deelightfull

And even for a 17 year old, you as a guardian have to sign some one time paperwork. You can do it online before you get on the boat or in person on that first day. During first day check in the staff makes sure the paperwork has been signed and adds a small sticker to his sign and sail card that shows he's allowed in the club when it's open. (Basically, the paperwork goes over basic rules and gives them permission to evict a kid who's acting a fool. It's never been an issue for me, and I'm glad staff has some authority in the space.)

We sail Carnival because it's the cheapest we can drive to, on the west coast, and have done a couple NCL cruises that we've flown to and we picked for the ports. For us, the particular Carnival cruises we take are mostly about the ship and the NCL cruises are more about the ports. Carnival has a much more energetic sail away party than either of the NCL cruises I've been on. In my experience the cruise director is higher energy on Carnival, classier on NCL. Carnival does have a exclusive area on its newer ships, similar to the Haven on NCL, but it's only an exclusive pool, no exclusive restaurant. Oh, and a big one for me, almost all the Carnival ships have guest laundry, where you can do your own laundry for like $7/ wash and dry. (But not on the newest ships) On Norwegian I have to do laundry in my sink 😁. Oh, and NCL doesn't have anything that compares to a Carnival chocolate melting cake😆. (But Carnival doesn't have a gelato station. 🤷‍♀️)

JGB's experience was basically mine back in February, except we were notified ahead of time, and the bus driver didn't get lost on the way back to the garage. 🤷‍♀️

"The public bathrooms on the Malecon are 10-20 pesos per person. If there are free ones we never saw them. " I'm weird, but paid public toilets are actually something I really like about Mexico (and other places). Paying an attendant keeps the restrooms cleaner and more likely to be stocked. Don't get me wrong happy to use the restroom at the restaurant I'm patronizing. But I'd much rather use the public restroom on the beach in Mexico and pay a small fee than the free gross one on the beach at home in California.

They don't care what empty containers you bring on board, they just don't want you to smuggle on vodka 😆. Bring on whatever empty container you want!

In February we were sent elsewhere as well. We arrived at noon, so who knows what happened to the first people. Anyway, when we got there, the entrance to the garage was blocked off, and we were sent around to a spot where we could drop off passengers and luggage. At the same time we were given directions to the off site parking. I'm the driver, so I dropped off my hubby and son, and almost all our luggage, then put the address into the phone gps. Took me a little less than 10 minutes to get to the new parking. Once I got there, I learned the first garage was full and they sent me to a second garage around the block. Second garage was sketchy looking, but my car was there when we got back. 🤷‍♀️ I had to pay for parking in full when pulling in to park. (It was $20/night x4=$100) (As it turns out, no one was staffing the garage when we got back, which is why we had to pay on entering.) Anyway, I ended up parking on the top floor, and in this second garage, no elevators, just stairs. (I believe the first garage had an elevator) The directions weren't real great, but a couple of minutes later I found the shuttle (a mini bus) and got myself back to the parking garage, to meet my hubby and son and carry on luggage. At the end of our cruise, no mini busses, but full size busses. We all went together, with our luggage, back to the garage. As I stated above, our garage wasn't staffed when we got back. I left the luggage with hubby on the ground floor. I climbed up the stairs and drove the car down. We loaded up and drove out the open gate. Not the worst, but certainly less convenient than being able to park right there.

Oh well 🤷‍♀️

Our West Coast ships right now (Feb 2024) are the Panorama, Radiance, and Miracle. Of those three, only the Panorama has a Havana area. The Radiance and The Miracle are too old for such fancy areas. In a couple of months we're going to lose the Miracle (😭) and gain the Firenze. (🤞 It will also be awesome.) On the Firenze, the specialty area with the Private pool is called Terrazza instead of Havana. I haven't seen pictures, but hopefully it will be as cool as the Havana on the Panorama. On either the Panorama or the Firenze, once you click on interior or balcony you can see Havana or Terrazza as an option for type of interior or type of balcony room. I just looked for random dates this summer and this fall. For most of them they have both balcony and interior rooms of all classes available. I saw Terrazza/Havana balcony rooms for all the dates I happened to search. One of the days had Terrazza interiors sold out, but for the rest, Havana/Terrazza interiors were available too. Good luck!

Nice!

Sounds like we need to figure out how to get a cruise on the Splendor 😁!

We're on the Miracle right now, and are really enjoying the interior decorations in the public spaces. The individual "grapes" on the ceiling in the dining room, (not to mention the grape chandeliers!), the art glass in the stairwells, the Alice in Wonderland roses theming of Mad Hatter's, and on and on. Anyway, here's my questions. First, which ship has your favorite interior style? Second, we're West Coast cruisers so besides the Miracle, we've only ever been on the Radiance and the Panorama, both of which are much more sedate. So, I want to know, are there other ships in the fleet that are as wild as the Miracle? Do they get wilder? (Please tell me they get wilder!) Thanks!

🤦‍♀️ the aft or the PROW of the boat. Our rooms are in the PROW. Thanks

That, we're used to. But we've never been quite this low before. It'll be interesting to see how much lowder it is on the first floor vs the fourth. When we were on the fourth it woke me once or twice, but then I rolled over and went back to sleep. I much prefer the "thrum" to the time on the Radiance when we were right under the gym. All the early morning pounding! 😆. Even that wasn't the worst. We're apartment dwellers in a medium sized city. Even at home we have plenty of noise outside our bedroom window and from upstairs and downstairs neighbors! At least this way I'm still on a cruise ship! 😁

We board the Miracle tomorrow. I know we're in an ocean view room near the bottom of the guest area, and I honestly couldn't remember if we were in the aft or the stern. 🤔 I just double checked. We're all the way forward, (on the lowest passenger floor). ☺️ Crises averted. 😆

Glad to hear that!

We're on the Miracle next week with a stop in Catalina. So far the weather looks good, but I have my fingers and toes crossed! Thanks for the interesting updates! Time on the island of Catalina would be nice, but I've been there before. It's more important to me that conditions on deck are such that not EVERYBODY is looking for space in the interior of the ship ALL day. 😁 Did it feel very crowded when the weather was bad?

11 nights in January is the cruise least likely to have the issues you describe. Most kids will be in school and few young people can afford to take 11 days off of work. Or, if they aren't working, can't afford the cruise itself. Every cruise has drunk people, and I've never been on a Carnival Cruise with absolutely no children. But if you go back and look at those reports you'll see the extreme events tend to happen on weekend cruises (booze cruises) and during school breaks. Enjoy your cruise.

We're cruising to Alaska on the Bliss, embarking on Saturday. We were supposed to go with my parents but my dad got a major infection in his knee and now they can't go. 😭. They booked most of their cruise through an agent and they're working with their insurance to get reimbursed. We did book one excursion for my mom (though NCL) so we could make sure she was in the same group as us. We paid for it. It would be nice if it was automatically refunded when they cancel, but I doubt it! Is this something we can handle aboard ship? Do they need to do it because it's in her name? This is our first experience with excursions that are going through the cruise line, so thanks for the help!

If this request is specific to Princess, you may have more luck asking on their boards. Good luck!

It is my understanding that cruises that leave from Vancouver tend to cruise the inside passage, and cruises that leave from Seattle don't. But I wouldn't swear to that. There are about a billion trip videos on YouTube. I'd start with one possible trip and see what you can find from other people experiences, see if it's helpful.

As a couple of people have posted, check in time is what you sign up for, which is NOT your board the ship time. (Embarkation). The earlier your check in time, generally, the earlier your board the ship the time. You can skip to the head of the line, of course with loyalty, suites, fttf, etc. And if you don't have any of those things, no matter how early you check in, you'll be behind those people. And if you do check in on one of those early times, you WILL be hanging around the (air conditioned) terminal. Not The worst thing, not the best either. Since we drive to this port, (and it's a short 90 minute drive too) we prefer a later check in time (noon-ish for the Radiance without propulsion issues) so that we can hang out at home and then go straight from check in to boarding the ship. But, you do you! Sometimes hanging at the port is more fun than hanging in a hotel lobby, or an airport or you have a longer drive that you want to leave wiggle room for, or a million other reasons.

The taxis also need permits, the same way the blue bus does. I wonder if they have more permits left, or if they're going to run out quickly too.

The city bus is bound to be VERY crowded for this exact reason. If this is a bucket list item for you, pack your patience. If it's not, you may want to choose something else. "According to Alexandra Pierce, the City and Borough of Juneau tourism manager, there is growing concern that as these bus services turn away tourists, an increased number of visitors will begin using the city’s public transportation system, Capital Transit, to travel to the Glacier instead. She said that could have a negative impact on local riders and put a strain on the system which is already facing a driver shortage. “Because of public transit authority, we don’t have the ability to refuse service to anyone who’s a fair paying transit user so that — and we have a driver shortage — is a problematic issue that we’re really watching,” she said. “I think our local operators are working really well and trying their best to handle and manage that.” From this article on the lack of permits: https://www.juneauempire.com/news/unprecedented-visitors-at-mendenhall-glacier-rapidly-outpacing-allowed-capacity/#:~:text=A service day equates to,do not need a permit.

I think the whole point is to limit how many people go, so no, there's no other way. It's really hard when so many people want to see this beautiful thing, but at the same time seeing the beautiful thing, ruins the beautiful thing. I don't have any good answers.

https://www.juneauempire.com/news/unprecedented-visitors-at-mendenhall-glacier-rapidly-outpacing-allowed-capacity/#:~:text=A service day equates to,do not need a permit. From the article, the tour companies are not booking tours they don't have permits for, so if you have a tour with a tour component you'll be fine. But, if you're visiting in August or September (or October!) It looks like getting a tour of otherwise visiting is going to be an impossibility. If visiting the glacier is vital, you need to go earlier in the season, which is not helpful now, but could be for those planning for 2024.