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TMLAalum

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  1. Long ramble of discontent.... On February 22 a friend of mine made an onboard booking for us, them and 4 other couples on an Apex Fjords cruise next year. On February 23 I submitted the mandated form to Celebrity and received their confirmation email that day: Please be advised that your request to transfer reservation #xxxxxxx to be serviced by xxxxxxTRAVEL located at xxx,xxx,xxx was received. Please allow up to 5-7 business days for processing. We look forward to welcoming you onboard! Sales Administration Dept. When no confirmation from the BBTA had arrived by March 11 I contacted them. They were unable to retrieve the reservation and suggested I call Celebrity. I did and was relieved to hear from the Celebrity rep that my booking should be transferred no later than the following day. Guess What? It wasn't. I emailed the BBTA on March 15, received an email and a call that day from their cruise help representative who gave me a different Celebrity # to call, which I did. The Celebrity rep who answered my call informed me that # was for TAs only, so I asked if he could please transfer me. Instead, he "handled" my call, referenced my previous call, tried resubmitting the Celebrity transfer form himself and ended the conversation by telling told me to be patient and referring to the "5-7 business days" for processing. When I expressed concern that the 30-day timeline for a booking to be transferred was fast approaching, he told me not to worry as there was a log of my calls. Has anyone had a similar experience? If so, how was it resolved? When would be a reasonable amount of time to lapse before I call Celebrity yet again if transfer hasn't happened? Thanks, and please be kind.
  2. If booking a non-Celebrity tour, go with a company that guarantees they will get you to the next port if they cannot get you back before the ship departs. For example, we used this company out of Naples: Shore Excursions Private Tours Naples Amalfi Coast Sorrento (aptours.it) Luckily, I do not have any actual instances of being left behind on a private excursion to share!
  3. A kind poster provided this link to obstructed view cabins on E-class ships: 02_15_23_FLY_Obstructed_Cabins_EG.pdf (rccl.com) After the list there are photos of the obstructions as seen from each cited cabin! You might want to bookmark this to favorites for future reference.
  4. To put your mind at ease here are a few photos from our round trip out of Seattle in September 2021! IDK why upside down.
  5. @Nikita4 Please consider the advice of @AKStafford and @oaktreerb! You are 16 months out from your intended cruise. A rental car for your family would provide the flexibility that a cruisetour cannot possibly allow. With 2 teens along, perhaps they can do a little online research and come up with plans that interest them! For example, they might enjoy an overnight here: Hatcher Pass Lodge – Alaska's Favorite Mountain Playground which is next to an abandoned gold mine. Or this: Summer Hiking Tours Anchorage Alaska | Go Hike Alaska. And this: Visit - Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center Happy Planning!
  6. I am hoping we can book the Flam railway independently- up and down without time in Myrdal. @Nodrog2024 One thing to consider is how much time you will spend on the bus for each excursion. From your excursion time in Alesund, it seems you haven't booked the Troll Road- that's probably a good thing! Even though I thought it would be wonderful, when I read the details it seemed there were limited brief stops along the route. Most all your ports except for Flam will give you free time to explore on your own. One thing I wish we had booked in Geiranger was the rib boat excursion, but unfortunately that is not one of the ports on our 2025 itinerary.
  7. Our May 2015 Fjords cruise was mostly gray days. We were drenched in Bergen thanks to heavy rains, and it was so early that the Dalsnibba viewpoint out of Geiranger was blocked by snow. Hoping late August/early September next year on the Apex will be better weather. Like you, Mr. Click, DH is an avid photographer, which is why we booked a porthole veranda vs. an infinite veranda. So much easier to access the open-air view to quickly take advantage of that perfect photo op!
  8. @georgiaguy 6303 reminds me of the last 8 cabins port and starboard sides of the S-class ships Deck 6. Those verandas jut out over the blue roof of the dining areas below but have an advantage of several square feet more space.
  9. @8mma Thanks. We are still nearly 18 months out, but I will call Martins next spring JIC.
  10. Oh great! We have this cabin booked for the Apex. Was there a worker there often? And was the equipment permanent? I would love to hear opinions of the BEST choices in porthole verandas. The most forward DPVs have the window washing equipment blocking the view, so I thought 7123 would be far enough bag to be safe from obstructions......
  11. Our friends were on that cruise and overall enjoyed it except for difficulty dining early in the MDR, which they solved by finding the OV grill, taking their meal outside and developing a good relationship with the bartender!
  12. But you can buy frequent flier miles aka points! On last year's cruise we were 2 Captain's Club points away from Elite Plus. We had just earned 5 points from a PUP video about 2 weeks prior to that cruise, but the rules indicated they would be awarded the 14th of the following month- after we disembarked. I emailed and called pleading for those points to be credited before we cruised, to no avail. We were really hoping to enjoy that Cafe al Bacio benefit! Sorry for the OPs angst and even more sorry for her injury. Ship happens, even though the ship didn't happen. Imagine if the injury had occurred on the cruise!
  13. Dang! Never got the email and we were traveling when the new PUP activity was released so my perusal of all the Celebrity threads on Cruise Critic was not as diligent as when I am home. Hate missing out on even 1 Captain's Club point. FWIW, I computed that all my previous PUP efforts resulted in 77 points, without which we would still be 20 short of attaining Plus status. Even our May Summit cruise will not have gotten us there!
  14. Using a HoHo bus is the perfect cure for jet lag! In Reykjavik, we took one loop around the city with our eyes wide shut and were refreshed enough the next time around to actually hop off and on!
  15. Martins Taxis! Scroll down to Cruise Ship Transfers section: Taxi zeebrugge, taxi brugge, taxi to bruges, havenvervoer (martinstaxi.be) For convenience sake I've copied the information from the website- CRUISE SHIP TRANSFERS From Zeebruges cruise terminal to the center of Bruges and back cost € 110 per vehicle (up to 8 people maximum for the same price). We bring you to the center ( Market Square). You do not have to walk 30 minutes to get to the center as when you take the train or bus ( you don’t lose time) You can decide when you want to go back to the cruise ship by making an appointment with your driver. Day trips to Ghent, Antwerp and Brussels are also possible. Twice we've been to Zeebrugge and headed into Bruges, and this is the service we used. I booked Martins once since we had 8 in our group and the second time we lucked out by joining a roll call member who'd organized this. If you don't have others to share the ride, ask on your roll call. Even if only 2 more sign up, the price is a relative bargain!
  16. It would help if you posted the ports you are interested in on the Cruise Critic forum I linked in my post #6 above. I am sure you will get specific answers as to how to DIY those ports for far less than $950 per person.
  17. @Irelandlady I head to the Ports of Call forum when looking for options for what to do in ports other than taking a ship's tour. Here is the link to the specific forum that covers your cruise area: Mediterranean - Eastern & Western - Cruise Critic Community Lately, roll calls have not been as active as pre-covid. However, another source of tips on what to do in ports would be Celebrity roll calls for the similar itinerary as yours. When we were looking into an Iceland/Greenland itinerary I found a wealth of links to private tours on the roll call for last year's cruise. Although not cruise focused, Rick Steves' forums are another great resource: Italy - Rick Steves Travel Forum Happy Planning!
  18. Booking a NRD cruise while aboard only ties up $200 (maybe more for a suite?) If cruise needs to be cancelled prior to 90 days out that is all that is lost. We will lose $200 for cancelling next year's Edge cruise because plans have changed. Travel insurance premiums for "cancel for any reason" would likely have been well in excess of $200, so we view that NRD as a loss we can absorb.
  19. Re: my post #16. I clicked on the link embedded into my MoveUp email from Celebrity which answered all the questions I asked in that post! Celebrity MoveUp – Upgrade Offer | Celebrity Cruises
  20. Can you please link this thread? Just received a MoveUp offer for our next cruise. This is our only opportunity to place a bid since all our other bookings are with the BigBox. I checked out which cabins have the greatest availability and think bidding on one of those might work at a lower number. But one of the categories available (non-suite) has only 3 open and I'd love to sail in one of those- can I bid on more than one cabin type?
  21. We opted for a tour with Cape Breton Taxi Tours. Simon MacKay customized a tour for the 6 of us sailing together that includes Baddeck, St. Ann's and the Red Island hike (Red Island Hiking Trail - Cape Breton Island (hikecapebreton.ca)
  22. Not enough coffee yet... CC linked to cruise- Cruise Critic? Captain's Club? It wasn't til the last paragraph of OP's post that the light dawned on me, even if it's not quite dawn here!
  23. I am hoping that the forward facing OV cabins have chairs by the window as I've seen on pix of the Equinox. Our August sailing will be our 6th cruise on the Eclipse starting when she was a newborn in 2010!
  24. YVR EXPRESS | YVR We have Global Entry. Does signing up for a time slot via YVR Express give us any advantage in getting thru US Customs/Border Control? The website doesn't address passengers who have GE, just suggests using the Mobile Passport app. Our Air Canada flight to PDX departs at 1:30pm and we were planning on getting to the airport @11am.
  25. Oh, that would be nice too for our upcoming Eclipse cruise, Did you spot any whales?
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