ChucktownSteve

I live in Central FL. When sailing out of POM, I use at Park N Go Ft Lauderdale then use SAS Transportation to take me the rest of the way to POM. I've also used them when I dropped a rental at FLL to get to Miami for a non returning cruise to POM. They've always been convenient and affordably priced at $15pp. Considering when I used Park N Go for less than $10pn while POM was $25pn, and I didn't have to navigate the Miami traffic on I95, it was a great alternative to get dropped at the terminal. Plus I always get frequent parker points by using PnG for free nights.

We did a Miami to Montreal cruise in May 2022 with 21 tours between the two of us. We never felt the excursions were crowded. But our ship was the Navigator with about 60% occupancy. So hard to tell what you'll experience.

At the suggestions I called choice air again. The person I spoke with did have bizness class. It's only $7,784.77pp on Delta Air. The owner's suite we booked was only $16.598.28. Is there anyone who wants to pay $32,167.82 for an 11 night Greek Isle cruise? That's about $1,500pp/pn. That doesn't include hotel and excursions or shopping.

Since the airlines pricing directly are now charging about $6K pp for the Bizness flights to Venice and return from Athens, I don't believe Choice Air could be much less. Based upon that, I do not want to take this cruise. You can have our flight seats and cabin. lol

i just want a simple Caribbean getaway so we don't have to fly to catch the ship.

I called choiceair to try to get an international business class to Venice Italy. They said they don't do that class and only offer the back of the bus. Not for long flights for us.

I wish they would release the remaining 2024 cruises already. Anyone know when they usually do that? I'm about to book another cruise line before their prices go up if Azamara doesn't come out of the chute soon.

They shrunk and came back as flip flops

The word free in advertising is very powerful in attracting people. There are always those gullible people who bite. That's why I always ignore the language even in the grocery store. They mark it up above normal to lower it. In cruising I look at what I receive at the cost per night. I decide on the bottom line. However any business that uses the word free after marking it up loses my trust and believably. That's why cruise line emails immediately get deleted when I see those words.

Insurance is only expensive when you don't need it. At 10% or so premium to risk, I can cruise ten times and only need it once to recover all the premiums of my more expensive cruise bookings now. Carnival or Royal Caribbean, I can self insure.

Yes I had a Travel Guard policy several years ago. They are notorious for that. The way I got it resolved was through Steve in Tripinsurancestore.com even though I bought directly from the company. He contacted an underwriter there he knew and greased the wheels. I don't know if he can help or not. But I have been using him ever since. Giving him a call for advice couldn't hurt. He likes helping people I've discovered.

If it's not a lot of refundable, no problem getting the cash from guest relations. However with the larger R OBC, our TA has started just mailing us a rebate check after the cruise. Much more convenient than carrying a large sum off the ship. Some cruise lines let them just apply the R OBC to lower the booked fare as if we made the payment.

Have you ever asked them to remove the back of the watch so you can see all the plastic parts they put where you can't see them? I learned that lesson in the islands decades ago. The outside is Purdy. Inside not so much....Sometimes cheaply made at top price. Using up Non Refundable OBC is what everyone apparently does. See the previous posts of free money.. You're the only one who I heard sells the items to friends to recover some cash. I let my wife pick out anything she wants. I call that making a deposit in her emotional bank account. That way I can take debits when I screw up. And if you're married, you know I"m gonna do that. The refund was for a defective Mary Francis purse that I actually got cash back from the vendor and AZ. That's the best way to convert NROBC. I got the cash back AND her good will. lol WIN WIN.

By about 1/3? lol

Glad he was able to help you!

Plus there are lots of people who buy with real cash not the OBC perk which is really built into the cost of the cruise. Free? I heard the people in corporate cruise companies laughing at that one. 🤪

I wasn't complaining. What part was a complaint? The first sentence?

Now I'm not begrudging the cruise line from making profits on top of the lease contract, however I was able to determine the AZ cut on a recently refunded, defective item. After several months, I received the credit. It came in two refunded portions. One represented the amount from the vendor while the other from AZ. It appears AZ's cut adds about one third to the price because the amount refunded by the vendor was the regular retail obtainable elsewhere.Thought I'd share with those who were curious. So is that OBC really free money or are they just getting it back?

I just checked two of the credit cards I use for all our cruises. I noticed last Thursday Regent applied credits to the two totaling $1,200. I don't know if its a credit perk for becoming an SSS member after our last cruise for two additional cruises that were booked prior or it was due to a promotion. One is past final payment before we first sailed so I asked my TA to see if they could get us something as a new SSS member. She said they might upgrade me. We're in a Penthouse cat. Then the credits show up. Regent had already credited the booking not yet at final payment. I have an email into my TA to find out the reason...not that I'm looking a gift horse in the mouth.

Please don't forget to tell us how that worked out for you. Thankx.

I always use Steve at https://tripinsurancestore.com He does insurance threads here on Cruisecritic. They rep several companies and you can preview the policies on their web site. Some of their policies have a 21 day deadline for pre-existing coverage from deposit date. Others are prior to final payment. I'd give them a call and see what they might be able to do for you.

Phil I agree wholeheartedly about the premium liquors and unlimited laundry benefit being real desirable perks. On Azamara late last year the P1 got "basic" shelf liquor in the cabin but premium throughout the ship plus one bag of laundry per full seven days with how much you can STUFF into their bag. I realized the enjoyment of unlimited laundry recently on Regent. We didn't have to worry about stuffing. Sometimes the bags went out days in a row or sometimes we would skip a day. But no worry and no charge was a true benefit that means next time we can certainly pack much less clothing. Full ltr bottles of requested premium brands were in the suite. I'm glad the upper AZ suites do this but perhaps they could consider whether they want to elevate some of the other categories experience to go with their premium pricing. Sometimes a low out of pocket cost with a higher perceived value goes a long way to seal the deal. At that point it's no longer about price but value/perks for less than Zenith.

We used All Transfers in Rome from the airport and a 3 hour Rome tour. Then we picked up another couple at a center Rome hotel to the port. They were very reasonable at the time.

RATS

In May we cruised from Bermuda after a three day port layover (which required testing onboard 2 days before arriving) to Canada but didn't need to test to get into Canada. All the ArriveCAN app required was proof of vaccine. So this is great since we're on Regent from Vancouver in September. Yay no testing. So glad the world is understanding the virus has evolved. Hopefully Celebrity will follow suit.