Traveller94

They gave me a wife. I'd get mail to me and Laura. When I'd go to book a cruise, they'd have her name prepopulated. I've only booked DH with me on cruises, but his name never appeared and still doesn't when I get to the info for Guest 2.

That’s even more impressive! You’ve got to wonder if there’s some prankster employee messing with people. ;p

I’m glad it seems like this is a single account kind of issue, but not thrilled that it’s been happening for years and apparently hasn’t been fixed. Oh well, now I know to watch for that kind of thing.

So I was on the Princess website today trying to put a cruise on hold and kept getting an error. Apparently they thought something was wrong with my address. Well, there was. My zip code didn’t match my Puerto Rico address. That would be because I live in California. I went out of the reservation and in to my address info and sure enough, my state and country had been changed to Puerto Rico. I could change it, but every time I saved it it reverted back to PR. Finally had to call Princess. The rep hadn’t heard to this problem, but just in case this was a wider spread computer glitch, I wanted to give people a heads up.:o

Thanks for reporting. This is great to hear! I sent mine in on Friday from CA also by snail mail and I haven’t received it yet, but I’ll keep an eye out now that I know they are fast.

I sent mine by snail mail because I couldn’t get the fax number to answer. Verified the number, and it was correct, but it only ever rang with no answer, so I gave up and put it in the postal mail. If anyone has an email, I’ll try that next time, but I couldn’t find one.

I personally think the Marriott Marquis is a lot better than the Union Square Marriott. The JW is better too. All three are close to Union Square. If you want to stay in a Marriott property, you may want to have a look at all three.

Thank you so much to everyone! I’m really excited about the trip. All your wonderful tips will make it even better. This is a really friendly and helpful board!

Wow! This is great info. I’m going to print it out to take with me. Thanks to everyone!

Thanks, everyone! This is great information!

Thanks for the great tips, Yuvraj! I hadn’t even thought about parades.

For the specialty restaurants, do you need to reserve before we are on the ship, or could we wait and check out the options once we board?

Thank you for the clarification, Bob! It looks like it is going to be an awesome cruise!

I’m sailing on the Allure for the first time later this month. :D As a long time Princess cruiser, I’m excited by all the new things I will experience. As I have been researching, it sounds like there are a few small differences in the way things are handled that might trip me up if I am not careful. I’ve put a list below of the differences I have found and how they are done on RC, I think. Would you experienced RC cruisers mind verifying these for me? Also, if you see something missing from my list, please let me know. Thanks!

Embarkation: On Princess you can go to your room to drop off your carry on as soon as you get on the ship. It sounds like on RC you carry your bag with you until an announcement is made, somewhere around 1:00, that cabins are ready?

Time: Princess changes time overnight to be on the time zone of the port stop. It sounds like RC stays on Eastern time the whole trip so sometimes the time on the ship and the time on the island are different? I read a suggestion to turn off the auto time set on your phone when you get on the ship to make sure you always know the time on the ship while in port.

Beach: Princess provides beach bags the night before your first beach stop. Bring your own beach bag on RC?

Shows: Not a problem to get in to most Princess show (although I don’t usually attend because they are not really my style.) On RC make reservations or get to the standby line early. Shows sound like they are worth seeing.

Disembarkation: On Princess you need to be out of your room by 8:00. It sounds like you can stay in your room longer on RC?

In Monterey you will tender in. I don't know exactly where the tenders dock, but any place I can think of would be walkable. If you dock at Fisherman's wharf, the mostly likely place, I would think, it's about a 15 minute walk along the bay on a nice smooth walking/biking path.

If you are using the tube I would allow a bit more time, 25 - 30 minutes.

 

However if you have luggage i wouldn't bother with the tube but would use an Uber.

Thanks! We'll allow a half hour then. We're going to try to just bring carry ons, so the luggage should be manageable. However, if we end up over packing, I'll keep Uber in mind!

Thanks for all the information and the video. We are staying two nights before across from Kings Cross, so I will try and pick up the tickets there to make sure there is plenty of time in case of any issues.

It looks like it's about a 10-15 minute tube trip from Kings Cross to Waterloo, so we'll plan to be at the Kings Cross underground station about 9:20. I think this should work out with the timelines suggested.

Thanks again for all the help!

I just went directly to the Virgin Trains site and was able to book a return! Thank you so much for the help!

I do realize I may have spent a couple extra pounds on the outbound trip, but £13 was a good price, I thought, and it was worth it to have the piece of mind knowing my trains are booked.

It looks like I will just need to type the confirmation number into a ticket machine to pick up the tickets? Maybe also insert the card I used? Anything else I need to know about this? I'm assuming it's ok to pick up the tickets right before getting on the train? There is no cut off time?

Again, I really apperiate all the help I have been given! I probably would have been paying a fortune for walk up fares without it!

Thank you everyone for your help. I knew about Mega trains, but thought £13 was pretty good, and it would be nice to have the train ticket checked off the list, so to speak. It's also my understanding that on the way back to London we won't be able to get a mega train ticket for Saturday morning. I did try choosing Virgin trains as the seller from National Rail, and it said there were no options available, but I'll try another one or go directly to the virgin site. I really apperiate all the help.

Well, I just had my sister try on a Kindle Fire, and it didn't work there either. Not sure what else could be the problem.

Well, I downloaded Firefox and enabled pop ups, and it still didn't work. The only thing I can think of is that the website won't work on Macs regardless of the browsers.

Thanks so much for the help. I'll try Firefox a try and report back!

Hi,

I'm trying to book our train tickets from Waterloo to Southampton in order to take advantage of the advanced fares. National Rail redirects me to South West trains. Every time I click the button to proceed to payment I get an error message. I haven't put any personal information in yet, so I don't think it's because I'm in the US. I have tried Safari and Chrome on an iPad and a desktop computer. I would apperiate any help anyone can offer.

In case it matters, I'm trying to buy the 10:05 on July 1 for 2 people.

Thank you!

Stacy

We have used EZAir on three trips to Europe in the last four years with no issues. Used EZAir because of the ability to modify or cancel up to 45 days before the cruise. Twice we got in on fare sales that made the cost even more reasonable. It was actually a sale because the price United showed as being paid was the the price before the sale, and much more than the price we paid.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

Thanks for letting me know if can work out well!

One of the worst pre-travel experiences I had was booking EZAir with Princess and American... I will probably never do that again.

 

BTW- This is the Princess board- and you said you had booked with HAL. Just wanted to let you know...

 

Good luck and happy travels-

Tracie-Lynn

Hi Tracie-Lynn,

I'm trying EZAir for the first time for an international flight with American. Would you mind sharing what went wrong for you? Maybe I should reconsider. (I decided to try it because I am going with my sister, who is a first time cruiser, and a bit nervous about it, so I figured using EZAir I wouldn't be stuck with international air if she changes her mind about going.)

Thanks,

Stacy

Hi Sue,

Thanks for reporting back. I hope you had a wonderful time, despite what sounds like a few hiccups.

We're doing it the other way around. Train from Zurich to Lucerne, two days in Lucrene, the train to Basil for the cruise. Any tips you wish you would have known about the Zurich airport or train station, the train trips, or Lucerne? We're doing that portion on our own as well, so I hope to be as prepared as possible.

Thanks!

Stacy

Update:

I called Celebrity this afternoon. They fixed my account while I was on the phone. Thanks, Ryan at Celebrity! I have a new invoice that lists everything out separately and all three are now showing up online.

Thanks for all the help everyone!

we also booked a cruise for june 2016 with 123 promo. The OBC shows and the gratuities are posted and then backed out. The classic beverage drink package does not show anywhere and when I called, I was told that that has to be posted manually and they do the cruises leaving now and will get to our cruise after the first of the year. The reservation does show 123, so I am not worried. I did tell the lady I talked to that I would not make final payment until reservation was correct and the total was correct, which is in april 2016

It sounds like our gratuities should be listed, but it might be too early for the drinks package. Thanks!

A box said 123 go and the obc was listed....I did all the hints here and finally just called....she said something about the date now being correct to release the details....I just wanted what I was expecting printed out in case there was any question....all for naught because I got an even better deal this week and cancelled...my new perks are already printed out on the original receipt....whatever...so much for the correct date!....lol

Yep, I just want a written record as a back up too. Sounds like we had the same problem. It must be pretty common. Glad to hear you got a better deal!

Thanks everyone for all your help! I appreciate it!