Toofarfromthesea

In the immortal words of Paul Simon, "A man sees what he wants to see, And disregards the rest."

Really? I look through the board and I see a lot more criticism of people who take and use their devices. Typical is someone asking about wifi plans being inundated with people self-righteously declaring that they should disconnect from their life while on a cruise. Right here in this thread someone is saying the people who use their devices on a cruise are just trying to avoid being alone with their thoughts.

It's not a class system if you get to choose your class. It is a Choice system.

I've always brought my Chromebook.

I'm old enough to remember my dad pulling into the gas station and telling the attendent "$5 worth or fill up, which ever comes first" and he usually got change from his fiver. In 1970 he and I drove to Beaumont TX from NYC. Gas was in the mid 30s in NY, but as we got closer and closer to TX the gas price went down and down, and by the time we got to TX we were paying about 13 cents a gallon.

I grew up in NYC and they were definitely there at least up to the 70s.

And those visitors do impose costs on the community. While I think some communities go too far, in principle they are justified, IMO.

I agree to the extent that these "ancillary" charges are imposed by the hotel or cruise line, like a resort fee. But when they are imposed by a third party, as in the case of port fees and taxes, I prefer they be separately broken out. If I'm being taxed I want to know that I am being taxed, and how much. Same with sales tax. I find the system where the VAT is just bundled into the price to be deceptive.

You can do without, or You can pay an exorbitant price, or You can BYOM Bring (Your Own Meds)

I don't think you are going to get 'rocks aiming at my head'. That generally only happens when people say they remove the automatic gratuities.

The only discount I recall getting was 10% from MSC for being a retired teacher.

It is an interesting issue for which there should be ample precedence. The big Salesforce conference that is held in San Francisco every year uses cruise ships as floating hotels since even SF doesn't have enough hotel space for the number of attendees. I don't know how the issues you raise shook out in that instance but they seem to be comparable issues, with the main difference being duration.

They tend to give their kids less restraints than typical American parents give theirs, in my experience. It's different. Different isn't necessarily good or bad. These differences don't keep MSC from being my favorite line, but some people would be put off.

It's not about controlling anyone, it is about avoiding situations where you are forced to deal with things you don't want to deal with. As in, if you don't want to be around predominantly Europeans rather than Americans, and are discomfited by the child rearing practices of certain European cultures, then MSC, my favorite, wouldn't be a good choice.

I second the train ride in Flam. Maybe you could contact your cruise line and see whether they can make a wheelchair available to Mum for excursions? Alternatively see if you can rent a lightweight folding wheelchair for the duration of the cruise.

No one can answer that question that long into the future.

Wow, almost none of her question had to do with insurance, which was completely tangential to her ta question, and most of you got into a big insurance discussion that had nothing to do with her real question.

How does asking her if she wants to transfer the booking and get some perks translate to pushing hard? Where does offering a incentive end and pushing begin?

One of my favorite cruises was the length of the Mississippi from MN to NOLA. But mucho expensive - definitely a one shot deal.

I've never cruised Carnival, but in the unlikely event I ever cruise again it will likely be in the MSC Yacht Club, on Celebrity, or on Holland America, in that order.

Yes, well, people say a lot of foolish thing because they fail to look at empirical facts. Me? I'm an empirical guy.

I have a little list They never will be missed

The real problem is that Carnival eliminated the raw beefsteak and the frozen bag of peas late night options for the brawlers. 😝

I can't definitively contradict you, but I'd be astounded if that was correct.

Avoiding Carnival is the best solution, apparently. I just googled XXXXX Cruise line brawl, for Carnival, RCCL, NCL, MSC, Holland America. One altercation came up for each of NCL, RCCL, and MSC. None for Holland America or Celebrity. But each Google search came up with several links to brawls on Carnival ships. My favorite was a 60 person brawl on Carnival Magic last July apparently caused by a passenger 3-way followed by cheating complaints. In all likelihood fueled by copious amounts of alcohol.