AlohaLivin

A Kraken Lava Flow and a Butterball

We are booked there in December since Mr. Sancho’s service and food has hit the skids over the last 3 years IMHO 👍🏼

Wow… one post you didn’t like on cruise critic has now been generalized to this supposed downfall of the entirety of America? Something about the pot’s conversation with a kettle….

Memory is one of my top 10 favorite songs of all time - worth it for that alone. @poocherI have been lobbying for Jersey Boys forever, we definitely need a change. Heck, I would settle for Guys and Dolls or Oklahoma!

You ever tried to convince a 30 yr veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps of something? 🤣😂 Semi kidding. He wouldn’t mind another, but the opening repeatedly would cause him to lose his mind.

Agree. Which is why I separated the issues 👍🏼 But it just isn’t what we do (opening new cards). Stretching is essential! I tell DH that my words for the year (ever year LOL) are maximize and optimize!

I think there is a difference in “chasing points” and maximizing points by strategizing credit card use. The former might include those to spend money that they would not spend otherwise or those who spend on the CC seeking points without considering the costs on the other side of the ledger (interest/debt). And for some, the “game” includes opening and closing multiple card accounts to grab new account bonuses. What we do is to optimize the use of 2 credit cards in order to make money/points/benefits to make our money (that which we would spend anyway for groceries to travel) go further. We don’t open multiple accounts (my USMC DH would lose his mind if I considered that, we have an 830 credit rating that indicates his level of care with our finances) and we never, ever have a balance. I agree that credit cards can be a huge slippery slope for some people and that financial institutions have been guilty of encouraging their use for their own profit. But that is what businesses do, try to increase the use of their products, whether RCL or BoA), silly to think they would not. As a younger person I wasn’t careful with my credit cards, but honestly that was on me and I learned from that. ** Of course those banks should never use unethical practices, hopefully that goes without saying. ** From my perspective, the OP was only discussing this kind of optimizing for greater travel rewards during retirement and in my book stretching a dollar is just smart way to go about things.

I believe it’s $550 (350 as you say would be a no brainer) - but definitely as we travel more that will look better and better (definitely as long as you max out the credits, including several of the “smaller” benefits/credits like how both Sapphire cards provide a free DoorDash membership). 👍🏼

Trying to convince DH to spread out to some utilities. I know he has things set up how he wants some now, but I keep telling him that my word of the year every year is MAXIMIZE 😂

You use the Reserve one? I stay on the fence about bumping up to that partly for the lounges (since we get a holly reduced rate on the Delta Lounges with the Delta American Express). Has it been worth the 550/yr for you? We love the travel insurance with the Chase Sapphire cards too. I haven’t used it for the airline miles much as we primarily fly Delta, but no doubt we will at some point.

We really like our Chase Sapphire Preferred and use it for as many expenses as possible. I wish we had more expenses we could use the card for, but utilities, pre-paid taxes and mortgage vendors either don’t allow us to use a Cc or charge a large enough fee for using one that it is not useful. One of my patients used to fly regularly to New Zealand in first class lie-down seats using credit card points - but he had a construction-related business where he bought large amounts of building materials on his credit card that were later covered by his customers. Lucky duck 😂 We also use the Delta Amex for a few extra flight-related benefits. We have considered getting the Chase Sapphire Reserve which offers even more benefits but a $550/yr fee. Maybe after retirement we will try that when we travel much more. If you were able to accumulate that many points that quickly, you’re clearly able to put more on the card than we have been able to manage. But for now our reward points are more than covering our pre-cruise hotel stays with extra banked for later. * If anyone has any great ideas about how the rewards cards can be used to maximize rewards ( other than for food/groceries, gas, and travel that we now use it for), please let me know!

Great to hear - we will be there twice in August. We love Labadee, sounds like these changes will only improved the experience.

He seems like you might’ve reacted a bit strongly to what I said. I’m saying you can get a reserved seat on Delta, but with SW you end up paying nearly as much even if you pay a lot extra to get on early to get a decent seat. And most flights are not non-stop on SW going to FL. I have been flying out of ATL pretty much since 1960, I am very well aware of the options. But I was directly responding to John about a very specific topic, it wasn’t an indictment of SW but a report on our legit experiences (which is that time and again Delta makes more sense for us).

That’s the issue that we have with Southwest - if you get a ticket with a reserved seat from ATL to FLA, after paying for our luggage the price is almost the same as Delta. And then with SW if there is one non-stop flight it is very, very early and extremely late in the day. The worst part is that all other flights have a layover in random place like Salt Lake (!?) making for a 7-9 hour flight. Nope, not happening. We could almost drive it in that time 😳😂

I have a casino comped cruise on 8/14, the email in response stated that the stock OBC is not combinable. Oh well!

My eyes may be blurry from too much work today, but from what I can see Amtrak goes to points west and N/NE only from ATL - to get to Miami means a trip to NC first logging 43 hours one way 😳🤯 oh well!

Interesting thought - we are petty close in (suburbs in metro county, just NE of the city). I will check that option out, definitely need to consider alternative as we get closer to retirement when we will be cruising 6-10x a year! 👍🏼😊

Miami def seems to be higher than Orlando or most other FLA ports. Fort Lauderdale if often a good bit cheaper but usually the extra transportation can eat up the difference. We had to use Fort Lauderdale for the December cruise out of the port of Miami as there were no companion tickets options for those dates for Miami (and I was determined to use that voucher before it expired!). I think I could live with driving to Port Canaveral, I’m not sure I could live with driving to Fort Lauderdale or Miami. But should these prices persist, I may change my mind or my residence!

Main cabin. Believe me, if there was any way to get it cheaper we would get it cheaper. It would be slightly less expensive if we were willing to take a super early flight or a super late flight or if we were flying in or out on Wednesdays, but flying in the day before (Usually of Friday) and out of (usually Sunday) the rates have been nuts. Our last one crossed Easter weekend which probably didn’t help, but nothing is happening mid August. 😳 Thankfully I managed to use two of our Amex companion seats for two of our flights (August/December). Here is a screen shot of the best options for the Atl to MIA (the flight in shows $328, but all flights for 11 am or after on Sunday is higher then we fees/taxes it is 1284 total.

We have been trying to do the same - 2 of our next 4 are B2B. Just makes sense when possible whether flying or driving 👍🏼

Our flights have been $1000-$1200 R/T from Atlanta to anywhere in FLA these last months and through December 2022. It hurts, definitely, but for now we have booked cruises and I can stomach that better than an 11-hour drive one way - at least in the short term. If this continues, we will calculate the balance again.

Dang… was that you ? I am pretty sure that I have given you the evil eye 🤨😝

I was told that there are so many people in the ship they give service and assist passengers but in the past only a very small number we’re getting tipped and this was a fair way to do things (in the same way that sometime restaurants pool the tips for servers and share it with people that bus tables and cook in the kitchen). Seems fair to me. Lifeguards, for instance, work as hard for cruisers as anyone else as far as I can see. I clearly can’t give you a list of every single person on the ship with whom they share those tips, but mentioned a few as examples.

That is what I was told. But it’s definitely shared with a lot more people than one’s server and the cabin steward (and IMHO the purpose is to tip those people who deserve it rather than the cruiser getting the proud, tingly feeling one gets from handing someone money). Just my view.

How are you going to hand everyone that works on the ship envelope? You’re going to hand them to all the people that work cooking the food, to all the people that wiped down the staircases from all our hands, the musicians, and the life guards? I think it’s one thing to give extra money at the end to those who serve you consistently throughout your cruise, but I think it’s very selfish to remove the daily gratuities so that all of those that you don’t see who work on your behalf will be shorted. @Merion_Mom I tried, but could not resist!