kwb101

When we went to Alaska a couple of years ago, our TA gave us each a dinner at Caneletto and Pinnacle Grill. When we arrived on board, among the other papers in our cabin, were small folded cards announcing the dinners, with the phone number to call for reservations. We didn't use them (the MDR was too good), so received credit for both on our final bill. 

6 minutes ago, fatcat04 said:

I don't think any part of North America qualifies.

I'm surprised, considering the number of itineraries that leave from Seattle, go to Alaska, and stop at Vancouver or Victoria, or both.

We are going to book a segment on a world cruise, but there's only one fare category, no mention whether it's a flex fare or restricted. Will have to inquire, so we don't get locked in to early on our air. Anyone know about this? 

16 hours ago, HokiePoq said:

New to this, but I can say that booking with HAL Air postpones the payment until final payment and perhaps extends the cancellation deadline.

2 hours ago, Tampa Girl said:

The good thing is that I would not have had to pay until final payment.

I just checked the Flight Ease page (available from HAL's home page), and when you pay and whether you can get a refund depends on which HAL fare you've booked. Some itineraries have only one type of fare, so don't know which of these fare options will apply to those. (N.B. Italics are mine.)

FLIGHT EASE OFFERS TWO BOOKING OPTIONS:

FLEXIBLE FARES
For those who want greater flexibility, payment for air travel will be due with your cruise final payment. Flexible fares can be changed or cancelled without fees at any time prior to your cruise final payment due date. After the cruise final payment due date, fees up to the full cost of the ticket apply.

RESTRICTED FARES
For those sure of their plans; non-refundable, but generally lower rates.
Pay at time of air booking:  Full payment for air reservation is due at time of air booking.

Change/Cancellation fees apply:  Changes to air reservations will result in cancellation of air booking and cancellation fees up to the full cost of the ticket.  Air prices are nonrefundable (no money back).

1 hour ago, palolake said:

Does anyone know if the Zuiderdam has interactive tvs?

Not sure exactly what you mean by interactive, but last September, our OV cabin TV had many choices by category (I don't think we could search). We were surprised and pleased that many of the films were related to our ports-of-call or countries visited.

I didn't measure, but the TV seemed about as big as our 55-inch one at home, with an excellent picture. It was mounted on the wall across from the bed. There was no DVD player. 

As an alternative (albeit not very satisfactory), if you have Netflix streaming, you can download many titles to a tablet to enjoy. We have a good-sized one, and, while not perfect, doing this generally beats what the S-class ships have.

Good luck! 

I think we bought a small box of detergent, either in the laundry room or from the nice folks at the front desk. Don't forget you'll be in Canada, so you'll need Canadian quarters. Not sure what the exchange rate is now, but we got $130 in currency and coin fir $100US at the front desk.

You didn't ask, but if you're looking for a good place to eat (beside the quite-good restaurant at the hotel), The Aurora Inn Restaurant is a block from the main building and is very good. As an aside, we were very happy to get yummy local fish the entire 14 days of our trip. The only time it wasn't prepared perfectly was the hotel in Whitehorse. 

Enjoy your trip. 

If you're concerned about a particular hotel, go to https://www.westmarkhotels.com. They are all owned by HAL. Since you'll only be there a night or two, I'm pretty sure there's no laundry service. You may have to download the fact/info sheet for each one to get the info,.

We did the three-night Alaska-Yukon trip a couple of years ago, and planned to use the laundry in Dawson, since it was at the halfway point. We started in the new building across the street from the lobby and restaurant, and it had some very small washers and dryers (about the size of a microwave). The front desk staff told us there were full-size machines off a hallway behind the front desk. We managed to wash and dry during dinner, a definite advantage (the on/off switch for the Northern Lights is there, too). Good luck! 

I can't speak to Civitavecchia, but we've used it twice in other cities. The HAL rep (holding a HAL logo sign) will meet you at your baggage carousel and give you directions. We were told to collect our luggage and go to a seating area, where we were then directed to our bus. We did have to get our luggage as far as the bus, but the driver took care of it at that point. 

I've found the easiest way to find show excursions and prices for a given cruise is to:

• Log in to the HAL site
• Click Already Booked
• Click My Account
• Ckick My Bookings
• Scroll down to find the cruise and drag Book Shore Excursions to a new tab (or press and hold, and select Open in New Tab)(so you don't have to keep going back and forth between trips)
• You'll see all the excursions by port

The advantage is that you'll see the actual price charged, where if you search ports in general (as above), the prices are shown as "starting at". Also, you'll see only your ports in sequence, and won't have to go back and forth on a giant list to find them. 

I've also find that it pays to track the number of excursions offered at each port. We picked up a very interesting one in Ketchikan for next month that was added about a month ago. I found it because the excursion count for that port went up by one overnight.

If you don't have a cruise booked, find the one you're interested in, click View Itinerary, click List View, and click Learn More for the ports you're interested in. You'll see the shore excursions (with the "Starting At" prices). However, it should show just the excursions available for just that voyage, not all possible voyages.

Sorry for the length, hope this helps. 

If memory serves,  the cheapest Internet service onboard only allows connections to social media sites. The middle (surf) plan is for most other sites. However, HAL does block some sites like DuckDuckGo (a search engine), which is strictly text, so there's no excuse that it uses took much bandwidth. 

Are you working strictly through HAL, or a TA? Our big-box TA has always made a lengthy point that a particular deposit was non-refundable.

In summary, all the Alaskan ports we'll be visiting are all one hour earlier than San Francisco (Pacific Daylight Time).

As mentioned, your steward will leave a printed note in your cabin notifying you the evening before the change. 

Canadian ports will be on San Francisco time. 

1 hour ago, dchip said:

 

THANKS KWB101, 

 

Yesterday our TA was told too bad, so sad. She called back today and we also got a cabin upgrade, OBC and FCC. What a difference a day makes. 🤗

 

Cheers, Denise 

:) Glad it worked out! I called about three weeks ago, and spent over 90 minutes with a very nice TA from our big-box warehouse (tial time was about two hours, including hold time). She was on the line with someone from HAL most of the time, and, while not quick, was certainly painless, and with a happy ending.

One thing I did learn: HAL central doesn't open until 0700 Pacific time, so don't call too early if you think they'll have to be involved in your dealings with your TA.

See you onboard! 

If memory serves, we had two check-size bags and two carryons. This was in 2017 on an Alaska-Yukon trip from Anchorage to Denali, then Fairbanks, Yukon, and Skagway. There was no problem with number of pieces or size. They were all picked up early morning, then delivered to our room at the end of the day.

Enjoy your trip! 

Are you going to Alaska or Yukon? We went a couple of years ago, and luggage size and weight info was in our boarding pass docs. 

Given that prices (at least on the first one) have dropped considerably, I suspect that they're not very popular. It may will be the length or the time of year. I'll be in the first one,  and, when I called about another price drop, got a cabin upgrade, OBC, and future cruise credit...all at no charge, very generous.

Other possible problems are HAL's fiddling with the itinerary (removing two ports, and only having two of three big ports (Anchorage, Vancouver, or Victoria) on any itinerary, and, being an EXC voyage, cutting stage productions in favor of talks and other educational content (yay!). Hope this makes sense. 

27 minutes ago, Mary229 said:

<snip>I just noticed you said for one year out, I don’t even think you can purchase that far in advance.   As in any thing prices will increase over time but I don’t think you can do anything about it now. 

Our UK trip in September '21 has had shore excursions available for sale for several months now.

On our Panama Canal trip last April and May, we did observe the King's birthday (April 25), although it was quite subdued. We received something from HAL before the trip asking that we wear orange that day. However, there was a special menu in the MDR with some traditional Dutch dishes. Otherwise, we heard there was a gathering around the aft pool, but nothing else. 

The only time I've seen a price change is for an Alaska trip we're taking, where prices were reduced 15% for one week. We saved about $175. I let's others on the roll call know, but some waited, and the prices went back up.

Unless you're uncertain,  I'd suggest booking the excursions you really want now, lest they sell out. Some have very limited capacity (I think a new one to an oyster farm in Ketchikan only takes 14, for instance). I think some of the very expensive ones (such as a boat landing on the Antarctic continent) are also limited, for various reasons (including its $3600 price for the day). 

We were on Maasdam last May and June, and I think both the U.S.- and European-spec plugs were two-prong. There may have been USB ports as well, but I don't remember. 

We just take a lightweight two-conductor extension cord with three sockets, which works quite well for our phone, tablet, and camera chargers, and didn't cost much. The stewards always unplugged it while we were out.

I do remember that the ships outlets were somewhat recessed and were not very suitable for anything much larger than an extension cord plug, not a charger (at least the ones we had).

Good luck. 

37 minutes ago, floridacruisers said:

Phil.... when I first saw the" Lanai cabins"  it made me think of the red light district in Amsterdam where you could look in windows to  see a "show"      I wonder, at night can  non lanai passengers turn the chairs around and watch the cabins going-on 

Might be better then the theater shows. 

 

Hawaiidan......Now that you mention it, it does sort of look like Amsterdam's red light district. However, given the average age and looks of HAL's passengers, I don't think I would watch the goings on. Something once seen can't be unseen

 

 Phil........floridacruisers

We weren't afraid of folks seeing us, we were afraid they'd laugh. 

As I mentioned, we didn't have any problem with deck-chair poachers, and didn't notice any on either of the trips. I did enjoy sitting there, watching the ocean go by, and talking with the inevitable walkers (there were quite a few on Maasdam). It was an unexpected bonus.

One thing: there are unreserved deck chairs on either end of the lanai section, plus a couple near the doors that go inside.

9 minutes ago, floridacruisers said:

With the lights on inside the lanai cabin and dark outside, can you see anything in the cabin from the outside? The mirror is supposed to block out all view of the inside of the cabin or are they translucent vs opaque?

I think you'd have difficulty seeing into the cabin at night; it's pretty much impossible during the day. Don't forget that there are fairly bright lights on the deck at night, which also make it difficult to see through the mirroring. We always closed our blackout curtains at night, leaving them open a couple of inches.

i should mention that on one ship, the curtain was a single piece that pulled from one side, while the one on the other ship was two pieces that met in the middle. We preferred the latter at night, because the gap we left let more light into the cabin. One ship was Volendam, the other Maasdam.

2 hours ago, TiogaCruiser said:

Those love seats don’t fit those who are small fore to aft when they want to nap on them, either. It’s sort of “draping oneself” over them with the legs hanging off. IIRC the outside measurements were 42” and the bedside stands (and walk space) was 18”. Veendam.

You have hit the nail on the head: they're not quite doll-house-size, but close. About all you can do semi-comfortably is sit in them. Naps would not be fun.

I forgot to add one caution about lanais: the sliding door is very heavy, difficult to push open (I'm 6 feet tall, and not exactly weak), and wants to stay closed. As a result, you will quickly learn to go through the door quickly, lest you get squished like a bug (to quote "South Park").