POA1

Just a note: Those of us booked for a future cruise on the NS are getting 404 errors (or blank pages) on the menus in Navigator. Apparently, they have the URLs loaded so they are able to be accessed on the ship's intranet, but not from the external internet. I'm sure there's a crack team of experts working hard to solve the problem. In other geek topics, is the new wireless router you purchased working on the ship? Thanks!

How did you pay the amount over the $500? If you used a $500 gift card and paid $625 on a credit card, the amounts go back from whence they came - in the same amounts as originally charged. The only exception would be if you closed the card on which you charged the $625. If the account was closed, then you enter the realm of check repayment. It takes longer, because the refund for the closed card has to fail first. This is pretty standard for any type of transaction.

Even if you purchase the gift cards with your Amex card, they are not covered by the travel protection. (I checked for American Express Platinum's standard coverage.) Only the part paid by the AX card is covered. There is supplemental coverage you can add which would cover it. If you cancel your cruise, the $$ go back to the gift card, which is why you need to hold on to the original cards / PDFs. For close-in trips, we pay with our Platinum Amex. We do occasionally backstop with HAL cruise protection. That's because "something happened to a relative and we can't travel" requires cancel for any reason coverage.

I did not realize that it was a TA booking. If the booking confirmation had come to you, that would have been better.

For the iPhone crowd, I posted a link to a college library site that has nice graphical instructions for you.

Did you receive a booking confirmation with the attached PDF after you paid?

I found a nice Apple iPhone version of the MAC address fix on the Carthage College library site. It's got nice, clear graphic instructions. https://carthage.libanswers.com/faq/352277

Use guest relations guestrelations@hollandamerica.com

The Navigator app for Android updated today. I can't tell what the miscellaneous bug fixes and improvements were though. The one thing that I know was broken - and still is - is some dining menus for upcoming cruises. It's a file location problem and not an app issue, so I guess we'll just need to wait until they get the files in a location available off ship. We're trying to see Nieuw Statendam menus. I know they can be seen on the ship because Colin is posting them in his "Live From" thread.

Sometimes it's easy to bring da noise, but much harder to bring da funk.

Be very concerned. You are limited to a 2.5 inch (63 mm) pocket knife blade. They are wielding 12-14 inch (22°C) knitting needles. The knife will come in handy if they try to knit you to a chair, but you'll need safety goggles so they don't poke your eye out. And whatever you do, do not comment on the "lovely scarf" they're making. They could be knitting what they call "a muffler." Offend them at your peril.

@Real NHDOC Are you talking about the Volendam & Zaandam? Or every ship that's not one of the three big Pinnacle Class ones? I ask, because we've heard great BB King bands on the Vista and Signature class ships. It's nice to have the 3 separate music areas, but I haven't found that it detracts from the experience if you don't.

Behold! The healing power of CruiseCritic... I hadn't really thought about all the implications that MAC randomization would have. There are quite a few instances where it can mess things up with network Layer 2 (L2) protocols. This is especially true where you have a wireless network with multiple access points - like on a ship, for instance. You've got devices presenting a different hardware address every time they move to a new access point (AP.) So, without you knowing it, your phone, tablet, or computer is flooding the MAC address / hardware address tables of the network. The same thing happens if you have devices that are trying to "talk to one another." What's happening is the equivalent of the "This device is not recognized" error you sometimes run into with two factor authentication. You have to supply additional credentials in order to connect. Multiply this by a few thousand users - because we "Have It All" -- and you've got yourself a full-blown, Class A, circle-jerking, clusterfark*. It's not the network's fault you've got a slew of devices acting like teenagers with a bunch of phony IDs. The blame lies with the operating system vendors. I'm sure there was some mention of this during a "What's new in iOS 14,"or the Android 10 changelog, but who the heck reads that stuff? Anyway... I'm glad to know that this has helped some people. (Did anyone have "CruiseCritic Networking Advice" on their 2024 bingo card?) * I used to use the less clean version of this phrase at work to describe projects that went sideways. It's impactful, yet humorous. Let's bring it back for 2024 — hard.

They changed it from Room to Lounge because the literal-minded stood the entire time. HAL had a press release about a week ago stating that BB King and Rolling Stone were continuing.

It's $11.80/pp/day when you factor in the service charge. Yes. It includes soda and canned water.