Disney Deb

Your dad is adorable! He needs to be around for your August trip so that I can read your live reports after I'm home and in mourning after our Alaska Jewel adventure!

Sorry that we won't be on the same cruise but we will get everything ready for you!

That lodge looks wonderful-hoping to hear that you were able to get something yummy!

Are you on the Jewel again in August? DH and I are on the southbound cruise on Aug 12th.

Loving this live report!

I'm so excited to actually be following a live review of yours, YVR! Especially since I'm going on this ship in August :). I'd read all the others well after you were off the ships.

Your latest dad story is the best LOL. Glad that you can roll with it. 

Hope that you have a wonderful trip!

12 hours ago, YVRteacher said:

My dad won’t drink gin. He calls it “mother’s ruin.”

Very British of him!

I've been waiting for this live report to start! *Deb runs around in circles*. After reading these reports I was inspired to book the Jewel this August for a Seward to Vancouver trip after a 6 day NCL land tour. Can't wait to hear your experiences this year!

My mother-in-law had dementia and we were lucky to have her for 10 years after her diagnosis. It's very hard for loved ones to go through but some of those times with her after her diagnosis are cherished memories. She wasn't the same person but there was still plenty to enjoy-up until when she started referring to my husband as her brother. I love that you are making these memories with him. I hope that you both enjoy this cruise.

@YVRteacher I am so glad that you are enjoying NCL again as you are my hero :). I've been reading your Alaska live reports as we are heading to Alaska (for the first time!) on the Jewel in August. DH and I have a land/cruise tour booked through a local trip planner. I can't wait to read about your trip on the Jewel. We have only been on NCL's Sun and Epic so far. 

I'm glad that your first day back at work was good and sorry about your water situation.

Thanks for taking the time for all of your funny, insightful posts!

(Also I'm a big reader (do some pre-reading of ARCs on the side) and I've enjoyed a number of your book recommendations as well.)

So glad that I found this thread! I too am an overplanner but I feel like it's almost as much fun as the trip itself. For this trip, our first to Alaska, my husband has gotten on board early and is researching the things that he would like to see and do. Normally, he does that within a month of the trip and does a lot of Google mapping to figure out logistics. We're part of an organized cruisetour (local travel guide) through Norwegian. We've sailed with them before. If we had booked this tour ourselves, we would have likely paid $4000 more but at the same time, I've had to give up some control which is hard lol. We were supposed to take a My Way Alpine trip through the Rick Steves tour company but since this one was such a good deal, we changed plans.

The cruise portion starts August 12th southbound and beforehand we stay in Fairbanks, Denali and Talkeetna. Thanks for everyone's tips-there are so many good ones!

Thanks everyone! Yeah, those Haven cabins are a little bit more than I want to spend. 😉 Can't wait to see Alaska!

Hi-we're planning on cruising Alaska for the first time aboard the Jewel. I was wondering-do the Club Balcony Suites get the Haven perks? Or must you reserve one of the higher level suites? (I think that I know the answer, just looking to confirm).

BirdTravels-go for it! Our Thanksgiving plans dried up this year and rather than try to force something different on our kids (grown) I started looking for things to do. Looking for a really relaxing 5 days! 🙂 Our last Norwegian cruise was over New Years' in 2015/2016. So much fun!

Just booked the Sun out of Baltimore over Thanksgiving! So excited to see Norwegian have a ship here. We sailed out of Baltimore years ago on RCI's Enchantment of the Seas. This is a very convenient port for us in SE PA.

We are doing a similar cruise in Jan on the Epic and I am really enjoying your trip report. We are also doing RIL tours in Naples and Rome-hope that we get HIB lol.

Thanks so much for your sassy reviews :). I actually have been listening to some Rick Steves audioguides in preparation for our trip. I don't listen to the tour ones obviously but there are a lot of other ones about various cultures and cuisines that are very interesting. Love the free stuff!!

Thanks to everyone for their help yesterday! I explained the situation to Jany and it turned out that she had sent the pre-payment link but I had never received it. It was never clear from her emails that that was what happened. She re-sent it this morning and I was able to pre-pay.

Theredofshaw-that's a shame. I'm guessing it would only work if you pre-paid for the other people, too. That's what I just did but we are a very small group and are traveling together anyway.

Thanks again!!! This is the best forum for cruising questions! I have gotten more help and information here.:D

Thanks, Mare-I will try that!

I don't understand what the issue was and didn't anticipate having a problem.

Thanks for your reply to my vent :).

I have a Spam folder and a "Quarantine" folder. I've been tracking both of them. I even checked my work email over the weekend so that I could see this confirmation email that I needed to respond to.

I'm wondering if it's a translation problem-maybe she really didn't want me to pay this far in advance? If that's the case, I would have been fine with it.

Has anyone ever had an issue pre-paying their tours? I was trying to pre-pay our tours of Rome and Naples for Dec. I'm trying to pre-pay as much as I can before our final cruise payment comes due. Anyway, when I sent Jany an email to that affect, it took her a few days to respond and then I felt like all last week we were paying email tag about it. She finally sent me an email saying "are you sure you want to pre-pay now? Once I send you the link, you have two days to pre-pay before it expires". I responded that yes, I want to pre-pay now. (which was like t he 3rd time I'd said that). I waited days with no response. Finally I reached out yesterday and said basically, I'm still waiting for this link to pre-pay and got back "You will be paying in cash at the end of the tour as prepayment was not made on time and expired." ***??? I"m sorry-all I've ever heard/seen is how prompt and responsive she is. I wasn't expecting this. Just wondering if anyone else has had this issue.

Well said Stef and Irish Cath. Very sad news. My heart goes out to them.

Just joined this thread today because we'll be cruising in this region soon as well (Canary Islands and Madeira, not Tunisia). Praying for everyone's safety.:(

We booked the 6 day one that leaves Barcelona on Dec 28th and also the 10 night Canary Island that leaves on Jan 3rd-Can't wait!!! These prices are amazing :). I'm going to look at JFK airfare-I saw non-stop from Newark from $1080 and I like the idea of non-stop ;). This will be our first NCL cruise and for the couple traveling with us, it will be their first cruise period! Yay!!!:D:D

Thanks to everyone who posted! I'll be on the EOS in less than four weeks! :D