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polmcs

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Everything posted by polmcs

  1. I recognize that view With a semi covered Caribe deck, which Grand class type ship are you on? When I was there, I was on the Tahitian Princess, so a much smaller ship.
  2. My late wife and I did one in Honolulu on the Star one year. We were about halfway through the meal when the heavens opened up as a thunderstorm rolled through. Thankfully, we were on the Caribe deck, so it was just a case of dragging the tables and chairs under the overhang and we got to watch natures fireworks for the rest of the meal
  3. Whale watching in Cabo around that time of year is my go to excursion every time. I would throughly recommend the sunset sail excursion. I did one last Feb and it was the most amazing experience. Whales galore and everyone aboard was game, despite the breezy conditions, to have a little bit of extreme sailing according to the captain and first mate, and they cut the engines and hoisted the sails for the return part of the journey. 😉
  4. I just went into my total solar eclipse cruise for April 2024 and tried to reserve 360 for an evening after a port visit (high chance not a formal night) and despite being in a full suite, it shows that it will charge my credit card for the reservation
  5. The middle one looks like 1 days gratuities for 2 (I haven’t sailed since Feb, so no idea on the current daily rates). The other days could be grats, plus say a drink at the bar, or grats and a purchase from a store onboard, etc.
  6. If they continue to show pending and not actually charged, then they should drop off after a few days. As your room charge balance increases during the cruise, Princess will place a temporary authorization/ hold on your card, just to make sure that you are “good” to pay the final bill when it becomes due.
  7. I’ve found that when booking excursions in advance of a cruise, the SHOBC can only be applied to the passenger who has the credit against their name. If I have say $100 SHOBC and I book a $50 excursion for both passengers in the reservation, it will take $50 of my OBC and apply it to my reservation and then ask me to pay the $50 for the other passenger, even though technically, I still have the other $50 of OBC in my account. No such issues if I wait until I board to use the OBC for both passengers assuming both onboard folios are paid by the same credit card.
  8. OBC showed up in my account less than 2hrs later. About 12 hrs in total from signing up for an account to having the credit show up on my booking and no need to share broker login details.
  9. I’m looking to change an existing booking. One of my options is to add a 3rd person to the booking and buy a plus package for them as passengers #1 and #2 were booked with a plus fare and we’d all like to have a drink, or three. Does the first night speciality dining for suite passengers apply to all passengers in the cabin and given that I’ve booked a cruise on the Discovery Princess and therefore it offers 360 dinning, does the 360 invitation also extend to all 3 passengers? TIA
  10. I got an email a few hours ago to say that my stock holding verification was complete and to go ahead and submit a claim for OBC. I did that and got the stock “please wait for up to 5 days for the credit to show up on your account”
  11. When it came to the brokerage info, I simply typed etrade and was promoted to upload a copy of my brokerage statement. I just sent a single page showing my CCL stock holding. I got a confirmation shortly after to say that they had received it and would review it within the next 2 days
  12. I would have been tempted to ask guest services to check the medallion logs to show where you were and where you were not that evening! I’m sure they track those 24x7. Princess would be rather shocked to find my late wife always used the gents public loos when we cruised as I would always have her medallion in my pocket during the evening! 🤭
  13. I have not been on the Crown yet (roll on the 2025 WC), but if the Crown is like other Grand class ships, the balconies on deck 10 (Caribe) will be semi covered. The first 4 feet or so of the balcony is covered by the Baja deck and the last 5 feet of the expansive deck are exposed. I was on the Star back in 2013 and that semi covered balcony came in handy when we had our ultimate balcony dinner when docked in Honolulu. During the meal it began to rain, along with a spectacular thunderstorm, so we simply pulled the table and chairs under the overhang from Baja deck and enjoyed natures fireworks whilst enjoying the rest of our food and drinkies. and yes, even a hobbit will feel claustrophobic on the majority of the balconies on the Royal. Even in an S6 suite!
  14. I’ve done the HI circle cruise over the holidays twice, though out of LA and not SF. The day of departure was not too bad, but it turned chillier the next day. It warmed up slowly as we got closer to the islands. It wasn’t really sunbathing weather until 2 days out from the islands and the same on the return.
  15. Can you submit multiple passports to Princess when on a WC to get round some of the visa/electronic travel requirements? If I travel to Europe on my US passport, in the coming months, I will require (and therefore pay for) an ETA, but if I travel on my EU passport, then no ETA required which works right up until the cruise arrives in the US. On a EU passport, then I need an ESTA (and need to cough up for that) but with a US passport, it’s “welcome home”. The same will apply to arrivals in the UK at some point.
  16. I have a WC booked in 2025. My partner and I like to eat late, but if I wanted to select a shared table, I had to pick a slot before 6:20PM. As I had 113 nights to select a table, I opted for the whole cruise dining plan option and had to select a private table for 2 for 7:40PM. I would be delighted if those turn into tables for 6, or 8 as I’m definitely a fan of a large TD table when cruising.
  17. On the last cruise I got to take with my late wife, the Sanctuary area was an absolute godsend. By the time we got to take that cruise, she was in so much pain, that she was pretty much confined to a wheelchair. If it took her a little while longer to get ready in the morning due to having to take breaks, then no biggie as our loungers would be waiting and available for us. It also helped that the loungers had extra padding that helped lessen the pain in her legs. Whilst there, we were very much looked after by the very attentive crew in that area. It definitely made that last cruise more enjoyable and more bearable for us. We boarded pretty early as we were both Elite, but had to queue for an elevator at San Pedro to get us up to the boarding ramp. That wasted a little time. I left her at Bellini’s (we were on the Royal) with a glass of bubbles and I hightailed it up to Sanctuary. There were a few people ahead of me, but when my turn came, there was still a pair of loungers available for the whole week, right at the front and under lots of shade, which suited us perfectly, so I grabbed those for us. Given the circumstances, it was definitely money well spent and I don’t recall ever being charged the $3 delivery fee for food and as for afternoon tea…. 😍
  18. Right now, you can’t buy a reservation to 360, so not exactly apples to apples here. Princess is offering the Sanctuary for general sale. I’ve been fortunate enough to experience 360 by staying in a suite and some of my fellow diners at the dinner were in mini suites and in balconies, but were elite and were also invited, so it’s not exclusive to suites at the moment. That said, if I were on a 5 cruise b2b, though not in a suite and didn’t get an invite, I might be more than a little miffed about that! 😜
  19. Airlines will do it quite often in an attempt to poach customers from competitors. Usually, it’s in the form of a challenge…. Here are the perks, but if you want to keep them, you have to fly on x flights, or fly y miles in the next 90 days.
  20. So the poor “Schmuck” in a club class mini suite (can’t recall the new name for it) on say a b2b2b2b2b itinerary has to defer on all 5 of the cruises to those in a suite. I’ll wager the “schmuck” paid a heck of a lot more to Princess, than each of the suite passengers who may have only booked a single cruise. Yes, I’m being pedantic here! 😝
  21. The Ernesto Burger. And yes, it was pretty good.
  22. I was “almost in the same boat” as you (so to speak). When I saw the balcony fares for the Island WC2025, I decided to look elsewhere and was tempted by the 2025WC on Cunard as it was much more reasonably priced. I ended up booking a Princess WC for 2025, but on the Crown out of Sydney as the fares were much more reasonable and I think that the itinerary is much more interesting than the Island.
  23. Anyone have any experience with using gift cards on a cruise that originates in Australia? Paying the cruise fare isn’t an issue as I’m paying in USD anyway, but what about trying to use as a pre payment towards OBC? I’ve been bitten before where $100 USD of OBC miraculously turns into S100 AUD of OBC when on board, which given the exchange rate, is not in my favor.
  24. Thanks folks. I knew that I wouldn’t get an OBC for using the FCD. The 3% discount was worth way more than any OBC that might have been offered. I’ll still chase them up for the shareholders credit much closer to departure time. I just wasn’t aware that the FCD would go away entirely if I cancelled the cruise, even if there would have still been some validity on the FCD, especially as I mentioned in the base note that it was still under the old rules.
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