Seas2mountains

Are you saying when you go to dinner, they won’t let you keep the bottle after ordering a wine on P+? We found they were reluctant to do this in some restaurants and more willing in others. Thank you for posting it when you have time.

What are the changes? Do you have any photos of any new wine list?

No, this can't be your last visit to Seward! Yes, we went to Exit glacier in June 2015 before our first NCL cruise ever on the Sun. We love staying in Seward as it such a beautiful area and so much to do. Whittier does not sound like it is a great port. Thank you for the amazing and spectacular Hubbard Glacier photos! You have convinced me to pay the $350/person for the excursion as the cruise ship cannot get as close as the excursion boat. Enjoy your final day at sea with your Dad! 😀 Thank you for bringing us along!

Thank you! That was helpful and interesting. I’m glad you had a wonderful cruise. We love NCL for many reasons but we are also impressed when we are trying other cruise lines. I’ll add Azamara to the list.

Good morning! Thank you for doing the wonderful live review! It’s interesting to see what Cunard has to offer. We are also trying other cruise lines. The breakfast hash browns look delicious. How were they? The ones they serve on Celebrity are a bit too crispy for our tastes. For those not familiar with NCL, they cut the hash browns from their breakfast menu and are definitely missed by those who loved the breakfast treat. Have a wonderful cruise with your family! We will enjoy following along.

I’m so sorry to hear that. Where are they sending you and your Dad while they aren’t working? My husband says it sounds like crappy situation. I loved your Seward photos and it is my favorite port! I look forward to reading your comments on Hubbard Glacier. Enjoy your final days of making great memories with your Dad! 😀 It’s so good to hear all your service and food issues aren’t ruining your time with him. It sounds like this may be your last NCL cruise for awhile?

This is really nice! It pulls up the dinner reservations and you can click on the menus. Now here is hoping we can view the lunch and dinner menus for the main dining rooms on the app rather than having to go to the dining room each day. It is also allowing you to make reservations for the main dining room at 5:30pm or 8:30pm even for a ship with a posted rollout date later than our cruise date. I was able to make a reservation for Skyline Restaurant on POA at 5:30pm and it gave me the option of 5:30pm or 8:30pm. Not that reservations are needed but for those who like to have reservations in advance, this may be a helpful feature.

This ^ was our experience, too, on Prima in June for Indulge and Food Republic.

Well…you might not have to worry about it. NCL is cutting ports from itineraries and replacing them with a sea day for “fuel optimization as part of our commitment to the environment and sustainability efforts”. Happened to us on Breakaway in June with Tortola being cut. And now in December on Viva with Bonaire getting cut and on Joy with Ensenada being cut.

The Gem would have been the only large ship in port on that day. Sad that NCL saved a bunch of the large ship restricted slots only to cancel with short notice.

Yes, I’m glad this will help Bonaire. It’s not the reason why NCL canceled this port for Viva on multiple sailings and for Gem on Dec. 20th.

They have restricted the number of large ships to one but NCL Viva was the ONLY ship scheduled on December 19th. Now, there is no ship scheduled in port in Bonaire on Dec. 19th.

But I booked this itinerary because Bonaire was included. I’ve been to Aruba and St Kitts recently so those were my rest days. I agree with the points made by @LUV2KROOZ For St Lucia, the excursions all started at 2:30pm or later since it was scheduled to arrive at 1:30pm. With the new itinerary, they had to cancel the excursions that got back after 5pm which was most of them and they haven’t offered the new ones yet. Who knows if they will or not. They are going to save $ on fuel. And they got us hooked on this itinerary and changed it. Just like they did with two other cruises we are on this year. We will have a lovely time and we are blessed to be on this cruise. But we are sick of the itinerary changes issued at or after final payment to provide fuel savings for NCL.

Thank you so much for taking the time to write a review with photos. We will do online check-in later this week for our POA cruise that starts next month. Your review made me more excited as we have been warned about some concerns with POA. I'm glad to hear you had a nice cruise!

Have a wonderful cruise! I hope your flights are on schedule with no issues. We tend to fly on United for all of our flights and have not had any major issues for as long as I remember flying on United. I’m excited to follow along and learn more about Cunard. Alaska is so beautiful and I hope you have good weather. Thank you for doing this review whether it’s almost live or not.

Exactly! They are going to find the dates within the dry dock window that least impactful for revenue. For POA, the month of May seems to be a low travel month compared to other month in the window.

Thank you for sharing your industry expertise on the dry dock date selection. When observing the dates for dry docks, I noticed that the scheduled ones seemed to occur more frequently in the January- early March, mid-April to May and September- early December time periods. I found a few summer dry docks but those seemed to occur less frequently than the ones during the non-peak cruise dates. Any insights into why the cruise lines avoid the peak travel periods? Here is why the internet thinks summer and December dry docks are not typically selected. Cruise lines typically avoid scheduling dry docks (maintenance periods where ships are taken out of service for repairs and updates) during the summer and December for the following reasons: 1. Peak Travel Season: Summer and December are peak travel periods. Many people go on vacation during the summer due to school holidays, and December is popular for holiday travel. Cruise lines generate significant revenue during these times, so they prefer to keep their ships in operation rather than out of service. 2. High Demand: During these peak seasons, demand for cruises is at its highest. Dry docking a ship during these times would mean losing out on potential bookings and revenue. Cruise lines aim to maximize the availability of their fleet when demand is strong. 3. Weather Considerations: In some regions, weather conditions are more favorable during the summer and winter holiday season, making it an ideal time for cruising. Dry docking typically occurs during less favorable weather periods when demand is lower. 4. Operational Planning: Cruise lines often schedule dry docks during shoulder seasons (spring and fall) when demand is lower, allowing them to carry out necessary maintenance without significantly impacting their revenue or customer satisfaction.

It sounds like you are having a fabulous cruise with your Dad. Thank you for doing a live review. We have cruised in Suites or the Haven this past year on Pearl and twice on Gem. It is normal for us to wait 37 minutes or more for hot food to come when eating breakfast in Moderno. If you have been served your hot food faster than 37 minutes, you must be on a VIP list to bypass all other orders. We tended to arrive at breakfast about 30 minutes before it closed and expected to be there for an hour. If we went when it opened when there were only a few other people there, we’d get served the hot food within 10-15 minutes. The buffet food and fruit kept us occupied until the hot food arrived. We have experienced getting the French press coffee delivered after the hot food arrived but that didn’t happen too often but a few times when every table was occupied. When on the Prima in a suite, there were very few passengers in suites who went to breakfast in Cagney’s so we were in and out in 30 minutes and the coffee arrived within 3 minutes. With you having to wait for your hot food, how did you have the willpower to not touch the yummy fruit and muffin until your hot food arrived? Have a great week with Dad!

We received an email one day before final payment was due for our December Viva cruise. The reason given is “optimal guest experience top-of-mind”. Translation - they will save on fuel costs by skipping Bonaire. This is our third dropped port with a Sea Day added this year. It happened on our May Breakaway cruise with Tortola being dropped after final payment, this Viva cruise and Ensenada being dropped from a late December Joy cruise two weeks before final payment. It’s getting frustrating to count on these itineraries and having them dropped to cut expenses.

Yes, I’m part of the 23%.

Cruises have been canceled as late as the day of the cruise across different cruise lines for a variety of reasons. Hurricanes, fires, wars, maintenance issues, floods, droughts, full ship charters, port closures, financial reasons and more have been reasons why cruise sailings or itineraries will be modified or canceled. We are on the POA in 30 days. I know it is possible that we may get a cruise port modification or if there is something that goes horribly wrong with the ship, it could get canceled. We would be disappointed but would deal with coming up with a Plan B which would probably be a land vacation. That is why it is a good idea to get insurance as soon as you pay for any items that are not refundable. With the amount of notice you were given, I can understand it is disappointing but it isn’t a crisis. This happens. Kids I work with would tell me this is life and things happen. How is May a “peak” sailing month on POA? They are likely to choose a month where they are least impacted from a profitability perspective.

It is impacting us on our December cruise. We found out about the change on Friday when final payment was due on Saturday. I did post it within this thread.

Duplicate

Yes, almost is true… Joy non-Haven suites = No breakfast or lunch restaurant. No butler or concierge. No priority embarkation or disembarkation. Prima class non-Haven suites = Breakfast and lunch in Cagney’s. Access to concierge and butler assigned. Priority embarkation and disembarkation.

1. I don’t think you will find people on CC who intentionally leave the first half of a B2B early and expect the cruise line to pick them back up at their preferred port on the second half of the B2B after skipping the embarkation port unless there were emergency medical reasons. If I were to do this and weather canceled the scheduled port stop, I’d take responsibility myself for taking the risk knowing each port stop isn’t guaranteed with weather issues. I don’t see this as NCL’s fault. It’s your poor planning and judgement and was a risk you took and lost. I don’t understand why you think NCL should pay you for your risky decisions? 2. With 99.999% of the passengers of a cruise on the cruise after it left the embarkation port, when ports are changed due to weather, why would NCL create a process to text, call or email you when you were supposed to be on the ship? It seems crazy and expensive to create a process for 0.001% or fewer who intentionally did not get on the ship at the embarkation port. 3. If the ship did stop at Akureyri, did you have written documentation from NCL to confirm you could for sure embark at this port? Did you have a contact person with a name and email address and phone number? It sounded like you had a verbal approval but it sounded like you talked to one person? The one you called the “Embarkation Manager”?