LongIsland-Cruiser

I assume you sailed out of NYC? It's the wild west at that terminal. They do whatever they want. I have never gotten priority there. Even Haven has problems there, shunted to a little room.

For me, the Jewel's thermal spa is a bit on the small side. I always get the thermal spa pass when available, but for Alaska cruises you usually are at Port each day, and I don't spend much time in the spa. If you think you will be spending time on the ship a lot, and it's too cold when you are going to be outside, you might consider it. My Alaska cruise was the only of my 9 cruises that I didn't use the thermal spa on (if one was available).

It sounds to me then that you have found the cruise line that matches your interests and wallet. I am happy for you. That's what we're all trying to do. So...why are you on the NCL forum? Honest curiosity. If NCL is not for you anymore (which is totally valid), why are you here?

I really get confused by the phrase "Nickel and Dime". Nickel and Dime is when you are FORCED to pay for something that you didn't realize or was hidden from you. If it's an OPTIONAL service, you aren't being nickle'd an dime'd. Is booking a massage NCL Nickle and diming you? I find people just use this phrase to dramatically complain that they are not being treated like the special little people they think they are. I find similar phrases like "a slap in the face!" to often be used as well. NCL is not Nickle and Diming on specialty restaurants. You can eat for free. If you want the xtra service you pay for it? But it's still optional. I just don't get some people on this forum.

Perhaps....but the forum doesn't dictate how many people are still buying cruises. Vote with your wallet. If NCL has no problem getting people to cruise with them, all the online complaints don't mean much.

Perhaps, perhaps. Just goes to show that it is important to REALLY do your research when booking cruises. Some of the upgrade offers I have gotten are the infamous In Room Balcony Jacuzzi ones. Would love to have my own private Hot Tub, but scuttlebutt on this forum was that they don't work and are shut down. I think it was eventually discovered it was because of fear of legionnaire's, but I wonder if they are up and working now.

So I have sailed NCL a few time and I am familiar with their upgrade offers. I am 55 or so days out from my sailing, and perfectly happy with my room, so I am not looking to upgrade. But I was surprised by the Upgrade process this time, and wanted to share with you all and get your opinions. I am not rich enough for the Haven, but it was my 25th anniversary, so I decided to spring for a forward facing suite (Category SK). Front of the ship, big balcony, separate bedroom to escape snoring. Good times. My cruise has all suites sold out, so I was surprised when I get the "Bid for an Upgrade you special person whom we loooove!" email. I clicked on it just to see, and I was surprised that it was offering me to bid on rooms that are WORSE than the room I have. I know that worse/better for rooms is subjective, but one of my upgrade options was a Family Suite (Category SJ) that had both a smaller balcony and was smaller in square footage? How is that an upgrade? Is NCL hoping people will just upgrade willy nilly without checking? Did I get a really good deal on my SK room and they are hoping I will move so they can sell it at a higher price? They also offered me to spend MORE for a SH/SI cabin? That doesn't even have a master bedroom and a MUCH tinier bathroom. Why would anyone pay more for a worse room? Is being aft that amazing? I am not one to focus on "the big bad NCL is out to get me!!!" but it just seemed so odd? What do you all think?

I hope we can be happy that 12 people did not die of exposure or drowning without making it political. Let’s see.

If you don’t want to wait for crowd sourced answers you could search the forum and find all these answers and more. It’s been discussed exhaustively

Thanks everyone for the advice!

I wasn't talking about the early bird special. I'm talking about people who book thinking they might get back to ship early on port day, or they may not, better book just in case. Or those that think drinks with their friends might end early, but they don't, but we book just in case.

I think this is fleet wide going forward, and it makes sense. A lot of people book MDR as back ups and it creates a mess. My sailing in Prima in April is telling me the same thing, and an agent confirmed it for me last night.

I am actually having a similar problem. 15 day TA cruise in April. I ordered several meals packages since we will have so many sea days. My Vacation Summary shows : Specialty Dining Package Dining Package - Promo QTY: 2 Specialty Dining Upgrade Upgrade your Free at Sea Dining package by adding two extra meals for only $69 USD plus gratuity – a 30% discount off the two meal package retail price. QTY: 2 Specialty Dining Upgrade Upgrade your Free at Sea Dining package by adding two extra meals for only $69 USD plus gratuity – a 30% discount off the two meal package retail price. QTY:1 Which I thought meant I had 8 meals lined up. In addition to my Platinum status 2 meals, I thought that covered most of the cruise. I called NCL to make a final payment last night, and was told "No, that's only 5 meals." I tried to confirm with them, but the told me they only saw 5 meals ordered, they were 100% confident. I called today to confirm, and was told "That's 4 meals, guarantee, I can clearly see you have 4 meals". So I don't even know what is going on! I have sailed so many times, this should not be confusing for me, and yet it is. I guess I have a case of the stupids. This is my most recent Booking confirmation codes. PROMO CODES: AIRPROM3 DINMEAL DISC50 EASYFARE FASUDP HSDISXIN LATITUDE LATREW* SHX50 And my add ons in the confirmation email. 1 x Shore Excursion Discount 2 x FAS Dining Package Upgrade – 2 meals 2 x 3 Meal Speciality Dining Package 2 x Internet Package (300 Minutes) Can any old hats on there tell me where the confusion is? I don't trust NCL customer service. Thanks in advance.

Hi all, Any information from previous cruisers is appreciated. I am taking the NCL Prima on a 15 day cruise in April 24, starting in NYC and ending in Southampton UK. I am using NCL option to buy airfare back to NYC. I know that NCL bills Le Havre France as PARIS and Southampton UK as LONDON. I also know that those are only technically true with around 3 to 4 hours of travel. We are terminating in Southampton at 6 am, which gives me plenty of time to travel to London and see the sights. We were thinking about asking NCL to book our airline the next day and just stay in a hotel so we could see as much of London as possible. However, we are disappointed about seeing Paris. We will be in port in Le Havre for about 15 hours...so even with a 2 to 3 hour trip both ways into Paris, we would be able to spend a few hours there and see the city...but it just seems a shame to not have more time for the City of Lights. I might not get to see Paris again in my life, I want to spend as much time as I can. Could someone that has made a similar trip before tell me about the logistics of two options I have been brainstorming about below? OPTION 1 Take the trip from Le Havre into Paris. Enjoy the (hopefully) 9 hours or so I will get there. I will incur no extra costs other than what I spend travelling around the city and the train/excursion to take me back and forth. Continue onto London and get a hotel there, spend all day touring, fly out the next day. OPTION 2 Spend the time in Le Havre. Enjoy the historic town. Don't rush, venture out and really enjoy the French country side. Then, when the ship drops me off in Southhampton at 6 am, take the train to London. Drop my bag off at the hotel and tour London. Then wake up early the next day and take the train into Paris and enjoy a full day exploring the city, and fly back to New York from Paris. I could always spend the day in London, and take a late train to Paris and stay in a hotel there, giving myself an early start on exploring that city, but I don't know what I would do with my bags all day. We travel very light, but would still have at least one rolling bag following us around in London without an English hotel to drop it off at. Has anyone any advice for me? I'll take all suggestions. I am only going off what I have read online. Perhaps the train from London to Paris is a nightmare? Flying out of Paris is much more difficult than flying out of London? I know I won't abandon the cruise in Le Havre and skip the London leg to give myself more freedom, because they severely punish you for that. Curious if anyone has done any of the options above? Thanks in advance.

Hi all, Any information from previous cruisers is appreciated. I am taking the NCL Prima on a 15 day cruise in April 24, starting in NYC and ending in Southampton UK. I am using NCL option to buy airfare back to NYC. I know that NCL bills Le Havre France as PARIS and Southampton UK as LONDON. I also know that those are only technically true with around 3 to 4 hours of travel. We are terminating in Southampton at 6 am, which gives me plenty of time to travel to London and see the sights. We were thinking about asking NCL to book our airline the next day and just stay in a hotel so we could see as much of London as possible. However, we are disappointed about seeing Paris. We will be in port in Le Havre for about 15 hours...so even with a 2 to 3 hour trip both ways into Paris, we would be able to spend a few hours there and see the city...but it just seems a shame to not have more time for the City of Lights. I might not get to see Paris again in my life, I want to spend as much time as I can. Could someone that has made a similar trip before tell me about the logistics of two options I have been brainstorming about below? OPTION 1 Take the trip from Le Havre into Paris. Enjoy the (hopefully) 9 hours or so I will get there. I will incur no extra costs other than what I spend travelling around the city and the train/excursion to take me back and forth. Continue onto London and get a hotel there, spend all day touring, fly out the next day. OPTION 2 Spend the time in Le Havre. Enjoy the historic town. Don't rush, venture out and really enjoy the French country side. Then, when the ship drops me off in Southhampton at 6 am, take the train to London. Drop my bag off at the hotel and tour London. Then wake up early the next day and take the train into Paris and enjoy a full day exploring the city, and fly back to New York from Paris. I could always spend the day in London, and take a late train to Paris and stay in a hotel there, giving myself an early start on exploring that city, but I don't know what I would do with my bags all day. We travel very light, but would still have at least one rolling bag following us around in London without an English hotel to drop it off at. Has anyone any advice for me? I'll take all suggestions. I am only going off what I have read online. Perhaps the train from London to Paris is a nightmare? Flying out of Paris is much more difficult than flying out of London? I know I won't abandon the cruise in Le Havre and skip the London leg to give myself more freedom, because they severely punish you for that. Curious if anyone has done any of the options above? Thanks in advance.

I stayed in one of those on my Joy cruise on March! We enjoyed it, even though we missed our balcony. It was so spacious, we really enjoyed the size and the separate living room.. I will say though that butler service was also promised, but was never provided. So take that with a grain of salt.

This is like the 4th time I have seen you complain about this. Both live threads of the Alaska cruises over the last 3 weeks have stated their rooms were ready by 1:30. Why can't you just accept that you had bad luck and your room took longer than normal?

I am actually very curious about this. Can someone who has done this guide me? I chose the Debarkation Scenic Cruisetrain - Seward to Anchorage Hospitality Center excursion on my Vancouver to Seward Cruise. I knew I had to get form Seward To Anchorage to fly home to the east coast (I am not doing a B2B), and I thought this would get me to the airport. But Now I am nervous. When I check the railroad schedules online for Alaska Railroads, there are no trains leaving from Seward to Anchorage until late at night....apparently the early morning trains go in reverse, from Anchorage to Seward. But the excursion said that I had to disembark by 6AM in order to catch train..and that I couldn't take the excursion unless my flight left after 5PM. So I chose a later flight at 8PM. I called NCL, and they told me that I only needed to schedule a flight by noon (they said rule is 7 hours after ship arrives in port, or 5 AM). I am also seeing that there are different seat classes on the train according to the Alaska Railroad site and other threads here on Cruise Critic, but the NCL website doesn't offer that or mention it at all. Am I looking at the wrong railroad? Are there multiple trains? And then when you mentioned that so many people on your cruise are scrambling to get home, now I am sure I messed something up and didn't plan properly. I got a good deal on flights, but they are non transferable. Does anyone know if I can get off the ship at Seward on Aug 9th and get a train to Anchorage in time for an 8PM flight? I am worried over nothing?

I have taken a battery operated fan with me on every cruise I have been on, including the Getaway at the beginning of March. I have never had a problem, nor have I hid it from the room attendant.

So, my 2 cents... I don't lounge on the deck. It's too crowded and people are loud and obnoxious. I purposely by a spa pass on every cruise, or a vibe pass if I am on a ship without a spa. However, I am confused by some of the conversation in this thread. If I see a chair is unoccupied, then I am moving your stuff. Period. I get some people don't like confrontation but I will not tolerate rudeness. I am not going to throw your stuff in the ocean. But I am going to move it to the next empty chair (which probably has another chair hog's stuff on it) and then if you come back then you and the other chair hog can fight it out. You two deserve each other. If someone screams at me for taking their chair I would simply say "You can't reserve chairs" and promptly ignore them. I have never understood why we stand back and tolerate bad behavior. If everyone would move a chair hogs belongings to some designated chair and make all the chair hogs fight each other for said chair, then we wouldn't even need a Mr Sexy Legs contest to entertain us. Someone should make a "Chair Hog" flag and place it on one lounger, and then everyone can put unattended items there. The chair hogs can go fight each other for their possessions back. Last chair hog standing wins the lounger....which they will promptly leave empty to go take a nap in their room. I don't want to ruin someone's vacation by being overbearing. But I am not forcing my rules or morals onto the chair hog. These are the rules of the boat that they agreed to. If Everyone would take a stand against Chair hogs, then chair hogs would stop. If someone cut you in line at Starbucks would you speak up and say "Hey buddy, the line starts back there!". Or do you let them cut? I am confused by people in this thread. But I understand how a lot of us are gobsmacked by rude behavior. Oh the stories we all have to share. My husband and I were on the Getaway last month and there were some nice Wicker/ratan chairs by All American Diner. They were in the shade, and a nice place to relax. Some couple was sitting in 2 of the chairs, and had dragged another 2 over and had their FEET in them. Had their feet all over the cushions. It was standing room only on the ship, we were at full capacity, and this couple was taking up 4 chairs. I simply walked over and said "Hi, Can I please take these chairs, there are none other available". The immediately removed their feet. I don't understand why someone would just stand in the shadows grumbling to themselves about "rude people". Just confront them. You don't have to yell and throw fists. They know they are in the wrong. Confront them. I was in a buffet the December (during COVID) before last on the Joy, and a woman pulled a panini from the station, physically opened it and touched every ingredient in it, realized it was vegetarian (it was clearly marked as such) and decided she didn't want vegetarian...SO SHE PUT THE PANINI back on the station. The absolute brain dead actions of people who think they are the main character of our stories. I said very loudly "We are in the MIDDLE of a pandemic and you just put your nasty hands all over that sandwich!" She picked the Panini back up and went to another station. You have to confront obnoxious people. On the Getaway in the Spa there are those tiled heated chairs, about a dozen of them. There are not enough that one is always available, and the sign clearly says to please limit your time to 30 minutes. People would walk in, drop all their stuff on the heated chair (like it's a lounger) and then go into the sauna or the therapy pool...leaving a feature of the spa (a heated chair) empty but unusable to everyone else. To me, this is just like blocking off the Sauna door so no one else can get in, because you might decide to use it later. It's just rude. So I moved their stuff to the window ledge. A woman got out of the hot tub (where she was talking on her phone using speaker so we all had to hear the conversation) and said "Hey, excuse me, that's my chair, I was using that". I said "If you were using it, I wouldn't have been able to sit down on it, now would I?" And that was that. Confront people. Don't let them ruin your vacation. They aren't going to hit you. She got back into the hot tub and started loudly yelling on her phone. I called over an attendant and asked him to do something because the Spa is supposed to be a quite zone. He went and asked her to stop. She decided she would rather leave the spa than face such an indignity. Everyone was happy to see her go. Also on that same cruise, in the spa, there was a woman who went into the therapy pool and stood over the powerful massage jet they have cordoned off. She would proceed to push herself as hard as she could against the back wall and let the jet hit her at full force. You could see her head rocking as the water battered her. She stood there like that for HOURS. I kid you not, she just kept hitting the jet button over and over completely hogging that portion of the pool. But you know what happened if you got in the pool and moved in her direction? She would immediately look at you and say "Hey, do you want to use this? I have been here a while and I'll move." She was a perfectly nice weirdo. If you were one of those people that are afraid to assert yourself you probably wouldn't have realized that she was willing to step aside and share. She was just trying to enjoy her vacation by undergoing water torture, but she was cognizant that she needed to share the water feature and was willing to do so. Not a bad lady, but you have to work up the courage to ask her. I guess my point is that a lot of people in the thread like to complain about chair hogs, but I wonder if you had asked them politely if they would have moved or made way, like the feet couple or pool torture lady? Just my 2 cents...You shouldn't be afraid to ask people to move. The worst they can say is no. And if they say no and are a chair hog they know you are gunning for their lounger so maybe they will actually sit in it. And if someone is being gross, shame them. Loudly warn the rest of the people in the buffet line that Nasty Nancy is touching all the food and putting it back. Or complain to the staff if kids are where they are not supposed to be. I don't go to Splash Academy and start playing their XBox. If I did, you can bet a parent would complain about me being around her kids. So I return the favor to those parents. Don't let your kids into Spice H2O, and get them out of the hot tub. Nothing gets parents to clear their brats out of the hot tub faster then when 2 gay men start walking to it and saying "Oh yes, oh yes...excellent. this will do nicely". But that's just me. I go on a cruise to vacation. Not complain about everyone around me. If I wanted to do that, I could just stay on Long Island. Where complaining about everyone else is an Olympic Level sport.

Hi all. I am not a first time cruiser, this will be my 6 or 7th. But I wanted to get some opinions from the people that seem to take 3 or 4 a year. My husband and I wanted to take a cruise that would be a little more on the empty side (like the ones we took during Covid) and with as few kids as possible. Our bright idea was to take a longer 13 day cruise in the off season (not during a school break). However, it seems like we are going to have a full sailing. Are there any timeframes that are "off season" or now that Covid is over it should just be expected that most ships will be full? I sailed a few times during Covid and I think it warped my understanding of how cruises work. Any advice or insight appreciated. Thanks.

Some family insides, like the Joy, are actually 2 bedrooms with a wall that mimics a view. There are several threads on here about that. You would need to specify what ship you are talking about.

I found a duck on my last Cruise in May. It was made of soap and was tagged by the Facebook duck group encouraging me to hide it again or take it home. I repeat...IT WAS A SOAP DUCK, NOT PLASTIC. So all you grouches can calm down. I can't get over how nasty and negative so many cruisers are. Kids organize a fun scavenger hunt for themselves and use their imagination and Boomers on this board sneer "Where are my plastic straws!". God, I hope none of you get invited to any birthday parties. What nastiness.

Google and YouTube are best sources for this. I don't see a room number like you have posted, however, this is the class you are looking for.

Most hotels you can select an early check in. It seems like it might be a better idea to find a hotel and then just ask them...rather than ask on this messageboard.