birdergal

We have an aft cabin on Sapphire leaving Feb 5.  You will warm up when you get to Buenos Aires.  I'm seeing low 90's for this upcoming weekend.  Been loving your photos!  My husband and I also love wildlife and he's a birder.  

When I pay for excursions I go to the payment section of the Cruise Personalizer.  It shows my balance for shore excursions and lets me pay.  If I try to pay from the excursions section it gives me the error message.

1 hour ago, tonit964 said:

The mini's on deck 8 are completely covered. If you can snag either E728 or E731, those have a bigger balcony that wraps part way towards the aft. Caribe balconies are half covered. You can't go wrong with either.

Thanks so much for this info!  Had no clue about the mini suites on Emerald deck.  Unfortunately the two you recommended aren't available but there on plenty of other ones available on Emerald.  Think I will go for that!

Looking to book a cruise from Buenos Aires to Santiago for Feb 2024.  We like bigger balconies but wondering which selection we should make.  It looks like the mini suite balcony is completely in the open but the caribe has a little cover over it.  We spend a lot of time on our balcony so hopefully someone who has been on the cruise can give me their opinion.

I am having a problem with the app also.  I have been in the green lane for weeks and now show yellow and our departure is this Sat.  Mine freezes up also and shows I still need to complete choosing the medallion (I already have mine) and picking an arrival group.  Did that a long time ago.  I'll be upset if that changes from what I had.

I booked a cruise for 12/3/19 on 10/15/19 and could only get a guarantee.  I still have no cabin assignment.  I think I will take the advice of others and give them a call.  I still have the name of the Princess rep I talked to so will try to reach him. 

2 hours ago, richmke said:

 

Don't know. But, if there is not enough time to ship (arrive 2 weeks prior to cruise), they won't ship it. Even if they do, and you miss it, you can get a "replacement" when embarking. There is no private information on the medallion (other than your name, ship, and sailing date), and the old one is deactivated when the new one is enabled.

Thanks for the info.  I wondered if they'd have replacements.  I actually called Princess and was told I could request picking it up on the OceanReady app.  Originally I was concerned because the app wanted me to indicate a shipping address and defaulted to my home address.  If I clicked on that, it wanted me to verify that's where I wanted the medallions sent and to submit it for mailing.  When I tried the app again, I clicked the "add  a new address" instead of my home address.  This time it gave me the option to have it delivered at the port.  Hope this helps someone else.  It definitely wasn't very clear.

Is there a way on Ocean Ready to indicate that you want to pick up your medallions at the port instead of having them mailed?  We are leaving home three weeks prior to our cruise and don't want to take the chance that the medallions won't arrive before we leave.  The only option I can find is filling out address info to have them delivered.  Do I just ignore this so they won't mail them?

I just booked an AirBnB in Rome. Did a ton of research on Trip Advisor ( read allot of reviews ) Found some nice places very close to the Trevi fountain and/or the Spanish steps. And the price was much more reasonable then the hotels. Well worth looking into

I have also been looking at AirBnB or VRBO. Lots of nice rentals out there and prices are definitely reasonable. I've used VRBO a lot in the past but never AirBnB. Glad you found a nice rental! I'm looking more in the area of Pantheon, Piazza Navona, and Campo Fiori.

Having the same problem on my PC using Internet Explorer. Went to Chrome and it works fine.

I reserved Burn the Floor but ended up canceling that reservation so haven't seen it. It's a ballroom dancing show. I don't know if there's a story line.

 

Priscilla Queen of the Desert is a Broadway-style show that is great! It absolutely the best entertainment I've seen on a ship. It's a show for adults and they give several warnings before the show that parents should take their children. It's a really well done musical production.

 

You can reserve both shows at the 90-day mark (100 days for suites +) and it's a good idea. Those with reservations are allowed in before those who didn't reserve ahead of time.

Thanks so much for explaining this. Both shows sound like something I'd like to see. Glad I can reserve in advance.

Going on Epic in Oct. First time on NCL. Trying to gather as much info as possible as we've only been on RCI and Celebrity. What exactly is "Priscilla" and "Burn the Floor"? I've seen this mentioned in other posts and they sound pretty popular. Is it something that you need to sign up for in advance? If yes, where and when do you do this?

I found a large staple like they use to fasten cardboard boxes in my salad from the salad bar onboard either a Celebrity ship or RCI ship. It has been awhile so can't recall which. I took it to Guest Relations and they thanked me for bringing it to their attention. Didn't seem very surprised but did apologize.

Thank you lillilu for all of this info. NCL now seems to be offering the exursion that we can get thru Celebrity which is also $45. We really don't want to be limited to a certain amt of time so we'll still probably go with a taxi. Hopefully it's not too difficult to get one to come back to the pier.

Here is the email I received back today. I did shoot another one off as I had more questions.

 

Good Morning,

 

Thank you for your recent email.

 

Stop 2 Pastelillo is the closest stop to the Port, which you can access via public transport. At this stop you will be able to do the full tour and hop-off as many times as you like during the operating hours.

When you come into port on a cruise ship it can be at a high cost due to a shuttle service may be provided with pre-purchased City Sightseeing Tickets from the port to one of the stops on the tour.

 

I hope this information, please advise if you need any further assistance.

 

Kind regards,

 

Charlotte Mander

Sales and Marketing

administrator

 

Thank you birdergal, we are planning on it! 4 more days and we are on the ship!!!

Thanks lillulu for the info. I have seen many posts recommending taking a taxi into town. That may be what we end up doing. Hope you have a great cruise. We leave on Nov 7 so if you're back in time, add a post to this thread letting me know what you ended up doing. We've been to Cartagena twice so have taken tours to see the popular sites. Looking for something a little different and a bit more independent.

Still no answer, I sent another email again today to the company. Our ship does not offer this in our tours that I saw. They just have their typical ship excursions.

 

 

Hope to hear something as I leave Saturday to head to Miami. If I hear anything I will post and let you know.

 

Enjoy your cruise.

Thank you! Enjoy your cruise also!

I'm just curious if you ever got an answer, or answered your own question by finding out another way? I have emailed. Waiting for an answer back.

Interested in the same thing. Will be on Celebrity Equinox in Nov. Wondering if you purchase the Hop On Hop Off thru the ship on the pier whether you have to return at a certain time to get the bus back to the pier. The ship excursion is $45 if you purchase it in advance and says the duration is 4 hours which is why I'm questioning this.

It's about 10-11 miles from the port. I can't remember exactly but I think it took us about 30 min. We did stop at another beach first to let other passengers off.

Went to Turner's Beach on Nov 19. My DH and I shared a van with other folks going to Valley Church Beach. Turner's was just down the road from there. I believe it cost $8 pp each way. We made arrangements for the driver to pick us up before the other folks for our return trip. It worked out very well. Turner's has permanent umbrella's made of wood. You don't need to rent one. Lounge chairs were $5 each. There was an open air restaurant but not a big selection on the menu. We ate lunch at 1:00 and they were out of a lot of items. Ended up getting a cheeseburger and fries which was $8. There are vendors set up at each end of the beach and they did occasionally come over to try to sell something but just told them no thanks. Biggest drawback was the drop-off going into the water. The sand sloped down quite a bit and it was difficult to get back out - at least for this senior! When we stopped at Valley Beach to pick up our other passengers on the way back, I noticed that it had gotten quite crowded since we dropped them off. They also had music blaring at a beach bar. We also compared prices on our ride back and they had to pair to rent an umbrella and chairs plus their cheeseburger was $11. Hope this helps.

We were in Dominica on Nov 18 and Serenade docked at the industrial pier. It wasn't convenient to town and the vendors were set up in a warehouse area.

162 days until sailing on Jewel of the Seas. Way too long!!

Well, in Alaska it's the rain I was thinking about. If there is little cover then the balcony becomes much smaller if it's raining.

 

Thanks for the info!!

I checked with my DH and he thought at least half of the balcony was covered.

I don't recall exactly how much coverage there was on the balcony. I know there was some. It was very warm during the canal transit and I remember trying to find as much shade as possible and sometimes it was hard to come by depending on the time of day. I don't think that would be an issue in Alaska. You will probably welcome the sun.

I'm not sure about the chairs. I know we had the nice ones on our Hawaii cruise in 2007 but they could be different for Alaska. I do know that this cruise went on to Alaska when we disembarked and I can't imagine that they changed the chairs. This cruise was on the Radiance also.

this is 9260 which is the exact same as 1104, huge balcony about 10 x 14. We had two lounge chairs, two regular chairs and a small table.

 

We stayed in 1604 on our last Panama Canal transit and loved it. My only complaint was that we didn't have the nice lounge chairs as shown in the picture. We only had the two regular chairs but asked our cabin steward if he could get us lounge chairs. He said he wasn't supposed to but he would see what he could do. He came up with two but they weren't very nice ones. They were the ones with the vinyl straps and looked pretty old.

Birdergal - Thanks for the tips. Do you know what species you saw in Labadee?

My DH supplied me with this list: white-necked crow, stolid flycatcher, black-crowned palm tanager, palmchat, broad-billed tody, black-whiskered vireo and hisponialan woodpecker. You're bound to see the magnificent frigatebird somewhere on your trip. We've seen them quite often on our cruises in the Caribbean.