Xyla

OP: Can't recommend the golf-cart tours in Rome enough.

They zip their pax right up close to absolutely everything. Cuts walking by 80%.

Have not seen similar in other Med cities but, in Rome, it's on.

Oh I *just* saw those when googling accessible tours in Rome. Good to know!

 

I would arrange private tours where you can and try to do tours of three to four hours unless the place is very special.

 

 

Keith

Thanks - this seems to be the consensus, don't overplan and allow for downtime to recover. And arrange small private tours wherever possible.

The cruise starts/ends in Rome so I'm thinking we should fly in a couple days ahead and get an airbnb so my parents (and us!) can recover from the flight. They would fly in from CA so it's a significant flight/time change.

My biggest fear would be the 2,000 year old cobblestone sidewalks, stairs, and roads that are often slick, uneven, and difficult to walk on. That said, I would try to select tours where most of the viewing could be done on a van or bus.

:)

Yes this worries me wrt to my mother and her visual status. I was in NOLA with her this past weekend, and even some of the sidewalks there with the accompanying trip hazards were challenging for her.

I'm considering booking a June 2019 Med cruise on the Jade for me and my family, and bring my elderly parents along. They are in the their late 70s, early 80s and have some mobility limitations. By that I mean they don't require any assistance in routine day to day stuff but they walk slow and get tired easily. My mother is also visually impaired, not blind but is not able to go anywhere on her own. We have done a med cruise before but my parents have not so it's all new to them.

I'm thinking we can book some excursions we would all enjoy (dh and I and 3 teen kids) and maybe some others my parents would need to join an organized tour geared toward their fitness level.

Any advice or gotchas I'm not thinking of? They cruised with us last year but it was a shorter Caribbean cruise with only 3 port stops so not as much planning. Everything will be on me to organize so want to make sure I'm considering everything important.

I got off the Breeze the day you got on. Part of me wished that we had cruised the following week except that we parked in the official Lot B in my husband's little Honda. For sure, we would have had water damage so that would have been a bummer to deal with afterwards. Glad you guys had a good time in spite of everything. I agree, Mike was the best CD I've seen so far. He was seemingly everywhere!

We were on the Silhouette last Fall and we docked. Only one other ship in port that day, IIRC.

I was on a March cruise out of Barcelona and flew in from TX two days early. But my daughter's work gave her grief for taking time off and she couldn't fly out early. She had a non-stop flight out of JFK that was landing in Barcelona at 10 am, so lots of time before the 6 pm sailaway. However, she had huge traffic problems getting out of Jersey and almost missed the flight. She was texting me while on the bus to JFK giving me the play by play and it was so extremely stressful for both of us, I could not go to sleep until I knew her butt was on the plane. She did end up getting her luggage checked in 10 minutes before the luggage cut off time and made her flight ok. But I would never have her do that again.

Logged in too late for the $500 but at least snagged some $100.

It will be considered a new booking and price accordingly. I know it is difficult to plan around a work schedule. I had to change flights for 8 and staterooms for 3 and we were booked early saver. Talk about a financial hardship!

All I can say is, ouch!

My family currently has 3 cove balcony cabins for multiple family members booked for an August cruise on the Breeze. Final payment is next month. My son and his two daughters are booked into a 3 person cabin. My daughter in law originally was going to stay home but now her work schedule has changed and she'd like to go with. There are no more 4 person cove balconies available. Additionally, I originally booked my son's cabin under the $50 deposit military special, so I'm not sure if it's considered ES rate. I'm thinking not because they let me do a name change (the booking was originally in my son/wife's name only, and I dropped DIL off and added the two girls).

A simultaneous wrinkle is that my husband may not be able to go due to his work schedule. I'm booked past guest so I know I can remove him from the booking before final payment. I'm in a 4 person cabin. So (assuming DH bows out) I'm considering adding my DIL to my cabin on paper, then she can actually sleep in the cabin with her family. The two girls are 4 and 7 so even if they had a 4 person cabin, they probably would not use the high bunk, the girls would just sleep together on the sofa bed.

Will the cabin steward have any issue with that?

If DH does go, and we upgrade to another cabin for son and his family, is it considered (and priced) like a new booking? Rates have risen significantly since I booked this last year and a 4 person interior is now the same price as a 4 person cove balcony was. The cheapest 4 person balcony is about $1k more.

Advice?

I am hardly an expert, but did sail on the NCL Spirit a few weeks ago over spring break with my 3 kids ages 12, 16 and 20. My husband and I also did a Med cruise last fall on the Celebrity Silhouette, a sister ship to the Reflection. I imagine the passenger demographics will be quite different on a summer cruise but we found both ships to have a very adult oriented entertainment. The Spirit does have a kids pool/hot tub at the back of the ship which my youngest enjoyed. Our sailing had only 12 kids his age group so he only went to one kids event, then had no interest in going back. But with a busy, port-intensive itinerary, it probably doesn't matter much. Spirit is definitely an older ship but I enjoyed it and would sail it again if the price was right.

I saw you already got the issue resolved but just wanted to add that we experienced the same situation. My husband got a new job after final payment and didn't want to ask for the time off so soon after starting. NCL was willing to subsitute my college-age daughter at N/C. While I'm sad my husband can't go, I'm thrilled to spend the time with my daughter who lives across the country and I rarely get to see!

OK SO WE BOOKED THE ADJACENT INSIDE CABIN FOR THE KIDS!!! Got to keep our perks and our Concierge Veranda!!! AND WE ARE GETTING REFUNDED the couple hundred dollar difference! !!!! I was on the phone for hours with Celebrity shuffling things around and weighing our options....BUT SO WORTH IT!! Now we will have more room, more beds and an extra shower!!! WHOO HOO!!

Great decision! Enjoy!

They changed the future cruise booking process several months ago.

 

Now, you only get a $50 OBC and no Friends and Family Certificates.

 

I don't know if you are required to book under the ES fare, but if you don't ask that is what you'll be booked under along with the penalties for making changes.

 

The OBC is okay, but I certainly wouldn't stand in line waiting to book.

We booked on board last September, got $100 OBC for our 7 day future cruise and we booked past guest. We also got the 2 friends and family vouchers, which were valid for 60 days and I booked my parents and son to join us in two additional cabins. Due to other promos running when I booked their cabins (a few weeks after returning home), they each had additional OBC which combined with their $100 each from the friends and family voucher.

Yep, I just faced this situation today. My husband can't go on our booked March cruise (where we had elected for the UBP as one of our perks) and is being replaced by our 20 yr old daughter. Even though it's a round trip European cruise where I don't have to sign the alcoholic drink waiver, NCL won't give her the UBP and is giving her the soda package instead. At least they are refunding the gratuities I already paid (we are past final payment) so I told my daughter that's her alcohol allowance haha.

Looking forward to reading more of your review, we are doing a variation of this cruise on the Spirit in March.

We are flying out of DFW into BCN for our March Spirit cruise. I caught a sale on Delta for $445 roundtrip. I set up several fare alerts on sites and haven't seen that low a price very often from any of the TX airports I was checking (AUS,DFW,IAH).

We booked and paid a deposit for a Future Cruise onboard Solstice in Nov 2016

 

At that time it was for the as then unpublished 2018/19 season... we were told the booking needed to be finalised before 31 Dec 2016

 

We would like to complete the process, but cannot see how to convert the booking to a reservation

 

Does anyone have any suggestions, the rccl email is not reliable in our experience, and the clock is ticking

 

Cheers

We did the same on our Oct Silhouette cruise. When the new schedules were announced, I went online and picked what I wanted and put a 24 hour hold on it. Then talked to Celebrity directly afterwards via phone and finalized the booking.

Is there any benefit to transferring the booking?

Can we transfer to a PVP also?

I transfer mine to a TA to get the additional OBC the TA will kick back to me. On Carnival cruises, it's usually not that much but every bit helps.

I can't seem to find the definitive answer to this. After making a booking direct with Carnival, what is the time limit to transfer the reservation to a travel agent? I've seen anywhere from 30 days to 90 days listed variously. Anyone know for sure?

I have read reports of people getting discounts for signing up on the first day in the I lounge. I wanted verification. It doesn't appear to be the case.

 

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A few months before my particular sailing last month, the 14 day unlimited was being sold in cruise planner at $199, closer to sailing it went up to $269 and as I posted earlier, on board it was $319. There was no discount the first day in the I lounge, I had earlier heard reports of this but I went down there to check it out and no deal.

I returned from a 14 day cruise on the Silhouette 2 weeks ago and it was $319 on board for unlimited internet.

We were told by the future cruise desk on board the Silhouette last week that the 2018-19 schedules would be out by December 1st.

We got off the Silhouette on the day you embarked but there were so many passengers continuing on the B2B that we half-wished we were continuing on as well. :)

I'll look forward to your continuing review.

Daughter received a couple of carnival gift cards and wants to know if you have to apply them to your sign and sail card at the concierge desk before using your sign and sail card.

Is she putting a credit card on file or a cash deposit as well? Our last cruise, I put a card on file but then once on board I used the self service kiosk to add my gift cards. All my on board charges were deducted from my gift card balance first and I never had any pending/final charges to my credit card.