new_cruiser

The cost savings of going up a level is fairly limited. The biggest difference is between 3 Star and 4 Star because that adds unlimited WiFi and the laundry package (the latter only makes a difference for cruises under 15 days because everyone gets that free on long cruises). That's $44.50 per day per person for WiFi and laundry or $35 if it's only laundry. Also $25 additional cruise credit per person. Beverage package, excursions and Windstar-branded merchandise get an additional 5% discount which is only of value if you buy those things. My husband will be 4-star for the first time on our next cruise and he'll appreciate the free WiFi because it's never been worth the cost of buying it to him. So it's not saving us $35 a day, but will be a nice benefit so he can get his daily Sudoku fix on sea days.

Perks for the next level start the cruise after you get enough points. My husband reached the points for 4-star in the middle of last cruise. He'll get 4-star perks for the first time next cruise. I'm not certain what happens if you get to the next level during the first segment of a cruise collector (B2B cruises booked under a single fare). Possibly the new level kicks in for the next segment.

Windstar doesn't bus everyone to Colon. They include bus transfer from the Windstar hotel for those who booked it through them. If you are staying at another hotel (or booked that hotel directly), you can pay for the transfer from the Windstar hotel. The price for that for the two of us was about the same as the cost for our guide taking on a half day of touring between Panama City to the port in Colon. This would apply to the Panama Canal Costa Rica itinerary from Colon to Costa Rica. From where we are on the West Coast, leaving from either Sacramento or San Francisco airport, there isn't much difference in flying to either San Juan, Costa Rica or Aruba. Either way it requires at least one stop and the price range seems similar.

I've generally gone in January or early February as a break from winter's cold. The weather has been great and the water temp perfect for snorkeling - I don't like cold water for swimming and I'm comfortable in the sea there for snorkeling.

A note on terminology: Windstar mentions their reduced rates for solo passengers as reduced or waived single supplement but it's more common to use "solo" any passenger traveling on their own with "single" more specifically used for solo travelers who are unattached (i.e. not married or otherwise paired-up overall). I'm not single but my husband isn't interested in traveling as much as I am so I sometimes travel solo. I have been solo on a few Windstar cruises including sometimes one with a waived solo supplement. There have always been some solo passengers but not a huge number. I didn't notice the proportion being markedly different on the one I took with no solo supplement (maybe it was higher like 15 to 20% instead of 5 to 10% but not enough to be noticeable). On the other hand, I've generally found Windstar passengers to be a friendly lot and couples were quite willing to socialize with solos. I never felt left out or isolated when traveling solo on Windstar.

Who told you it would be a singles cruise? I've never heard of Windstar having any specifically designated singles cruises. They do have some cruises with a reduced or no solo supplement so perhaps it could have been one of those - it isn't currently on the list for that, but it's also showing up as pretty fully booked so maybe it was taken off the list.

The cabin next door wouldn't be a 3rd berth. It would add sleeping space for two. Also, the Deck Plan clearly has text saying Grand Owner's suites can be booked to get 2 or 3 bedroom suites listing the multiple suite numbers and separately has Owner's Suites 640 and 641 having 3 berths. The issue may be that that 3rd berth is in the bedroom and therefore won't help for avoiding snoring. I doubt that they have any on board. The third berths are permanent installations in the rooms that have them. No reason to carry a rollaway.

In addition to the included laundry, Star Collector voyages usually have a lower fare than buying the two (or more) segments individually. You will be booked in the same cabin for the whole Star Collector. Before COVID, they didn't do itineraries that ended in Fuete Amador so they didn't do Panama Canal cruises from Aruba to there. They would do that itinerary a few times a year when they moved a ship from the Caribbean to Panama but it would end in Colon unless you stayed on for the next segment and ended in Costa Rica. Panama decided to promote Fuete Amador as a cruise port and put in docking facilities which I think were completed in 2022.. It was only a tender port before that. I recall reading at the time that they were also doing some financial promotions to encourage cruise lines to start using it. That change to the port allowed Windstar to have Panama canal cruises that originate in the Caribbean and terminate at the Pacific side of the Canal. So those cruise only started in 2022 and given the passenger capacity of Windstar ships and light post-pandemic passenger loads, it's no surprise that reviews of the itinerary are sparse. We were also on the Barbados to Aruba cruise pre-pandemic with Ski Mom but continued on for the next 3 segments. The segment from Aruba was almost identical to the current Aruba to Panama one except it didn't include San Blas and it terminated in Colon. Wind Surf is too tall to go through the canal. We had a partial canal transit through the locks on the Caribbean side to the lake and back.

You only need to turn the application in in person for a new Passport application. Renewals of unexpired passports (and expired ones up to a certain time limit) can be submitted by mail. No appointment needed.

We have done the Costa Rica Panama Canal itinerary and almost the same itinerary as the Aruba Panama Canal cruise. (The later for us was on Wind Surf when it did the big Caribbean series of itineraries shortly before COVID - its the same as Aruba to Panama canal cruise except that the Wind Surf masts are too high to exit the Pacific end of the canal it was a partial transit and then the ship continued up the East coast of Central America.) I'd say you can't go wrong with either one - I enjoyed them about equally. The Aruba one has better snorkeling opportunities and Caribbean port towns and such plus the Columbia stops. The Costa Rica stops are more about nature - seeing the varied bird and animal life of the jungles in the area, Costa Rica culture and crops (e.g. coffee, bananas, chocolate and other tropical fruits).

With either cruise, they will be flying to or from Panama. The flight that changes is Costa Rica vs Aruba.

And if the expedited passport process isn't fast enough, there is an urgent passport process that can be used when start or travel is less than 14 days away. It's kind of a pain, but not too bad if you are willing to travel to one of the Passport Agency offices.

I guess the border people could not figure out the fist name & birth date are the same 🙄 There can be a lot of people who have the same first name and birth date so that's normally not enough to link a virth certificate to an ID when the last name has changed. (I have no personal experience with the closed loop cruise requirements because I've always used my passport. Anyway, I chose to not change my name when I married.)

The Port hole Suites aren't in the new section, but they were added when the ship was stretched. Prior to the stretch, there were no Suites on deck 3. Rather than put the new Suites in the added section, they moved Amphora there and put the new Suites in front of them. Presumably because they wanted Amphora to still be next to the main stair. One can be in the Lounge or Compass Rose before dinner, then go down the stair and Amphora is right there - better flow.

Also the Star Port Hole Suites - if Star is in the category name, it was added in the stretch.

Even though they tell you to be at the airport 3 hours before for international flights, I have had times when the check-in desk isn't open until closer to the flight. (That is most often the case for early morning flights or where the carrier doesn't have many flights out of that airport so they only staff the counter at times it's needed) However, you may be able to do electronic check-in and go straight to your gate if you don't have bags to check. If you feel more comfortable, go early and know you will have that extra margin in case of travel issues. I'd probably split the difference change to 8:15 so planned arrival is 3 hours before. But do what you are comfortable with.

I don't see one currently called Spanish Treasures. The Aruba to Panama City sailings I see are called Panama Canal, Cartagena, San Blas Islands and More - not very catchy. We did almost the same itinerary as one segment of 31 days just before COVID. The only difference was that our cruise was on Wind Surf which is too tall to go through the Pacific end of the canal. We did a partial transit and the segment finished in Colon. It's a very nice itinerary. We've also done one of the Panama and Costa Rica cruises from Colon to Puerto Caldera - the stops in Costa Rica are more nature oriented rather than history.

Have you heard anything about what time of day they usually release tickets? We live in the US Pacific time zone which means the Italy work day is roughly from Midnight to 8 AM in our time zone. It would be nice to have a clue on whether to stay up very late or get up very early.

I've read a couple of horror stories on line about people having trouble getting through on the phone, but that wasn't my experience. My son's family decided to book a cruise about a month and a half before sailing and I wanted to join them. However, I was just about to submit my passport for renewal and didn't want to wait until after the cruise because we had a fall cruise scheduled. So, I used the urgent passport process which requires calling the National Passport Agency for an appointment. I was a bit nervous about the process; I didn't want to be biting my nails about being able to get an appointment just before a non-refundable June cruise. So I also booked a short jaunt to Vancouver in May that could be altered to use as the justification for the urgent passport process. I ended up having to call 3 times - the first time, I misunderstood their interpretation of "14 days ahead of travel." The day of travel counts as one of the 14 days so my initial call was one day too early. I called the next day and got an appointment for a few days before travel, but then realized I had an unavoidable schedule conflict for that day so I moved the Vancouver trip a few days and called again to cancel that appointment and book another one. Each time I called, I got through dialing once with a reasonable amount of time on hold (I didn't time it exactly - it may have been 20 minutes or so, but it wasn't hours). I wondered if there are different call centers that the calls get automatically routed to or if there is some other factor like time of day because 3 out of 3 times it was pretty easy. The urgent process took pretty much all day for me - a two-hour drive there, the appointment in the morning and then waiting around to pick up the passport, then a longer drive home due to rush hour traffic. Other than that, it went without a hitch. I could pick up the passport the same day because I live more than 100 miles away. Pick-up might require coming back the next day for those closer to the office.

Some cruises get big discounts on some sales, but not all of them do. I mainly cruise on a Windstar, a line with small ships (the biggest are 312 passengers). I'll sometimes watch a cruise I want and book if there is a good sale price. Other times when we particularly like an itinerary, we will book at the current price. In either case, I'll watch the price until the end of the Price Assurance Policy (which coincides with final payment). Twice over many cruises, the price has never gone down, on one it went up quite a bit from where we booked - both were very nice itineraries that are less frequent and the ship booked full or near full so it's obvious why the line never felt a need to put them on sale. Many times I've gotten a moderate discount - a few hundred. A few times, I've gotten a big discount - something over $1000. I had a 23-day Cruise Collector last spring where there was a December sale just before the end of the price assurance policy - the price went down enough that I upgraded from Ocean View to Balcony (a French Balcony) and still got a nice fare reduction. The price went back up after the sale and never came back down to anywhere near what I paid - actually, what I paid as a solo for the crossing plus the following 10-day segment was less than the 10-day segment pp double occupancy price after the sale. They honored my initial no solo supplement price when they repriced to the sale. That was a pretty rare deal. Another time, we had booked a 14-day cruise and had considered adding the 17-day after that but didn't. About month before our cruise, the 17-day went on sale for a really low price and we added it. The 14-day was one of the ones I mentioned above that never went on sale. We usually get some OBC from our TA - more on more expensive cruises, just a bit on cheap cruises. I recently went on a Royal Caribbean cruise with family - my only cruise on a mainstream line since our first cruise in 2005. We had booked after final payment and I'd initially booked an ocean view guarantee. The balcony guarantee would appear for a few days, then disappear for a few days and then come back. I saw it for a couple hundred more pp than I had paid, which was less than the its price when I initially booked, and I thought about it but it was gone before I jumped, then came back at just about $100 more and I jumped on it. So that price was fairly fluid - not by a lot in absolute $ but the initial price wasn't much so % wise, it was a pretty good discount.

Would you consider a cruise terminating in ports in the Caribbean or Central America? Many cruises to the Caribbean departing from the US, hit the same few big ports on the same mid-week days. You might be on a smaller ship, but if, for example, you stop at St. Maarten on a mid-week day, you still deal with crowds in port due to sharing the port with multiple behemoth ships. Itineraries that start in the Caribbean, usually hit the more common ports at the beginning or end of the week when they are less crowded and visit smaller islands on other days. Also, the port times are generally better as the ship doesn't have far to travel between ports.

It's only been one day since they posted. Not everyone checks every day. Since small can mean anything from ships under 1500 to ships under 100, you'll have to give some more ideas about what you want to get more helpful suggestions. How small you consider small ship? Are there any ship features you are looking for? If small is less than 1500 to you and you still want a casino and big shows, it won't help if we suggest ships that carry 300 where the ports and a more laid back atmosphere are the highlights. Or vice versa. For me, small is around 300 passengers or less and that's what I prefer. I've mostly done Windstar, but there is also Star Clippers in that size. While small ships are often more expensive per night than huge ships, one can find specials with pretty good prices. Christmas/New Year's is going to tend to be more expensive on most lines large and small as a lot of people have vacation then.

Or plan on going solo. There are many places I would like to go that don't interest my husband so I go to those places on my own. He's more of a homebody and not as adventurous so it has to be something he really wants to do to tempt him to travel. About half the trips I do are with him and most of the rest, I go solo. Solo supplements are a pain, but sometimes I've been able to find specials where there was little or no solo supplement or find a travel on sale. Also, when traveling with him, I like to make the trip as comfortable as possible so book business class for overseas flights and upscale hotels, but when traveling on my own, I'm willing to fly coach (sometimes requesting an upgrade on miles) and book cheaper good enough hotels. That helps offset some of the extra costs of traveling solo. He is very supportive of me going solo when a trip doesn't interest him.

Several in our family group, including granddaughter who was my cabinmate, tested positive on board a Royal Caribbean cruise this summer. The medical center would have charged ($175 IIRC) for the COVID test if you took it and tested negative but waived the charge if you tested negative. They were given symptomatic medicines (cough syrup for my granddaughter and acetaminophen without charge). They were all younger without complications so didn't need Paxlovid or IVs and I don't know if the medical center would have charged for those. (I was sorry that I hadn't brought some home tests kits along - I did for some earlier cruises but didn't think about it for this one. I bought some home test kits in a port because those in our group who hadn't tested yet wanted to be able to test without the hassle of the medical center's limited availability.) Those testing positive were quarantined in their cabins for 5-days, but assymptomatic untested cabinmates had no restriction. No threats were issued about violating the quarantine though of course we all complied. This was a 7-day cruise so the 5-day quarantine really meant until the end of the cruise. Debarkation was kind of a mess. They wanted to debark each room separately, but two the two minors were rooming with other family members and the younger one would have been extremely upset and confused if debarked without parents. Also we felt that they should be with their parents when leaving the ship and the parents were holding their passports. Communication was poor. Cabins with positive tests were debarked after the rest of the ship - it was a quite a few people, maybe several dozen. We were directed through a different route that bypassed customs and had us in an area for a while where baggage handlers were moving big carts of bags - the baggage handlers weren't happy about us being in that area. Those who tested positive got free room service (normally Royal charges for room service other than continental breakfast) and internet. Once one tested positive, the stewards couldn't enter the room so there was no servicing of the room. The steward was good about bringing fresh towels, ice and anything else needed to the door on request. We put used room service trays outside the door and he was good about clearing those away too. They were also supposed to get some future cruise credit based on how much of the cruise they missed. We were all vaccinated with boosters kept current. Except for me, those in our group who didn't test positive on board, tested positive shortly after. I never tested positive but developed similar symptoms shortly after debarking. I suspect I had a very mild case but a recent booster kept viral load low enough that antigen tests didn't pick it up. I've been on 4 other cruises since the restart of cruising without getting COVID, but those were all on much smaller ships (Windstar with a max capacity of 312 passengers).

Which cruise line is that with?