psychtobe

I'm not overweight but I just really like to eat so in a place with unlimited food I can get in trouble. At a Chinese restaurant I've been known to put away 10 bowls of rice with food! For me a great entree salad at lunch is a treat because I can't do that during my work week. I'll try AquaSpa Cafe, and maybe MDR once to see, and can always do the buffet as well (just throw some protein on my own salad).

If I only do one specialty restaurant for dinner, which would you recommend? We like anything but prefer substance over style. We prefer hearty, savory food over delicate, airy, 'pretty' creations. We also will be perfectly happy in the MDR so if there isn't a really special reason to fork over $90-$100 for dinner for the two of us, we won't.

thanks all. I'm so glad I posted this, or I would never have heard of AquaSpa Cafe, and if I had I would have assumed it was limited to Aqua Class.

If MDR is closed on port days, what are the options? buffet, AquaSpa, Bistro on 5? Anything else? (that said, I think we'll be in port most port days ourselves).

By the way, is there no way to 'pack a lunch' for the port days?

 

For extra tips above the amount we have already paid, we tip our stateroom attendant, dining staff & servers, etc. an amount that we feel is appropriate for the service given over the total time of the cruise.

That's the point of my question: how much? Can you give some examples?

For those who are willing will you please discuss exactly how much you tip and why?

If you tip just the suggested amount please say so.

We want to appropriately recognize good service or going above and beyond and don't know what is appropriate (ie, in land restaurants we know 15-20% is normal, so with exceptional service we tip 25%). We don't have a good point of reference for cruises.

Example: On our last (7 day) cruise we tipped the suggested amounts, except $50 extra for our MDR waiter and $40 extra for his helper guy. They were very nice to us, especially our kids, playing games with them and always bringing them extra goodies without being asked. That represented extra for the 4 of us and in retrospect we wonder if that was really an appropriate amount ($50 divided by 4 people divided by 7 nights = not even $2 extra per person per night).

So I am looking for specific amounts and your rationale. I will not feel attacked if you think I tipped too little above. Please let me know.

(Our upcoming cruise is 14 days so I would expect tips to be more accordingly).

thanks

I'm confused, the X website does not show Dec 2016/Jan 2017 Caribbean cruises yet and I thought they would?

Greetings all,

We're getting excited about our upcoming Eclipse cruise.

I've decided the best way to not gain (too much) weight on this cruise, beyond my usual habits, is to eat only a salad for lunch.

Where can I get the best entree salads every day for lunch? MDR? Bistro on 5? Does Baccio only have treats or do they have salads, too? I'll poke around the buffet but if we're not off the ship I prefer a sit down meal to a buffet meal for lunch.

Best way to take advantage of room service once or twice?

Any other dining tips for a foodie? We may do Tuscan Grille once, or not, and leaning against Murano and Qsine since the latter is not our style and we have lots of good Italian options around here.

Thank you all,

is this the place where the food is gratis but the coffee drinks, etc cost extra? So you can actually eat there without paying extra? Or am I thinking of another restaurant?

Have not been on X before.

An old proverb says that making faces at a blind man is pointless. So is arguing with you. You believe what you want. I'll believe what I want. And I hope to never have to rely on you for advice, ever.

Indeed, as long as you don't walk into my hospital I suspect you will be ok in that regard. Cheers, and don't forget to carry your umbrella!

Unlike you, many of us feel there is a huge difference between spending $10K on a cruise taken and losing $10K on a cruise not taken. At least when we take a cruise we gain value from that $10K. If we don't go, we lose that money, so there has been zero value gained for that investment. To most people that is a very significant point. You don't seem to care. You are lucky if you can afford it. But why put people down for not having the same laissez faire attitude towards throwing away $10K as you do? Is it a mean streak that you have? Or just a superiority complex? :rolleyes:

Both you and SantaFeFan feel that 'value' - as in 'psychological value' - is something that should be insured. To me, the value is not worth insuring. I insure against economic losses, not some nebulous psychological value. However to you that may be worthwhile insuring. It is your choice.

[sidebar - I also don't agree that if you don't go on the vacation you derive no value from it. Studies have repeatedly demonstrated that some of the greatest value in a vacation is the anticipation of going - not the trip itself. The other great value in a vacation are the memories it generates. Let's say each of these factors is worth one third (anticipation, experience, memory). In this case, total loss of the vacation at a late date is a loss of only 2/3 of the total value, since you still had the benefit of anticipation.]

Each person should make their own decision. It's true I hope people make informed decisions, and feel people insuring trips generally aren't - but that's not a judgment about those individuals, just the specific choice itself. I haven't put down anyone at all. I certainly haven't rolled my eyes at anyone.

But let me ask you this: if I am using some of the most brain-dead logic ever on this board, what should we make of people who have trip insurance but not personal umbrella liability insurance? Do you have this most essential of insurances?

You are a lucky person who can spend 10K on a cruise and not go and not care if you've lost the money.....truly there are just not that many people out there, including me, that could say that. 10K is a lot of money to most people and the $400 I spend to insure that if I have to cancel I can get my money back is well worth it. If I were wealthy and could afford to just say "oh well" it's gone perhaps I wouldn't buy insurance either.....I'm not and suspect must of us here aren't either....

You can also afford to spend $10k on a cruise or you wouldn't have done so (or whatever amount you spend). Once it's spent, it's spent. True, it's disappointing to not go on a planned trip but there is no economic hardship incurred by not going. In fact, you will probably save money on incidentals by staying in your home! So really, the $400 insurance cost is not insurance against an economic hardship; it's against 'feeling bad' for the lost opportunity/missed vacation memories. That's the difference between travel insurance and, say, umbrella liability insurance. One insures against feeling bad. The other insures against a multimillion dollar personal injury claim. I like to insure against real costs, not psychological angst; others may feel differently and so be it.

Yes I also feel bad for the OP as I would for any person whose plans were changed by a 'personal emergency.' He doesn't expect any consideration from X or UA and isn't entitled to any. He gits what he gits. Hopefully it works out for him. If this experience is sufficiently negative he will likely consider travel insurance in the future.

(NB: this cruise is $10k for 4 pax; is the $400 insurance price you quoted for 4 pax or for 1?)

Hi, I'm no expert but the three I have looked at are:

MedJet

GeoBlue

GlobalRescue

I'm planning on MedJet, I think.

Good luck

Do you also condone not insuring your car, your home, or your life? You prefer to take the risk that nothing will happen that insurance would cover. That is your choice. A pretty stupid choice, in my opinion. But don't expect everyone else to be equally stupid. Too bad you have chosen to look down at people who take a more responsible approach by purchasing insurance for what are typically expensive vacations. Most people can't easily absorb a loss of several thousand dollars.

I insure when the cost of not insuring is prohibitive. I do have car, home, umbrella, life, and professional liability insurance. However, that its because I have a lot to protect. I have gone without collision/comprehensive on my car before when the car was only worth a few thousand dollars and not worth the cost of insuring - I could buy a new car if needed. I would not go without home/liability because the risk is open-ended - in the millions of dollars. Do you have umbrella insurance? Should I call you stupid if you don't? Your dollar exposure is far greater than any measly vacation could ever be.

You are falling victim to a common psychological fallacy called 'sunk costs.' I spend $10k on a cruise and $5k on hotels/airfare. That money is gone, and I have budgeted for it. Now I can't go. Why do I need the money back? I already spent it. I don't need it back. It's not an economic hardship on me to not have the money back because mentally I had already spent it. That is why I do not insure travel. On the other hand if I drive down the road and maim a pedestrian, my liability might be $500,000. That is money I was not planning to spend; that is money that I need to protect my lifestyle; that is a risk I do not want to take, and can insure against for relatively little money. That is an easy decision.

If someone decides to save money by not purchasing insurance and then cancels an expensive cruise and wants the cruise company to give them some sort of dispensation, they certainly are "stupid" and "undeserving". They took a chance, and they need to accept the consequences. I don't need to know anything more about "their situations". They bet they wouldn't need insurance and they lost. It's their fault they are losing all that money, no matter how you want to twist the logic of the situation.

There's nothing stupid about asking for a favor and hoping for the best. Pretty smart in my opinion. As others have pointed out travel insurance has major limitations, restrictions, and exclusions. The few times I've considered buying for specific circumstances, I've found the specific circumstances I've needed covered would be excluded. Again the profit margins on travel insurance are extremely high. Those profits come from those who buy the policies that routinely go without claims. Each to his or her own is my point. What you need/want has nothing to do with what I need/want.

Well said. Never thought about it like that.How would it be fair to everyone who opened up their wallets to pay for insurance? Why would anyone buy insurance if you could just call in and get your money back?If your willing to take the gamble buy not buying insurance you should be ready to pay the price:rolleyes:

These industries are unrelated. The cruise companies could largely care less whether you buy insurance or not. In fact I would say that if you as a consumer routinely bought cruise insurance and it turned out that cruise lines were pretty forgiving about emergency cancellations, then you indeed are a sucker. So maybe we should get more data about how cruise lines handle emergencies before assuming they are stone cold unforgiving and unwilling to accommodate. If it turns out that is the case and you cannot handle psychologically the loss of your vacation dollars, then travel insurance is the way to go. For you.

By the way, I am planning to buy medevac insurance for our cruise, since we will be in 8 countries over 2 weeks and while we have good health insurance, medical evacuation at my command seemed worthwhile to have (and a cost I wouldn't want to absorb). About $500 covers 4 of us for all our travels for 1 year. See, I do buy insurance, when it make sense for us. We have never bought routine travel insurance for any of our many international or domestic trips.

Most respondents here are misguided.

OP can do nothing but ask and is entitled to nothing, that is true.

But X may well relent for any number of reasons, mostly having to do with 'good business practice.' They may smell a repeat customer; they may know something about his stateroom category, prepaid excursions, or other spending habits that tell us more about his future profitability to them as a customer than you can know. Or they may just do it to 'be nice' knowing that it costs 5-10 times as much to acquire a new customer as to keep an old customer. Furthermore, on a sold out or nearly sold out cruise they may actually make money with a cancellation and partial refund if they can resell the now vacant cabin, perhaps even at a higher rate than the OP first booked.

Airlines also have strict no refund policies but as (former) frequent flyers the airlines often bent the rules for us, based on the correct assumption that by doing so we would continue to be very loyal travelers.

I also don't mean to be snarky but it is tiring to hear from everyone who buys insurance all the time about how those who don't buy insurance 'need to learn a lesson.' How petty. It's also mathematically challenged. The travel insurance industry is extraordinarily profitable and those profits come directly from the delta between premiums charged and claims paid. This means your expected return on travel insurance is very low.

I have never bought travel insurance in 20 years of worldwide traveling, up to 100,000 flown air miles per year, whether for a $100 hotel room or a $10,000 cruise (plus airfare). I've never had to miss a trip. My wife missed one; we were flying Southwest so no monetary loss occurred. At this point, even if we are forced to miss a trip, we have avoided paying thousands of dollars of travel insurance, which is enough to pay for any missed trip.

Even if you buy insurance and have the 'privilege' of making a claim, you should not confuse strategy with outcome. Like in a casino, some bets are simply bad bets. You may win some, and lose some, but the odds don't change.

Your own personal circumstances may dictate you insure but the average traveler should not. Those who don't insure aren't 'stupid' or 'undeserving' and you certainly can't make that claim against them without knowing their situations in advance.

We live in one of the best food cities in America and usually avoid surcharge restaurants.

For $100 we can have a spectacular meal in Portland, including wine, with some of the freshest, most local food imaginable.

For $90-$100 at a surcharge restaurant, we get a decent steak and a humongous dessert that we can't finish. But remember I've already paid something tonight for the food I'm not eating - so the real cost of the meal is more like $150 or more.

The food isn't good enough in our view to spend at the high surcharge restaurants. That said, we might spend $5-$10 once in a while at lunch just for a change.

In 3 cruises we've done a surcharge restaurant once. On our upcoming 14 day cruise we have no specialty restaurant meals planned.

What we ended up doing:

one-way rental through Costco with Alamo FLL-MIA for 2 days (29 hours) for $67 all in. 24 hours would have been only $45.

one night using 10,000 Marriott Rewards points Courtyard Miami Lakes. They said early check in as available - but we'll have a car, we'll either head to the Everglades or the beach if we can't check in. We'll keep up water and sodas and snacks. We'll be able to grab some Cuban food and smoothies, do a little sightseeing, etc.

Sunday morning a leisurely breakfast and drive to MIA airport by 10:30 am with goal to be at POM by 11:30 am. We'll either get a car rental shuttle or a flat rate taxi for $24.

After the cruise we're staying at Homewood Suites Miami Airport using 40,000 Hilton points - not the greatest use of points and we may pay for a hotel instead. But right now this is the plan.

thanks for the help.

I would book a budget room near FLL for two nights (Friday & Sat) and advise the hotel that you will not check in until Sat morning.

 

I would rent a car from National, Alamo or Thrifty and drop it at the MIA airport and ride their free shuttle to POM. The car will get you to dining and shopping and the beach.

 

Post cruise I would use a shared shuttle to get from POM back to FLL.

 

Bring your own car seats if the kids still need them - I would not count on rental seat or the shuttle company. My kids only rode in seats I purchased and installed. Good luck! :)

the car rental prices I listed are actual one way quotes for an intermediate car. No mercedes. I checked Kayak, Costco, and the large travel aggregators (Orbitz, travelocity, etc). I realize car rental rates are fluid and I will keep checking.

A FLL room with a one way rental for $250 will be $350 total but that may not be terrible considering we can drive to beach, grocery, and meals.

What is the best use of time and the most cost effective option for 2 adults and 2 kids landing at FLL airport Saturday early morning, and not embarking on the cruise out of POM until 34 hours later (Sunday 4 pm)?

FLL hotels: $100-$225 - but is early check in possible?

Car rental in FLL: $100 or so

Car rental FLL-MIA one way: $250 or so

MIA hotels: likely comparable to FLL

FLL hotel to POM shuttle: $60 for 4

we'd like a chance to hit a grocery store for some water, sodas, and snacks but not if we have to rent a car for $100+ to do so.

Any suggestions appreciated.

thanks all, we'll just rent a car or find a different place. I have a free Hilton night and the kids like ES for the pool and the breakfast and we like it for the extra room. Might find a Homewood suites or similar, closer to a grocery and safer, yet still a short taxi or shuttle to both the port or airport?

Is there a grocery or market within walking distance of this hotel?

I can see there is a Publix but it is 4 miles away, 50 minutes by bus or requiring a taxi.

Car rental is $80 for 24 hours so would like to stay away from that.

Goal is to pick up a suitcase full of soft drinks and bottled water for the cruise. I don't mind walking with a suitcase for 15 minutes, but if it's not a safe area I'll take a taxi.

We land Saturday morning and have more than 24 hours til embarkation, so we may end up renting a car just to go to the beach, do some holiday shopping, whatever, but if we don't, would like to know our options.

Yes my daughter's passport dates from her three month old date. It might be worth getting hers for the unlikely event of a medical evacuation since we will have medical evacuation insurance. Thanks for that idea. I think the rest of us will save renewing til our next trip.

Thanks!

We (41, 40, 7, 5 - married with 2 children) will be doing a closed loop cruise (Miami-Miami) leaving Dec 21 returning Jan 4 2015.

Our passports expire(d) as follows:

he 41 - March 15 2015

she 40 - May 9 2015

she 7 - June 2012

he 5 - Feb 3 2015

According to the Celebrity website, because this is a closed loop itinerary starting from and returning to a US port, we do not require passports be valid for any length of time during our cruise. And the kids under age 16 do not require passports at all, as long as they have original birth certificates. In other words this is domestic sailing.

here's the link:

http://www.celebritycruises.com/frequently-asked-questions#domesticSailings

So am I correct that we would bring the following:

adults - 2 passports, valid through march and May 2015

kids - 2 original birth certificates

And be good to board in Miami (and of course, to return)?

This is a Southern Caribbean itinerary, if that matters.

We generally don't do shore excursions, or if we do we arrange privately. Don't think we will do any this time around; might take a taxi.

specialty dining - will do one time in 14 nights.

gambling - we do gamble a little, but have won all 3 times; that said we also withdraw cash from an ATM and would never charge to our on board account - we mentally account for this from a different fund.

spas - don't use

drinks - about 1 each per day. We bring 2-3 bottles of our own wine on board and that is plenty.

photos - don't buy

gratuities - on this cruise they are prepaid

with all that said we will also have $500 OBC on this next cruise so we anticipate we will not have any additional out of pocket expenses when all is said and done. We could afford to buy little things here and there but don't like big surprise bills at the end. We plan to zero out our OBC this time and that's about it.

I will ask, but in order to ask I also have to buy, which is why I wanted some understanding before proceeding.

I am cautiously optimistic. Since I only have prepaid gratuities and a small TA discount, I don't believe I have any other non-combinable promo/or offer. So I'm going to buy, and submit, and hope for the best.

I don't think this should be a problem. As I understand it the only requirement is that at least one of the occupants remains unchanged. OTOH I've never really done this type of change. So give your TA a call and ask.

TA was able to make the change in her records as well as with Celebrity, new invoices in hand, no problem. thanks for the tip.

The issue, I think, is that as soon as one quotes a price on CC, others will want to know specifically how they got that price (if it seems like a good one), and then comes the problem of not being able to mention or refer folks to TA's, and there is where the conversation ends.

At least this makes sense, thanks.

Definitely understand that booking during the holidays = double the price. I accepted that when we made the booking.