Earthworm Jim

42 minutes ago, JamieLogical said:

 

Every wedding I have been to in the past decade plus, men don't wear suits unless they are in the wedding party.

 

I have definitely seen people wearing shorts and jeans to funerals in the past couple of years.....

 

Not to be morbid, but what if you're the deceased? Do they wear a Hawaiian shirt and cutoffs to their own funeral? (Not that it really matters to them at that point)

5 hours ago, Torfamm said:

Reports show that fewer than half of American men own a suit of any kind, much less a tuxedo.

Not disputing the accuracy of that statistic, but it surprises me. I could see most men very rarely wear a suit, but I'd have thought you need to own one for weddings and funerals.

Update from OP- Tried to make the dining reservations today using the app on my phone instead of the website on my computer this time. And it worked fine. Go figure. 

So all is well. Thanks everyone. 

1 hour ago, sushraya said:

We are traveling with three other couples.  I was able to make reservations at the MDR for all eight of us.  But I had to add them to the reservation - explicitly specify the reservation number and last name.

Yes thanks. I did go through that part. Which resulted in their names being listed on the dining reservations page, but they are grayed out and can't be selected. 

12 hours ago, gold1953 said:

Both being ' American' has nothing to do with your booking in any way

OK. But the "different booking currency" line to me implied a currency other than US Dollars, which being Americans booking from the US we both used. 

OK, thanks all. I'm somewhat reassured, but only somewhat. I'd definitely feel more comfortable if we could book the specialty restaurant together, as it seems the system is intended to allow, but it doesn't work properly. I was going to pay for all 4 of us myself.

Is this group booking issue just a problem for me, or do others have the same problem?

21 minutes ago, jelayne said:

Are you trying to make reservations in the MDR or specialty dining?  If it is the MDR do you have Anytime dining (Select) or traditional fixed dining?

 

If it the MDR and you both have anytime dining you can both go ahead and make your own reservations, then just show up together and you will be seated together.

We're trying both MDR (Anytime) and specialty dining reservations, and get the same result either way. Good to know they'll seat us together, though that kind of defeats the purpose of an Anytime Dining reservation. If we both had separate reservations, they'd presumably be holding 2 tables for two, not 1 table for four.

We're traveling with another couple and want to make joint dining reservation. So I connected our cruise booking numbers via "Manage Reservation", linking our reservations for dining, hotel, and air. In Plan My Cruise to book dining reservations, it only showed my wife's and my name, not the connected couple. So I use the a link to Add Guest, and now their names show up. However, it says "Because these guests have a different booking currency or group ID, they must make their own reservations."

What does that mean? They are US citizens, same as us, and just booked from the Celebrity website as we did so there's no special group. Can we not dine together?

For what it's worth, until yesterday when it expired we had a complementary hold on a different cabin that was showing up with my name as an additional party to book dining with and that had the same "different booking currency or group ID" warning. That made sense though, because there was no deposit was associated with that hold, so they shouldn't let me book dining for that one.

2 minutes ago, memoak said:

My dress does not change during formal night. Nice pants and button down shirt. I am done with carrying around a sports coat and I do not own a tie anymore 

I figure one still needs to own a tie for the occasional wedding or funeral. But agreed you don't really need one for a Princess cruise.

31 minutes ago, Potstech said:

Their website like many of their other documentations has not been changed in years. Just like calling customer service. Ask the same question to 3 of hem and get 4 different answers.  Most likely none are accurate.

Have not worn a tuxedo, dark suit or dinner jacket in years. But I have wore slacks, I think.

As far as I know the daily planners onboard still call it a formal night as well. But it has been a while for me, so perhaps that has changed. If so, I'm wrong.

We aren't really disagreeing, just talking past each other. I'm saying they still have designated formal nights, though they aren't really formal anymore. And by you saying they don't have formal nights anymore you really mean that none of the nights are particularly formal in reality anymore. You're not meaning to say they aren't designated as such.

21 hours ago, Potstech said:

Princess no longer has a "Formal" night. Another item that has passed with time.

Well, on their website they still use the term "Formal":

https://www.princess.com/en-us/faq/pre-cruise#what-to-pack-for-a-cruise

Though the website still says:

• Evening gown, cocktail dress or elegant pant suit for women
• Tuxedo, dark suit or dinner jacket and slacks for men

So what the website says and what actually happens on the ship may not be in sync.

9 hours ago, greenbeanie said:

how do I know where my muster station is before I go to the cabin?  Does that info pop up on the app once I board (like, it seems, the folio does).?

It's on the app. Hit "Journey", "Explore the Ship Map", then "Muster Station". It's my understanding the location of your muster station isn't accurate until you actually board. I've read it just shows a placeholder location before then.

26 minutes ago, Bemidji Ty said:

Got some air tag bracelets from Amazon.  They were cheap and work great.

Aren't they only available in kids size?

On 4/10/2024 at 5:06 PM, abby1257 said:

So we get one free 1.5L bottle of water, why would anyone get it at the bar when they have some in your room?

 

If you are sitting out on deck and decide you want your free bottle of water there, why would you go back to your cabin?

26 minutes ago, jimbo5544 said:

Done the walk several times.  You can park wherever you want,  the walk is easily done, I usually do the walk and drive around for the pickup.  Easy peasy. 

Yeah, we were embarking at F and debarking at D, so we parked at garage D. It wasn't a bad walk, even rolling our bags. There's a sidewalk most of the way on the garage side of the street, then you cross and go through the Terminal E unloading area to Terminal F. Nothing was happening at Terminal E (seems like a smaller terminal) so that was easy.

On return, getting out of Garage D was super fast and easy since there was virtually no one there yet. Which was good because we had a long drive to make that day.

19 hours ago, Beamafar said:

Can anyone tell me what the casual dining venues are on Grand Princess, please, and what kind of meals we can expect to get with Princess Plus?

According to this list of casual dining venues by ship, Grand Princess has Vines and Alfredos.

https://cruiselifestyle.co.uk/princess-cruises-casual-dining-guide/

I have no idea if this is a significant issue. It may be an easily resolved, no big deal type concern. But Carnival has to suddenly arrange for all the food and other supplies that they were going to get in Baltimore to now be supplied in Norfolk on short notice. Maybe it's just run the trucks necessary to bring the Baltimore supplies down to Norfolk, rather than arrange a local supply in Norfolk.

All in all, there are going to be a bunch of people in Norfolk who thought they had Easter Sunday off working instead.

6 minutes ago, mz-s said:

 

Missed ports of call isn't really the same thing as a changed home port with no further alterations to the cruise.

Agree to disagree there. It's not exactly the same, but it's similar in that you aren't getting the same thing as you booked.

3 hours ago, mz-s said:

 

Relevant portion:

 

"Carnival shall have no liability for any compensation or other damages in such circumstances for any change in itinerary, ports of call, ports of embarkation and debarkation, and/or duration of the cruise"

That's absolutely correct. They don't HAVE to offer anything. That said, cruise lines have often offered compensation for events beyond their control, such as weather. For example, the MSC Meraviglia was supposed to go on a Bahamas cruise from NY last December when weather forced them to change it to a New England and Canada itinerary. They gave the option of a full refund instead. But that was clearly a bigger disruption than the Baltimore to Norfolk switch.

A west coast Carnival Miracle cruise had to radically change their itinerary last October due to a hurricane (San Diego and Catalina Island instead of Cabo) and Carnival gave $200 compensation there. That may be a more comparable situation. But in the current case didn't Carnival offer some compensation for flight changes?

1 hour ago, mz-s said:

That's an over 4 hour bus ride. Not how I'd want to end my vacation but what choice do you have?

Yeah, but on the other hand how many of us have routinely spent 4+ hours in airports and on planes at the end of a cruise? Though here the trip to Baltimore is not the final destination for many people. They still need to get home from Baltimore.

1 hour ago, SRF said:

 

We would take it.  Live 30 minutes from Baltimore port.  Easy, get up, have breakfast, finish packing, easy quick drive to port.

 

Add 4 hour drive to that and it makes it a LOT different.

Well, you'd be going on that 4 hour ride either way. The difference is it's someone else's problem to do it, but also someone else has control. In your case you'd also benefit from not having to pay for parking if you could get someone to drive you to the port.

All hypothetical anyway it seems.

1 minute ago, Rubyfisch said:

Trying to find a hotel the week of Christmas that doesn't have horrible reviews under $400 a night proved very difficult. And there definitely decent options in the just over $100 range. Again, I have done this twice and am going out of Port Everglades this year (and did in 2017, where we paid over $700 a person for tickets on Spirit - American would have been over $1,000).

In fairness, we had a car when we got those $200-$250 hotels recently so we were able to look outside the immediate Port Everglades area. That's not likely a viable option for most people flying in.

10 minutes ago, Engineroom Snipe said:

Carnival stated the bus from Norfolk to Baltimore was a one way, one time deal for the disrupted cruise currently on the water.

If they did state that, I missed it. All I saw was them saying there would be buses from Norfolk to Baltimore, without any "one way, one time" definitive statement. Still, unless they say they're going to do something, they presumably aren't doing it.

Regardless, the point was it may not have been worth offering the bus to Norfolk anyway because I doubt many would take it. Carnival probably came to the same conclusion.

2 minutes ago, Rubyfisch said:

It is so much cheaper to fly to Baltimore than Florida - like, a fifth the price, and the hotel is a quarter the price

Assuming a $200-$250 hotel room price in Florida, which is what we normally pay for a mainstream chain hotel, you're finding Baltimore hotels for one fifth that cost, $40-$50 a night?

Flight costs may be the case wherever you're flying from, but randomly picking a Friday to the following Saturday round trip in May out of my airport (Albany, NY) on Southwest shows from $134 RT Baltimore and from $154 RT Ft. Lauderdale. Minimal difference. And Baltimore is a major SW hub too.

12 hours ago, Yorkvillain said:

 

Did Carnival say they are going to bus guests from Baltimore TO Norfolk? I understand they are going to bus the guests that are sailing right now FROM Norfolk back to Baltimore but I have not seen anything saying they will bus future guests to Norfolk.

If they did offer such a bus, I wonder what the take rate would be? Assuming Baltimore cruises are mostly driven to, if you're coming from anywhere south or west of Baltimore it would be quicker to drive directly to Norfolk than to go to Baltimore first.

Even drivers coming from north of Baltimore might just do the extra driving to Norfolk or switch to flying. Driving yourself has extra costs and potentially traffic aggravations, but it also gains you control over timing and stops.

But if they offer a bus to Norfolk, then they have to offer a bus back from Norfolk at the end of the cruise too. And then we have the same question as to whether to offer a bus to Norfolk the next week. At some piont they'll want to get out of the busing business.