tj_shopper

How far is the Sky Train from the cruise port? We will have luggage to be lugging around with us to get to the car rental at the airport. Thanks.

I'm actually going to be doing the opposite. We fly into Los Angeles (LAX) on December 9th. I'm going to pick up our rental car at Enterprise at the Airport and have it for two days. My cruise is on Monday, December 11th and we'll drop it off at Enterprise by the cruise port in San Pedro. I reserved a mini van for four of us through Costco travel. It's going to cost us $362.

Thank you!

Can you tell me which you do your mock booking? I'm trying to get some pricing on refundable fares and I don't know which website/cruisesite to use. Thank you.

I am late in replying to this thread but wanted to say that this exact same thing happened to me with IMG SE policy for a January 2023 cruise. Our flight was canceled due to weather and we had to spend an extra night in Texas. I submitted my expenses and two weeks later, I received my check with only half of the payment. They divided my bill in half but only paid me and not my husband. I had to contest it and about a month later, I received the other half. I think it was the analyst that worked on my claim. My girlfriend also had the same thing occur to her and she submitted her claim. It came back perfect for her. She must have had a different claims analyst complete hers!

We had to use our travel insurance for the first time ever in January 2023. Our trip was delayed due to weather and our travel insurance covered our extra day we had to pay the dog sitter. However, I never looked to see what the limit was on that. It was only $100 per day. We had three dogs (2 are mine and one is my daughter's). The extra day of dog sitting was $150. They only covered $100. In hindsight, we should have bought a separate travel insurance policy for my daughter since she lives separate from us. So, when purchasing, make sure you look at the limits. From now on when I purchase travel insurance, I will purchase one for my husband and I and then separate policies for each of my daughters as they live separate from us. I just thought it was easier to buy a policy that included all of us. Big mistake. It would have been a costlier mistake if we had other things that we needed reimbursed as there is a limit for each item on the one policy versus limits on each policy for each daughter. Lesson learned.

I have used Steve at TripInsuranceStore for many years and have referred all my friends. You don't think you need insurance, until you do lol. We've had great experience with Steve and his team. Most recently, we had to file a claim with IMG - iTravelInsured for a delayed trip. It took about two weeks to receive my reimbursement; however, the analyst who completed my claim did a very poor job. I had to resubmit my claim and contest the amount I was reimbursed. Luckily, they reviewed my case and a few weeks later, I received the rest of my reimbursement. So long story short, I received my reimbursement but it certainly wasn't a one and done. IMG's website and claim process was very confusing too. I will purchase from Steve again for sure but will probably try another insurance company and shy away from IMG. I was just not impressed. We are traveling more these days and am considering the annual insurance but after reading here, I don't think it would work for us.

Thank you! I bookmarked it and will go back and read when I have some time.

Thank you for the added color and description. I just want people in our group to be aware and not be disappointed if they were to go in May. We want to do May as it won't be as crowded and of course, it would be more cost effective.

I heard this somewhere too; don't recall where. We have a couple of people who wants to go salmon fishing but we're looking at May cruises. What about other tours in early May? Are things opened up this early? Thanks.

We are deciding on two cruises - one in early May (5/9/2024) or later in May (5/24/2024). Will we be able to do a fishing tour in early May? I know that May is early season - I'm hoping early May most stores/shops/tours will be opened. Thoughts? Thanks in advance.

Thank you for your help. It was a good thing we got someone in our group who had free international calling to make the call. She said she was on hold for a while until they found someone who spoke English. She had to call back twice - once to get all the information and then the second time after we all collaborated on what we wanted to do lol! We are all so excited and can't wait. Four more days and counting!

Update: We called Pronto Italo 060708 at the number for overseas (since we are in the US). The number to call is +39 06 89371892 every day from 7 am to 10 pm CET (your operator fixed-line call cost applies). It took a bit of a wait once they answered to find someone who spoke English. We gave them our Ticket Code which they looked up. The strike time on 5/14/2023 is 9:01 a.m. to 4:59 p.m. Our original train to Florence from Rome was at 8:25 a.m. and it was not guaranteed to arrive Florence. We had to change our ticket to the 7:55 a.m. train which is guaranteed to arrive Florence. Our train ride back from Florence to Rome is scheduled at 5:42 p.m. and it was guaranteed so we did not need to change that ticket. We are a group of 27 with four different Ticket Codes. They were able to make all the changes and we received confirmation emails. We could have asked for a refund but would have likely had to do it in person at the station as we couldn’t do it on the App. Also, it wouldn’t have been a quick refund. It would have taken some time and they mentioned that it would have to be deposited to our Bank account, although we charged it on our credit card, so not sure what that was all about. In the end, we just decided to change our outbound ticket as it was only a half hour difference. Glad we are still able to go to Florence.

We purchased Italo train tickets from Rome to Florence for Sunday, May 14, 2023. Yesterday, I received an email from Italo Treno stating the following: Dear Customer, we are sorry to inform you that your Italo 8956 of 14/05/2023, PNR RECNXT, is not guarantee due to a strike of the Italo staff. To get the refund or to arrange a new travel solution for the 14th of May, please contact Pronto Italo 060708. We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for understanding. Have this ever happened to anyone before? When researched, it shows that the strike will occur between the hours of 9:01 a.m. to 4:59 p.m. Our train ticket is for 8:25 a.m. which is before the strike and our train back from Florence to Rome is at 5:42 p.m. which is after the strike. So, does that mean we're okay? It's outside the strike time. Will the trains run or can it possibly get cancelled? Not sure how they do things out in Europe. Also, it's almost impossible to find out if I can get a refund through the app. Does anyone know or have any experience with this? Italo is the only one striking on this day that we can see. I'm thinking of cancelling and purchasing from another train line. However, there are 27 of us going for this day trip to Florence before we get on a cruise on Monday, May 15th. We have to make it back to Rome on Sunday, May 14th so that we can catch our cruise the next day. We also bought tickets to see the David statue in Florence and I can't find how to get refunds for that either. Ugh - was trying to be so organized and then this happened. Any thoughts or suggestions would be welcomed. Thank you.

We haven't done the tour yet, but we did book with PK Travel for 5/22/2023. There are 27 of us and they were very accommodating. We debark our cruise on 5/22/2023 and staying in Athens for two days. They will pick us up when we get off the ship - take all of us with all our luggage on our full day tour. When we are done, they will drop us off at our hotel/airbnb in the city center. That saves us money from taking a car service from the cruise port to our hotel/airbnb.

That's definitely food for thought. I didn't even think about the 2 hour time change from Athens to London. I'll price out the other more convenient hotels and net out the cost of the Ubers and see where that takes us. Thanks!

That's what I thought when I googled mapped our hotel. Unfortunately, our rooms are non-refundable and booked by Royal Caribbean's Air2Sea - it's a comped room for all of us -- 11 rooms in total. I know they won't move us. That's really awful that they have banned airport shuttles. I wonder why. We were delayed on a flight home from Houston, Texas and the airline put us up in a hotel with shuttle. It was great. The shuttle even took us within a one mile radius for dinner. As it looks right now, if we did Uber, my family of 5 will probably spend about $100 to go from and to the airport. We could take the bus back to the airport but with all our luggage, I'd rather not.

@Globaliser - haha yea I don't know how we will all get on the bus with all our luggage - 23 of us - all adults! I haven't even begun to think about the ride back to the airport. We are on American Airlines back to Chicago. Our flight is at 9:15 a.m. (flight #99). I had to make sure the hotel knows that we're a late arrival and that wouldn't be a problem. They say it isn't and they put a note in each of our reservations. Once I figure out the ride to the hotel, I will start thinking about the ride back to the airport and timing. We'll probably have to leave around 6:30 a.m. to get us to the airport two hours before our flight.

@gumshoe958 That's actually not a bad price if we could fit 5-6 people with their luggage in each XL car. We will each have one full size luggage and a carry on bag - 23 of us lol. I can't image how we're all going to fit on the bus with all our luggage. I think this is a regular type bus right - no luggage rack like shuttles to hold our luggage. Maybe we can split up - some on the bus and some with Ubers as there are so many of us.

@Globaliser Thank you for the detailed information and also for telling me about the other Holiday Inn Express. I would not have known there was another one. I pulled up my reservations and the one we are staying at is Holiday Inn Express London Heathrow T5, an IHG Hotel London Road, Slough, England, SL3 8QB. I'm going to make sure I put that down in my notes so as not to be confused with the other one. I will take a look at google map to familiarize myself and look at First Berkshire's number 7 bus. The hotel told us that this bus only runs to 2200, thus they suggested we go through preferred taxi company “Five Star". When I looked them up, they had horrible reviews.

Thank you @gumshoe958 Holiday Inn Express told us to take Bus Number 7 but it stops running at 10:00 p.m. We are flying American Airlines but I think we're on a British Airways flight even though the flight number is AA. We all will have a lot of luggage as we're coming home from a few days in Rome and a 7 day cruise. I was hoping we could catch the Hoppa but it doesn't go to our hotel. So, will the Uber XL cost £150-200 for every 4 to 5 passenger?

We are a group of 23 (family and friends) connecting through London from Athens on our way home to Chicago on May 23th. Our flight gets into London at 10:00 p.m. and Air2Sea has booked all of us at Holiday Inn Express in Sloth. The hotel does not have a shuttle service and the local buses stop operating at 10:00 p.m. By the time we go through Customs and get our luggage, it will probably be close to Midnight. Will there be taxis, Uber or car service we can use at this late time of night - preferably something economical? Thank you.

Thank you! My daughter studied abroad in Milan in 2019 and she used Omio. When I went to check, there were so many on line sites and I got all confused.

Hi there. This might be a really dumb question but I'm trying to purchase train tickets from Rome to Florence for a day trip. When I go into the search engine to purchase tickets, there are so many websites to order from. Which website is the legitimate one I should go to buy tickets? Thank you in advance.

Thank you! We hope that we'll have a clear day too seeing Hubbard Glacier if we end up going on that cruise. I am definitely leaning towards Brilliance or Radiance with all the glass and it's a smaller ship which will be better for us getting through the inside passage from what I heard. We also do not want to start and return to Seattle as that would be time taken away from traveling to Alaska. We heard great things about Vancouver and would love to spend a couple of days there before the cruise. Thanks again!