grandgeezer

I was kicking myself for missing this sale. Lo and behold, it showed up this morning again. I called my online TA and booked a veranda guarantee for $949 plus tax, etc. I checked on Celebrity's web site and my reservation was there, along with a cabin number, this was shortly after noon. It was a 1C. I checked for other 1Cs that were available that might have a more preferred location. Location isn't something I would pay for. I found three at midship. I called my TA and my first charge was mine, at no extra charge. Did I mention that they also gave me a $225 obc?

I Hit the wrong button, I wasn't done.

I booked my air from Rome to Phoenix, using choiceair.com. British Airway had the best price and times. When I got my conformation code I went to British Airway's site to see if I could improve my seats. It must be my lucky day as I was able to grab exit row seats on both the flight from Rome to London and from London to Phoenix at no extra charge.

I booked the flight from Phoenix to Ft. Lauderdale, to start the cruise directly from the airline as they were about $150 p.p. cheaper.

I was kicking myself for missing this sale. Lo and behold, it showed up this morning again. I called my online TA and booked a veranda guarantee for $949 plus tax, etc. I checked on Celebrity's web site and my reservation was there, along with a cabin number, this was shortly after noon. It was a 1C. I checked for other 1Cs that were available that might have a more preferred location. Location isn't something I would pay for. I found three at midship. I called my TA and my first charge was mine, at no extra charge. Did I mention that they also gave me a $225 obc?

You each get one coupon to use the Persian Gardens. It has to be on a port day. There is no time limit on how long you can stay.

From my experience, obcs from the cruiseline is use it or lose it, and the obc from the TA is refundable, usually as a credit on the credit card you registered to cover cruise expenses. A couple of days into the cruise, charges and obcs will show up on your account on the tv set in your cabin. That will tell you if it's refundable or not. You could also ask the front desk.

IF you haven't made your final payment yet. and IF the price for the veranda is from Celebrity, and not a travel agent, they should allow you to change. One other thing, if you booked under a promo, such as 1-2-3, that might be in jeopardy, I'm not sure though on that part.

I notice that a Balcony 2A has gone up 10.5% from the price I paid in September. Plus at the time I had the pick of the prime location cabins as well. Just shows that trying to time the lowest fare is much like trying to time the stock market. So all in all I have the location I wanted plus I am still ahead on the pricing.

Let's do the math. Current price for a 2A is $1599 p.p. You stated that that's up 10.5% from what you paid. That means you paid about $1449. Somebody that bought in the last few days could have got a balcony guarantee for $945 p.p. They could get assigned a 2D at the very worst and maybe a 2A or better. $504 p.p. savings is a pretty nice timing reward. Ship location is vastly overrated. I always booked guarantees and have never been disappointed. Besides the huge savings could keep me in drinks if the ocassion ever arised.

There still over 20 insides and 50 balconies left

What about all the guarantees that have been sold, but haven't had cabins assigned yet?

It looks like the $949 p.p. for a verandah guarantee is gone. For those of us who snoozed, we loosed. (Lost doesn't rhyme)

I was already to jump all over this until I checked on air and a hotel in Ft. Lauderdale for the night before the cruise. Being around spring break, the air is up over $100 p.p. over what I paid this past October. Our "favorite" hotels are up over $100 per night also. Maybe I'll wait until there is another price drop, or my ta can throw in more percs such as obc or prepaid gratuities.

Like others, I paid about $1,000 p.p. for a Conceirage last spring.

Once you are inside the final payment date, you are at their mercy. Technically they don't have to do a thing. The best I've been able to do is get an upgrade if there are higher category cabins that are going for less than you had paid when you booked the cruise. I think your chance of getting an obc is slim to none, but I could be wrong. It doesn't hurt to ask.

Favorite is Seranade of the Seas. Like everything about it.

Least favorite Allure and Oasis. Not going to say why. Don't want to be flamed by their cheerleaders.

I booked a B2B on the Equinox for October, the first week of January. They were both guarantees. Cabins were assigned last week. Neither were upgrades from the category I booked. From my experience, that's the norm for X.

I use an internet travel agency and I always get my balcony discount. It shows up on my confirmation/receipt as a credit of $250 under my booking as it is a cabin discount. My wife's shows the price agreed upon. I usually receive this within a week, or so, of booking.

Don't quote me on it, but I think it is one bag per person. Also, just so you know, it's wash and fold so if you need to send it back to get ironed, that cost extra. I, also, wouldn't send anything too expensive or delicate as it gets washed in an industrial washer with everybody elses laundry. You'll find a sticker on your stuff, that's how they sort them when finished.

I've done four Royal Caribbean cruises. I usually start at their website for a baseline price to compare other agencies to. In the four instances, I've never seen Royals site cheaper. The big thing with using TAs is the perks offered as the cruise price is usually the same. The only exception, that I know of, is if a travel agent prebooks a large block of rooms on a particular cruise. Then they are able to pass most of the savings onto their customers. For example, we have a 13 day Med cruise, followed up by a 14 day transatlantic on Celebrity Equinox in October. My online travel agent, of choice, has a large block of rooms on both cruises, so I paid $700 p.p. less than Celebrity's site charged. I also got a huge obc from them so I'm guessing I'll bring home over $500 of that. We did the westbound transatlantic, on the Celebrity Connie last year, and they had over 200 rooms booked through them. I know this because they had two agents on the cruise. I still can change rooms or get a price reduction, if there is one, by calling or e-mailing them. The only minor downside of a price reduction is, if you are getting an obc from them, that might drop a little as the obc is usually a percentage of their commission.

Book when the price is at a level you are comfortable with, whether it's now or six months down the road. Keep in mind, if you book with the 1-2-3 promo, if there is a price reduction, you'll probably have to give up some, or all the promo to get the lower price.

We had 2-29" suitcases that fit under the beds nicely.

You were given flights through RCL? Whenever I book a cruise through them, or Celebrity, I book my own air through choiceair.com, at a greatly reduced fare. Generally you are given dozens of choices and you select the one which best suits your needs. Once you get the conformation number from them, you can go directly to the airline's website and choose/change your seats. I've never tried to change flights though.

I only use choice air.com for one way tickets to/from Europe, for transatlantics. Everything else I book through the airlines as they usually have better prices.

I have always found the price better on Celebrity site...all the major players have been more...even when they give all the extra perks....Celebrity still comes out the better deal.

Forgive me if I don't buy that for a second. I've booked 30 cruises through online travel agents and have received a much better deal than going directly to the cruise lines. Besides Celebrity, I've done this with Princess, Norwegian, Royal Caribbean, and Holland America.

Contrary to other postings, a travel agent can sell a cruise for less than the line itself. They can book a block of rooms, get a nice discount, and pass it on to their customers.

Case in point: I'm booked on a B2B on the Equinox in October. It's a 13 day Med. cruise followed up by a 14 day transatlantic. We have a balcony and I paid $700 p.p. less than quoted on Celebrity's website. My downpayment was taken by Celebrity as well as the final payment, I'm sure, so they know exactly what I'm paying. Besides what I got from Celebrity, my travel agent is giving me $1,000 in obc. This high obc is an accumulation of several offers from them. I'd call Celebrity and see if they would match that, but I couldn't take all the laughing on their end.

Several years ago we sailed Europe to Florida. I think it was 8 days at sea. I remember a question and answer session with a member of the bridge crew. He described his job (I think he was radar) and then we asked questions; it was really interesting. We also had a guest lecturer who gave several lectures on the founding of America. It was a "Big Bands" cruise so there were dance lessons during the day. I took a class in cocktails and appetizers and got to eat and drink the results. There were two wine tasting classes: one for "ordinary" wines and one for fine wines. There was a lot of bingo, trivia, etc. Also a boat building contest using throwaway things. I'm sure you could find lots to pique your interest.

 

Happy Cruising

 

Arizona Cruisin

Thanks neighbor (we're from AZ also):

This is the kind of info I was looking for. It'll be nice to be gone for 25 days and see many Med. ports.

We've done both the Oasis and the Allure in the last three months. The ships are like nothing else sailing. The entertainment was the best ever. The food was just ok to good. We found the Boardwalk balcony too noisy especially when there was something going on in the Aqua Theater. The Central Park balcony was better but you did pick up noise from the pool area. We felt crowded and elevators were at a premium especially after an event such as the boat drill or a parade . If you hit the rush hour for lunch in either the main dining room or Windjammer Cafe, there was a wait to get a table. These ships are something to see and everybody should do it once. For us, we'll stick to the smaller ships.

I don't like the "traditional" sea days on normal cruises. As I stated before, the extra activities that Celebrity had on the TA made the time go by so fast that I did it a second time. It sounds like Holland does the same thing. I'm waiting to hear back on air cost, and if it's reasonable, we're out of here in March. If not, life isn't real bad in Phoenix the end of March,first part of April.

I should have mentioned that I've done two transatlantics but they were on Celebrity. The way it sounds, HAL does much the same things that Celebrity does to make the time go by faster. I thoroughly loved doing it on Celebrity so it sounds like HAL will be the same. I've cruised HAL nine times so I know how the regular cruises work, I just wanted to make sure they treated the eight sea days on the transatlantic a bit different. I'll check with HAL on air tomorrow and if the air is reasonable, I'm out of here in March. Thanks for the feedback.

Does HAL do anything extra to help pass time on the eight sea days going across the Atlantic? Guest speakers? extra activities? I am not a big sea day person, that's why we quit cruising to Hawaii as it's 4-5 days.

The reason I ask is, my travel agent has some block space on the 25 day cruise on the Nordam, in March, and would rather give her best customers a deal rather than turn it back in to the cruise line. We're talking over $300 p.p. off HAL's price plus a nice little obc.

Also, can you book one way air from them? Their current price is high and their flight from Phoenix to Ft. Lauderdale is a red eye. I can answer this question just by calling them, but I'd rather hear it from someone who has actually done it, if it can be done.

Oh yea, one last question, don't they have a daily laundry rate package rather than sending it in after you have an accumulation? This would help with paking.

Thanks...

I have heard the same comment applied towards other cruise lines.

 

So, which cruise lines have the best entertainment? Keep in mind that one expects entertainment to scale up with passenger load, so answer the question in terms of a given passenger load. For example, which cruise line has the best entertainment for a ~2,000 passenger capacity ship?

 

igraf

We were on the Allure of the Seas (RCL), this past October, and they had the best entertainment, by far than we've seen in our 327 days at sea. It was beyond description.

I realize this is much bigger ship than you were looking for but I just had to mention it. We used to be big HAL cheerleaders, with seven of our first nine cruises being with them. During that stretch we've see an overall cutback on entertainment, food quality, and services all in the name of cost savings. All of the lines have done this but not to the extent that HAL has. With this being said, only two of our last twenty one cruises have been with them. We think Celebrity and RCL have cut back the least so that's where we've been going lately.

We would be more than happy to cruise HAL again, if they would put things back to where they were eleven years ago when we first started cruising.