KINGBOBOFTHENORTH

The Holiday Inn-Port/Downtown is right across the road from Bayside Marketplace, home to more than a dozen restaurants plus lots of stores. And it's less than 10 minutes to the ships.

Yes, there are two toll plazas between the Port and Orlando International Airport so the tolls are the same both ways.

Most of the Food Outlets on Ocean Cay closed at 3PM on the first day there when we overnighted. Lighthouse Food and the Rose Food Truck stayed open until 5PM. After that, only the Lighthouse Bar remained open until 11PM for drinks.

If it's offered, it should be listed within the Excursions. If it's not there, it might be offered on board at the ShoreEx desk. Don't panic though; worst case scenario would be to take a train from Civit to Rome Termini and then another train to FCO from there. You wouldn't want to have an early flight though.

If the itinerary says Hamburg, the dock is in Hamburg, If the itinerary says Warnemünde, the dock is in Warnemünde.

I have been on 11 MSC cruises and have never had a bad experience. It is true that on the first couple of MSC cruises nearly a decade ago that the people working the Reception Desk were kind of indifferent. And I don't think our room steward introduced himself either. But that has changed as MSC realized that to grow as fast as they are, they have to compete with the other brands. I was on MSC in Europe in December and they were just as friendly as all the other lines. So I think they have evolved. As for the food, I'm a meat and potatoes person so easy to please. I don't like that sometimes the carvery is in one place and the potatoes a mile away at the buffet, but the food itself is fine.

Also check the following: There are two ways to access your reservation when you click on MANAGE BOOKING at the top of the MSC website. One reads "With Booking Number" and the other reads "With Your MSC Account" which requires you register and create a password. When you use the latter and select your cruise, it should bring up a listing with each port and when you click on that port, present you with the Excursion options for that port.

Much better than everyone watching the video at the same time and then reporting to their muster station immediately afterwards.....at the same time! Feedback can make a difference.

Prices are based on the demand for the product. If there's little demand, prices will go down. But the cruise industry as a whole is reporting unprecedented demand so more likely than not, prices will go up.

I was looking at their website because I have an upcoming cruise at Port Canaveral. I don't like the way they count days. My cruise begins on a Monday and ends on a Friday. That's a 4 night cruise and parking at the port would charge 4 days at whatever rate. This offsite lot wants to charge for 5 days even though it's just 4 24-hour periods/4 nights. And then they add a $7.50 Port Canaveral entry fee and sales tax. Yes, it's still cheaper than parking at the Port but not as much as it should be if they counted days the same way. I think I'll just park at the port.

It's been my experience that the length of time it takes before a MSC credit/refund posts to your account kind of depends where you are in your credit card billing cycle. Let's say your bill just dropped and you're due a refund. Because you're at the beginning of a new cycle, that credit could very well post before the next bill drops. But if you're near the end of a billing cycle, the next bill will drop without the credit because it's so soon but the credit should show up before the second (from then) bill drops. The important thing is to make sure that someone is actually working on issuing you a refund.

Should you happen to have a NC Quick Pass, it is valid at all toll plazas in Florida marked E-PASS and SunPass. The two toll plazas on SR528 between Orlando International Airport and the Port are both E-PASS and both have cash lanes. Please note that once you cross into Brevard County (where Port Canaveral is located), there are no tolls anywhere.

What kind of items do you think might be out of stock?

Just looked at the Daily Program from my 1.5 day/overnight visit to Ocean Cay last September. The casino opened at 1PM and the hours simply indicated "Open Late". However, elsewhere in the program it indicated "Slots Open All Night Long". So perhaps the table games ended at some point during the night but the slots stayed open.

My recollection of that HIE is that there's not enough parking. This only impacts you if you have a car. Otherwise, the hotel is fine and is near so many things.