Baron Barracuda

Selecting the best travel insurance policy for you can be daunting. Policies may appear similar but beware the fine print. When we have questions I call Insuremytrip. Good people who have never steered me wrong.

A number of times we requested a table for two in early traditional on M & S class but were assigned either a larger table or second seating. Never a problem. At embarkation there is a head waiter stationed at the mdr entrance to handle change requests. Always been very accommodative.

Also in a little over two years the SPR has been reduced from roughly 650mm barrels to 350 million. At some point that will have to be replenished likely pushing prices higher.

Two months ago oil was below $70 now $87. Last quarter RCL reported they were 55% hedged for remainder of this year and 25% next year. They estimated full year impact of a 10% rise in fuel is -$111MM. So at current price that's vulnerability of -$222MM. Another impact of rising fuel will be higher airfares which travelers must take into consideration when deciding whether to book a cruise.

We have the same situation as OP on our Grand Hawaii and Polynesia sailing this November. Hilo Hawaii, our first stop shows two included excursions, the 3 1/2 hour Hilo Highlights plus the 6 1/2 hour Secrets of Puna. We're in a PV and booked the longer tour as soon as reservations opened. Within 10 minutes it sold out. When others on our meet&mingle board expressed disappointment I referred them to TellUs. Later out of curiosity I checked the shore excursion descriptions on the VO web site and found Secrets of Puna listed as a pay excursion. On MVJ I remain booked with no additional charge.

Other than Ocean vs River to make a recommendation it would help to know your friend's preferences: sea days vs port days, discovering new places or revisiting familiar ones, longer itineraries vs shorter ones, summer sunshine or other cooler seasons.

X suffers from multiple personality disorder. Suites, especially higher level ones do provide a premium experience though at an absurdly high price. Aqua class might be considered premium by those overly infatuated with Blu and the spa. For the remaining 75%+ of passengers however what we saw as a premium line 30 years ago (and maybe still 10 years ago) has steadily descended into upper mass market.

X keeps pushing prices up while taking actions that push their product down market. It may work for a while but there's a lot of competition on the way that will test passengers loyalty. Over the next five years Viking will be adding 6 new ships, Explora Journeys 5, MSC 3, Virgin Oceania Silversea and Princess 2 each, etc, etc. That's a lot of new capacity offering a value proposition equal to or greater than X.

To confirm, in lieu of liqueur you requested and received normal size (750ml) wine bottles. That would be great. Last cruise we ended up bringing home 50+ small bottles of vodka for our daughters. Still have most of it.

Don't read too much into divisional job titles. Many companies have division presidents or CEO's who ultimately report to parent company superiors with lesser sounding titles. Laura and Michael are simply line of business managers. They enjoy some level of decision making authority but are not on the board. Ultimately Jason Liberty calls the shots.

DW is an early riser so usually did laundry at 4am. And she usually wasn't the only one.

Great Viking perc. Allows you to drastically reduce how much clothes to pack and no need to wash socks in the sink or string clothesline across the cabin to dry bathing suits.

Of course deposits and bookings are up. They'd better be. Even during covid RCG continued to add new builds latest being ICON, Ascent and Silver Nova. That's a lot of additional capacity. There was also a mountain of FCC's that needed to either become bookings or expire.

Viking has a great 33 day itinerary round trip LA. The 11/10/23 sailing which we'll be on still has lots of availability. Prices start around $7K with lots of inclusions (booking code SUM23).

'23 vs '22 is apples and oranges as a number of ships weren't back in service last spring and others were still operating at reduced capacity.

We booked Dec '24. Took advantage of free air and $25 deposit (take a look at high cost of booking air on your own). Have another VO sailing coming up so they gave us 6 month FP. If price drops will cancel and rebook only being out the $25 pp.

MARDIGRAS.COM of course.

Our Mardi Gras sailing back in '17 was marketed as a Mardi Gras theme cruise however X ran it as simply a sailing that happened to call in NOLA for three days in February. Very little themed activities or dining. Fortunately we had well over 1k boisterous CC members on board who created our own fun. Hopefully X has since upped their game.

We've moved over to Viking for our last couple of sailings and are very happy. Miss the casino and big time entertainment but enjoy their free dining options and love all the inclusions. Can initially appear pricey but they are always releasing discount codes which are posted in the "post Viking promos thread" in the VO board.

Is the PC logjam only impacting ships moving Eastward from the Pacific to the Atlantic? We're scheduled to board the Star in LA in three months after she repositions Westward from Florida. Hope drought conditions don't worsen causing further disruptions.

Sailing is poorly timed. Doesn't arrive in NOLA until sometime on Monday so misses many of the big weekend parades. Little to do Tuesday aside from Rex parade as most of city is shut down for holiday. Even the outlet center adjoining the dock is closed. We had a great time on the inaugural Mardi Gras sailing back in '17 which arrived a day earlier. Only disappointments were lack of Mardi Gras themed onboard events and little late food available after returning from parades.

I like to fly Premium Economy on UAL as it has many of the benefits of Business Class at a much lower cost. Last week UAL shuffled their fall NY - LA schedule, downgrading a number of flights from 777 and 787's to 757's which eliminated the PE class. I was booked on two of these flights and UAL downgraded me from PE to a standard seat. As a big guy that doesn't work for me. I am now gun shy about re-booking back into PE for fear they will change planes again. Therefor paid almost double to move up to Business Class. In the future will only consider PE for close- in bookings.

I take 9 prescriptions, some AM, some PM, some both, so always use an organizer. Have 32 night sailing coming up so trying to decide whether to buy extra organizers or pack of ziplock bags. Have pics of bottles on my phone and if need be can call up my UNH account online to show every medication claim I've submitted.

Clay's post prompted discussion with dw. We're on the 32 night Grand Polynesia this Nov which overlaps with a good piece of wc. She admits doing Polynesia decreases likelihood of taking future world cruise but doesn't know if she's mentally prepared for 120 days at sea. Price and inclusions are enticing though. Might call and ask if Viking would let me switch without 20% penalty.

Seem to remember back in ancient times (90's?) mast grill also served ribs, chicken and maybe steak. Would love good, fresh barbecue.