'll switch to river cruising if I need to before ever setting foot on the latest RCL style monstrosity.

Also won't do one on those megaships. And we did our first river cruise earlier this year, a tulip time cruise in the Netherlands and Belgium.

[ontheweb]

On 8/17/2024 at 7:32 PM, Mary229 said:

I fly for 100% of my cruises and I would think that 95% of cruisers travel by some form to their embarkation.  To design a cruise business around only those living in embarkation ports seems to me to be defeating. 

We have flown for all but two of our cruises. For the other 2, we took the bus to New York City, both easier than driving and probably cheaper than parking.

 

Our first cruise was in 2002 for our 25th anniversary. I suggested a cruise for that occasion in late 2001, a time when no one really wanted to fly. So, I suggested Bermuda. DW said no, and we ended up flying to actually Barcelona, as we found a Western Mediterranean cruise we both agreed upon!