donaldsc

Totally incorrect. Lines such as HAL and Princess do a very adequate job covering the mass market cruises to AK. The cruises are OK and you do stop at the ports that most people consider important stops in AK. However nobody who has ever done much AK cruising would ever say that they are the best. To really do AK you have to take one of the small ships w 500 passengers or less which will take you to ports that the big ships do not go into. Even better are the really small ships w 50 passengers or less which also get you into places that the big ones don't hit and then put you on a zodiac to get even further in. I have been on HAL or Princess ships to AK when I went w family and especially w grandkids and a good time was had by all but nothing will beat AK on a 50 passenger small ship. Some day I would like to do AK on an 8 passenger trawler yacht. DON

Just get a good modern cell phone. I look at my S24 as a pretty good camera attached to a phone. DON

The computer problem might have been fixed but the transportation mess will continue for at least several days considering that many planes may not be where they need to be and planes that are or will be flying were probably fully booked. We obviously have a very fragile intercommunications system out there. DON

Actually SW was not impacted by the problem because their computer system was running a very old operating system (DOS 3.1) which was released in 1985 instead of the newer systems. For the same reason but maybe a different operating system FedEx was also not impacted. As a totally and mostly irrelevant aside I read recently that the underlying operating systems for many financial and governmental systems today is still COBOL. Remember COBOL. It was released in 1959 and standardized in 1968. DON

Does anyone know if Atlas Cruise Lines or the city of Casablanca provides a shuttle from the cruise port to either the mosque or to town. It looks as if we dock way out on very a long pier that you would have to walk to even get to the shore. According to Google maps we will have to walk about 2 km just to get off the pier. Once you get off the pier it is only a 1 km walk to the mosque but the walk off the pier is ridiculous. DON

Does anyone know if Atlas or Casablanca provides a shuttle from the cruise port to either the mosque or to town. It looks as if we dock way out on very a long pier that you would have to walk to even get to the shore. According to Google maps we will have to walk about 2 km just to get off the pier. Once you get off the pier it is only a 1 km walk to the mosque but the walk off the pier is ridiculous. DON

IMHO in any Japan cruise it is 100% about the itinerary. All Japan cruises are port intensive so you be on the ship only for breakfast and dinner. DON

I will bet that my TA would have it handled in a day or so. DON

If you have 12 people at one table there is no way you can have a conversation across the table unless you really yell or else send each other texts. The background noise level in the dining room is high and the acoustics in the room are awful. Just go w two tables of 6 and switch around every night. DON

A 2-wheeler with little tiny tiny wheels that also break off. Not much better. Give me 2 really big wheels. My wife's suitcase is a 4 wheeler. I HATE pulling it. DON

We are going to be in Morocco for 3 days off a cruise. We stop at Casablanca, Siri and Agadar. When we do something off the ship it will probably on a tour. I don't see myself buying much if anything there. I really do not want to buy Moroccan currency at my local exchange even assuming I could get it there. Do I really need to buy some Dirhams. If I do buy anything could I use dollars or Euros. I know that I might get screwed on the exchange rate but I will spending such a small amount there that it really will not make a difference. Would real restaurants or real shops accept Euros, dollars or even credit cards. DON

The RealID law was supposed to be required by 2008. Does anyone really that it will not be extended again. DON

This going to sound like a dumb question but here goes. We are doing a port intensive Spain and Portugal cruise and we plan to do a fair number of longer excursions. I also want to be able to enjoy the on board meals which are supposed to be excellent. Breakfast and dinner is not a problem. However if I schedule too many long excursions I will end up missing lots of lunches. I checked a number of WEB sites and it appears that they do lunch until about 13:30. Does that sound about right. Is there anything else that I should know about the food. DON

Also anyone who has ever done any kayaking knows that you do not dress for the air temperature but for the temperature of the water that you might fall into. The problem is that many people who have never kayaked before and have no idea what they are doing decide to do a kayaking tour on a cruise because the tour companies make it sound it sound easy and fun. It is easy and fun until something happens. DON

If you're being sarcastic - please note that I did answer your question. DON

Do you mean this - https://alaskawildlife.org/. If so it is well worth visiting. DON

You are sort of wrong. As you said Norway has a lot of fjords and larger ships can get into many of them although new environmental regulations may change that soon. AK has a lot of very pretty fjords but the large ships just can not get into many of them. I have done several AK cruises on small <500 passenger ships and they can get into these smaller fjords. Yet one more advantage of small ship cruising. DON

I am a luddite. When I go to a restaurant either on land or at sea they better be able to give me a paper menu. This has never happened to me yet but if I was on land and a restaurant said that they did not have a paper menu I would get up and leave. DON

But does glacier ice taste any different from ice made from clean purified water. Not really. DON

Tell you why I use a good TA. I am sitting on the runway in Las Vegas waiting to take off but with a long delay because of a ground hold. The delay is making it likely that I will miss my connection in Atlanta to Greece. I call my TA from the plane and tell her my problem. She says not to worry and that she will handle it. She already as an alternative flight figured out and the ticket held by the time I step off the plane in Atlanta and she calls me as soon as the plane lands in Atlanta to tell me that things are under control. Turns out that we did barely make the initial connection but we also had a backup plan just in case. Tell me that your cruise company personal cruise consultant will provide that level of service. DON

Try typing "seabisco" into Google. DON

Drinks w ice in them. DON

Nobody has actually answered your "How do I Find a TA" question. The basic answer is by word-of-mouth from friends who travel a lot or whom you meet on the ship. You ay go through several bad ones before you find a good one. When you find a good one stick w them and do not use them to do TA shopping. We found ours from a friend who does a lot of traveling and who recommended the one that they use. We stuck w him for years until he died. His daughter took over the business and we continue to use her. She has saved our trips several times. Could I maybe get a better cruise price or more perks - maybe. Has she ever given us bad crtuise suggestions - no because she knows us, Could I get the service that she gives us - I seriously doubt it. DON

I assume that you have spoken to your physician about this subject. DON

I think that it is interesting that a person can be banned from all airplane travel for no apparent reason or for a reason that does not have to be disclosed to the banee. Yet appears that there is no universal banning procedure for cruise ships. DON