mertziek

We sail on Marina in March 2025. When are culinary classes available to book? I don’t see anything available thus far. TYIA

I could be mistaken but it was my understanding that the king beds in the Haven can’t be split into 2 twins.

They will eventually figure out what will be safe. Staying off the roads is indeed good sense until they’ve fully evaluated what further risk, if any, there might be. Ketchikan is a lovely community and I hope people can still safely visit.

Your opinion only - tourism being just one of the factors those in charge need to consider. Once they assess with their geologists where/if there is additional risk, the community can best decide what is in its best interest. I never advocated “poor people need to be left alone for the rest of the season.” If there is risk of additional landslides - and there are credible reports that is the case, they will have to decide how best to protect everyone and minimize liability if further events occur, including protecting tourists wanting to visit. Once they’ve done their risk assessment, they will also be better able to decide on if any further restrictions are needed. And just for your information, I live in an area that depends heavily on tourism for most of the year so I actually come from a tourism-based economy and know of which I speak. Yes, tourism dollars are very important to local economy and survival BUT protecting people and minimizing further risks takes priority for community leaders. Have a nice day…..

I’ve read their comments and I feel those opposed to cruise ships coming in right now are valid. It’s hard to cope with a state of emergency when several big cruise ships drop thousands of passengers off. It sounds like they are still assessing further risk in the area which further complicates the situation. Plus Ketchikan is not a booming metropolis so their infrastructure will be limited in their ability to respond. Ketchikan should do what’s best for Ketchikan. No easy decisions about how to handle it.

Of course natural disasters happen all the time. Plus you have to agree many natural disasters impact communities in untold ways - tourism is the least of their concerns right now as they assess for risk of further landslides and impact on their infrastructure. Again, if they determine the cruise ships will create more problems, they will try to divert them regardless of how many tourism dollars are lost. Latest I read and reported above by another poster said they are asking the cruise ships to not come. Still early and I’m sure they are assessing several factors to determine how best to proceed.

If there is a declared state of emergency and significant power outages, it could affect the excursion routes despite being outside of town. Sounds like they are concerned about further slides, too. A cruise ship with 5,000 passengers might not be in Ketchikan’s best interest right now.

We were on that Spirit cruise, too, (in fact the final cruise to be normal for 2 years just before Covid struck) and did not get into our DOS cabin until day 14 of the shortened 19 day cruise. Plus there were work crews with open panels and long electrical cords down hallways all over the ship and several days where they were drilling and hammering for hours above our “upgraded balcony” cabin - it was not an upgrade as they tried to tell us on checkin and the balcony we were put in was definitely the smallest they had on the ship! - making it pretty miserable. But we survived despite being in one of the last 2 cabins to be finished. We were able to get extra hotel days in Rome pre-cruise with only 5 days notice of the delay in embarkation and did a lot more Italy touring so we still had a great cruise but were disappointed to miss several ports. We decided it would not wreck our cruise and went with the flow. NCL compensated us more than most others due to being booked and paying for the best cabin and being the last ones to get in our suite. There were many times during the cruise I just wish they would have been more open and transparent about what was going on but in typical NCL fashion they chose to deflect. Since then we definitely do not book cruises for a particular port since anything can happen to affect the ports you get to. And if a port gets canceled due to weather conditions, we likewise take it in stride. And, if possible, we also try to avoid booking cruises right before and after dry dock.

Well as regards to a previous post saying there are two sides to the story (by the way from a very pro-NCL person on these boards who I’ve yet to see say anything negative about NCL) either they had ac or they didn’t, they had hot water or they didn’t for several days. I believe the OP saying he had no ac and hot water for several days. No two sides about it. Either you believe the OP or you call him a liar. OP also sounds like he did try to deal with the proper NCL staff to get resolution. But given how full ships are right now, the ability to get OP into other accommodations may have been limited. As to expecting compensation I say the OP is indeed owed a lot more than offered. No hot water for several days with two children in your cabin makes it tough to get washed on a daily basis. They gave us $300 for a wet carpet in our living room floor. They give passengers 10-20% FCC’s for itinerary changes in cruises. To OP- keep track of dates, names of contacts, and dates work was attempted. Compose a factual letter to Katty Byrd and the CEO outlining your experiences and ask them if in all honesty they feel they lived up to their contract. If they respond saying they fulfilled their contract then I’d be done with NCL. Could the same thing happen with another cruiseline? Yes but it happened on an NCL ship so that’s all that should matter to you. I’m not sure what fair compensation would be but having run my own business plus semi-involved in my spouse’s business, NCL’s question to OP should be what can we do to make this right? That’s how a reputable business would handle it. Unfortunately NCL has been remiss in customer service since Covid.

Thank you! I’ve sent in my request.

I’ve already checked and it’s not there.

I know there is a way to request a copy of all charges from a recent cruise. We disembarked Sunday without a final copy of our bill - my bad - but I want a copy of charges for our records. Can someone tell me how to request a copy of our recent final cruise expenses from NCL? TIA

We are good.

Thank you. I think we will be good with 4 adults and 2 skinny kids.

We are booked through NCL for one of their “Dogsled & Glacier Adventure by Helicopter” tours. We are a family of 6 - 4 adults, 2 children. Does anyone know how many people can go in the helicopter as we would like to be together? TIA

Yes, I believe that next cruise or the one after it was stuck trying to find a port to disembark while the world was shutting down. We felt very lucky to have stayed one jump ahead of Covid. Several of our ports closed a day or two after we left. We were a bit nervous about getting home but had a few days leeway to travel before everything was closed down. Again, we were very lucky!

We were on this cruise. Initially we lost a day from the original cruise itinerary and then a week before the cruise we lost 3 more days causing us to scramble and book extra precruise days in Rome. Then we got to the port and on checkin found out our DOS was not ready and were told we were “upgraded” to a better cabin before we boarded. NOT!!! We were in one of the smallest balconies for 2+ weeks and only spent 4 days in our DOS. Had we known all of that before boarding we might have canceled the cruise but in retrospect, other than the unexpected room downgrade plus other unfinished parts of the Spirit, we had a great cruise. After that cruise I became aware of the true meaning of “travel is an adventure” and learned to go with the flow expecting the unexpected at any time. In the age the ease of last minute internet bookings, it’s much easier to go with the flow and formulate a Plan B very quickly. By the way - we made all of our ports just scooting ahead of Covid port closures and getting home from Dubai without any delays.

Then there is the possibility the bag fell off the ship into the water as they were unloading bags. We saw that happen at a port where 5-7 bags went in the water. The crew did not seem too upset about it and we did not see them fish the bags out while we were watching.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you for the hotel suggestion. It sounds like San Antonio might be like why we stay in Rome and not Civitavecchia when we leave from there. More happening in Rome.

We have a cruise out of San Antonio, Chile next March but fly into Santiago. We want to go a couple of days early to do some local touring before embarking on our cruise and it looks like tours from Santiago are easier/better to book and then arrange a transfer on cruise embarkation day to the Cruiseport rather than staying in San Antonio. Any suggestions on 5* hotels in Santiago? Or do you suggest staying in San Antonio? We are looking for a good hotel location for local site seeing as well as day touring out of Santiago or San Antonio. Thank you in advance.

Since we are particular about the cabin we book and usually see those cabins booked early, we like to book as soon as we find a cruise we want to do. We’ve booked 2 years ahead several times. My husband always says he hopes we are still alive then. 😳😳😳

Ummm….BirdTravels you are wrong. Yes, we did book a Viva suite with a hot tub because of the hot tub although we preferred another much less expensive Owners’ Suite set up. Had we known in advance that there were issues with the hot tubs impacting ability to use it whenever we wanted without having to get our room steward involved, we would have changed our suite to another much less expensive suite by $1,000’s with a better interior room layout. The paltry OBC given was significantly less than the extra we paid for the hot tub suite. Also we sailed Prima before the problem occurred and were able to control our hot tub temperature plus use it without a thought given to get staff involved. The Viva hot tubs were different - as far as we were able to determine - with no ability to control the temps and keep the heat on even when not being used. That being said - we made a point of not letting it ruin our cruise but it left a sour taste because we felt duped by NCL.

I’ve looked online and searched here but didn’t find an answer. Can you explain the difference between the OS and OE designated tours? Are there restrictions who can book them? TIA