hhoope01

Today is our departure day on our 11-night Adriatic Dream cruise. They let us sign for the drinks in the Neptune lounge and they are charged against our HIA package. No extra payment required.

The first cruise my wife and I ever took (along with the kids) was out of Galveston. We live in North Texas about 6.5 hrs away. We decided to drive down the day before, get a hotel room, have a nice dinner. During dinner that evening (after the 6.5 hr drive) I realized I forgot our passports. So my son and I jumped in the car and drove 6.5 hrs back home to get them. Turned around and drove 6.5 hrs back to Galveston (i.e. almost 20 hrs. on the road). We made it back the next morning with a couple of hours to spare. 😵‍💫 The moral of this story is, yes, never forget your passports (and I haven't since.) But just as important, building in a day or 2 buffer can be a life-saver should anything "unplanned" happen. I'd rather be in a different city with and extra day or 2 trying to figure out what to do until we board than risk missing our cruise ship.

For our Vancouver to Seward cruise, we flew into SEA and spent the night. The next day we took the train to Vancouver and spent another night there before boarding. We made the extra "hop" a part of the experience as the train had some great views especially of eagles. Also, when dealing with airlines, I try hard (even though sometimes its more expensive) to get direct flights. As a 2 hr delay on a direct flight is annoying, but nothing major. But that same 2 hr delay to a connection could cause a day or more wait due to missing that connection. I know that sometimes you have no choice, but minimizing those connections can really lower the risk level. 🙂 And finally, arriving a couple of days early can be very helpful in getting over jet-lag. We have a cruise out of Rome coming up (traveling from the US) which means there is a 7 hr time difference. If possible, I'd rather be well on my way to getting over jet-lag before the cruise starts.

Also note that just because there are specific rooms available doesn't mean they have lots of available inventory for sales. A number of people could have "Guarantee" types of rooms. That means they have a room, but no room number yet. They could be trying to eke out a little more revenue by trying to get others to purchase "upgrades" instead of putting a "guarantee" customer in that room. If they can do that, the "guarantee" only gets the lower level room, you get the paid upgrade, Holland gets more money.

I had the same issue where I could add it on my app, but not on the website. So I added it to my cart in the app. Then logged into the website and I could now see it in my cart from the website.

While I'm sure there are many more sites to look over, this might be helpful: https://kessiworld.com/train-from-seattle-to-vancouver/

When we did this (about 5 years ago now), we flew into Seattle and took the train to Vancouver. It was a beautiful ride. We saw lots of nature, especially eagles. The train ride itself was one of the highlights of our whole trip.

Just make sure to get a manual transmission vehicle. 😜 We did that once when staying in London and decided to rent a car to head out to Stonehenge.

I usually use Chrome. So I tried on my laptop using Edge and still had the same issue. But after your comment, I tried from my phone and it worked. Thanks for the information. 👍

I booked one of the "Free inside stateroom" offers Holland keeps sending us though I did upgrade to a NS (for a very reasonable charge.) When I first made the reservation, I noticed the HIA package was available, but now that it is made and paid for, I also have the "HIA package not eligible" message. So I'd guess it has to do with the base rate for our reservation (which for me was free except for taxes/fees/gratuities plus the upgrade charge.)

Have you looked into paying for Club Orange for your daughter and her family? If that is within the budget, that should solve most of your concerns (except Neptune Lounge won't come with it.) I'm new to Holland America (and cruising in general), but if you haven't fully paid for the rooms, maybe you could downgrade their room, then purchase Club Orange to get the upgrade back to the VA balcony. Pricewise it might end up being about the same either way, except your whole family gets the Club Orange benefits.

We have been getting the "free" inside stateroom offers every couple of months for over a year now. We finally bit on an 11-night Mediterranean cruise. I was surprised they let me upgrade to a NS for a very discounted rate. I've only been on a Holland America cruise once before and we didn't spend any money at the casino. But we did purchase an NS for our Alaska cruise. Maybe that has something to do with getting on their mailing list. I just hope they don't stop sending them to me now that I've bit on one of them. 😜 The room category for each level is the "guarantee" room, but I'd guess if you then purchased Club Orange you ensure you get the best category room in that level (except for NS as I can't purchase Club Orange with my NS).

Thanks for your thoughts on it. I guess all I can do is wait to see what they end up doing. Hopefully we will have an opportunity to say hi while on the cruise. 👍

We've only been on a few cruises (and one Holland cruise about 5 years ago.) We got a very nice price offer for the upcoming 11-night Adriatic cruise in October/November. I decided to purchase the Thermal Suite package for $149. In looking around on the CC boards, I noticed that it looks like this cruise at one point in the past was selling as a 7-night cruise, cancelled and then put back as an 11-night cruise. I then went back to the Thermal Suite package I purchased and it says it is a 7 day cruise pass. So does that mean I will only be able to use the Thermal pass for 7 days in total and I get to pick them or do they pick the days? How does that work? Or did they just forget to update and I'll get some type of email from them cancelling my purchase and telling me that I have to repurchase at a higher price? Thanks.