Eli_6

Oh man, for a second I got super excited because I thought I could go to the Thing 1 and Thing 2 Birthday Breakfast ON my birthday...and I was envisioning my son and I dressing up like Thing 1 and Thing 2...but then I realized they are only doing it on the last Sea Day which is not my birthday. Womp, womp, womp. 

4 hours ago, starstruck05 said:

You usually can note on your booking that it's a special occasion and put your birthday. We've done it when we sailed before or after a birthday and the crew sung happy Birthday in the dining room with a dessert of their choosing. I say their choosing because we did this for my birthday once and they brought me diet orange cake. For my mom for our last cruise, they brought the melting cake but I don't believe happy Birthday was sung to her. It depends on how busy they are. 

I would be so sad if they bought me diet orange cake. 

1 hour ago, mkcurran said:

Toss the kid into the club and enjoy the chef's table. Get a sash saying, "birthday queen" and live it up! Wear the sash all day. 🙂 

I am seriously contemplating sending him to the Kid's Club and going to the Chef's table.  Plus, I am pretty sure they would give me a cake at the Chef's Table because I have seen them do it for others...and it looked better than the one you order through the Fun Shops.

2 hours ago, BlerkOne said:

Tell the maitre d' what kind of cake you want and offer to pay for it. Something that will make the other cruisers jealous. We've done that before.

That sounds like a very interesting proposal. I did not know this was a possibility...

TBH, I really don't care if I am recognized or sung to.  It's really JUST about the cake. 

17 minutes ago, kwokpot said:

I'm looking at reviews on Google specific to the worm cave Seems like there are literally a handful of worms that are actually MOVED by people from the water to the caves. 

 

I know the City Center is a bit aways from the cruise terminal but we had a nice time touring the City Center. We went to the Old Town Hall, the Botanic Gardens are wonderful and they are right downtown, and the southbank area is really nice to have a meal at. There's a portion of the Brisbane ferry system that's free and we rode that and got to enjoy seeing the city from the river. Then there's a section of the river that has this great catwalk promenade right over the River that was a great walk. SO there's would be plenty to do if you went right into the City Center and did your siteseeing there, then make your way back to the crusie terminal.

I am anticipating it being underwhelming but my son really, really wants to do the glow worm caves. But thanks for the recs! 🙂

3 minutes ago, Harters said:

Is this the hopon-hopoff bus? If so, then it operates on public roads just as a taxi would.

 

I cannot recall which stop for the Castle would be the best (I think there are three stops on Montjuic - and we only got off at the one for the Miro gallery, but, if you could work that out then you would have a destination to be able to tell the taxi driver. Getting a taxi back after the castle may be an issue - I can't recall seeing taxi ranks up there (although I wasnt looking for one). 

It said to take the 150 bus from Placa Espanya and get off at bus stop number 2315.  Said it takes about 30 minutes and the bus runs every 10-15 minutes.
Honestly, I am a bit concerned about even getting a taxi back from the place we are fishing. I have asked my husband to contact the fishing charter and also emailed my hotel. 

52 minutes ago, kwokpot said:

There alot of mixed reviews about that tour, or the worm cave specifically.

What's the problem?  There are no reviews on carnival. Maybe they took them off. I thought about doing one in Sydney instead...

I have searched for this answer online and not found anything. Everything just talks about the bus and the cable car.  

My husband booked us an off-shore fishing expedition the day before our cruise. The place we are going to to catch the boat is south of the airport on the coast. When we come back into Barcelona, it seems that we will go near Montuic and I was hoping to see it at that time...in other words, have a taxi drop us off. However, I can't find anything stating whether this is allowed or done or where we would have them drop us off.  If we have to walk a bit, that is fine.

@kwokpot Lol, I just remembered your feelings on The Splendor because I also thought the decor was awful.  So much pink. So many circles. Why?  Why??? 

However, I really liked the layout of the ship so I can get over the pink circles. The Serenity area (at the back of the ship) is nice and I like the extra hot tubs on the second level of the Lido and the covered pool.  They also had good water slides on this ship...one where the floor drops out from you. My kids loved that one. We have one of the bigger scenic ocean view rooms so I think that will be a plus and we will probably just spend most of our time on the Lido and not even go into Pepto-world much. 

I also was amused by some of the very strange artwork.  My kids still talk about the artwork of the man sitting on the toilet backwards that was in one of the elevators.  Why was he doing that?  And why did someone turn it into artwork? No one knows... 

3 minutes ago, kwokpot said:

What do plan on doing in Brisbane?

We are signed up for the glow worm/winery excursion.  My son really wants to see the glow worm caves.  

So, my husband may be bailing on our Australia to Singapore trip.  Both he and my younger son keep equivocating. They have concerns about the long flights. (They are in a different room that we can cancel and get all but $150 back through May 28th.)  If they ditch, it will just be my older (11 yo) son and I on the cruise. (We like to fly!) I will be on the boat on my birthday. It will be a sea day.  So, my question is this: Do I need to order myself a birthday cake? (Not a huge fan of the carnival birthday cakes.) Or will my waiter take notice and sing me happy birthday?  I know I can't depend on my 11 yo to do anything. He won't even remember it is my birthday or know what day it is. I thought about trying to do Chef's Table that night but it would be a waste of money on my kid. Although, I suppose I could leave him in the kids club and go by myself...

I also heard there was a midnight buffet on journeys cruises but someone can correct me if I am wrong...

I am personally super pumped for the horse and frog racing thing.  

I am about to go on my first Journeys cruise out of Australia going to Singapore and based on the group pages I am on, it seems like a fun group.  Seems like a lot of people who like to drink and have a good time. There has been numerous posts about meet ups and get-togethers at bars and where to drink in various ports. Also, I have already met three other people who (like  I may be if my husband cancels)are cruising alone with a teenager. With that said, it may be that a journeys cruise out of Australia's demographic is totally different. 

It may also be that the plane ride is too long for some oldr US cruisers.  My husband has equivocated half a dozen times on whether he is going due to the long plane rides to Australia and home from Singapore...and he is only 50. I know there is no way that my elderly mother would make that jaunt from the US over there and back. 8-9 hours to Europe is one thing. 17+ to Australia and 25 home from Singapore is another. 

@kwokpot I will be on your favorite ship for 16 days in July/August.  I will be seeing pepto pink donuts for years now, LOL. 

I would go with the second.  Sea days on either side of two ports will be fun. I like itineraries that mix up both - a port then a sea day then a port day, or a couple of ports and then a sea day, etc. I have done Europe cruises where we had very few sea days and they were both amazing and exhausting.  About to do one in 2-3 weeks with only 1 sea day on an 8-day cruise. Rest are in port. In July/August, I will have about 5-6 straight sea days on a SYD-SING cruise...most I have ever had. We shall sea how I like it. 😉

I know last year they had Cristine (sp?) Duffy and Emeril on board for the Pride.  I am wondering if anything similar will happen for the Legend.  Anyone heard? I can check in tonight and trying to decide whether to do an early check in (in the event John Heald or Emeril or someone interesting is there again) or do a later check in and go see a site in the morning before we board.  Last year we did first boarding slot and then they boarded a bit late so we were just sitting there in the port for a bit...actually, it got crowded enough there weren't any more seats so we had to just mill about.  It wasn't terribly long, but if there isn't going to be anyone worth taking a selfie with on board, might as well show up later.    

UPDATE: Carnival sent out an email about the Visa and ETA with instructions and links. Only I didn't get the email and neither did a bunch of other people. Fortunately, someone in one of the other groups told us about it. I was able to email carnival and get them to send me a copy of the email.  It has all the relevant links and information.  So, I feel much better now that I don't have to guess what is going on. 

2 hours ago, BlerkOne said:

Viking is not Carnival, but...

 

https://www.vikingcruises.com/oceans/cruise-destinations/asia-australia/bangkok-bali-beyond/visa-information.html

 

I think Carnival could apply for visas for everyone and pass the cost on, but only Carnival can answer if they will. I didn't see anything in the ticket contract that permits them to do so, though.

As an aside, Oceania will handle the visas for you.  My guess is some of the guests on this cruise are used to cruise lines that do that. I am surprised that Viking doesn't. I am not surprised that Carnival doesn't.

2 hours ago, BlerkOne said:

Viking is not Carnival, but...

 

https://www.vikingcruises.com/oceans/cruise-destinations/asia-australia/bangkok-bali-beyond/visa-information.html

 

I think Carnival could apply for visas for everyone and pass the cost on, but only Carnival can answer if they will. I didn't see anything in the ticket contract that permits them to do so, though.

Gah. The link on the Viking page is the website I already used and that works so poorly.  I guess I will try it again and pay another $35.

Thanks everyone for the responses!  I booked it.  We have quite a few sea days so I will get to enjoy. 

Has anyone cruised on a cruise where one of the port stops requires a visa to enter?  How did Carnival handle that? I am in a group on a different forum and there is no consensus. The country is Indonesia FWIW. Some say Carnival gets the visas/ETA for us because Indonesia handles cruise ship passengers differently than regular travelers. Others say you have to get the visa yourself. I asked John Heald (twice) and he didn't respond.

I already got my ETAs for Australia since we are leaving from there and Singapore doesn't require a visa for US citizens. I actually out of an abundance of caution went ahead and applied for an Indonesia visa. The website was a nightmare and it took 2.5 hours due to horrible processing speeds and the website not reading my passport.  Finally, it went through only my "visa" has my DOB as DD/MM/0080 instead of DD/MM/1980.  It had originally read my passport as stating I was born in the year 0080, but I corrected it before submitting to 1980.  Nonetheless, when I received the visa it still said I was born in 0080 EVEN THOUGH I had noticed the mistake and changed it! It was like system corrected my correction to what it thought my passport said.  So, now my only option is to reapply (which will probably take another 2+ hours) and pay another $35. And I have concerns it may still come out again saying I was born in the year 0080. (I have to say that I look darn good for being 1,944 years old!)  I googled and apparently lots of other people online have this same problem (i.e. it misreading their scanned in passport and giving them screwy names, incorrect DOBs, wrong passport numbers, etc.) and them being unable to correct it.  One guy after redoing his visa app three times and paying three times and having all of them screwed up, finally gave up and just applied in person when he got there. So, long story short, if Carnival will do this for us, I would like to let them. 

I agree with what others have said.  It depends on the ship and how many kids are on board. An Alaskan or Europe cruise is totally different than a carribean cruise on one of the giant ships where there are 500+ kids on board.  However, I will say that in all my cruising I don't think I have seen the youngest child group (2-5) ever combined with the 6-8 or 9-11 age groups. When my kids were 7/9 and 8/10, their groups were combined all-the-time when we were in Europe cruising, but the 2-5 were in a completely different room and never combined with the older kids.

Your best bet might be to ask if the 6 year-old can be in with the 2-5 (Penguins). [2-5 are Penguins, 6-8 are Stingrays, and 9-11 are Sharks.]

Only time I saw the youngest combined with older kids in all my cruising was on an Alaskan cruise where there was only one 4 or 5-years-old and all the kids were combined in the same room because there was only about 8-10 kids on the entire cruise. 

I know different ships have different things that the thermal suites covers--as in they cover more than just the thermal suites but also sometimes a hydrotherapy pool, etc.  The pass is $209 AUD which is about $140 USD for 15 days. That seems pretty affordable to me.  However, I am not sure exactly what the pass covers on the Splendor. Anyone know? Can anyone help me out on this?

I got notifications last night that 3 of my 4 were approved.  Guessing that 4th one is going to be denied for some reason or another. 

I am taking a cruise from Sydney to Singapore that stops in Indonesia.  On a separate board, people were saying we had to apply for an Indonesian visa as a US citizen.  So, I applied for one. It was granted, but my Visa says my date of birth is 09/09/0081 instead of 09/09/1981.  My application undoubtedly said 1981 when I submitted it.  Is this something specific to Indonesia with the 0081?  Do they not use "19"?  Or is this something I need to be concerned about such that I need to re-apply for the visa?