new_cruiser

My cruise was a round trip from Phuket, Thailand, 1998 IIRC. Most stops were beaches of National Park islands 🏝. So a very beachy laid back cruise. They don't currently have any Asian itineraries on their schedule. They have cruises in the Mediterranean, Caribbean, and Central America with some of each on the zero solo supplement list.

Some small ship cruise lines have cruises with reduced or zero solo supplements. Star Clippers usually has at least a couple dozen with no solo supplement. From their main page go to specials and look for solo ones. Windstar has a list of cruises with free or reduced solo supplement. Their regular supplement is 75%; the ones on the reduced solo supplement list have a solo supplement between 0 and 50%. In both cases, the deal applies across cabin categories and it isn't just last minute sailings on the list. When I did one on Star Clippers, there weren't any solo gatherings but there wasn't any need for them. There were so many solos amongst the small number of passengers, that you met them without needing a gathering. And the couples socialized fine with the solos. Windstar has started having solo meet-ups; I noticed them in the daily program on a recent cruise but wasn't solo that trip so I don't know if they were well attended. When I've been solo on the line, other passengers were sociable and I didn't feel a need for solo gatherings.

That seems like a good idea for the Barcelona end, but a night in Rome e is much more desirable than a night in Citivecchia so not attractive.

In case you haven't taken a Venice water taxi before, note that hotel docks are usually fixed docks, not floating. That means that the ease of getting from boat to dock or vice versa varies with the tide. We managed it (over 70 but reasonably mobile) but it was a challenge, especially the time when the tide was high. One woman on our Venice to Rome cruise last fall started the cruise in a wheelchair because she wounded her leg disembarking a water taxi. The boatman did help with getting the luggage in and out of the water taxi. The ride from the airport to our hotel was lovely. Our hotel was multiple bridges away from the Grand Canal so it was great to be brought right to the door of the hotel by the water taxi. I would do it again as long as I stay agile enough. But it's something to be aware of.

What you were told is incorrect. It is one device at a time per package. So if you each buy it (2×$35/day), you can each have one device connected simultaneously. Yes, you can buy just one package. I have done that. Is your cruise more than one segment (a b2b cruise)? We had a 17 day Cruise Collector once that we got last minute. The first segment had 3 sea days and I was still making arrangements for some ports so I wanted WiFi for that but didn't need it for the other segment so I just bought the package for the first segment. Also, with the newer system on the motor yachts you can get buy the package by the day. E.g. perhaps you generally don't need it on port days when you can use cellular data or wifi in a cafe, but you want it for a sea day. The sail ships don't have that system yet, you can only get it for a whole cruise segment on them. I expect they will get the new system in the announced upgrades.

Since the answer will depend on the cruiseline, it's best to ask this question on tge board for the particular cruiseline.

I enjoy St Maarten but I've only been on days when it isn't overwhelmed by having many big ships in port. A 7-day cruise leaving Florida on the weekend will stop at St Maarten mid week. There are a lot of those so it's too many people at once crowding the island with day trippers.

Falling short by $158 isn't bad. If you go for a policy with higher limits, it's likely that the policy will cost more. When buying insurance, I'm most concerned about it covering the big open ended costs - emergency flights home, medical costs (if not covered internationally by your regular medical insurance), loss of all or most of the trip cost. Over the years of traveling, I'm probably ahead even if I had to pay for a few high season hotel nights.

It's possible to do it using the urgent process where he goes to a passport office in person, but even if you live very close to one of those offices, it's not worth the hassle for a 4-day break. Florida can be chilly or can be pleasantly warm in February. You can go to the US Virgin Islands or Puerto Rico without a passport (check requirements - one thing I saw said you need a birth certificate and photo ID, but I didn't find a .gov cite to confirm that). Unless you want a booze cruise, I wouldn't recommend a 4-day cruise.

I'm happily married, but I go solo on a trip if I want to go but the trip doesn't interest my husband. There are single people who share a cabin with a friend or family member so they are double occupancy but not married. That's why "solo" isn't the same as marital status. Not that I approve of charging a solo more than twice the pp double occupancy rate.

It's true that a cruise ship is more stable than a fishing boat or ferry. I'm not convinced that there is much difference once ships are large enough to have stabilizers. I've mostly cruised on small (100 to 350 passenger) ships, but I've been on larger ships a few times and haven't noticed a difference. I've crossed the Atlantic, the Pacific and the Tasmanian sea on small ships - the Tasmanian was a bit rough - it's known for it, but not that bad. Only some of the last day of sailing getting into Lisbon was rough. For most of the crossing, the captain was able to choose a path avoiding the rough bits.

If it's mild, you may not be bothered by it on a ship (unless conditions get really bad). The ships have stabilizers. I used to get mildly sea sick on small boats at times. On ships, I would take bonine and ginger the first day or two of a cruise and then be fine without it once I'd acclimatized. More recently, I don't need it even if it gets kind of rough.

You should ask on the Carnival board because this is about a specific cruise line's policies/procedures. (The post may get moved there anyway.) The cruise is past final payment so cancelations won't get their money back and are quite unlikely at this point so there's not much chance.

Most taxis we took in Rome recently didn't want to take credit cards. I haven't run into that on other recent trips in Europe and elsewhere. Also some small restaurants wanted cash. So I'd generally agree with you for most of Europe but not for Italy - especially taxis. Most other things accepted cards. All ATMs seem to charge a per use fee in Europe but I still find it the best way to get cash. I generally get 300 Euros at a time to minimize the fee. I don't mind if I take some Euros home because they'll get used on a later trip. If you don't want to do that and haven't prepaid your Rome hotel, you could use leftover Euros for part of your hotel bill.

If I understand what Yeah wrote, the TA offering the lower price is a different TA, not his. Then, if the price difference is enough to you to be worth the hassle and you trust that the TA offering it is legit, your only option to get the drop would be to cancel your cruise and book with the other agent. That will mean you have to let go of your current cabin and take whatever one is available from the agent giving you the quote. Also, there may be a risk that the rate disappears between canceling and rebooking.

I had a similar price drop due to a sale last December on a 23-day cruise collector shortly before final payment Windstar was going to reduce my fare to the new amount. But I asked my TA to check on the price if I upgraded to a balcony. It was still less than my original fare. So, I got an upgrade and a fare reduction. I was pretty happy about it, especially since I was solo on that trip under a reduced solo supplement and they honored that wit the sale price. Then the price came back up after the sale ended.

It's also worth checking the specials page of lines that you are interested in. They sometimes have a reduced or no solo supplement special so you can get any cabin on the ship for slightly more or the same price as the per person double occupancy rate. For anyone interested in cruising on small ships (by which I mean around 140 to 350 passenger capacity), such specials are frequent on some lines. Star Clippers almost always has a list of cruises with no solo supplement, currently about 3 dozen cruises are on the list. Such specials used to be rare on Windstar, but in the last few years they've had a list of cruises with reduced or no solo supplement. Currently, they don't have many with a zero solo supplement but many are 20% (meaning the fare is 120% of the per person double occupancy fare). I was booked on a Windstar cruise with no solo supplement last spring and it went on sale with a much lower price. I wasn't sure if they would honor the no solo supplement for the sale price but they did so I'm pretty happy with them.

On the couple of RC cruises I've looked at, the solo price was twice the per person double occupancy price for choosing your cabin. The big price differences (similar to what tge OP found on Celebrity) came because guarantee cabin rates disappeared when booking a cabin for one.

They have stabilizers and they ride pretty smoothly. We crossed the Tasman Sea from New Zealand to Australia last year (an area known for rough seas due to the currents) and it was fine.

Not correct. We had OBC from our TA on our last cruise. The statement of OBC that was in our room stated that it was refundable. We also had $600 in non-refundable OBC from Windstar that we made sure to use up during the cruise. The refundable OBC was used to pay our gratuities and the remainder was refunded to our credit card.

It depends what kind of OBC you habe. The OBC Windstar gives you can't be used for gratuities. If you have OBC from your TA, that can be used for gratuities.

In most cases on Windstar ships, connected cabins aren't connected by a door in the wall between cabins. Each pair of cabins is accesed from a short hall off the central hallway. For connected cabins, that short hall has a door that can close it from the main hall so that the cabins connect through their regular doors.

My condolences on your loss. I've been solo on some Windstar cruises because my husband wasn't interested in the itineraries. Two were ocean crossings. There usually aren't many solos, but the passengers were friendly and I had plenty of socializing. On Windsurf this fall, I noticed that the daily program had a gathering for solos listed most evenings. That's the first time I've seen that. My husband was with me on that cruise so I don't know how those went. When solo, I've usually either done Windstar excursions or explored the port on my own. A few times, a couple had similar interests and we explored a port together - had the best time in Madera doing that.

There are two kinds of OBC. One is the OBC from Windstar - the OBC you get from Windstar including that based on your Yacht Club status, promotional OBC (from specials and such). That can't be used for gratuities and it's use it or lose it. The other is pre-paid credit. That's what you get from your TA. It's real money so it can pay gratuities and anything left at the end of the cruise is refunded to your card. Somehow, we ended up with $600 of the first kind on our last cruise and had a hard time spending it all. We are 4-star so get laundry and internet included. We aren't big drinkers - 0 to 2 drinks a day and they had winery on board hosting complimentary wine tastings (apparently about a half-dozen cruises this year will have a winery doing this). And for the particular itinerary, we preferred doing our oelwn thing rather than excursions.

The Panama Canal itineraries are also great.