VideoTech

So, is there a way that two people on board can text each other and/or text people at home while on the Getaway without using the $125 wi fi plan?

This is a two part answer due to your "and/or."

The answer is that you can text others on the ship only without buying an internet package. You would have to download (before you leave on your cruise) the NCL iConcierge app, then pay the one time activation feed (was originally $9.95 per device, but seems to have been increased lately). You put your phone in airplane mode, then turn on the wifi only. You will be able to text any other device on the ship running the iConciege app.

Texting off the ship can be done two ways, both of which have additional costs. First, and cheapest, you buy a package of internet access minutes from NCL. Then you sign your phone onto the internet. Having done that, you can use any texting program which uses the internet to send and receive texts. One example of this is Facebook Messenger. Your phone remains in airplane mode and there are no cell phone data charges involved.

Second method (NOT recommended) is to turn on your cell phone as you normally would at home (i.e. turn OFF the airplane mode) and use traditional cell phone texting, otherwise known as SMS. This requires a cell phone connection. While the texting itself may be relatively inexpensive, the per minute charges for use of the ship's satellite cell phone service are not. However, this may be useful in an emergency situation.

Anyone have any experience with this suite? Do you hear noise from the bridge? Any info would be appreciated, thx!

The forward facing penthouses on the small ships are absolutely our favorite cabins. LOVE the huge balconies, great views. Have stayed in several on the deck directly under the bridge on different ships and never heard a noise from above.

Cruise4Kicks is correct about the night time light situation. Some will try to tell you that you cannot use your balcony after dark, That is simply not true. However, I have had cabin stewards who closed and locked the outer steel weather door when they made up the room at night. You can open it again (minding the rules about your cabin lights), but be aware that it's a heavy steel door and can get caught in the wind. Make sure you latch it open. Once you're done on the balcony, you will likely want to close the outer door again, as the wind whistles around the inner door if you leave the outer door open.

is it feasible to have a 11:30 flight out of La Guardia after disembarking Escape? I don’t want any stress so I guess my question is 90% of the time is this fairly routine?

First time sailing from NYC

Thanks in advance

Karen

In all the ports I've sailed out of, I would say an 11:30 am flight would be fine. However, I have not sailed out of NY (although I am in the city frequently on business, flying in and out of La Guardia), and I have read here and elsewhere that there are often delays to disembarkation at the NY port.

While it's true that there is massive on-going construction at LGA, I have still never had any problems getting there reasonably quickly in a taxi or Uber.

If you simply don't want any stress, then book a later flight.

I think NCL should have free WIFI! The cost is way to expensive!

They do have free wifi. What they don't have is free internet access. The two things are not the same.

Yes, I know I'm being nit-picky. But there is a difference, particularly as it is used on the ship. The NCL iConcierge app uses the free wifi and does not require you to have paid for internet access. Many people do not understand this.

With regard to free internet access, you can select that as on of your "free at sea" perks.

I just read in a Getaway dailie that was just posted that the app can be used to call home. Does anyone know if this is true and if it is an additional charge on top of the $15 to use the app for texting?

First of all, I believe the one time charge for activating iConcierge is $9.99.

It's interesting to hear that some have reported being able to call off the ship to a land line using iConcierge. My initial answer would have been no, that the iConcierge app cannot be used for calling off the ship (to your home or any other land based number).

I say this because while the iConcierge app does do wifi calling (you can place a call to the ships's cabin phone of any of your contacts in iConcierge), the app does not require internet access to function. Wifi access alone would not provide a connection from off the ship to a land based phone.

It's my feeling that those who were able to do this may have also had internet access enabled on their phone at the time, and that the wifi calling feature of iConcierge made use of the internet as a connection to the shore based phone number. If it does work, I suspect it's an "unintentional feature" of the app.

If that's the case, to have this work, you would have to pay the activation free for iConcierge, and also purchase (or have as a perk) a package of internet minutes. Your phone would need to be signed onto the internet at the time you tried to make your call. It's worth noting that many phones now offer "wifi calling" as a standard feature, which means that with the wifi on, and the phone connected to the internet, you would not need the iConcierge app to make a wifi call in any case.

This isn’t some joke. This competition is really important to me, and I was just looking for some advice. Please don’t be condescending and rude. Thank you

Serious answer: I was on a cruise on the Pearl onetime and as a suites guest, would have breakfast and lunch in Cagney's. One day after lunch I heard the most marvelous classical piano music coming out of the lounge next door, which was not officially open at the time, I poked my head in, and found a passenger there, playing the piano.

After commenting on how much I enjoyed the music, I found out that the passenger came up there every now and then to practice. I don't know if it was with NCL's permission or not, but the lounge was not open, so I assume there was no reason for permission to be denied if it had been requested. As a side note, that lounge on the Pearl (which also used to be Cagney's overflow seating) has since been moved and replaced by Moderno.

So, you might see if you can find a suitably unused piano for daytime practice...and if you want to be formal about it, ask.

As a general rule the games at the bar are the worst paying games in ANY casino. Among slot type games, video poker has the lowest expected return. Combine the two and you might as well roll up your dollars and light them on fire.

Not sure how you can make that statement, since you have no way of knowing the payback percentage on any non-VP slot machine.

Video Poker is the only slot machine where the payback percentage can be calculated, from the pay table for the game. Therefore, if you can play perfectly you know your expected return. On a reel or video screen slot machine, there is no such thing as perfect play, and no way to know your expected return.

Also, at my local casino, the only VP paying 9/6 on JOB is on the bar top machines. The machines on the floor pay much worse. Not sure why they set them up this way...unless they want to keep dedicated VP players at the bar, or figure that bar players drink more and therefore are less likely to play perfectly.

I agree...PRE is usually good enough and certainly a better value but I have seen very longs lines at SEA. I would just suggest paying a couple of dollars more and getting Global Entry which comes with PRE and also lasts for 5 years (and lots of credit cards and frequent flyer programs will pick up the tab).

One further advantage of Global Entry is that I think it's beginning to make an appearance a some of the major cruise ports. I have it for reasons of international air travel, but I've heard people mention seeing Global Entry at cruise ports now too.

NCL just mailed me luggage tags for my upcoming trip. But there are no directions and I have no idea how to put them on my luggage.

 

Are the supposed to just be stuck flat in the middle of my luggage? looped around a handle? ( they are self adhesive).

 

Can you tell I’m a newbie?

1. Do not put the cruise luggage tags on if you are first flying to the port. They may be taken off by the airline or accidentally ripped off by the baggage handlers of the airlines.

2. Put your luggage tags on the morning you go to the ship. Loop them around a handle. Since you have the self adhesive ones, you're all set. If you don't have those, the easiest way to do this is to ask to borrow a stapler at the hotel front desk. Alternatively, you can buy a small roll of wide, clear shipping tape at a drugstore and use that.

3. Tip the porters at the port $2 to $3 per bag.

I'm diamond player for total rewards. Mostly play at Ballys in AC. Play a lot of craps, 3 card, bj, etc.. Never a big slot player at all. Have hit a few 1200-1500 jackpots in AC on dollar machines, but nothing that great. On my ncl cruises I stick to the same games for the most part, and rarely, if ever, play slots on board. My question is, how do the ship machines pay out compared to land based casinos? I always feel the ship machines would be extremely tight. I'm seriously considering hitting the slots a lot more than normal on my upcoming Breakaway cruise, but I'm looking for feedback. I APPRECIATE IT!

Shipboard casinos generally set their machines to lower payback percentages than land based casinos. After all, they are the only game in town, right? None the less, they can't afford to set them extremely lower..they still need enough action on the floor to keep the interest up and generate enough excitement to draw in the casual gambler.

DW and I play slots exclusively, and are Diamond with TR and high level CAS. Overall, we know we don't do as well on the ships as on land, but we do well enough to have fun, and that's the point.

Sailing on the Escape in February in the Haven. Should we wait until we board the ship to book shore excursions or book them before we leave?

If there's an excursion you particularly want to do, you should book it in advance. Excursions can and do sell out, particularly the more popular ones.

If you have the $50 per port excursion credit, you can still book in advance online. The credit will be applied to your final on board balance once you've taken an excursion.

Might just be my imagination, but it sure seems like cruise ship casinos have more slot winners early in the cruise versus late. Anybody else notice the same thing?

This is one of the biggest urban myths about cruise casinos - that they deliberately increase the payback percentage (not the number of Jackpots awarded) early in the cruise, then lower it as the cruise goes on. Here's some facts about that:

1. On the older style reel machines, changing the payback percentage requires opening the machine and physically replacing a computer chip on the mother board in the machine. I know - I've owned one of those machines and I've changed the chips many times. This is a time consuming procedure and there's really no reason or time for the cruse staff to do this.

2. On the new, video screen machines, the game play is controlled by programming a computer (typically right at the machine). However, it *is* possible for this to be done at a central location, so that all the machines *could* be controlled (and therefore changed) from one day to the next or from one hour to the next. So now the question becomes: Do they do this?

All of my research leads me to believe that there is no real reason for the casino staff to do this. The skill of managing the machines in a casino lies in setting up a mix of machines with different payback percentages. This is done to insure that there is enough "action" on the floor to encourage play. Machines of the same type, in the same bank, may even have different payback percentages between them, but as long as some people are winning - even just the smaller amounts provided by the machines with higher payback percentages - they will keep playing. (by the way, when you see a bank of the same game machines advertised at a certain payout, that can mean that only ONE of the machines in the bank pays that percentage.)

Because the casino managers know the payback percentages of each machine, they can closely predict their daily revenue from each machine, and their overall take. Once they have a good mix on the floor, they simply sit back and let the math of the house edge make their money. And they will make money, otherwise they wouldn't be in the business.

All of this is completely separate from the issue of jackpots. A jackpot can happen on each and every spin of a machine, and each spin is a separate, random event that has nothing to do with the spin before or the spin after. So you're just as likely to hit several jackpots in a row, or not hit anything for days or months. The idea that machines are "hot" or "cold" is human nature..we aren't equipped to understand completely random systems, so our brains try to impose some kind of pattern on the randomness. There is none. It's completely and totally random.

This last is confirmed by our experience as long time, seasoned gamblers both on cruise ships and on land. The experience is identical. We've had cruises where we cleaned up and did very well, and cruises where we did nothing but loose. And I've sat in cruise casinos on the first night of a cruise where there was almost no action, and in others on first nights where there were hand pays happening everywhere. I've also sat in cruise casinos in the middle of the cruise, and at the end of the cruise, with hand pays going on everywhere. It is completely random.

The random number generator that controls the machine is not supposed to caer about your bet size.

If t does, the machine's ben goosed and you shouldn't play it anyway.

Playing max bet has nothing to do with the RNG. The reason you should always play Max Bet is because many machines (particularly progressives) do not award the Jackpot unless you are playing Max Bet. If you take a moment to read the game rules you'll find that out.

Therefore, it's always best to find a machine where you can afford to play max bet.

New to NCL, primarily a VP player. We will be sailing on the Getaway soon and I was curious as to the variety of games, single line/multiple line, and the pay tables, can any experienced NCL cruiser fill me in?

They have both single and multi-game VP. Pay tables are generally several percentage points worse than what you'd find on land based casinos.

Apologies, as I'm sure that these questions have been much asked.

 

Thinking of doing our first NCL cruise (on Breakaway) and looking at the Haven. Have cruised RCI a lot more, mainly in suites.

 

How easy is it to get space by the Haven pool or on the Haven sundeck (we'd be travelling at Easter)? Are bookings necessary for the Haven restaurant or do you just turn up. Keen to understand this as the main reason for booking is to have a stress free trip compared to the scrum for sunloungers on the main sun decks...

 

Also very happy to hear any other Haven related tips/ must knows for a newbie...

We have sailed extensively in the Epic and Escape Havens. The courtyard/pool experience can vary greatly. First point is that the pool in the Haven courtyard is very small. It's really not more than a plunge pool. There are also two hot tubs. During the day, on cruises at popular times with families, you are likely to find the pool area very crowded with kids. How they behave depends largely on how their families make them behave.

With regard to lounge chairs, our experience is that (just as on the non-Haven pool decks) if you're not down there early to find a seat, you won't get one. Again, it can depend largely on the time of year of the cruise and the itinerary. But - there is a very nice interior sundeck on the deck above and around the pool deck, and there is an even better exterior sundeck on that same level. We've never had problems finding loungers in those two areas. There's full bar service on both those sundecks as well as a hot tub on the exterior sundeck. I haven't been on the Breakaway but I believe the setup is the same as on the Escape.

Since you're cruising at Easter, you may find more families on board. I would suggest you'd do well to use the pool courtyard early in the morning, or late in the day.

No reservations are required at the Haven restaurant. The food is excellent, although as pointed out, the menu does not change over the course of the cruise (one thing NCL could do better!) .

We are on the Bliss July 7th sailing to Alaska. We are trying to decide what time to take the White summit train and bus combination trip in Skagway. We would like to take the train up and the bus back down but are worried about the fog on the way up. Are options are 7:30 am, 8:30 am and 12 noon. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what time would be the best to select? Thanks.

Fog is pretty hard to predict, since it depends on so many different weather variables. The issue with the railway is often more one of low hanging clouds as you climb up in altitude. But they make for beautiful photo ops!

We've been back at the Pearl in the afternoon in Skagway and watched a low lying fog bank come up the inlet at water level until it enveloped the ships and the town. But through gaps in the fog bank you could see the mountain tops in the sunlight.

I suppose what I'm trying to say is not to worry about it too much. Pick an excursion time that works for whatever else you want to do.

In case anyone is interested CLEAR is doing a free 3 month promotion. SEA has CLEAR and it combined with TSA PRE makes transiting security take 2 or 3 minutes. The offer I got in email is attached.

 

I don't get anything for this nor do I work for CLEAR :) .

You also can get a discounted price on CLEAR if you are a Delta sky miles member. I didn't know this when I initially signed up and wasn't very happy when Clear refused to honor my membership after the fact. None the less, the CLEAR service can be a real time saver at some airports, like Denver.

You might want to re-post this question on the Mediterranean ports of call boards.

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=19

Still trying to compare going on the NCL Epic and the RCI Symphony of the Sea.

 

Looking at the itineraries and they are similar with a few differences. I wanted to get opinions about some stops.

 

NCL:

Livorno- Easily go to Florence and Pisa

Cannes- Easily go to Nice and Monaco

 

RCI:

La Spezia- Easy to go to Cinque Terre

Marseille- Not sure where else to go

 

Which are the better group of ports where I can go on excursions?

 

Thanks

We like a dark bedroom, so on the Escape we've always gone with configuration B. Like the natural light in the bath and shower too. Can't beat those huge balconies on any of the aft penthouse configurations, though.

2nd time I've copied/pasted this in 2 days. :D

 

H6 info for BA/GA/Escape/Joy/Bliss/Encore

First, decide on your preferred bedroom/master bathroom configuration.

With Configuration A, the master bedroom (larger) is near the balcony and there is a 2nd access door to the balcony in the master bedroom.

With Configuration B, the master bathroom (larger) is near the balcony and has a view of the ocean and balcony but no 2nd access door to the balcony.

 

 

Configuration A doesn't have natural light in the master bathroom.

Configuration B doesn't have natural light in the master bedroom.

 

On Breakaway and Getaway, Configuration A is on decks 11 and 14.

On Breakaway and Getaway, Configuration B is on decks 9, 10, 12, and 13.

 

On Escape/Joy/Bliss/Encore, Configuration A is on decks 9, 10, 12, 13, and 15

On Escape/Joy/Bliss/Encore, Configuration B is on decks 11 and 14. (opposite of BA/GA)

 

All H6 living rooms are the same no matter which ship (BA/GA/Escape/Joy/Bliss/Encore) other than mirror image between port and starboard.

 

The balconies are all roughly the same width but differ in depth.

 

On BA/GA, the size order is 9, 12, 11, 10, 14, 13 from deepest to least deep.

On Escape/Joy/Bliss/Encore, the size order is 9, 12, 15, 14, 11, 10, 13 from deepest to least deep.

 

For Escape, the Garden Cafe and Spice H2O are above the H6s so most people avoid the higher decks because of the potential for noise in the morning and late night. . If balcony size is important, decks 9 and 12 are the best. If having a larger bathroom with a view is important, take either deck 14 or 11 as their balconies are nearly identical in size.

You will be spoiled for cruising any other way after this! Did you happen to book a forward facing penthouse? Those are our favorite cabins on the Jewel class ships, and that's absolutely the BEST cabin to have for the Alaska run!

You can ask about having your adult kids check in with you...they may not do it since they are adults and can check in on their own. But it's worth the ask.

Sailing on the Pearl to Alaska in 4 weeks (June 17th).

 

We just moved from a balcony cabin to the Penthouse with large balcony (Cat SF). Upgrade price was great so we jumped on it! Our adult kids are booked in an inside on the same deck very close to us so they will enjoy our large balcony too!!

Questions 1: Can we all check in together through the suite check-in? I assume my kids will not be able to piggy back through the suite priority check-in with us. It will stink to not be able to take advantage of this perk for our first suite experience, but, it won't be the end of the world either way. We are platinum as well, so we have had luck getting them to go that route with us. They technically should be nearly platinum but many of the cruises they went on with us as kids did not get tracked. We definitely want to board together for this amazing trip!!

Question 2: Will our butler deliver mimosas and bloody Marys with our breakfast in the morning? I have read a lot about the upgraded room service menu and breakfast and lunch at Cagney's! My sweet husband normally ventures out to find me a mimosa for the balcony in the morning, but it would be great if he didn't have to. :-)

 

Feel free to share any other tips I should know about! I hope this doesn't spoil me for every cruise in the future!!

The idea to book a hotel just for a few hours didn't occur to me before, but sounds like a great option. I searched for day use offers and most hotels offer them starting at 9 or 10 am, but I did find one hotel that has 7am - 2 pm offer. It's not as close to the port as I would like, but still looks like a very good option.

You don't necessarily need to find a "day use" rate option. Just get a normal hotel rate, but make sure the hotel knows you will not be checking in until early morning the next day. Explain about your flight. Check out time may be 11 am or noon, but you could also ask about a "late check out" at say 1pm, when you want to head to the port.

The older style of machines chips had to be manually changed by opening the machine, unsealing the chip, resetting it, then resealing the chip. The newer network(multiple machines controlled from a single source) machines chips can be switched and controlled from one computer. The regulations are the same as to what the chips can be set at though. Now depending on the regulation these chips can technically be changed constantly. So with that being said, yes a ship could make the first/last or any days payouts higher on any number of machines.

Yes, the newer computer based machines can be centrally controlled and *could* technically be reprogrammed as often as the casino liked. The old school "chip" machines could not.

But there is simply no reason for them to do this. Slot machines grind out the profit for the casino on each and every spin, just the few percentage points of each wager they do not return, over the long (long) haul, generates plenty of revenue for the casino.

The skill of the casino staff lies in putting a mix of machines with differing payback percentages on the floor to generate enough "action" to keep the players betting. After that, it's sit back and let the money roll in. Believe me, a good slots manager knows within pennies what revenue he/she can expect to see every day.

The fallacy of "early pay outs," "hot or cold machines," "Casinos alter the machines" are just that, fallacies. Each and every spin of the slot machine has the same chances of paying out or not. And each and every spin is a random, single event that has nothing to do with the one before or the one after. But our minds don't work well with true randomness. We like to try and find patterns in random events, so we decide the machine is "cold"or "hot" or "the casino has stopped them from paying." None of that is true.

Hello out there!! I'm sailing on the Escape this summer and am considering upgrading my balcony cabin to either a forward facing suite or the courtyard suite. I've never been in the Haven and would love this opportunity. Do you have a preference between the two and if so' date=' why? I can't figure out, other than size, which is "better."

 

Thoughts? Pros? Cons? Thanks in advance!!![/quote']

 

We have had both on the Escape. It really comes down to whether you want to be in the Haven proper or not.

 

We love the forward penthouse because it has a separate bedroom. Since one of us is a night owl and the other is not, that really works for us. Plus the cabin is bigger. On the other hand, the balconies are tiny. Just room for two chairs. That's a shame.

 

We don't find that it's a problem not being in the Haven. After all, it's just a few flights or an elevator ride away.

Thanks for for the explanations! Any thoughts on cabin selection? Choices are BA midship on 9 or 10.

 

 

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I would take deck 10 so you have cabins above and below you.

Husband and I are new to NCL, but have cruised Celebrity twice and have 2 upcoming cruises booked with them. We love the itinerary of the 10/24/19 Med cruise and I checked out the super active roll call which is exciting!

 

Questions I have - how does internet work? It appears to be very costly-we will use it more than 250 minutes over the course of 14 days, I’m sure. Could someone please break down the gratuity protocol for me? This is a port intensive cruise and the balcony cabin looks great to me. Is there any advantage to booking mini suite?

 

Thanks so much for any advice!!!

Ellen

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The internet isn't that complicated. You buy a package of internet minutes, anything from by-the-minute to an unlimited minutes package. If you are using your cell phone, you make sure the phone is in Airplane mode. Then turn on just the wifi on your phone. Connect to the NCL wifi, establish your sign on and password, then you can do most of what you normally do on the internet. It will be slower than you are used to, however. Remember to SIGN OFF the NCL internet when you are done if you have a limited number of minutes.

Only one device can be signed into your account at a time, but you can use any number of devices..your phone, tablet, laptop, whatever. Just sign each one on, and then off again. If all you're doing is grabbing email and responding, you may find 250 minutes is fine for 14 days. You can always add minutes or just buy the unlimited plan.

I don't know if the Jade has been upgraded with the new NCL internet services yet. The new services have packages that are sold for high volume use, such as streaming video.

Also remember that you can often find a cafe or restaurant with internet at your port stops...just buy a coffee or a drink and spend a few minutes on their internet service.

Finally, you will see a lot of discussion about whether or not you can text to your family and friends ashore. The answer is yes, but only with services that use the internet for texting, such as Facebook Messenger. Standard cell phone texting (SMS messaging) does not work with the phone in airplane mode.