YXU AC*SE

Just off Valiant's TA last week. We had dinner sailing away from Cádiz but were still within Spain's territorial waters (12nm / ~22km from shore). Had Spanish VAT added to our bottle of wine (at 10%). Scott.

Just off Valiant Lady transatlantic. Cannot say inside the cabin b/c other than for the security video, the tv never goes on -- was able to catch NBA (Celtics) / NHL (Leafs) / EPL (Man City) games on the screens at The Social Club on deck 7.

We debarked at 10h15 this past Sunday in Barcelona, and mine showed up in my inbox at 11h24 local time. Scott.

(1) you can ask upon boarding. (2) the easiest self-serve way is scanning in / out of the ship at the security podium. Their screen (easily viewable) shows a live count of on-board / off-board guests -- add the two together and you have your pax load. Scott.

Concur -- the menu changeover as well as opening times of venues is a bit weird / inconsistent. I'm on vacation so I don't give it much thought, but it is a bit weird to have to check an app to see if whatever venue is actually going to be open or not. Scott.

The Galley's printed menu is a bit limiting compared to what you see at the actual stations -- but we have no problem working w/ our server in mixing / matching things though. If I have one universal comment, is nothing anywhere (the Galley or the main restos) is seemingly served hot. Warm would even be nice. Scott.

Actually, it was ham and roast pork (yesterday's special was Cuban sandwiches! 🙂 ) Scott.

LOL. I'm TD (Toronto Dominion) as well, which is the parent bank. So at least I colour matched for you. 🙂 Scott.

Are you holding CCL in an online brokerage / trading account? You should be able to pull off a monthly statement through your trading portal. Each portal is obviously different, but you 'should' be able to easily get to that from a home page -- for my brokerage, it is parked under 'documents / e-services'. Good luck! Scott.

Actually in pro forma HAL IT prowess, Carnival hasn't updated their website -- the benefit has been extended through July 2024 as published in CCL's annual report which one can find at page 3 here: https://www.carnivalcorp.com/static-files/ef80ac8c-e40e-42ad-ba8e-62a02fb13d6d. Scott.

I was in the same situation last month -- for my sailing this Saturday. You'll see first notices being pushed to trade here: https://www.firstmates.com/fmdc/s/offers. Scott.

We did the same. We had previously scheduled HAL Rotterdam fall westbound TA and cancelled both in 2021 (US wasn't admitting Canadians yet) and 2022 on account of airline chaos through YYZ. Hopefully third time is the charm. Ended up with two nicely nested tickets -- YXU FLL return and my above open jaw, at a great price compared to one-way faring. Scott.

Be creative with airfare? Our open-jaw return from BCN at the end of our eastbound TA was ridiculously expensive -- ended up booked on SK via CPH on an open-jaw return (BCN - CPH - YYZ || YYZ ARN - AMS) that was pricing 510USD pp. There are deals out there -- sometimes you need better tools to find them? ITA Matrix is my goto. https://matrix.itasoftware.com/search. The cruise air forum can be particularly helpful. Scott.

Good to know. Thanks. Regardless, I f u l l y aspire to maximize my HIA value in the Ocean Bar, much to the detriment of my CCL share ownership. I'm on vacation after all, and on a Rotterdam westbound TA, so my port stops will be limited !! 😛. Scott.

As much as I like my fellow HAL-igans, some are not very fleet of foot, and I loathe hurry up and wait. Oosterdam is in port for 07h, and it's very likely you could hit an 08h01 train, and be at Roma S.Pietro for 08h54 and get a jump on the day. I'm saving my HIA for airport transfers -- knowing I will leave some money on the table. Enjoy your cruise. Scott.

(A). It is 43 - 60 mins give-or-take to Stazione di Roma S.Pietro depending on your departure time. Depending on how fast the HAL herd is on you tour, you could meet an 08h42, 08h54, or 09h07 departure from Civitavecchia into Rome, which would put your arrival time at Roma San Pietro at 09h25, 09h54, or 10h00 at the latest. The 08h54 departure has a 1h0m transit time. It's about a ten-minute walk or so to St Peter's Square. (B). Returns vary -- assuming you're on Oosterdam with a scheduled 19h00 departure, I expect your all aboard time will be 18h00 - 18h30. Working backwards you would have four likely departures (16h02, 16h32, 16h43, or 17h02) -- there is no boarding formality - you simply walk onto the platform a few minutes before the scheduled arrival of your train. Corresponding arrival times would be 17h05, 17h13, 17h20, and 18h05 -- which might be a bit too tight on time) So I wouldn't pre-book anything before 10h30, nor past say 15h00 (assuming 90 or so minutes at your venue) to allow you time to get to the station. Unasked (C). There is a free shuttle from the ship to Largo della Pace at the port entrance -- from there it is a 12 min walk or so to Stazione Civitavecchia. Return train fare is €9.20 ($10.12USD or $13.60CAD) so compare and contrast what the value of your tour cost is. You can research / book tickets here: https://www.trenitalia.com/en.html. Scott.

Offer details. Scott.

TL;DR version of these threads ... does your subjective measure show any subjective marked improvement over my subjective measure. Perhaps we could have them merged. Scott.

That's not awkwardly worded at all! LOL. Generally, there are three pools of onboard credit (OBC) -- (1) cruise line provided (2) agency provided and (3) everything else (future cruise deposit, recognition OBC (teachers, military, first responders etc.) purchased OBC, CCL shareholder benefit, etc., So HAL is providing 500$ OBC inclusive to your booking, and your TA is sweetening it w/ a further 600$. Scott.

And why do we think booking velocity is somehow correlative to share value? Actual verbatim from Q1 2023 analysts / results call from two weeks ago ... Josh Weinstein: "To that end, wave season has been phenomenal. It started early with record Black Friday booking volumes and has continued to build. We achieved our highest ever quarterly booking volumes in our company's history, and we actually had our best weekly booking volume for this wave the last week in February. And the good news is that strength in bookings has continued into March, supporting our revenue expectations for the remainder of the year. Of course, we're working very hard to do even better. "In North America, our Carnival brand continues to propel us forward, breaking new booking records every single week in January and February. Booking volumes for our North American brands have been running in excess of record 2019 levels for the last 6 months and booking lead times are now back to peak levels." EBITDA numbers might look good, but you might remind yourself what comprises EBITDA, and then ask yourself what is contributing to share price drag. And then factor in dilution. Or not. Scott.

https://www.hollandamerica.com/secondaryFlow/gifts/flowers Scott.

Me too ... board in a fortnight. getting more than a little bit excited for an antithetical HAL (314 nights) cruise experience. Scott.

TBH (and said w/ respect), I'm not sure how any of our conjecture is helpful. It won't bring the deceased back, nor will it comfort her family and friends, nor the crew that had to triage this unfortunate mess? Scott.

(1) It's quite possible HAL has turned over remaining inventory to 'opaque sales channels' to liquidate.. (2) Or yield management has begun the process of upsell offers to booked pax. I am showing bookable inventory available currently with my high-volume cruise-only TA. Scott.

It is only an up-charge if delivered as room service. Scott.