FlyingCruiser2

Now the rest of the packages are posted. Small cabanas are $700 now. Butler add on went up $100 too. Oh well.

I stand corrected - looked at our last trip there and we paid $700. Was on the Eurodam just post-covid. Only 1000 people on board.

Hope they do change the schedule for the Carnival ship - I’m going off the Bahamas port authority schedule page. The big Oasis thingy at the south end of the beach includes food, however the 2 story villas only include real food if you get the butler add-on (which we normally do). You get to pick selections prepared by Pinnacle grill served for lunch.

Shore excursions just started to show up for our late November trip on the Rotterdam. We like getting a Beach Villa there and normally it was like $500-$600 for the day. Now they’re at $999.95!!! There’s a Carnival Ship there at same time - wonder if that’s why?

Have to agree with this. We did 8 night Caribbean on Valiant Lady in the Massive Suite. The room and balcony were amazing, but what they’re asking for it now you pretty much have to rub shoulders with Richard Branson to afford. Service was great, but from what I could tell, there’s a HUGE difference if you’re a Rock or Mega Rockstar or not. Other con is how “crowded” it feels. There were only 1000 passengers on our trip, with a 2700 person capacity, but pool and most public areas seemed crowded. Can’t imagine what 2500 plus would be like.

Planned on doing that and more….our last two cruises were Virgin in a “Massive Suite” (booked before they raised prices so that only Richard himself can afford it) and on Holland in a Pinnacle. Planned on posting comparisons of the three.

Thanks. Experiences seem to differ by Suite type. Our first Celebrity trip will be in April on Constellation in a PH and don’t know what to expect….

Which type of suite did you have?

I miss the old fashioned muster drill. We’d go check for the biggest football-player type dude so we’d know who to eat first if we’re stranded at sea.

Are you responding to OP?

Do they count towards our 2 bottle limit for customs? Did they even check? There were 6 full size bottles in our room when we boarded, then we asked to swap 2 of them for a Bulleit and Mezcal. They just brought 2 full size of those without swapping. We’d have to put ourselves on the national registry for liver transplants if we drank all that in 6 days!

On board Valiant right now. Almost everyone we’ve talked to is not from Florida anyway, unlike the mainstream lines we’ve taken before, so they would have to fly no matter where the port is. Many people on board from Europe - although I suspect they are mostly on “free” trips or super-discounted because of prior cancellations. Otherwise it seems to me a long way to go four a 6 nighter. I feel terrible for the large number of pax that we’re on a Virgin flight from Europe to Miami that got diverted to Dulles for a medical emergency Saturday, and due to crew time limits and a maintenance issue ended up not getting to Miami on time. Cannot imagine how disappointing that would be.

If you go to the Port of Roatan's web page, you'll see entries for Valiant Lady in their schedule. We made arrangements for our tour to pick us up there.

Thanks for the info. We’re either going to have to go later in the year, or pick a cruise on another line. Doing a VV Massive Suite in Nov to try them out, but now they stopped discounting suites, they’re a bit out of our travel budget. BTW…very cool on the computer program. I was told by PCC once that even they can’t search that way - only by more general category. Do they have some sort of API to allow access to the schedule data?

The coffee maker in the Neptune/Pinnacle suites is more like a Nespresso than a Keurig. There's no way to get boiling water out of it. You can definitely get boiling water in the Neptune Lounge, which is convenient if you are not in rooms at the back of the ship. Neptune lounge not open 24hrs though.

We got an email yesterday that our March 26 Nieuw Amsterdam trip was cancelled due to drydock issue, and we have been moved to the Nieuw Statendam March 25 trip instead. We had booked the PS, but that is not available on the new trip - so the only alternative is for them to downgrade us. The original itinerary is still available for booking on the website - no one we've talked to so far at HAL has any idea what is happening. Have been on hold seemingly forever, and now waiting on a call-back. What can we expect them to do? We had a great price for this booking - will they honor that price for another itinerary or trip? TIA

These are NOT Nespresso machines - they are a brand called MoCoffee. We thought we were so smart for thinking of bringing our own Nespresso pods and they don't fit. Not sure where to buy them.

Sorry, on Valiant Lady leaving a couple of days earlier - otherwise I'd be happy to!

Before snarling....I searched and searched first before posting. We got the free $300 bar tab credit for our November VL cruise. However, we are mega and get a free bar tab anyway - so no way to use it. (No, even being free my wife would not buy a bottle of wine over the free tab limit). Our question is - can we use the November bar tab credit for tips, as we plan to spend lots of time at the Mezcal bar?

Did the same thing (but not in advance). They were able to do the shrimp on a different night, but had to sub something for the rice pilaf. A 'thank you' to the chef for doing something special as we were leaving was highly appreciated.

Yes - someone on Facebook posted the opening of their wristband box yesterday and the bands were black with gold. It also showed their luggage tags, and the room number they had is a Rockstar - not mega.

If you want to bring your own pods - maybe flavors they don't have or something - the makers are manufactured by a company called Mocoffee. Nespresso pods won't work - as we tried that.

On Eurodam out of FLL in March, when we got to the table just past carry-on xray - they asked what it was and then told us not to worry about the fee.

They just opened up Shore Things for our November 13 Western Caribbean voyage. However there's only like 5 in Roatan, 4 in Costa Maya, and 3 in Bimini. Should we expect them to add more closer to sailing?

Mega rockstar band has a gold anchor clasp, while rockstar one has silver. Both bands are black..