donaldsc

It is a whole lot easier to remember deck 1, deck 2, etc. than ALOHA, BINGO, CHARLIE , etc. as deck names. Bottom line that why is the deck name so important. As for the rest of the issues I have no comment as I don't cruise Princess any longer. I will say that there are other lines that are more peaceful and quieter than Princess although I would suspect that they are more expensive and would involve having you make a whole bunch of changes. Maybe change is good. DON

You have to ask? Greenland/Iceland and hopefully plan to spend several days post cruise in Iceland. DON

Surely there has to be something more important to post about than the 69 messages ( I know - now 70 w mine) about tote bags that are worth maybe $1.25 each. DON

My entire cruise history is on my computer in my photo files. I have a folder on my computer named "Donald&Carole". Within this folder are subfolders with years. Within each year is a a sub folder that identifies the subject of the folder including a sub folder for each cruise. The next subfolder is either the day number on the cruise or the locations of the pictures. Thus the pictures I took during an AK trip in 1998 of the cruise port Kodiak which might be the 5th day of the cruise would be in the folder donald&Carole/1998/AK cruise/Kodiak or day 5. I also have a folder in the AK sub folder called notes which includes the cruise documents and any notes I want to remember. Using this system all my past cruise history is self documenting. DON

That was what happened when I booked earlier for my cruise. I had no problems w excursions. No luck at all w dining reservations. I ended up calling Viking to get my dinner reservations but other posts on this thread have said that this was a fluke and calling usually doesn't work for dinner reservations. DON

In answer to your "who watched the original love boat" which most of the respondents seem to be ignoring - yeas I have watched it a few times. Even with the little that we expect from the supposedly "classic" TV series, it was a really dump, stupid show. There is lots more good classic TV out there. DON

Thanks for the response. Not sure I agree w your answer on this issue but I see where you are coming from. No reason to bother the Community Manager on this minor issue. Thanks for what you do on CC. Have a good Holiday. DON

Agree but in some instances and more often in AK if you want to book w a specific company you have to book w the cruise line. You have no choice. DON

A quick check of Google maps shows that the time from Monfalcone to Venice airport is 1 h 18m. I will add that Google Maps generally tends to be optimistic about travel times in many places. You should be able to figure out the rest. BTW - Google maps is a very useful source of info for any time, distance or location questions. DON

So far. We have been lucky. Our luck on this could change at any time. DON

Actually driving to AK is a fun trip. A few years back we drove from Las Vegas to AK; spent a couple of months driving most of the roads in AK including the haul road; took the car ferry back as far as Prince Rupert and then spent a week or so driving back to Vegas. It was a great road trip. If I remember correctly we put about 12,000 miles on the trip that summer. DON

Even if they did allow it what are you going to do w it when you are not actually lying on it? You are not allowed to leave anything that might blow away on the balcony. Are you going to take it into your cabin all blown up? Are you going to deflate it every time you are not using it? Think about it. DON

Also they will take it away from you if they find that it has a surge suppressor. Something like this will work and it is also small and cheap - https://www.amazon.com/3-Outlet-Grounding-Kasonic-Extender-Heavy-Duty/dp/B075PJYVMG/ref=sr_1_6?crid=92P2GYV9DB3L&keywords=triple+electric+plug&qid=1670992168&sprefix=triple+elect%2Caps%2C141&sr=8-6 DON

There are sites on the WEB that let you monitor the prices of some cruises that you are interested. They warn you about price changes. I have never used them so I don't know if they are any good. Also according to CC rules I don't believe that we can direct you to them. You will have to do your own research. DON

Better or cheaper are generally contradictory when you buy insurance. You need to figure out exactly what coverage you need or want and then contact InsureMyTrip or the Trip Insurance Store. Lots of people on CC use them. The problem that most of us find w cruise company insurance policies is that although they are generally cheaper the coverage is not good. Before you decide on a policy make sure that you are comparing apples w apples and not apple w potatoes. DON

While I agree that Viking provides good service - we have gotten ice delivered daily to our cabin on every cruise that we have ever taken. This is usual service. DON

I don't like sea days and after 2 or at most 3 of them I am bored stiff. My number 1 factor is picking a line and ship is the itinerary so basically I regard the ship as a big bus that will get me to the places that I want to visit. Also we almost never just cruise but we almost always tack on 3 or 4 days pre and/or post cruise as a land visit. Ideally I prefer long (20 - 40 day) land trips staying 2 - 4 or more days at every stop to cruising anyway as you never get to see anything in one of the single 8 AM to 5 PM port stops you get from a cruise ship. However my wife doesn't want to do as many land trips as I want to so I end up doing more cruising and fewer land trips than I would prefer. I can't imagine going back to the same places over and over and over again as many people do in the Caribbean. How many times can you go back to the same Caribbean island which basically has a minimal number of interesting places to visit in the first place. Another problem w the Caribbean is that basically the only thing to do there is beaches and beaches get totally boring after 1/2 hour. After all what can be interesting in lying on the sand doing nothing. That said our next cruise will be a Viking Ocean cruise in the Caribbean. Viking does some interesting itineraries and the closest place to pick up a Viking Ocean is out of Puerto Rico so we are doing the cruise. I did find it almost impossible to find any interesting either free or paid for tours to take. One last way that I am strange. I regard any ship that is larger than 1000 passengers as ridiculously large. The floating amusement park cruise ships are absurd to me. Out last 2 cruises were to AK on a ship w ~ 150 passengers and 2 weeks on a full rigged sailboat. You wouldn't get me on one of those Genormous of the Seas type ships if you paid me to take the cruise. DON

Is there any way that you can check the on time performance of the flights you are looking at. If that isn't possible perhaps you can check the overall on time performance for that line or even all lines out of your home airport. Again I am in the US so I don't really know anything about possible weather or other issues out of your home airport. I hope at least that the flights are non stop. DON

You can switch cruise lines. Royal isn't the only cruise line out there. Maybe Royal figures or maybe hopes that everyone will be so invested in their status level and they stay regardless of what the company does. DON

I am going to give you the same answer that everyone else gave you. It depends. When we did our trip we had reasonable seas going over and mostly reasonable seas coming back. Then when we got close to Cape Horn we hit a storm w more than 70 mph winds and high seas. I like high seas so I enjoyed it. Much less enjoyment for my wife and also for many of the other passengers based on the number of people in the dining room. On another trip I went to the Falklands and to South Georgia Islands. There was a really bad storm in the southern ocean but our captain managed to find a fairly calm route to the Falklands. He did say though the storm was bad enough that some of the ships in Ushuaia were not going anywhere that day or maybe even the next day. We did have a good storm on one of our days in South Georgia. You may luck out or maybe you won't. However if you can manage it will be one of the best cruises that you have ever taken. I do note that you are planning to do the cruise on a larger cruise ship and not an expedition ship. My trips were on expedition ships. Most of your responses seem to assume that you are going to be on a smaller ship with landings instead of on a large ship. I would assume that the larger ships would handle rough seas better than the smaller expedition ships. I should add that you can never totally predict sea conditions anywhere in the world. You can get storms anywhere and even though captains avoid them if possible stuff happens. Hope this helps. DON

So I guess that I just lucked out. Sorry that it did not work out for the rest of you. I tried. DON

I logged onto My Viking 10 seconds after my reservation period opened and the site said that "dining reservations are not available at this time". I kept on checking over several days and kept on seeing the same thing. I then called Viking customer service to complain and they told me that although no on line spots were available they could give me my 2 reservations over the phone. Problem solved. Good customer service. Hope this helps others who are having the same problem that I had. DON

I logged onto My Viking 10 seconds after my reservation period opened and the site said that "dining reservations are not available at this time". I kept on checking over several days and kept on seeing the same thing. I then called Viking customer service to complain and they told me that although no on line spots were available they could give me my 2 reservations over the phone. Problem solved. Good customer service. Hope this helps others who are having the same problem that I had. DON

That was good service. However better service would have been to put the few remaining bottles aside w your name on them so you could have them for the rest of the cruise. If you had not finished them off before the end of the cruise they could always put them back into stock. DON