donaldsc

Is there anyone on the ship besides senior officers who is not included on that list. DON

Check out this site - https://weatherspark.com/. This is one of the better accessible climate sites on the WEB and is my go to site whenever I need to have some idea of what I might expect at any location. Just make sure that you do not confuse single point weather data with long term climate data. DON

I did not know that there was any special and specific Denali music. Sounds both intriguing and horrible to me. DON

I am looking for 3 cruise transfers. 1) Haneda to Keio Plaza Hotel in Shinjuko; 2) Keio to Yokohama course port for start of cruise 3) Yokohama cruise port to Narita at the end of the cruise. My TA has come up w a bad option. Private transfer from Haneda to the Keio Plaza for $139. Private transfer from the hotel to Yokohama for $169. Also the suggestion that I take the Princess transfer from Yokohama to Narita at $180 which includes a tour that I don't want. I know that there are public transport options available but I do not want to have to drag suitcases around Tokyo at the end of a long flight. The Keio recommends that we use a company called Airport Limousine Bus Service which appears to do pickup at the airport and drops off directly in front of the hotel. The cost is only 1300 Y which is about $10 USD. Is this a good idea? Are there other options? As far as a hotel to Yokohama transfer I am going to contact the hotel. I am willing to take a shared ride service but I do not want to trapse all over Tokyo to get to the ride pickup service. Ideally I would be picked up at the hotel but I would be willing to take a taxi from the hotel to the ride pickup location if necessary. Again any other suggestions would be helpful. Same questions with regard to getting from Yokohama to Narita. Are there shared ride options. I do know that there is a very inexpensive bus transfers from Yokohama to the airport but I have to get to the bus terminal. I would be willing to take a taxi from the cruise port to the bus terminal and get the airport bus there. Any other idea? Thanks for the help. DON

Tell me about it. Weather in SW Alaska can be interesting. On one driving trip where we were using the Marine Highway to get from place to place so we were stuck in some towns for several days - it rained all the time we were in Juneau. It rained all the time we were in Ketchikan. It poured all the time we were in Prince Rupert. Luckily Prince Rupert has a very nice library and they did not kick us out. And this was in August. If it had been October with colder weather I think that we would abandoned the rest of the trip and headed back to Vegas. On the positive side the weather turned wonderful as we headed inland from Prince Rupert. DON

I have been to AK many times. My suggestion for AK if you have the time and money is not to do another AK cruise but stay 3 or 4 weeks and rent a car and plan or I should say sort of plan a DIY trip. Some years back we spent almost 3 months in AK and drove almost every driveable and some less driveable road in AK. We put 12,000 miles on the car (car and not RV) on that trip. At the end of the trip my wife and I were still talking. DON

Let me throw a question back to you and I am not being flippant. You live in Philadelphia. If you had 7 hours to "see" Philadelphia how much of Philadelphia would you see. Worse yet if you got on a bus that took you to Washington with a 2 1/2 hour bus trip each way and had to be back in Philadelphia by 6 PM how much of Washington would you see especially as you have to allow time for souvenir shopping, bathroom stops for 30 or 40 people and lunch at a touristy restaurant. Cruise ship stops are best for smaller towns with a small town center. Much less so for larger spread out cities. In a large city you need to pick pick out 1 or 2 places that are important for you (not the cruise company but you) to visit and forget the rest of the city. As an example of the "what is important to me" issue - I am not into art or visiting art museums so even if the most important site in a city might be an art museum I will skip it for something that I am interested in. The problem is that the cruise company tours usually will not do that. I would usually suggest that you do private tours because they are more efficient use of time and you see what you want to see but I would guess that as a 1st timer you would not be comfortable with that. Go onto the CC Roll Call for your cruise and see if you can find some private tours that others have set up that you can join. DON

Svalbard would be a really great place to spend a week or so. There is great scenery there. You might even see some polar bears. My brother did a summer cruise to eastern Greenland and got some incredible pictures there. DON

Whomever wrote what you read was very optimistic. This is the latest and probably optimistic update on the job completion - "The expected completion of a bridge on the Denali Park Road has been pushed back from 2025 to 2026. The 90-mile road into Denali National Park remains closed at about the halfway point, where it crosses a melt-driven landslide that has obliterated the road.". https://www.ktoo.org/2023/05/31/completion-of-denali-park-road-bridge-pushed-back-to-2026/#:~:text=The expected completion of a,that has obliterated the road. DON

Did you go to AK on a large cruise ship that did a 7 day round trip to AK which stopped at Juneau, Ketchikan and Skagway with only a short time in each port or did you actually explore AK. Makes a big difference in your AK experience. DON

Northern Aurora is currently the resident AK expert on CC. She knows whereof she speaks. She lives in Fairbanks. She also travels extensively in AK. I would suggest that you listen to what she says. Are your cruise dates fixed and unalterable? BTW - this is the climate data for Juneau in October - https://weatherspark.com/m/145123/10/Average-Weather-in-October-at-Juneau-International-Airport-Alaska-United-States Also for Ketchikan https://weatherspark.com/m/145140/10/Average-Weather-in-October-at-Ketchikan-International-Airport-Alaska-United-States Also look at the sunrise and sunset data for the ports. DON

Not acceptable to this non-Brit also and anyone else who appreciates good tea. Good tea requires a water temperature specific to the type of tea being made. I have a tea kettle that has a choice of 5 brewing temperatures. Anything out of the tap will be way too cool to be acceptable. DON

Try to find out if you are going through the Chilean Fjords. They are spectacular. DON

Typo Typo in my post. We took our granddaughter on the tour. She loved it and Carole and I enjoyed it. Yes - we knew that the gold was seeded but it was still fun. We did not have any of the issues that disneychem had, The guides were interesting. The shuttle drivers had no arguments with each other. I have taken all of the grandkids to AK and did my last grandchild this summer. The mine did not work out w our ship schedule and with the other tours we took in Juneau but I think he would have enjoyed it if we had done the tour. Hi Northern Aurora. Hope that you are doing well. I think that we have done our next-to-last AK trip. We are going to so oine next spring on Princess' 1st cruise of the season. We have never done a really early AK cruise. DON

A couple of cruises ago we did the mine tour w our granddaughter. It was very interesting and a good time was bad by all. DON

1) Yes 2) I did not notice any difference. DON

You are right and my answer was sort of correct but confusing. What I meant to say is that the cruise company agent is employed by the cruise company and does what the cruise company says they must do even if it is not in your best interests. While the TA may get a commission from the cruise their responsibility is to get the best deal for you. DON

Power strips are not expensive. Hardly worth the bother of contacting the manufacturer especially for a 10 year old strip. Just buy a new one. DON

My answer will be very short. A cruise company agent is paid by and is responsible to the cruise company. A TA is paid by and is responsible to you. DON

I have not read many of the responses so someone may have already made this point but if the cruise does not do Glacier Bay do not take it. There are other cruises that say that they will take you to glaciers but they often do not get in because of sea conditions or other issues. You will always get into Glacier Bay. Also if you feel that your dad can handle a one way cruise take one that ends in Whittier. The Prince William Sound entry into Whittier is spectacular. DON

I suspect that your Blue Cross/Medicare cards will be useless in Great Britain. DON

Is it too late to transfer their cruise to a good TA. DON

There is a handicap travel board on CC. You might repost there. DON

Read some of the current news stories about the heat in Greece right now and the fact that they have closed the Acropolis because of the heat. DON

I would hope that he is being facetious with his response. Sometimes you can not tell. DON