KirkNC

I think HAL uses these deposits to gauge interest in an itinerary. They also did it for the Grand Africa. We put a deposit on the GA but cancelled it once the final itinerary came out. It was too similar to the 2020 world cruise which we are doing starting today.

We did it as well as the train schedule was not good. You get dropped off about ten minutes from the central point in the city. We had already been to Alcazar so we wondered the old town. As I recall, we had four hours. i will say that Spain Day tours does an excellent job if you want to see Alcazar. I think it is $79/pp. While we went on a big bus to Seville, once there they broke us up into groups of sixteen.

The tram system in Amsterdam is excellent!

We just did our first O cruise and found the food to be the best we have ever had on a cruise, however our experience is on mid market lines. We thoroughly enjoyed our experience but entertainment and lectures were not any better then those same mid market lines.

Interesting. We were on the same cruise but only booked a few weeks before so when I went to book speciality restaurants it was hard to get anything other then 8:00 or 9:00, however when we got on the ship we made a bee line to deck five and were able to juggle them around to 6:00 or 6:30, sharing. We met some great cruisers, enjoyed every meal. We only ate dinner in the GDR once, it was good as well. Overall we found the food to be very good, some of the best we have had on a cruise but this was our first O cruise so can't tell if anything is going down hill. We ate one night in each speciality (Jacques was scary good) and also really enjoyed Terrace. The variety there is very good. The hostess in Red Ginger said its always hard on a short cruise to get the time you want. The couple in front of us threw a fit because they could not walk in and get a seat.

Not sure about magazines but I would think no, ours are electronic. No to the brochures, only first class items, no junk email. We have been gone as long as four months and it’s not even close to filled.

We rent a PO Box and forward mail to the box. The best thing is they only forward first class mail so no junk mail when you return.

Quite true

No, we travel over 250 days a year since we retired in 2016 so it can add up quick.

With over 700 days on HAL, .....enough said

It did.

We are currently on Rivera, our first O cruise. We ate ate at Jacques last night and they seated a passenger in jeans and suspenders, not nice jeans either. We watched and they did not say a word to him. On a brighter note, the food so far is ridiculously good. Our dinner at Jacques was fantastic. The ship is very clean and nice as well.

On our recent Maasdam cruise in the South Pacific and Australia the Maitre De told us most of the Australian passengers removed auto tipping as they do not believe in the practice.

OK, clearly no lifejackets 😎😉. We travel 250 plus days a year so I like to have all the details I can worked out. After all as Flatbush Flyer points out, I don't want to be "that guy". Thanks again

Thanks!