BroncoBobblehead

This was fun to read - thanks for sharing it. We finished our cruise just the week before yours (same ship/route) and also our first cruise. It's fascinating to me to see how others perceive things compared to our experience! For us, we had access to club orange because of being in a Neptune Suite. Our experience was opposite of yours. We had one night in signature dining (Pinnacle) and we kinda wished we'd just stuck with club orange. We found the service in CO quite superior, and the food was great for us but we are not high-scale eaters. While the food in Pinnacle was great too, I'd not say it would have been worth paying extra for at all. Nonetheless, I'm fairly certain our Pinnacle experience would have been better with a different server (ours was middle of the road at best), but the CO staff were above and beyond exceptional and personable. We especially liked being able to eat whenever we wanted to (only had dinners there - did breakfast in room or at Lido) and still could get a table for two and it was never more than half-full, and usually just 2-3 other tables occupied (but we always ate fairly early - around 5-5:30pm on average). Agree with excursions - SO expensive overall and cost vs benefit was quite low, though we enjoyed the two excursions that we did just fine! Thanks again for sharing!

Which ship are you on and which floor? Just curious as we had some issues on our debarkation morning (Koningsdam #7189) this past Saturday….

Just got off the Koningsdam last week. Our in-room binoculars were out of alignment and didn't work at all. Our kind steward brought two other pairs - the first pair also were broken but the second were a solid pair of compact Bushnell's and were quite nice, actually. That being said, I agree with everyone here thus far, if you have your own bring them instead!

We got these - twice as many for the same money as listed above - heavy plastic and metal screw-in connectors. Really happy with them - and 8 in package. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017BVFA00?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

Something that perhaps complicates a straight answer other than what's noted above is that if you have a "have it all" package that includes the "surf internet" then the upgrade pricing is much different. For our cruise we are currently on (Koningsdam Alaska 7 days RT from Vancouver), the price in my app to upgrade to the "premium" internet is $40 for the week (not daily but for the whole trip). Only for ONE user though (so each person in your party would have to pay up to upgrade). I thought there was a "multiple user" tier as well (thought I read that somewhere) but I've seen no mention of it in my info (but also didn't ask since the surf plan has worked just fine for us so glad I didn't pay more). If I needed more bandwidth I just wait until we're in a port and can use cellular.

as I said in my UPDATE above - this is exactly what I did....... thank you, kindly, though for your help! Glad to know I did it correctly.

Actually, I'm not a tech idiot. I believe if you were to dig in and try to answer my specific question perhaps you'd understand that the situation does not have a clear answer. Being insulting wastes your time and mine. The issue with ArriveCAN being presumably not viewed is but a side-quest to the original issue. My only point in bringing that up is that it says you must have a QR code or receipt available to show customs but that is not the case (or at least was not the case in my travels).

UPDATE: so, I spent 20 min nosing around in the app and can't find a scenario that would fit what I'm doing. It wants to know WHERE I am arriving into Canada but since I'm already in Canada I can't select any option that is correct. Can't use my flight from last week because it won't go back further than 72 hours. So finally just selected arriving by marine and picked "vancouver cruise terminal" or something like that (couldn't even pick Canada Place cruise terminal as an option), can't pick "arrive by car" because I didn't arrive at any border patrol site listed either. BUT, I got a submission in and a receipt I can show someone, even if it's not correct. When we arrived last week, NOBODY even asked to see the ArriveCAN - never had to show anything to anyone so there's that too. What a hassle!

But that receipt is now gone on the app because I have already arrived in Canada. I cannot access it in the app any longer because it is "expired" or in the past..... I have a hard copy of it but it's from last Saturday so I don't think it applies.

I feel a little better about being confused at this point.....

okay - gotcha - but if I'm following your thinking, then I need to fill out ArriveCAN within 72 hours of arriving BACK in Canada at the END of the cruise since we leave Vancouver and go to Alaska (USA) and no ports in Canada until July 9th? Are you saying you have to fill out ArriveCAN, being a Canadian citizen, to board a cruise ship embarking in Vancouver?

nope - been in Canada this whole time - arriving tomorrow from Whistler for HAL-arranged hotel the night before embarkation.

I'm talking about the $150 they're gonna charge now. And yeah, it's not free but as @Florida_gal_50 said, compared to what you're spending for the cruise, it's nothing. Sure, I wish it wasn't required at all, but unfortunately the options are wait to cruise, or find the cheapest options available so that's what I was trying to do.

A telehealth proctored home test (using a test provided free by the US government) is just $15. No reason to mess with Walgreens, CVS, or anybody else at this point!

ADDED INFO: I do understand we need to test and also VeriFLY and all that - I'm only asking specifically about having to fill out a new ArriveCAN "trip" to get on the ship if we've been in Canada for a week already.