olemissreb

Sure is! If I get over there, I'll let Paige know I "met" you in this forum and you said "hi". 🙂

I haven't been to see an Ole Miss Softball game in 4 years (shame on me). Hope to get over to the new softball complex a few times this year. I'm more of a baseball fam and sometimes the games conflict.

I'm not usually up to see a sunrise, but this was so pretty over the sleet/ice we got Sunday & Monday. Taken on my cell phone so it almost looks like a sunset...still learning.

The cooking class my sister and I wanted to do in Antigua ends a little too close to all aboard time for our taste. The venue is only about a 15 minute cab ride from the ship, but with an all aboard time estimated to be 3:30pm, returning to the ship at 3:15pm (if traffic allows) is just too close for our comfort. So... I found an art class (Art, Culture & Beach) thru another company. They guarantee a return to the ship in time. I was just wondering if anyone has used that company - it's the first two words in the title of this post .com. I figure a piece of art that we paint would be almost as good a souvenir as getting a recipe that we can cook later. If anyone has experience with this company or this excursion, please give me the good/bad/ugly (if there are any of the latter 2).

Thank you for posting this. If I don't do the scavenger hunt I posted about, I'd love to do the Harrison's Cave & Snorkel Cruise, but it looks like it starts at 10am and we don't dock until 10am. I emailed them to see if there is flexibility in the start time. I guess I'll wait to see what they say.

Please forgive me if I've posted this before...I tried searching and didn't see where I had, but then again I'm not super tech savvy, so I could have completely missed it! I found a company that does a scavenger hunt in Bridgetown. I've been to Bridgetown before (about 19 years ago) and we did a cruise excursion of the island. I'll be back in March '25 with my BF and thought something like this might be fun for a couple hours off the ship. He's not a museum/church/historical tour fan, but with this being his first cruise ever, I thought something like this could be fun while still seeing some sights. It's a walking tour, so we could also sample some of the cuisine and beer while we do the scavenger hunt. Has anyone ever done this? Is it safe? Is it easy to solve the clues if you know nothing about Bridgetown or Barbados? My sister and her boyfriend may join us, so is it better to be a team of 4 or just compete against each other as 2 teams of 2? Thanks for the help.

For me, I like to plan things out, so I usually book 18mos to 2 years in advance and then I slowly pay it off before final payment. Makes me feel like it's cheaper than it really is!

I'm looking at maybe doing this tour. I'll be on the Norwegian Viva in March '25 so still have plenty of time for planning. Looking at the website, it looks like the tour could end about 2pm. Ship leaves at 5pm (all aboard probably 4:30?) - will we have enough time to get back? Looks like only the Viva and the Eurodam in port that day (so maybe 5000 passengers). If the tour starts at 11:30am, how long should we give ourselves to get to the starting point in Rodney Bay? And finally, what is a good budget for the cost of a taxi to get there/back? Thanks for all the help.

Head over to the ports of call board for even more suggestions. You don't say how young your child is, but maybe they'd be interested in seeing the planes come in to the airport in St. Martin? My boyfriend is still like a little kid when it comes to that, so we're going to make a day of it and go plane watching. If your child is a little older and likes to cook, my sister and I are going to take a cooking class with Nichole's Table. We don't take this cruise until March '25 so we still have plenty of time to plan more stuff.

Last time I sailed out of San Juan (2010 on a different cruise line), we started boarding about noon.

HOTTY TODDY! Peach Bowl Champs! What a great game!

I haven't cruised in 4 years, but the standard then was you had to be checked in and on board 2 hours before sail away. I'm not sure if that has changed.

My mom and I did a round trip from Boston at the end of Sept 2019. Our itinerary included Portland & Bar Harbor in Maine and Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. While we enjoyed it immensely, I would have really liked to see more of Canada. I chose the cruise we were on because I knew my mom wanted to see Bar Harbor again. When I was researching whether to do a one way or round trip in Alaska, I found that the port stops were longer on the one way. Maybe the same would be true on a Canadian cruise? If that is the case, I'd go the one way.

Well then Hotty Toddy! And let's hope the Rebs play well on Saturday!

DUH! 🤦‍♀️I didn't even think to look for that! Thanks for that hint!

@Mississippian I see the website link in your signature...am I right that you understand HOTTY TODDY!?

Ahhh...great minds huh?

I believe the OP is boarding in San Juan and departure is 8 or 9pm. St. Thomas is day 7 of their cruise. OP - I've never sailed NCL out of San Juan, but I have sailed with Celebrity and Royal and neither of them had assigned boarding times when I sailed. That being said, on Celebrity, we didn't show up until after 1pm (that was when our flight got in) and we essentially walked right on the ship - no waiting. For Royal, my FIL at the time was in a hurry to get to the terminal and so we got there about 11:00ish to long lines. Luckily we were in suites, so we did get to bypass those lines a bit, but we still had to wait till about noon to board though. My sister and I and our boyfriends are sailing this itinerary in March '25 and I don't plan on getting to the cruise terminal until after lunch in the hopes of avoiding some of the lines...plus I love OSJ and no one else in my group has been there, so while we are flying in a day ahead of time, I still want to be able to maximize our sightseeing times. Enjoy the Viva and please come back and post a review for those of us that are having to live vicariously through others until it's our time to board!

patrlr...do you recall when the "dress up if you want" night was? I don't see it in the dailies (or I'm just getting too old and just overlooked it). My sister and I and our boyfriends are on this cruise in March '25 and while the guys probably won't dress up, I know my sister and I will probably want to get all spiffed up just for fun.

Since we had done our own land based tour for a week before the cruise, we booked Gold Dome service on the Alaska RR to Seward the day before embarkation. The railroad sent our bags to our hotel so we could do the Major Marine Kenai Fjords tour (highly recommend as someone else also said). The next day, the hotel held our luggage for us while we toured the Sea Life Center (also recommend with a behind the scenes tour). The train ride was phenomenal...assigned seats in domed car with bar service and food service below, both for nominal costs.

This needs a ❤️ button!

I found that a year out I was able to book my independent excursions. Not sure if that's what you are looking for, but maybe it's a good "rule of thumb"?

Doing this cruise in March '25, so looking forward to your posts about food and excursions. Did you get Vibe passes? Was it worth it for such a port intensive cruise (if you did)?

It may have been 20 people. I just remember it was so much smaller than the big charyer buses the cruiseline folks were on and our little bus wasn't even full, but almost.

Chilkoot Charters....that's who we used too. Not Dyea Dave. And we were on a small maybe 12 person "bus". So much more personal.