PescadoAmarillo

The WiFi charges are troubling and you are going to have to go after them to get them reversed. Princess makes these kinds of last minute, erroneous charges too often, and they are usually hard to disprove (like drinks or massages), but with the Plus package, it should make it easier. The “referred to corporate finance” amount is Princess accounting-ese for “you’ll eventually be getting a check in the mail for that amount”.

This one left me scratching my head, because I know I’ve seen Cholula on board over the years. DH confirms and has seen it recently at the pizza place on the Lido Deck on the Regal.

I have enormously enjoyed all of your posts and photos (and those of the others who contributed as well). I was originally scheduled to be on a few of the Sapphire cruises this winter, but had to cancel. Following along with your travels was almost the same as being there myself. Many thanks. I have a question, though about volcanos. I was in that area over 20 years ago, and had taken these two photos. I know the first is Osorno but I never knew the name of the second. Do you think it’s Tronador? Of course these peaks look different depending on viewing angle, but perhaps, having just been there, you would recognize it. Thank you.

Yep. Several of us had reached that point before the Royal Class ships came out. IMO, they offer nothing to compensate for the loss of the features you mentioned, and I don’t see that changing with the Sun Class.

Walk me through the accounting of this, since you seem to know how taxes and payroll carrying costs are affected by the auto tips. Because I truly don’t understand. Are these off- P&L and balance sheet transactions? Or is there a separate pool of cash somewhere ON the balance sheet offset by crew wages payable on the balance sheet? If the tips are pooled (and Princess flat out states that they are) where do they exist from the time they are collected until they are paid out? I’m not sure how Princess tax payments are affected since they aren’t paying US taxes on foreign employees working outside the US anyway. Or are they? But I do understand one thing you said, and that is that a loophole exists. Do we trust that Princess will take care of its crewmembers if everyone exercises that loophole? Because that’s really what people are counting on if they opt to take advantage of the loophole.

We were on the Sapphire in Alaska last summer and spent most of our time on those back decks. We noticed no smoke and no soot at all.

I agree that you have to be on top of the ticketing aspect of EZ Air. With our flights to Vancouver last summer, I expected to wake up 44 days before the flight and see that our tickets had been purchased (in the past, Princess had emailed us ticket numbers on that day). I immediately called Princess and at first got the run around. Finally they said our outbound flight would be ticketed by the end of that day (44 days pre-flight) but the inbound would not be ticketed until 45 days before that flight (14 days away). I said I would hold on the call until the outbound flight was ticketed, and I did. And then I saw they had ticketed the inbound flight at the same time. Squeaky wheel and all that.

He posted very early on that he had put a hold on the cruise. Perhaps his plans have changed…but then his post above doesn’t make sense. 🤷‍♂️

I know! I saw you on the roll call. Plenty of time to catch up on board!

So not necessarily a condemnation of EZ Air today. Good to know.

😆😆😆

I’m not sure. We still haven’t booked it, but I’ve been lurking on the Roll Call. I keep checking airfare thinking that if it suddenly skyrockets, I can finally dismiss the possibility of being on the ship but airfare has been really reasonable. DH would be flying from FLL through Houston and Auckland but I would probably go on the United flight from LAX. ETA I have actually booked the hotel in Sydney but it is refundable.

Here is a flight I’ve been watching for a while. The first pic below is EZ Air pricing; the second is the same flight booked direct through United. EZ Air is about half the price of booking direct.

Are you saying that the routing changed after you (she) booked the flight?

This is a fairly frequent occurrence and a big deal, but you might not realize it until it affects you the first time. I’m a big fan of one way flight reservations for all travel, not just cruises.

Great review. Thank you!

And tipping threads, and COVID threads. Thankfully, the years of “jeans in the dining room” threads are long behind us. One step forward, two steps back, I think.

You should be fine. The form (attached above) states that flights after 11am qualify. It is a wonderful program (can’t emphasize that enough).

These are the only docs I photographed. Hope they help.

Princess announced an itinerary change for the WC. https://www.cnn.com/travel/red-sea-tensions-disrupting-cruises/index.html

The crew doesn’t care which currency tips are in. In recent years, we’ve given all of our leftover local currency away in tips, especially in Asia where we had 4 or 5 different currencies.

This must have very recently changed. I’ve always used a one device plan between my iPad and iPhone. If I try to login on one device, it will state that I’m already logged on with a different device and ask if I want to switch devices.

No, you’re right. They won’t. I wonder if anyone has been able to get non-refundable OBC earmarked for extra crew tips, though I don’t know how you could verify that it is actually going to get to the intended recipients. I won’t buy overpriced jewelry on board but have found that certain cosmetic and perfume items really are competitively priced, especially considering the elite discount I receive, and take up minimal space in luggage. I usually manage to use mine at the Clinique counter. We’ve even purchased after cruise transfers we were really not keen about just to use ours up. Or more nights of specialty dining. We don’t do the casino thing though I know others do

When is your cruise? Is it possible to remove the Premier Package and instead purchase it onboard using your OBC or will that end up costing you more money and/or OBC?

I did not take the Princess excursion, but Thrak did, and perhaps he can comment on it. Both times I did it, we were at the old freight port. I don’t recall that Ubers, if they existed there, were able to come into the port area. We took a taxi both times, the first time with people we met up with who were going to the same place, and the second time with friends we were traveling with, and found another couple to share the taxi van with us. http://pescadoamarillo.blogspot.com/2019/10/day-37-brisbane.html The one with my “hold a koala” pic. http://pescadoamarillo.blogspot.com/2017/10/day-4-brisbane-australia_17.html