BirdTravels

Be careful because the first person on the waitlist gets the excursion when you cancel. That is exactly what the airlift is for. You can use the touch screens to see the number of available slots on a tour, but that doesn’t mean the your cancellation won’t fulfill a waitlist for a group of people. Then you’re stuck. A lot of times, we have a special shore ex credit that requires onboard booking for use. It is always a dance if we try the cancel and rebook trick.

We have no use for them. They just take up space.

What cruise line? They are not stardard items on NCL or Royal.

There is not likely a place to store them onboard. You are more likely going to have to push your bags around the crowded lines to book shows, book restaurants, halls, elevators, buffet lines, and pool areas while you wait for your room to be ready between 2:00 and 3:00. Your bags will have to fit in a standard airport x-ray machine for screening, should you decide to carry them onboard. Your bags are only brought to your room after the room stewards have finished cleaning all of the rooms and they are made available to you. The stewards do not want them obstructing the hall ways while multiple departments work to get your room set up. Your fellow passengers would greatly prefer that you check your bags with the porters. There are a lot of people that think that bags are "easy for you to roll aboard", but end up struggling with them in the very crowded embarkation day.

No. You will leave from the Pan American terminal. Old San Juan is only used for day port calls by NCL.

For us, it is not a great spot. We prefer the Solarium.

Yes to takeout window. And yes, they do comedy in headliners.

Nope. Only available for pre purchase on your MyNCL account.

You can disembark within 30 min of published arrival time,,, if the ship is running in schedule. All aboard is 30 minutes before departure time. Also consider that NCL does not dock at the main cruise docks in some cities. For example, if your private tour says the meet at the Tramway in Juneau, NCL docks at the AJ dock. After waiting in the long, slow line to disembark, you need to wait in line to catch a shuttle into town and the Tramway. In Ketchikan it is the same. The ship docks at Ward Cove, which is a 15 min bus ride (once you get on a bus) to some tour pickup points. We cruise to Alaska every year. On our last NCL cruise, our entire itinerary got changed and a port dropped when a medical emergency caused us to have to turn back toward Vancouver for a medivac airlift. Our NCL excursions were automatically rescheduled. And I would add that on our April and May cruises (Caribbean) we got into at least one port over 30 mins late for various reasons.

Yup. For us, it was easier to stop by the buffet, observation lounge or food hall (depending on what side of the ship we were on).

Magnifying makeup mirrors???

We sail on both NCL and RCCL multiple times a year. We prefer NCL. NCL continues to innovate and evolve the cruise experience. A lot of people complain because they do not like or appreciate change. (As a manager, I have taken all of the change management classes on how to keep people happy when you change their environment). The Icon is Royals’s first venture into true contemporary cruising. E.g., NCL doesn’t do fixed dining or formal nights. Royal is still stuck in the 80’s.

What is the status of your request on the State Dept web site?

Fancy dress up is not what the contemporary cruise wants. Royal is still stuck with the idea of formal nights. They don’t appreciate that they are not a luxury cruise line. Formal nights and fixed time dining need to go the way of the dinosaurs. This was formal night on our Wonder of the Seas cruise. Note all of the tuxes.

Lobster night is the busiest and slowest night in the MDR. If you talk to your waiter, they will try to get you out. For the Ice Shows, we like to show up about a half hour early to get good seats.

The “value” of the Diamond lounges have significantly decreased and someday they will be replaced with a revenue generating venue.

NCL does not have a tea service. However they do have “tea time” where scones with cream and jams along with afternoon snacks are served. So, you can do your own tea time by getting some sweets, some sandwiches or snacks, and tea.

We were on the Encore during spring break in April. We sailed with 4800 passengers (the ship’s capacity is 4200). Lots of younger passengers. We knew it was spring break and had a really great cruise. We were on the Escape last month sailing with 4600 passengers (4200 capacity). There were a lot more obnoxious older folks on that cruise. The ships are sailing full back to prepandemic levels. The US President and the WHO has said that Covid is over, so all Covid protocols have been removed. Elevators are crowded. And yes, I am older with some mobility issues, so I will take an elevator 1 floor. I will take a cart on the pier. And it is no one’s business to be judging me.

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Are you asking whether it is o.k. to defraud the cruise line? Can you be discrete and sneak your grandson drinks, sure. Should you, no. If caught, you drinks package could be terminated without compensation. In the worst case, they could go back and charge you for every drink you had on the package.

When we first started cruising, you had to rent loungers and tip the pool attendant to set them up for you. What if you saw the following items under Explore and Plan. And you had to rent your lounge chairs? Prices below are daily fees. Just a thought for NCL to see what land-based resorts charge.

Standard setup. Hamilton Beach single serve. No room for undies in filter compartment.

Actually, the April thing is your CAS tier level which provides onboard perks. It actually has absolutely nothing to do with what the agents will comp you. Lately, all the rookie agents care about is if they can find a internal (NCL) or external (e.g., Caesar’s) offer linked to your account. They have lost their ability to book based on theoreticals.

Just remember that there isn't much counter space in a balcony cabin. You will sacrifice a lot of your flat surface with the coffee setup. For us, the small space by the phone was filled with charging phones and tables, sun screen, make up.