bomabound

On our recent trip special coffees were included when we ordered them at the bar/restaurant, but sometimes they had a special drinks cart roaming the deck outside that sold a nice coffee with Creme de Menthe and it had bizarre pricing: $15 if paying outright, $2.45 up charge if on the beverage package.

Just got back from two weeks, Vancouver to Seward and then back. On the way up it rained in every port and was very cold. We wore our down jackets every day and I had to buy a toque because I was so cold. On the way back it didn’t rain at any of the ports other than for a short bout, but we needed the down jackets still in every port. Only on the last sea day before getting back to Vancouver could people comfortably sit outside and enjoy the pool deck. The weather is unpredictable.

Horrible! I sure hope you are able to get the flights changed. When I booked our upcoming Panama trip they were offering free airfare and I asked NCL about it during booking. They said “just be sure you understand that we can’t guarantee that you will be on the same flights. You probably will, but we can’t guarantee it “. So I declined. It is very important to me to travel with my husband. I find it bizarre that they state right in their terms that you WILL be on the same flights.

I’m definitely taking mine. The last time we went in May/June we were freezing out on deck at the glaciers. They really do squish down to nothing in the suitcase so I think it is worth taking.

On our last cruise to Alaska we mainly walked for miles and miles in every port and we loved seeing a lot of everyday parts of each port. We actually did that exact walk to Safeway and there was no problem….then cut across the street up the hills and found a good trail, and cut back down from above closer to the ship. Happily we didn’t run into any bears but I won’t pretend I wasn’t nervous about it. 😀. As a side note, we actually picked up a few really nice souvenirs in Safeway at non-tourist prices. As another aside, the reason for our walking based trip was that we were geocaching in all the ports, so that guided us to a lot of locations. We had already done a lot of excursions on previous trips. On our upcoming trip we are doing a combo of excursions and exploring on foot. I won’t be surprised if we find ourselves in Safeway again. 😀. I find seeing a town’s local grocery store just as interesting as a jewelry store.

After checking in online I printed luggage tags and the instructions tell you to fill in your name and address. But then this week I received official luggage tags from NCL in the mail. I’d prefer to use them since they are bright and shiny and will hold up better than printed paper ones, but they do not include an address or any space to write one. Would you use both? Just the mailed ones?

Thanks, I think that’s what I’ll try…..the breakfast part, not the nuzzling. I’m a shower before mingling with the world type.

Thanks, yes, we are in a suite on a ship that doesn’t have a Haven. We haven’t stayed in a suite before so we thought it might be fun to try this, just once as we like dining in the restaurants.

Just to add to the sorting advice…. On my iPad there is no visible drop-down menu with sort option until I click on “show all”. Only after I click on that does the “sort by” box show up. It took me an embarrassingly long time to figure this out.

When I’ve watched various YouTube videos I see that suite guests can have a meal served in their suite. It seems like this goes beyond just room service, with a multi-course meal. Has anyone done this? If so, is it the butler who brings each course? Is there a charge for this, or just something you’d factor in when tipping the butler? Or perhaps there is no such thing and I misunderstood something. 😀

I’m curious about this too. I’ve wanted to book that way but was told they can’t do that. I totally see your point though in getting fewer perks with it booked as a single cruise.

Ahhhhh, thanks, that makes sense! I didn’t realize we’d be docked away from town. Each time we’ve been we’ve been docked right in town and just walked to everything. Thanks for the info!

Thanks, I’ll check that out. This will be our fourth time to Alaska and we’ve never seen this show and have done most of the “big must-see type tours”, so we were thinking we should see it. Last time we were there we walked by after some hiking thinking we’d catch the show but it was totally sold out. Perhaps the money might be better spent on some crab legs, haha.

I haven’t particularly noticed that….maybe a bit but this one is quite an outlier. I was hoping there was an explanation, but perhaps not.

Does anyone know why this show is SO much more expensive through the cruise line than directly? Directly it is $37 but NCL wants about $78. They also show that the tour is 2.5 hours when the show is 1 hr and a five minute walk from the dock. I’ve checked the other lines and they are charging a reasonable markup (less than or equal to $50) and showing a duration of 1.25-1.5 hours. I called the shore excursion desk to ask whether perhaps more was included such as a shuttle that drives through town with a short city tour, but she said it looked like it was just the show. She couldn’t explain why it says 2.5 hrs. Has anyone done this through NCL that can confirm whether this truly is just the show? In the meantime I just cancelled because it seemed crazy to end up paying more even with the $50 shore excursion credit. Thanks!

Thanks. Yes, I saw that part about the duty, but didn’t see where to find the tax part. I imagine each province is different and didn’t want any surprises. I will dig a bit harder but was hoping somebody might have first hand experience. That’s good to know they might waive one extra bottle.

I was looking at the personal exemption limits on the Government of Canada website and it shows “1.5 litres of wine or 1.14 litres of alcohol” for trips of 7 days or more, and it mentions that if any more than this is brought back that duties and taxes will be owed. What I can’t seem to get a clear idea of is how much that would cost (specifically in BC). Has anyone exceeded the limit and paid to bring back extra? Sometimes it is nice to bring home a bottle of something from a port and the exemption limit is so low.

For me it is. I’d go on YouTube and watch a cabin tour of each to decide. With some ships the bathroom is so much larger that it is worth it just for the big shower and larger bathroom area.

Do you get anything with that? I’ve only done the ship tour on Princess, and it included quite a few photos, a really nice chef coat, and a plush robe. Does NCL do anything like that, or is it just the tour?

I thought customs might, haha.

Since you’ve all been so helpful I’m going to push my luck by asking perhaps a ridiculous question…. We took the free beverage package on the first 7 days but not the last 7 days as I figured I couldn’t sustain that much drinking, and now I see these details about the owner’s suite (see picture). With the drinks package I don’t know what I’d do with 3 bottles of liquor! I’m curious if we’d get away with transferring it to our second cabin since we won’t have the drinks package then. I mean, I can just tell the butler that we don’t want anything, but I’m curious. I have no idea what “bottles of liquor” even refers to though.

Great info, thanks! I’m surprised there wouldn’t be concern about your clean laundry getting returned to the new cabin before the last people left. 😀. I’ll definitely try this as packing dirty laundry is something I really don’t like doing. This seems like a great solution.

Thanks. Yes, we have done B2B Alaska cruises before, but we kept the same room so we didn’t pay any attention to instructions about switching rooms. We noticed there were a lot of people continuing on but they all seemed to be keeping the same cabin. We didn’t get to see what the changeover was like because we booked an excursion that left first thing in the morning and didn’t return until after everyone had boarded. So the day just felt like a port day really. We did the same thing with B2B Caribbean cruises and again spent the entire day out on an excursion and returned late in the afternoon. With the change in room it feels like we’ll want to stay on the ship until we get settled into the second room, but who knows. We’ll pay more attention this time to all the instructions!

Thanks for the detailed reply! This is really helpful.

We are booked on back-to-back cruises from Vancouver to Seward and then Seward to Vancouver. When we booked we made sure we had the same cabin for both trips. However, we then bid on upgrades for both trips figuring it would be worth the switch to try a suite for the first time (on the Spirit, so not Haven). Well, we ended up getting upgrades on both trips, and predictably to different cabins! Has anyone done back-to-backs and switched cabins in the middle? I have no idea what to expect. We’ll obviously need to get out of our first cabin early so that they can get it ready for the next guests, but then our second cabin won’t be ready so I’m wondering if we will have to actually leave the ship and check in again. I sure hope not.