new_cruiser

It's true that a cruise ship is more stable than a fishing boat or ferry. I'm not convinced that there is much difference once ships are large enough to have stabilizers. I've mostly cruised on small (100 to 350 passenger) ships, but I've been on larger ships a few times and haven't noticed a difference. I've crossed the Atlantic, the Pacific and the Tasmanian sea on small ships - the Tasmanian was a bit rough - it's known for it, but not that bad. Only some of the last day of sailing getting into Lisbon was rough. For most of the crossing, the captain was able to choose a path avoiding the rough bits.

If it's mild, you may not be bothered by it on a ship (unless conditions get really bad). The ships have stabilizers. I used to get mildly sea sick on small boats at times. On ships, I would take bonine and ginger the first day or two of a cruise and then be fine without it once I'd acclimatized. More recently, I don't need it even if it gets kind of rough.

You should ask on the Carnival board because this is about a specific cruise line's policies/procedures. (The post may get moved there anyway.) The cruise is past final payment so cancelations won't get their money back and are quite unlikely at this point so there's not much chance.

Most taxis we took in Rome recently didn't want to take credit cards. I haven't run into that on other recent trips in Europe and elsewhere. Also some small restaurants wanted cash. So I'd generally agree with you for most of Europe but not for Italy - especially taxis. Most other things accepted cards. All ATMs seem to charge a per use fee in Europe but I still find it the best way to get cash. I generally get 300 Euros at a time to minimize the fee. I don't mind if I take some Euros home because they'll get used on a later trip. If you don't want to do that and haven't prepaid your Rome hotel, you could use leftover Euros for part of your hotel bill.

If I understand what Yeah wrote, the TA offering the lower price is a different TA, not his. Then, if the price difference is enough to you to be worth the hassle and you trust that the TA offering it is legit, your only option to get the drop would be to cancel your cruise and book with the other agent. That will mean you have to let go of your current cabin and take whatever one is available from the agent giving you the quote. Also, there may be a risk that the rate disappears between canceling and rebooking.

I had a similar price drop due to a sale last December on a 23-day cruise collector shortly before final payment Windstar was going to reduce my fare to the new amount. But I asked my TA to check on the price if I upgraded to a balcony. It was still less than my original fare. So, I got an upgrade and a fare reduction. I was pretty happy about it, especially since I was solo on that trip under a reduced solo supplement and they honored that wit the sale price. Then the price came back up after the sale ended.

It's also worth checking the specials page of lines that you are interested in. They sometimes have a reduced or no solo supplement special so you can get any cabin on the ship for slightly more or the same price as the per person double occupancy rate. For anyone interested in cruising on small ships (by which I mean around 140 to 350 passenger capacity), such specials are frequent on some lines. Star Clippers almost always has a list of cruises with no solo supplement, currently about 3 dozen cruises are on the list. Such specials used to be rare on Windstar, but in the last few years they've had a list of cruises with reduced or no solo supplement. Currently, they don't have many with a zero solo supplement but many are 20% (meaning the fare is 120% of the per person double occupancy fare). I was booked on a Windstar cruise with no solo supplement last spring and it went on sale with a much lower price. I wasn't sure if they would honor the no solo supplement for the sale price but they did so I'm pretty happy with them.

On the couple of RC cruises I've looked at, the solo price was twice the per person double occupancy price for choosing your cabin. The big price differences (similar to what tge OP found on Celebrity) came because guarantee cabin rates disappeared when booking a cabin for one.

They have stabilizers and they ride pretty smoothly. We crossed the Tasman Sea from New Zealand to Australia last year (an area known for rough seas due to the currents) and it was fine.

Not correct. We had OBC from our TA on our last cruise. The statement of OBC that was in our room stated that it was refundable. We also had $600 in non-refundable OBC from Windstar that we made sure to use up during the cruise. The refundable OBC was used to pay our gratuities and the remainder was refunded to our credit card.

It depends what kind of OBC you habe. The OBC Windstar gives you can't be used for gratuities. If you have OBC from your TA, that can be used for gratuities.

In most cases on Windstar ships, connected cabins aren't connected by a door in the wall between cabins. Each pair of cabins is accesed from a short hall off the central hallway. For connected cabins, that short hall has a door that can close it from the main hall so that the cabins connect through their regular doors.

My condolences on your loss. I've been solo on some Windstar cruises because my husband wasn't interested in the itineraries. Two were ocean crossings. There usually aren't many solos, but the passengers were friendly and I had plenty of socializing. On Windsurf this fall, I noticed that the daily program had a gathering for solos listed most evenings. That's the first time I've seen that. My husband was with me on that cruise so I don't know how those went. When solo, I've usually either done Windstar excursions or explored the port on my own. A few times, a couple had similar interests and we explored a port together - had the best time in Madera doing that.

There are two kinds of OBC. One is the OBC from Windstar - the OBC you get from Windstar including that based on your Yacht Club status, promotional OBC (from specials and such). That can't be used for gratuities and it's use it or lose it. The other is pre-paid credit. That's what you get from your TA. It's real money so it can pay gratuities and anything left at the end of the cruise is refunded to your card. Somehow, we ended up with $600 of the first kind on our last cruise and had a hard time spending it all. We are 4-star so get laundry and internet included. We aren't big drinkers - 0 to 2 drinks a day and they had winery on board hosting complimentary wine tastings (apparently about a half-dozen cruises this year will have a winery doing this). And for the particular itinerary, we preferred doing our oelwn thing rather than excursions.

The Panama Canal itineraries are also great.

That's another case of Royal Caribbean only showing the guarantee fares for double occupancy bookings as I mentioned above. If you go a step further by clicking "Select", it takes you directly to inputting your booking info saying you have selected a guarantee fare. There aren't currently any specific interior cabins left, but some might become available (e.g. cabin changes with Royal Up). Therefore, they are willing to sell a guarantee. If no one moves cabins, that might end up in a currently available higher category cabin.

Munich (and Europe in general, at least Schengen countries) doesn't require collecting checked luggage to go through customs. The US is the only place I've had to do that. 50 minutes is still very tight. Munich is a lot better than Frankfurt but still. IIRC, MUC has some "remote gates." You deboard the plane down stairs to a bus that takes you to the terminal. That really slows things down. It's very common for the big ocean crossing planes to use these gates. On our recent flights from the US to Italy through Frankfurt, both flights at Frankfurt used remote gates.

It may have been a sale rate that wasn't programmed into the solo fare (either intentionally or by mistake) or something like the guarantee fare coming and going. On the cruise I mentioned, the guarantee rate would come and go every few days and at varying prices.

When taking a cruise with family on Royal Caribbean, I saw pricing like that. When I selected 1 passenger, the guaranteed room rate didn't appear - only the higher price for selecting your room. My guess is that with the very low fare, they are hoping for additional revenue from add ons like excursions, drinks and specialty dining for two people. For that trip, it turned out not to matter because someone else decided to come along so I ended up with two in my cabin. The extra cost for a solo that I was seeing was significant but not as large as what you are seeing. $750 pp double occupancy going to $3k single occupancy is a 300% solo supplement. For the cruise I was looking at, it was more like 150% (and not quite equivalent because the lower rate was for a guarantee but as it was past final payment, there wasn't much room choice available anyway). I usually sail on Windstar and their normal solo supplement is 75%.

An officer on our recent Wind Surf cruise mentioned that the passenger capacity of Wind Surf is about the same as the capacity of a tender on the 6000-passenger ship he previously worked in.

You can also look for cruises with a reduced solo supplement or no solo supplement (i.e. a solo passenger in a room pays the same fare as per person double occupancy). A lot of cruise lines offer that for some cruises.

I used this earlier this year. If you live close to a US Passport Agency office or are willing to travel to one, it works fine. Note that "within 14 days" includes the day you call for the appointment. I called one day too early and had to call again the next day. The only extra cost is the $65 expedite fee (+ whatever personal cost there is in getting to the passport office). My appointment was in the morning and they said I could come back in the afternoon to pick-up the passport because I live more than 100 miles from the office. If you live closer, you may have to come back the next day to pick-up.

Our experience this morning. Sunday morning for a flight to the US at 10:30 AM. 7:15 Left our Rome hotel 7:45 get to the airport zipping along with no traffic. 8:15 arrive at duty free (after dropping off bags, security and passport control). 8:30 in lounge (my husband isn't a fast walker) Only line was at the United counter to drop bags. Using the kiosk and bag drop might have been slightly faster. Other than that, we were practically continually moving. It almost couldn't have been any faster for us. Walked past a large empty rat race before security so it isn't always that easy. Glad I didn't spend money on Fast Pass. It wouldn't have been any faster this morning Caveat: US passports use the electronic passport control gates along with EU and some others. There was a significant line for the non-electronc passport control desks - no guess on the speed of that line.

I still see the Winter Med cruises. They are all the same itinerary or it's reverse: Citivecchia (Rome), Livorno, Nice, Marseilles, Barcelona with overnights in Rome, Nice and Barcelona. Some prices are pretty low: starting at $1400 pp, but with 17 sailings of the same itinerary, it is hard to see how they will get enough customers who want to do that cruise in winter.

Rome Cabs didn't have availability on our arrival date so they recommended Rome Chauffeur which has more cars. http://www.rome-chauffeur.com/ We were very pleased with the service. Our driver was prompt and courteous.