Tedferg

Best of luck to you, however, I would not be too unhappy with the new location. For me the Oceanview is to have daylight versus an inside cabin. I don't think you will spend much time with the 'View'. Especially in Alaska, viewing is best done on deck.

@TheMichael are you suggesting that a person can see available dining times via the App and so should have no need to walk up? I don't think the App is accurate enough to allow that. Often there is little selection at certain times but no-shows and other diners finishing early means there are empty tables. I also think you would need to scroll through ding rooms separately, which is a pain. I have seen Host suggesting another dining room that has availability, easier than scrolling through App for Tiem and Dining room.

13 hours ago, screwsmcernst said:

Thanks everyone for all your responses.  We have decided to book a stateroom in the "Basement".  We then took our savings and we are adding 4 days at the end and travel to Lucerne and Zurich and still saving enough to not fly economy.  😃 

Thanks for your question and all the answers. I was wondering about this, have not done a river cruise yet, Funny that you mention flying economy. I am always tempted but Business class is significantly more than Economy and I feel I can handle the latter.

11 hours ago, nini said:

Go to www.overlordtour.com

This is the company that we used as well as many on our cruise. They book up FAST! But, you can get on the wait list.

We used Overlord and joined other couples for a Private tour, this might be an option of regularly scheduled tours are full.

There are posts on both sides of this discussion, though the majority feel it is too loud. I would say that if you are in the Theater, you should not expect to be able to converse; Crooners is borderline and I accept that the piano player is there to entertain, but you should be able to converse in a bar; other areas in the Piazza, unrelated to the event, Alfredo's, Sushi restaurant etc. should NOT be drowned out by other events!

And, if you have a Wi Fi plan, you can enable Wi Fi calling in Airplane Mode and still make calls without charge.

We did a private tour of Highlands with Avril's Travels, out of Invergordon, nice small company. Avrils Travels | Highlands.

On the Regal they had Draft Heineken in the Crown Grill bar,

I have noticed several times that the map is different to the itinerary, always go with the latter. There is a current California Coastal from LA, first stop is Santa Barbara, map shows San DIego.

Interesting that no one has mentioned hurricanes. That was always a concern for me because cruises are during hurricane season. Most cruisers say the ships can avoid them and so we went Oct 2022. Hurricane Fiona hugged the coast, we missed Bar Harbor, soaked in Boston, Halifax limited by downed trees, missed St John - an OK cruise but disappointing.

3 hours ago, leck57 said:

 

Perhaps they don't any more. I'm referring to our last cruise about 12 months ago but we have two cruises in the next 4 months so I'll see if they still have them.  Personally I'd rather be sent away with a pager than stand around for however long it takes.

Agree with you, I was disappointed not to get a buzzer, hence my comment.

5 hours ago, leck57 said:

I just take a pager head to the nearest bar and drown my sorrows while I wait.

Did not know they still have pagers.

23 hours ago, PacnGoNow said:

If you do buy it again on the App, you should get an email confirmation right away.

Good to know, thank you.

5 hours ago, Thrak said:

 

That's how I managed to fail to purchase any on our May cruise last year. I waited until the end and then stuff happened and I forgot to buy them.

Once we went to buy FCD on last day and the rep pointed out we could do this using the app and showed us how. The transaction did not go through, and I did not notice until after we were home. Chatted to princes but no way to make the purchase after the cruise, they did give us OBC as a courtesy. So all ended well.

1 hour ago, Snaxmuppet said:

Deck 6...

 

Sneaky, thanks, I was looking over near International Cafe wher I think it is on Royal & Regal.

On 12/10/2023 at 2:11 PM, Snaxmuppet said:

Before we do Good Spirits at Sea (if we can get a seat), after we do Take 5.

I don't see Good Spirits on Sky deck plan,

I think it varies by Cruise / Date / Promotion. I just checked several random itineraries and deposit is $100. Also varies by promotion whether it is refundable or not.

4 minutes ago, snoozecrooze said:

I believe the logic is that they do 11×7 (assuming you're talking a 7-day cruise) and that makes it 378+77=455 (which isn't 452, I get that). But it's not just tacking on 11 to 378 and then that's it.

Great explanation - thank you! Isn't Math wonderful 🙂

Looking at California Coastal for Winter / Spring break. I know that if I select Interior, I often get the option to upgrade to Obstructed Ocean View or Obstructed Balcony.

Example: Interior $378, upgrade to OV OBS for $11/day, $389. Regular OV is $598. When I select Interior + Upgrade to OV Obstructed the resulting price is $452

16 hours ago, 1emerald1 said:

I keep waiting for a sale with OBC, hope thats not going to be a thing of the past!

I saw an interesting thing. I did a mock booking, no OBC, then I logged in to see if Veteran's OBC would be applied and it was, but also $100 each Promotional OBC showed up 12 day cruise.

Worst case, show the verification success to Guest Services inboard. BTW when I do mock bookings it shows for me and I did not reconfirm.

1 hour ago, Crashe said:

For us, the Piazza.  We jumped from Princess to another line and slowly we noticed we missed something.  The grandeur of the Piazza and the surrounding venues.  The crew is always great, make friends every time we go.

Agree, we took a cruise on Celebrity - enjoyed it but missed the openness of Piazza. Sadly agree with others that the noise spoils the Piazza.

They do combine accounts and OBC onboard, but if the credit card was charged pre-cruise, then I don't think combined accounts would fix this.

5 hours ago, kywildcatfanone said:

The bartenders don't pay attention sometimes to whose medallion they charge to.

I didn't even go up to the bar, but was sitting in a lounger about 10 feet away.

Most times we were asked for cabin number rather than medallion scan. One time I said 'Emerald 415' and server responded 'M415', confusing Emerald with Emmm. I think this is part of the problem as well as mis hearing cabin number. Most times they would also confirm my name, but sometimes not.

8 hours ago, Thrak said:

It's a bit pointless for us. We just got off a 63 day "cruise" that was actually 6 separate segments. That means we could each have had 2 pre fixe meals on each segment. 12 meals each. We had one. It's too damn much food for us. We went to Alfredo's and they didn't want to let us just share a pizza and let it go at that. They wanted us to each have an appetizer, a pizza, and a dessert. What a stupid freaking system. I'm hoping it was just the idiots on our ship but that's how they insisted we do it. We ate the appetizer (meh...) and each ate part of our separate pizza. We walked out without dessert and they seemed offended. Splitting one pizza is all we need. We had the same issue in Vines so didn't eat our "included" meals there either. Just let us have the much smaller amount of food that suits us.

On the Royal, transpacific, we convinced the waiter that we only wanted to share a pizza, as we always do.  He seemed confused but said 'OK, sure'. He brought us one salad, then one pizza and finally said we had dessert to come but we declined - we were charged two visits. We wanted to try Sushi so saved our other 'free one' for it. Went to Alfredo's a second time and stressed to manager checking us in that we were having one pizza a la carte. He agreed and as expected we were charged $8.50. We had the fixed meal at Sushi place and could easily have shared one portion at lunch. So, I agree with your points. I now understand how the Plus inclusions work, but it is silly and not well thought out - especially just two 'free' on a 21 day cruise!