JimInBuffalo

Are you allowed to bring your own boogie boards on the flowrider?

This will be my first time on the Anthem.

Thanks,

-Jim

73 degrees in Buffalo today, we tied a record for the highest temperature for the date set back in 1938. Who need the Caribbean?

We are on the 11/22/15/ sailing for the Anthem out of Bayonne. We have sailed out of this port 4 times and always drive down the night before, stay in a hotel in PA and then drive in the morning of the cruise.

We have used Premier Parking at a rate of $11.99/day. I have never had a problem with them and found this set-up to be most convenient and cost effective.

For this trip, based on info from this thread, I have made reservations at the Ramada at Newark Airport with their park/cruise package. The rate for one night with parking is $202 all-in. This reservation can be cancelled up to 24 hours in advance of the date for arrival.

Questions:

1) Any other hotels in the area that have a better deal?

2) We are planning on going into the city the night before the cruise and would prefer to take public transportation. If we drive to the nearest train station, what is the best way to get to Lower Manhatten (World Trade area) ?

Thanks,

-Jim

We will be on the Summitt on 5/17/15 for the 7-day cruise to Bermuda. We are looking for things to do while we are there for the 3 days of the itinerary.

What is your favorite thing to do when you go?

We are fairly active and can walk everywhere, love the beach and I am a snorkeler.

We were there for just one day last November on the Explorer of the Seas and were very impressed with the island. We went to Horseshoe Bay using the public bus system and we plan on buying a pass for the days that we will be there this time.

I would welcome any suggestions and tips on getting around and what we should plan on seeing.

Thanks in advance,

-Jim

45 degrees in Buffalo today and mostly sunny

As I noted when I started this thread, we had missed our connection for our cruise when our flight was cancelled out of Buffalo on Jan. 9th, 2015.

We have been waiting for Allianz Global Assistance, our insurance carrier to respond to our claim since it was sent in on Jan 10th. We were very disturbed by the lack of communication and failure of their online system to show updates in a timely fashion (or at all).

I made a few phone calls and did not get anywhere with their 'Help Team". I am actually still waiting for a phone call from their customer assistance department. After sending another e-mail to the Help Team, I was notified today that the claim has been approved and the check is in the mail.

Bottom line, we are getting $1600 back from Allianz. This is the maximum amount that is covered under their best policy for a "Missed Connection". Obviously, this does not reimburse us for the total loss that we had for the 9-day Southern Caribbean Cruise on Royal Caribbean that we missed.

Please make sure that you review your policy and know ahead of time what the coverage is for your trip.

-Jim; 14 degrees (F) in Buffalo today. Hoping for a warm-up over the weekend.

One reason for Allianz Global to call this a missed connection would be that under that designation, the amount of coverage is limited to only $800 per person per claim.

Of course this is much less than the amount that we paid for the 9-day cruise.

We would be satisfied to get that amount but we are still waiting for an answer from Allianz. They have had the claim since 1/20/15 and were supposed to give us an answer within 10 days. I have since received a request for more documentation which I sent immediately. Still no answer and their online info shows no update to the case status.

I also sent an e-mail to their "Help Desk" and got a automatic response saying: "Sorry to hear that you are having trouble, we're working on it."

This must have triggered a notice to the AAA office where we purchased the insurance and they told us to be patient since there are a lot of recent claims due to the bad weather across the county. My response to that is I expect the claims to be handled as first-in, first-out.

-Jim

Sunny and warm in Buffalo today. High temp will hit 32 (F) for the first time in over 35 days. Average temp for the month of Feb. was 10.9 degrees.

Thanks for the info. We are sailing on May 17th

-Jim

Hmmm. I just went on that site and I entered the same parameters that I used for our last family cruise aboard the Enchantment of the Seas and I found comprehensive policies starting at $58 TOTAL for our family of 4. Once again, I know that several factors are taken into account, but I can usually find some affordable policies.

 

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We just booked a cruise leaving on May 17th for Bermuda on Celebrity. This time we booked the insurance through our travel agent. The policy for 2 people was $300. This amount is more than we would have paid through Allianz (the company I am still waiting to hear from about our claim) but we agree that you need to have the coverage.

-Jim

Up to 33 degrees (F) now in Buffalo and freezing rain. We are enjoying the "heat" even though the dance we were supposed to attend tonight has been canceled due to driving conditions.

This is a learning experience no one wants! It's so hard to read the details of a policy and understand what coverage applies when. I hope you're able to recover more than you expect.

 

I filed a claim for my parents who had to cancel a cruise for medical reasons. It took months to get paid, but I wasn't surprised as doctors had to fill out information requests. Before we ever heard that they were paying, my mother received a check reimbursing all cruise fare and airfare.

 

This next trip, #1 I hope I don't have to use any insurance and #2 I got insurance through the trip insurance store where they vet the companies and policies ahead of time.

We booked through our online TA "Vacations to Go" which has been very good to us. Our TA Brenda, is excellent. They always offer to sell us the insurance however, we have always used Allianz Global Assistance since we purchase through our AAA (auto club) office where we have our AAA membership. The rates always were lower than those offered by VTG and since we never had to use it, we felt secure with Allianz.

The thing that should have given us a foreshadowing of what was to come when we filed the claim is that when our flight was canceled, we called the rep at AAA and they would not talk to us and referred us to Allianz.

If Allianz Global Assistance does not honor our claim I will pay a visit in person to the AAA office and get some answers.

4 degrees in Buffalo today with - 25 wind chill. (but it is sunny)

-jim

We have been on 30 cruises and we always purchase travel insurance. Our most recent cruise would have left on Jan 9th however our flight was cancelled and we were unable to get to the port in time to make the sailing.

We had insurance through Allianz Global Assistance and have not had a good experience in the way they have handled our claim.

According to the policy, if a flight is cancelled, you are covered under their "missed connection" rules. In this case, it was easy to verify that the flight was cancelled and that we attempted to get another flight but to no avail. (Under a missed connection, you are limited in your coverage to only $800 per person.)

We filed the claim with Allianz Global Assistance immediately. Their policy states that they will respond within 10 business days. It took them 20 days to respond but only to ask for more documentation. I sent the additional info to them 10 days ago and still have no disposition of the claim.

We have used Allianz Global Assistance many times before for our previous cruises. We have never had an occasion to file a claim. Insurance is like that; you never know how good it is until you have to file to get money back.

We are very unsatisfied with the service that we have received thus far and continue to wait for Allianz to reply.

When the flight was cancelled, the first thing that we said was "Well at least we are covered by the insurance". Now we are not so sure that we will ever get anything back.

Thanks for your comments. We scheduled our next cruise this afternoon. We will be taking Celebrity to Bermuda in May.

This was our 30th cruise and we have typically flown out the day of the cruise and had no problems. The weather in January in Buffalo this year was actually better than we have had for the past 4 weeks since we have had 90 inches of snow, only 2 days where the temperature has gone over 32 degrees and an average temperature for the month of March of only 13.5 degrees (F). The day that the flight was cancelled the forecast was for only 1/2 inch of snow and temps about 20 degrees.

We were only told that the flight was cancelled, the airline never said the exact reason. Our flight was the only one cancelled by that airline to Orlando that day. We did try to get another flight but they were all booked up and with the cancellation of our flight, they were trying to book everyone as soon as possible but could not accommodate us. It is possible that the flight was cancelled for mechanical or other reasons but we will probably never know.

We filed a claim with Allianz Global Assistance (our insurance carrier) and they were supposed to give us an answer within 10 business days. After 20 days waiting, they replied but only to ask us for more info and documentation. That was sent in 10 days ago and still no answer. Their online claim status is still showing that the case is under review.

We did look into catching up with the ship. The first stop was at Labadee, Haiti on the third day. Since this is a private island we could not get on there. The next available stop was in Aruba on the fifth day of the nine day cruise. The person we talked to at Allianz told us that we should only try to catch the cruise if it would allow us to make at least 50% of the trip. This would have been less than that.

Additionally, due to the logistics of flying from Buffalo to Aruba, the arrival time of the flight would require us to fly in at least one day in advance, book an overnight stay at a hotel and then meet the ship the next day. The total cost of this would have exceeded the entire cost of the cruise. Along with the 50% rule, we thought that mitigating the cost for travel to Aruba was the probably what the insurance company would prefer. (I. E. the cost of getting us to Aruba to make less than 50% of the cruise would be more than refunding the total trip that we insured.)

LESSSON LEARNED: Ask as many questions about your travel insurance before you buy it. It all sounds good when you read the policy but you never know what you have until you try to file a claim for it.

Today in Buffalo 4 degrees (F) with wind chill of -20.

We were scheduled to be on the Explorer of the Seas for a 9-day cruise starting last week. Our flight from Buffalo was cancelled at the last minute and we could not make it to the port on time. We missed the cruise and are now fighting with our insurance company for payment.

My wife swears that the reason that all this happened was that we were assigned cabin #6669 (with the first three 6's being the operative).

Has anyone else had a similar experience?-Jiim

20 degrees and sunny today in Buffalo

We were on the Explorer in March. I filled out an application for the deposit while on the ship.

I put both names on the form and expected that they would charge us a total of $200. Instead, they charged only $100.

I tried to make a reservation for a cruise in October this year and had to call RCI for confirmation of the OBC.

According to the rep at RCI, the program has changed as far as the amounts for the OBC. When I filled out the form on board the OBC levels were:

<> $100 for cruises that were 7-9 days

<> $150 for cruises over 9 days

I was told today that the amounts have changed and that I will only recieve $50 OBC for the 9-day cruise. According to the rep, this change took place on 3/15/14 (while we were on the cruise) I filled out my application on 3/20, the 2nd to last day of our cruise. At that time the higher rates were quoted.

After raising the roof on the phone and talking to a Supervisor, they did honor the $100 rate for the OBC.

Question: has anyone else heard of this change?????

We have been to S. Friars beach. It is not large. I don't remember what the color of the sand was. The beach is clean, and the water is very very clear. There is a small bar called the Shipwreck. The shade come from palapas(thatched roof things) You can snorkel there. The also rent equipment. At about 10:00 they put out chicken parts, and the mongoose come out of the hills and eat. A little while later they put out bananas, and family groups of monkeys come out. Kinda Cool.

 

We will be on the Explorer in March and our stop at St Kitts is on March 17th. We would like to share a cab for this 20 minute trip. We go in the morning and come back to the ship about 1:00 PM.

 

Doughball

We will be on the ship at the same time. If you have room, we would like to go along and share a cab with your group. Let me know,

-Jim

I can't believe that this many people are afraid of monkeys. We were in St. Kitts in November and we are going back there next week.

One of my wife's fondest memories is holding two small monkeys near the pier when we landed. No one forced us to handle the monkeys. We were approached by a man who showed them to us and then asked if we wanted to take pictures.

The monkeys were very tame and actually a bit shy. Their handler fed them pieces of cucumber and that made them even more docile. Things were a bit slow that day and we had a lot of time to hold them and after getting some pictures I tipped the handler for his time.

Seriously people, we did not see any mistreatment of the animals. They seemed to be in excellent health, and it is obviously not illegal for these people to have their "pets" on display.

I'm just saying, in my humble opinion.

-Jim

I always say that my favorite cuise is "the next one"

-Jim

I read through most of this thread and the same thing keeps popping up in my mind as far as a possible preventative method to keep infected pax from boarding a ship in the first place:

In some countries, customs/immigration agents use infrared cameras to check for persons with high body temperatures/fever from passing checkpoints until they can be cleared for possible infections.

Has anyone ever heard of this being done by the ship personnel instead of depending on the person's word (and signature) that they have not been sick in the past few days?

Let's face it, the virus does not come from the ship. It comes from the passengers. The only certain way (in my humble opinion) to prevent future outbreaks or at least to minimize them is to keep infected persons from boarding the ship in the first place.

-Jim

Currently +11 degrees F in Buffalo with a wind chill factor of minus 20 degrees F

Cracks me up all these people saying their so scared to walk in Jamaica.

I travel solo and one of my favorite safest places I've been is downtown

Jamaica.

Give me a break.

Go to the bronx if you want a show.

I see your point. It is similar to those of us in Buffalo who crack up when we hear that NYC and Washington DC close down the city because of a couple inches of snow. We get that everyday in the winter.

I am sure that I was from the Bronx I would not be worried about going anywhere.

-Jim

-2 degrees F in Buffalo today. Wind chill is expected to be -25 degrees F by noon.

We used premier in Nov. 2013 and had no problem. We will be using them again in March 2014.

Two things.

1) Don't get there earlier than 10 am to leave the car or you will wait. They need to clear out the lot from the past cruise before filling up with the next one.

2) Upon return, carry you bags off with express de-embarkation and get to the pick up location ASAP or you will be waiting for a while for a van to take you to your car. This is due to the lack of traffic flow efficiency at the port which creates bottlenecks that delay the vans from getting to the pick up location.

Again, we found it to be a great alternative and with good savings over the pier lot.

our first trip out of the country (U.S.) was to Jamaica in 1979. We did not feel safe then and have never returned, even though we did feel that the country is beautiful and has incredible potential.

Reading many of the comments about the country in its current state remind me specifically of what we saw and felt when we were there.

It is really too bad since I was hoping that Falmouth would be their salvation. I will not book a cruise that stops in Jamaica unless I plan on staying on the ship during the visit.

In my humble opinion

-Jim

we are going on the Explorer again in March, 2014.

With regard to the cost of parking at the pier in Bayonne, does the price per day include taxes? I was told by pax on our last cruise in Nov. that the price ($19/day) did not include an additional $5/day for homeland security fee.

Is that true?

Thanks,

-Jim

Do you know if the $19 per day includes all taxes? I heard from pax on our last cruise that they add local tax and $5 per day for Homeland Security Tax. Is that true?

NOt to soudn like a broken record but: the previous posting was correct. If the pier does not improve the traffic patterns and capacity, there will be problems no matter what service you use.

It is easy to see that the early traffic in and out of the pier is light. I drove it myself when I arrived in Nov. for our cruise. At 9 am there was no delay.

As the traffic builds, the bottle-neck starts and there is nothing you can do to get in any faster.

Those departing have no problems (as we experienced) if you get off the ship early. Once the bottle-neck starts, the vans from all of the satellite lots are going to have the same problem I.E.: how to get to you.

I will be anxious to see how the pier resolves this issue. This was our first cruise through Port Liberty and even though we had no delays, if the timing is different on our next cruise we know we could be the ones waiting for a ride. If that happens, I will grab the first cab out instead of waiting for the van.

We just used Premier Parking for our Nov. 3 cruise out of Bayonne, and we'll never do that again. We arrived about 10:30 AM on embarkation day and it took 1.5 hours to get a shuttle from the parking lot to the dock. It started raining and the temp was in the 40's. No roof over our heads, and the shuttles were running slowly. They said the port changed something for security reasons and all traffic was running in 1 instead of 2 lanes, hence the delay. Whatever. Thankfully we had umbrellas in the car so we didn't get soaked while we waited. Eventually one of the 3 vans they had managed to get us to the dock.

 

Upon returning from the cruise, the ship had some delay and we weren't able to get off until 11:30 in the morning -- much later than we anticipated. The dock was jammed with traffic and the Premier Vans were running slowly. There were 50-60 people ahead of us in line for the Premier Shuttles. Granted, the traffic wasn't Premier's fault, but they only had 3 vans running that could carry like 6-8 people with luggage. It was taking forever for the line to go down. Finally, after TWO HOURS waiting for a Premier Shuttle, another company came over and said they had 2 twelve passenger shuttle vans and would take us to the Premier lot for $3 per person. HOOORAY!!! TAKE MY MONEY PLEASE!!! Hopped on the 3rd party shuttle and was at my car in 10 minutes. Finally, close to 2:00 PM we were on our way home -- no thanks to Premier. Saving the $70 seemed like a great idea at the time, but now I'd much rather spend the extra money and have 3 more hours of my life back. Getting to the lot early and getting off the ship early would probably have resulted in a much better experience for us using Premier, but as it was, it was a huge waste of our time. Never again.

Does it make more sense to get a cab and go directly over to the Premier lot to get you car or to wait 2 hours like MANOVBRD for the next van?

I suggested the cab in case you get stuck like MANOVBRD and there are 50-60 people ahead of you. The cab fare would be worth more than the wait.

-Jim