Real NHDOC

Yes, or you would be paying them to wait or paying them for coming and leaving. Either way you will pay a penalty if you are even just a few minutes behind your scheduled pickup time

Just keep in mind there’s no guarantee the ship will arrive on time and no guarantee that they will get clearance to disembark on time. It’s a real risk to book a flight too early. We have had three significant delays in disembarking cruise ships that would have caused us to miss flights booked too early (out of around 30 cruises) so it does happen relatively frequently. Twice was due to late arrival and once due to customs in Boston harassing anyone who bought anything of value onboard the ship.

Until United changes the flight schedule Flight Ease probably won’t do anything. If I were you I would just keep monitoring the status and schedule of the flight and if it changes then contact Flight Ease and they can make any necessary changes.

Bar Harbor has such a limited supply of hotel rooms it’s unfathomable to believe that enough land tourists would boycott it because of cruise ships to create vacancies. Rather than ban them entirely limiting them to one large ship in port per day makes sense. But some ports have taken the extreme position that no cruise ships should be allowed. I just think that’s an overreaction to the situation.

I have never understood the argument against cruise guests that we don’t spend as much as land tourists therefore the cruise ships should be banned. It’s not like most of us would go to most of these ports as land tourists so any money we spend is found money for the locals. I’ve been to Key West many times on cruises and there’s always plenty of space on the sidewalks to walk around. More often than not we’ll eat in a local restaurant or buy some things at Kermit’s that they would not have otherwise sold. But if they would prefer us not to come and spend our money we can always spend it elsewhere.

The crew is resourceful enough to figure out how to turn any legal tender into something more useful and since a tip is essentially a gift I would not worry too much about giving them something other than USD. I am sure if the choice was between a tip in CAD or no tip they would be happy to take the CAD instead of nothing. Eventually they will be back in New England or Alaska and will be able to use that money then or can trade it to a friend who is going there.

I would like to see this menu put into rotation on all of our HAL sailings. We had a German head chef and he treated us to this one recently:

While the Mariner’s program says:”Does not apply to already discounted dining packages, special events, theme dinners and all “Pop-Up” Restaurants.” I can say that in the past certain “special events” we have attended had the 5* discount applied. The most recent being a New Years Day brunch in Pinnacle on Zaandam. Another HAL inconsistency. So, while I don’t expect them to give the discount at our upcoming Morimoto dinner on Eurodam I would not be shocked if they did.

…also, on our last Zaandam cruise the server insisted the lobster tail was a Maine tail but also said that lots of customers had complained about it being tough so offered me three of the 5 ounce tails instead. They were fine. I never actually saw what they were serving as the 12 ounce tail but if it was “tough” it was either improperly prepared or was a warm water tail (that was improperly prepared). Overcooking lobster will make it tough. The best way is to have it steamed and not broiled and only cooked to medium done.

My experience with lobster-gate is that HAL has only substituted the large (12 ounce) tails with the inferior warm water tail, not the smaller 5 ounce ones. The smaller ones are always cold water tails. The “substitution” has happened to me on multiple ships in both the PG and Tamarind. The PG menu always calls it Maine but they could have easily revised the menu. Tamarind doesn’t say it is Maine but the original recipe for the wok seared lobster called for the same 12 ounce Maine lobster tail served in PG. HAL substitutes the inferior warm water lobster whenever they feel like it. It’s convenient to say it is a supply chain issue when it’s also clearly a much cheaper option.

You get the discount either way but if you prepurchase you pay the full price initially and it gets adjusted when you get aboard.

HAL absorbs the discount in return for an interest free loan AND keeping all of the “breakage” (the term used for unused cards and balances left unused on partially used cards) which is probably a lot more than 10%. Having said that it’s a great deal for those of us who “buy and use” them and keep meticulous records to make sure no balances remain.

Yes, the Mariner’s discount only applies to the Sommelier’s Suite packages, not to individual bottles.

It’s something new. I have not seen it in writing but do know last year on N-S they offered us $11 off wine by the bottle because we had HIA. But I was told the new discount is 25%. This is actually consistent with a similar discount offered on Carnival for guests with their drinks package. Yes, you still need to pay another 18% in service charge but it’s still a discount you would not ordinarily receive.

I believe that you can always move your booking to another TA or to a HAL PCC but there may be a form you would need to sign before they can do it. The exact details of how to get it done have changed. I would call the agency you plan to move it to and ask them how exactly to accomplish it.

Actually, I was told by the Cellar Master on Zaandam last month that there was going to be a 25% discount off of wines by the bottle for people who have the drink packages. Last year they were giving $11 a bottle off but he said they are changing that to 25% so ask the Cellar Master or Beverage Manager on the ship you’re on about that.

There’s never been any transparency when it comes to the cruise line’s taxes and port fees charges. Another area rife for being overcharged and since we can’t audit the books we just have to accept what we’re told is actually the correct amount. The fee that the Panama Canal charges is based upon the number of berths on the ship but is only around a couple hundred dollars per passenger. This year the canal had a lot of issues with water shortages and may have increased the rates but it still seems very high.

Generally if you see an advertisement for a low price it’s a group rate. My experience has been if you tell any TA or PCC you saw the lower rate they can get it for you. They don’t tell you it exists but if you know it exists you can get it from wherever you usually book your cruise with.

I noticed that it seemed like something was wrong there. I am hoping your list is correct because I really like some of the cellar 1 wines and noticed some had been moved to cellar 2. We are booked onboard the Eurodam for 31 days starting next week so hopefully by then HAL will have straightened out these glitches. I was surprised to see the Eroica Riesling added to cellar 3. I do like that one but couldn’t justify the $60+ per bottle price they charged onboard for it.

As I was trying to say I am thinking that this “test run” was really a misinterpretation of the change in policy that was taking place during 2022 when HAL went back to including HIA coverage in the NL. It wouldn’t be the first time that the crew misunderstood what was being said and mistakenly thought it was “free drinks” instead of just being included in HIA. It would have been odd to have had HAL go from not letting HIA guests get drinks to everyone getting free drinks, though I suppose it is possible.

It’s not enforced at all. In fact, if a bar isn’t particularly busy I have often gotten the server to get us a bottle of wine from our package and have it served to us in the bar. I don’t do it when it’s busy because they usually have to go to the MDR to get it and it takes a few minutes. But they won’t refuse to if they aren’t busy. You can ALWAYS bring your own glass or bottle of wine to any venue and you will never be told that you can’t consume it there. BTW, they do get credit for the 18% gratuity for opening and serving a bottle of wine from the package so are usually happy to do it.

There was probably some confusion over the change in policy at HAL that led to this happening because I have never heard of any complementary happy hour in the Neptune lounge. Pre covid you could use HIA to get your included drinks in the NL but for a short period in 2021-2022 HAL implemented a policy that the honor bar in NL was excluded from HIA. There was a great deal of pushback so sometime in 2022 it was officially changed back to being included in HIA. When we were getting our drinks after that final change the concierge wasn’t requiring us to fill out the honor bar form, they just said take your own drinks. It’s possible that people without HIA were under the impression that it applied to everyone (HIA and non HIA guests) but I think it only applies to those guests with HIA.

There is no check of your belongings going off the ship at HMC so you can bring whatever you want in your beach bag. HAL excludes HMC drinks from HIA and you don’t want to pay (twice) for a drink you can certainly bring your own.

Don’t forget if you buy the wine package and don’t finish you can take it with you too. Some of the wines actually are less expensive after getting the 50% discount than they are at liquor stores on land so it’s not a bad deal.

As was mentioned previously, depending on how the ship accounts for it you may only receive credit for what you prepay and land up being charged the prevailing day rate onboard anyway.