Ken the cruiser

Flashback time! I have to say we had an awesome time on our Maasdam B2B Australian circumnavigation cruise. While on the Maasdam on the first leg of our B2B cruising around some New Caledonia Islands, we met a guy we had recognized from our Antarctica cruise the previous January on the Zaandam that played a key role in developing the In-Depth EXC program strategy, and he looked quite upset. When we ran into him on the promenade, we introduced ourselves and asked him what was up? He said he had just found out HAL was going to implement a watered down version of the In-Depth EXC program fleet-wide rather than implementing the “big ship” expedition-style In-Depth EXC program on another ship in the Atlantic while keeping the Maasdam in the Pacific. When the Maasdam docked in Sydney he left the ship as well as the In-Depth EXC program. Obviously, that didn’t happen. Then the pandemic hit causing some of the older ships to include Maasdam to get sold off. But we still have the memories and that’s the main thing. 😁

Traversing the Panama Canal is so cool. We’ve been through it 4 times and just booked one for Apr 2025 on the Koningsdam in an aft-facing cabin. For us an aft-facing cabin is the only way to cruise through the PC. Our first time through was in 2016 on the Veendam where they had a professional lecturer that packed the theater as well as a wonderful lady who really got into her port talks! Then twice on PCL cruises, one in Jan 2020 from Ft Lauderdale to Santiago by way of Easter Island, and the other one in May 2022 from LA to Ft Lauderdale, both of which offered professional lecturers. But that’s cool. As long as they’re offering lectures from whomever works for us.

Fast forward to today .... Does anyone know if HAL is providing lectures (along with the usual port talks) on their more exotic 15+ day "single itinerary" cruises? We're currently booked on a 21-day April 2025 Panama Canal cruise and are hoping they still do. But more importantly we are very interested in their new 28-day Alaska itinerary which includes going to Nome! That just looks like an awesome cruise, and it would be so cool if they included some quality lectures on sea days along the way.

I noticed itineraries weren’t listed in the above descriptions. We are in our early 70s and find we enjoy longer 3-5 week itineraries with a combination of sea days and port days. Right now we have 4 cruise lines on our go to list, PCL, HAL, NCL and then X, in that order. We enjoy booking PCL vista suites, HAL aft-facing vista suite balconies (with CO), NCL club balconies (with FAS Plus), and X Aqua cabins. We used to cruise in X sky suites when cruising first started back up for about $350 pp/day. But when the Luminae food started giving us heartburn and the rates started going over $500 pp/day, we switched to Aqua. But as I mentioned we enjoy longer more unique 3-5 week itineraries rather than the shorter 7-12 day ones, and PCL, HAL and on occasion NCL offer some pretty cool ones. Not so much with X. We like larger 2000-3000 pax ships, as we like getting lost in the crowd and being entertained, rather than the smaller 400-1200 pax ships. For us those smaller ones, such as the Oceania ships, feel just too crowded for us anymore, especially since we really don’t like socializing when we’re on a cruise and their entertainment is pretty weak. But, that’s just us. 😁

We do a lot of cruising with Princess and Celebrity too. But just in case you were not aware of the extra perks that come with the Have It All (HIA) Early Booking Bonus option, I have to say booking a HAL cruise farther out than 1 year with the HIA Early Booking promotion is pretty good, especially if you are low stress cruises like we are. This example below is from a 7-day cruise in Jan 2025. The difference between the Cruise Only Fare and the HIA Early Booking Bonus option is $420 or $60 per person per day, to include the $16 pp/day Crew Appreciation Gratuities. BTW their beverage package does include bottled water, sodas, and hot chocolate served onboard for a fee. But I did recently learn, as we're just coming back to HAL, that the "Early Booking Bonus" perks go away if you book a cruise less than a year from embarkation, leaving you with a much less desirable HIA product costing an additional $385 per person or $55 pp/day BUT the Crew Appreciation Gratuity perk disappears as well as the free upgrades to the Premium Internet and beverage packages. I realize you said "We do not get the beverage packages - alcohol is not a priority nor the internet. We would end up paying as much for the extras as we do the cabin cost." I just wanted to make sure you were aware HAL's HIA Early Booking Bonus perks is much different than those offered on Princess and especially on Celebrity.

Unfortunately, there was one other issue with Seabourn that we didn’t realize until after we had booked the Med B2B and did some research, to include asking folks on the Seabourn forum. My DW has to eat early for medical reasons, ideally starting dinner sometime between 5 and 6 pm. Unfortunately on Seabourn the MDR from what we learned doesn’t open until much later. But there was a silver lining to the Med cruise cancellation, we booked a B3B on a Princess Med cruise in a CC mini-suite for half the price in a great location that also turned out to be the same B3B they filmed the New Love Boat season 1 on. 😁

It’s amazing how one’s cruising perspective changes when they become fully retired and have the time and wherewithal to cruise as much as they would like. Cruising can definitely become addictive which in turn can change your whole way of thinking when booking a cruise, starting with the planning process with a special emphasis on the details and knowing what’s what before contacting your TA or your favorite cruise line POC. Heck, in our case we have our whole 2026 cruising schedule planned out. We also just moved Celebrity down to #4 on our goto list (mostly because of $$$ and boring itineraries) and moved HAL up to #2 behind Princess. We’re just waiting now for the appropriate itineraries to appear on one or more of our top 4 cruise lines we book with. BTW that’s why you’ve been seeing my posts lately here on the HAL forum. So much to learn about HAL’s new terms of engagement since our last HAL cruise in 2019. Does this mean we’re cruisaholics! 😂 BTW @Hobar I noticed you’ve spent most of your time cruising with Seabourn where their rules were relatively simple, or that’s the way it seemed when we booked an Antarctica cruise in Nov 2021 after the restart (which they cancelled) followed by a July 2022 Med B2B cruise, they subsequently privately charted the first leg of. Needless to say, that’s the last time we book a cruise with Seabourn. In any event, here’s hoping you have a great time on your upcoming HAL cruise!!

Unfortunately sometimes the school of hard knocks plays a role in that learning curve, especially when you’re either first starting out on your cruising adventures or you’re trying a new cruise line after mainly spending most of your cruising $$$ with a different line. In our case we started with HAL back in 2012, and it took us 5 cruises with them before we found out we could refare a cruise if the price went down prior to final payment. I know, who knew! Then after we booked a 40-day HAL cruise in 2019 that included 30 days circumnavigating Australia, the price of our VS went down and we contacted our TA, which is another story for a different time, who got us the cheaper price. But that rate reduction also included our deposit becoming nonrefundable. A month later, but a good 2-3 months before final payment, the price went down another $3500! But when we went to refare our booking again, HAL told our TA we couldn’t refare a booking that had a NRD. I know, who knew! But since then we have also cruised a lot with Celebrity and Princess, and recently a few times with NCL. You can see some of my Live From threads in my below expanded signature. But my point is from those early “school of hard knocks” lessons learned, we totally agree with your above 2 points. However, I will also mentioned we have learned quite a few more of those “hidden” rules of engagement on the various cruise lines we book with right here on CC. But at the same time there is a well known phrase that has always played a key role when acquiring information here on CC, and that is trust but verify. 😁

Here's what I would do. Launch the below link to the itinerary, which I believe is the one you're talking about, and save it to your favorites. Then every morning click on it. When any cabins become available, you'll know it. Cruise Details - 36-Day World Cruise Segment - Sydney to Rome (Civitavecchia) - Princess Cruises BTW we have 19 cruises booked through 2025, and that's how I monitor their applicable fares every day just in case any of them go down enough for us to want to refare.

Thanks for explaining this. We always book our cruises as soon as the one we want becomes available. Then refare the booking if necessary if the price goes down later on prior to final payment. Now we know with HAL if we refare within a year of the sail date, we will have to include losing the HIA daily gratuity credit into the math to see if it is really worthwhile to do so. We have found over the years, each cruise line has their own rules of engagement, and as one might image, they are never the same.

You mean itineraries something like these HAL ones? Search the Best Cruises for 2023, 2024 and 2025 | Holland America Or these Princess world cruise segments? Cruise Search Results - Princess Cruises

True.

And if I might ask how many times would you like to do that same itinerary or one close to it? When cruising started back up, the Caribbean for a good 8-10 months was the only place X was cruising to. For us old ones who like to cruise a lot, the Caribbean got quite redundant for us after seeing some of the same islands 3-4 times. But I guess that’s the point. I guess us old need to move on, which is cool.

One issue might be that the first leg of a typical B2B X setup was to the western Caribbean with the following leg to the eastern Caribbean, then repeat. Then in our case X chopped an awesome 13-day New Orleans/Aruba cruise (with 3 days in NO during Mardi Gras) in Mar 2025 down to 8 days by eliminating Key West and Aruba and replacing them with Progresso, where the only thing there to see is Chichen Itza, which we have seen and is way over commercialized. https://www.celebritycruises.com/itinerary-search?sailStartDate=2025-03-01&sailEndDate=2025-03-31&dateToggle=M&q=Caribbean-&ship=CS Needless to say we cancelled it and booked a HAL 21-day Panama Canal and Pacific Coastal cruise from Ft Lauderdale to Seattle in an act-facing cabin for $250 pp/day (net $151 pp after booking discounts) including the HIA Early Booking promotion.

That’s why the 18 3-5 week cruises we have booked through 2025 are with PCL, HAL and NCL, with only one 10-day Galapagos cruise this December booked with X.

We also like booking longer 3-5 week cruises. It would be nice if X designed their more unique itineraries so folks that like longer cruises can book 3 consecutive legs together without revisiting any of the same ports.

For us deck 5 would be better as it’s above other cabins rather than a public space such as the dining room plus it’s higher up as others have mentioned.

How about a roundtrip Alaska cruise from Seattle that includes stopping in Nome as well as other Alaska ports, and of course a port in Canada to keep the PVSA folks happy? That would definitely catch our interest.

We were on the Diamond for 17 days in July and it sure felt like there was a full crew, and more importantly we had a blast. Just like we did on the Regal the previous July for 21 days cruising around the Med while they filmed many of the New Love Boat scenes. You can see my Live From threads in my below expanded signature area if you’re interested. So no worries, any Princess cruise is still as fun, maybe even more than before the pandemic, especially if you like to laugh a lot at their variety of game shows! 😁

So I have to ask, how do you get the light to turn on when you want to pick out some clothes hanging in the closet? 🤔

That's cool. It's definitely an individual decision. In our case my DW only drinks bottled water and hot chocolate, which from what I remember bottled water is not free on HAL ships. Hot chocolate is free from what I remember if you mix it using the packages available in the buffet. Not sure if they offer a more quality product for a charge at the Dutch Cafe. If they do, she'll definitely be getting it there. For me I drink a couple of bottles of water a day, a bottle of beer in the afternoon on the balcony, a couple glasses of wine at dinner, and a triple Baileys watching the evening show in the theater. But again, doing the math the premium beverage package is pretty much "free" for us since we use the other portions of the HIA package as well. There is also the issue of the nonrefundable deposit that comes with the Cruise Only fare. We book our cruises when they first appear and like the flexibility of switching to a better itinerary if one happens to appear in the 18-24 month timeframe before our originally booked cruise's final payment date. Booking a cruise with a NRD is just not a good idea for us long range "low stress" cruisers. As far as booking excursions, again that's a personal choice. But getting $100 per person for three excursions is not a bad deal, especially when you consider all of the other benefits associated with the HIA with the Early Booking Bonus. But then there is this super cool deal if you book a cruise within the first 90 days of being available, and from what I read both types of bookings are applicable, although I would think there would be some stress tied to having a NRD booking in place for 18-24 months prior to the FP date. Mariner Society Early Booking Bonus | Holland America Line

There is an interesting note in the T&C just in case you have to cancel a cruise that you subsequently upgraded with this HIA option. So if you're going to book a Cruise Only fare and choose to buy insurance, make sure you include the cost of the HIA upgrade. Fares are based on Promo(s) O1. Have It All Offer code are per person per day to add the Have It All Premium Package of amenities. Offer is subject to availability. Have it All Offer Code is available for bookings, who would like to add on the HIA Amenities. This applies only to the cruise portion of Alaska Cruisetours, is not combinable with any other discounts and is not transferable or refundable. Commission, Gap and TC are based off the cruise fare. Have it all Offer Code pricing is dependent on the time of booking; bookings made prior to April 21, 2022, retain previous pricing structure. Offer is applicable only on select 2022, 2023 & 2024 departures.

Is a guarantee cabin booked with a nonrefundable deposit or can you book it at no additional cost with a fully refundable deposit?

OTOH it sounds like a pretty good deal to us, even though we are also 4 star Mariners. On the below 21-day cruise, we each get $300 off excursions, 3 specialty dinners (1 at each for a total of $89 or $44 if 4 star), premium internet service ($35 per day), crew appreciation ($17 pp/day (if you're in a suite which I'm assuming includes a VS), premium beverage package, and a refundable deposit. When I add it all up for a 4-star Mariner, it equates per person to $300 + $44 + $735 + $357 = $1,436, and that's not including the free premium beverage package. The difference between the two below fares, Basic and HIA, is $1,430 plus the Cruise Only fare has a nonrefundable deposit. What am I missing?