UKstages

coke zero typically will come in a can (although they will "decant" it into a glass). diet coke is typically on tap, but not always. depends on the bar and the supply.

it's not a "copyright" issue. it's not a music licensing issue. it's an artistic choice and a contract limitation based on that choice. please see post #36. the creators could decide to allow the show to be performed in other venues. we don't know if NCL has approached them to ask for that contract revision and if they said no... of if NCL has never asked. but the show was purpose built for a venue called syd's... think of the entirety of the club as the stage set for a theatrical experience. once one understands that, its easy to see why the creative team do not want the show performed in larger venues without all of syd's memorabilia.

thank you very much for your considered and thoughtful explanation of who you believe the contemporary cruiser is. i don't agree with much of it, especially being thrown into the mix with a bunch of "old farts like us." (or perhaps you were talking just about the birds; it's difficult to say.) in any case, i would caution you not to make broad strokes generalizations about any market segment or demographic. most assumptions and generally accepted "facts" about generation x or hen z or millennials or any other age group have simply not proven out. all the "data" contradicts. i point you to the work of jessica kriegel, in particular her book "unfairly labeled," which shatters the commonly accepted beliefs about generational dynamics. in brief: it is wrong to assume that people born within a ten or twenty year period all share the same tastes and values. there are baby boomers with a sense of entitlement, just as there are millennials with a sense of entitlement... and on and on. baby boomers left their jobs after just a few years when they were the same age as millennials now... but somehow only millennials are branded as less loyal. some millennials like game shows and hot tubs and specialty dining on NCL ships and some do not. and the percentage of boomers who like those same things is probably pretty similar to the millennials. most of the "research" that "proves" the generational divide is bogus. by the way, some millennials are 23 years old and some are 41 years old... what do you suppose they truly have in common? and, for the record, this is as it ever was... socrates was complaining about the younger generation 2000 years ago!

not sure where you're going with this... if your concern is that there will be kids, rest assured there will not. they are pretty strict. that's not to say that some mature 16 or 17 year olds don't get in from time to time. do you have kids and want to bring them in? they're pretty strict. see above. if you have mature looking kids on the fringe, they might be able to get in. but they're technically not allowed. or is your interest in adult activities? (nudge nudge wink wink say mo more). there'll be none of that. there's no nude sun bathing or extra curricular activities, if that's what you were thinking. and it can get pretty crowded in there, especially the hot tub. and, depending on the ship, smokey, too, as spice often includes a smoking section. if you want an adults only area free of kids and crowds, you might want to consider the vibe, for which there is an admission fee.

true. papeete only has air lift on certain days of the week. and, invariably, disembarkation does not occur on those days. i have heard, if using NCL air, they have been known to charter aircraft. i was considering this cruise on the spirit, but the other way... from auckland to sydney, sydney to papeete, papeete to honolulu. yes, a B2B2B. it would have been my first. but i could not get a stateroom that had other cabins above and below. the only cabins i could get were either adjacent to the smoking area on the ship, or below the fitness center or below the pool deck or below the buffet. i rejected them all.

you mention CAS. are your cruises comped? be aware that for comped CAS cruises, a "percentage off" coupon only applies to the admin fee. so, you'll save about $5 a day.

perhaps. respectfully, if i thought it was clear from the question asked and the answer given, i would not have commented. the poster asked... it's the word "each" from which i inferred that the poster was talking about each of the guests in the cabin receiving status meals... ... "do we also get the 2 meals each because of Latitude status for a total of 4 meals?" i inferred that "two meals each because of latitude status" meant the poster was expecting two coupons per elite status guest in the cabin. and they both apparently have the same status. in addition to the FAS meals, the poster is inquiring about 2 meals each because of latitudes status. and while all platinum or sapphire or diamond meals are because of latitudes status, it's unclear what the poster meant because there are two issues being conflated at once. how many meals a passenger gets to eat vs how many they are given. words like "both" and "each" are very confusing when you're talking about latitudes coupons because both people get to eat, but they don't both get a coupon and yet each has two latitudes meals... because they are using each coupon to dine together. if it weren't confusing people would not return to the forum over and over again to ask the same question.

you've hit upon an important point. while this post is ostensibly about a port-intensive itinerary, the more important issue is whether or not you intend to get off the ship while in port. if you're going to go explore in every port, then it may indeed not be worth it. but if you're a seasoned cruiser and don't need to see bermuda yet again, and/or you intend to stay on the ship in some or all ports, it's well worth it.

yes, thanks, but that's three words! and i promised only two. and those that have read my posts know i'm a man of very few words. plus, the staff on pride of america has that "i'm an american and i don't have to make up your room or serve you a drink" problem, so i don't recommend that ship. yikes! stripes! i've used up my word quota for this hour.

agreed. of course, i wasn't implying that war was "kool." i was implying that the folks talking about their service were kool. it was actually a reference to the relentless off topic convo. the contributors to this thread could just as easily have been talking about hamburger buns falling apart, in which case i would have mentioned "the great british bakeoff." or the cost of a platter of room service shrimp, in which case i would have mentioned "forest gump." or the disappearance of hash browns, in which case i would have mentioned "faith like potatoes." the comment truly had nothing to do with making light of war. it was making light of the extended off topic conversation, a recurring theme of which was "i know this is off topic, but let me just add this one more thing..." the structure of the joke is such that there is an outsider who desperately wants to belong and since it seems the only thing being discussed is military service, he has to find an "in." aha! he'll explain his connection with the military, which, as it happens, is just from watching a few movies. that's the joke, folks. nothing to do with mocking war or military service. and the joke was made after the contributors to that conversation had already commented on how off topic it was. bonus: there are two additional jokes... playful references are made to a universally panned film and the acting ability of a former governor of california. sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. and not everybody commenting on the thread has an agenda.

THIS. more or less. but it's not about requiring more money. it's been discussed ad nauseam in other threads, but here we go again. NCL came to the "rock of ages" people and said "create a show for us." they did. and the contract stipulates that the show must be performed in the club named after its fictitious club owner. the creators felt, as do many in this thread (including me), that the show's success depends on audience interaction and the intimacy of the club. so, it would be a contract violation to perform the show in the theatre. but you wouldn't want to see that show, anyway... it would be a very different show. the syd norman shows are are a highly scripted immersive theatre experience purpose built for the club in which they are performed; they are not ordinary concerts!

you do get four "meals"... but that's two meals for two. i usually travel solo on NCL, so i have no first hand experience with this, but i believe the sapphire meals are per cabin and not per person, even if you both have status. so you will likely get two coupons, one good for a free meal for two and another good for a free meal for two with a bottle of wine.

a lot of folks rave about the beatles on NCL, but i've never thought any of the iterations i've seen have been very good. there is always at least one beatle who's awful. last year, on the joy, "paul" couldn't sing. seriously. any random person from the audience would have done a better job. but he looked a lot like him, which is why he was cast, i suppose. "john" had a terrific voice and was a good mimic, but looked nothing like him. and so it goes, ship after ship.

hey, now! i watched "band of brothers" and "saving private ryan" and enjoyed them very much. on the other hand, i watched "commando" and felt that the director should have thanked me for my service afterwards. (the special effects were good, though. in one scene, they actually made it appear as if schwarzenegger was acting!) sorry, i just wanted to share my combat experience, so i could fit in with all the kool kidz.

them's fighting words! if there were no casino, i'd likely never sail NCL. i have two words for you: • disney • viking.

i completely understand the concern. i've found it helpful to look at the deck plans. the slide locations are clearly marked (at least they are NOW... they weren't at first). if your concern is noise and not just the visual obstruction, then give yourself a good ten cabin (or more) buffer. i was concerned about this, as well, but after having traveled on the prima i can honestly say that slide noise and obstruction is the very least of the prima's problems.

nail on the head! but it's even more than that... because they camp out starting at 10:30 or 11 AM... playing cards, knitting, doing whatever the heck else it is that they do. then they eat, then they nibble, then they nosh, but then they stay till late afternoon. i'm sure some might even stay till the joint opens up for dinner service. look, i get that the prima and viva have a paucity of indoor public spaces in which you can play cards or scrabble or monopoly or just sit and chat. so i understand why you might want to camp out somewhere. but when that somewhere is a restaurant at which there are too few tables, it's incredibly bad form. same thing when, as a solo or a couple, you occupy a table of four or six and don't offer to share (the table, not necessarily your food).

my goodness. i chose not to comment and critique every word in post #132 and to overlook the contradictions contained therein, but let's look at it now... you said that you understood the subtext and the context of the "contemporary cruiser" comment. but it's quite clear that you didn't because you went on in that post to explain it all and lecture me in a very pedantic way. why would you have done that if you understood the spirit in which my comment was made? there would have been no need to educate me because you knew that i already knew. (i'm very sorry, but you'll have to supply your own yellow highlighter here; i can't be bothered.) and that's the very post that began this dialogue! so the entire back and forth is based on your apparent misunderstanding of the way in which people in these here parts have taken to mocking the "contemporary cruiser.". the point about young cruisers likely not having anything to compare today's cruising to... ohmigosh... that point is indeed an entirely different point separate and distinct from the mocking of the "contemporary cruiser" moniker.

the casino bar also typically carries higher end products.

first things first... thanks for spelling "lede" correctly! few do. i felt the same way about "price" and "donna" that you did. but the reason we felt that way is because "price" is really well done - for what it is - and "donna" is not. it really is as simple as that. it has nothing to do with a preference for game shows or a distaste fro broadway shows... or vice versa.

well, once again, no cruise line is asking a bunch of experienced cruisers to design a cruise ship. what enlightened and progressive cruise lines do is solicit guest feedback to gain insight, test ideas and see if what they thought was so is in fact so. then their team of professionals will set about to design the ship, perhaps incorporating some of those ideas, perhaps not. professional maritime engineers don't really enter into the equation. if you let "professional maritime engineers" design a ship, you'd get a ship that would probably run efficiently but would not get very good reviews for its restaurants, public spaces or amenities. this idea that professionals somehow know better has limits. professionals know how to get the ship built; they don't necessarily know everything the ship should have. professional architects, chiefly men, have designed broadway theatres for more than a hundred and twenty years. and that's all well and good... until you have to go to the bathroom. the theatres were built with small bathrooms and the bathrooms for both men and women were the same size. anybody who has actually gone to the theatre in new york knows why that was a really bad idea, thought up, as it happens, by the professionals. it's only in the last twenty years or so that theatre owners responded to customer feedback and changed the design of modern theatres to include more restrooms and double or more the number for women. those same theatres.. the ones built by architects, without input from actors or producers or directors or scenic designers or playwrights... they also have inadequate backstage facilities, dressing rooms, fly space and places to store scenery when not in use. that's what happens when professionals do something without asking for advice from the intended end user of their product. there's a hotel in las vegas built by professionals that was designed in such a way that it created a "death ray" caused by the sun bouncing off its curved structure. guests trying to sunbathe by the pool got severe burns, with the temperature hovering at a balmy 108 degrees, 20 to 25 degrees higher than the actual temperature. the same architect, a professional, made this mistake twice... he built another building in london with the very same defect. that's what happens when professionals are allowed to do what they do in a vaccum.

i think it's kind of like that old axiom... if you have to ask the price, you can't afford it. if you have to ask for the definition of contemporary cruiser, you're probably not one. on the other hand, as jeff foxworthy always used to say, if you hate buffets and love game shows, you might be a contemporary cruiser! (i may be paraphrasing on that last bit.)

this thread, in turn, links to yet another thread on this same topic. if you don't want frozen drinks, any bartender can make you a juice blended drink. explain what you're in the mood for and they can usually do a custom creation.

i think you kinda just did.

yes, this is a lapse on NCL's part, as they ordinarily cater to the contemporary cruiser.