MammothMan

I’m sure TA vs directly with the cruise line is a frequently discussed subject here but here is my two cents. The TA may (and probably does) have some extra bennies added to get you to book with them. I found many years ago that adding a third party between myself and the cruise/airline/hotel can make it difficult to correct issues if they arise. On the cruise side, if you book with a TA you have to work with the TA if something comes up that needs to be addressed. Not that the TA won’t fix it eventually but I would rather be directly involved. Actually if I used a TA I probably wouldn’t have the problems that need to be fixed. What we finally figured out here is somehow in the past my wife got put on NCLs mailing list so we get way to many promotional offers in the mail. I had not noticed before that the flyers were addressed to her. It appears that when NCL sends out these offers they attach codes to her latitudes account. That’s why she gets the discounts and I do not. The 10% military discount is now permanently attached to my number. So now when we cruise we get the ongoing promotion (currently 35% off) + my 10% off for military + what ever discount my wife has (25% off this time). All so confusing. Bottom line sign up for NCL promotions to have your best chance at discounts.

Squaremouth.com and insuremytrip.com have policies that include the cancel for any reason option.

We sailed the Sun in May out of Seattle. When I looked at the cruise (aft penthouse suite) the running discount was 50% off. I thought that was great so I booked the cruise. I was a happy camper. I then called the suite concierge to book dining reservations and she noticed my wife’s latitude number wasn’t attached to the reservation. So she looked up my wife and saw my wife had a 50% off coupon in her account. So, with supervisor approval we got her 50% off added to the original 50% off. Needless to sat that worked out well. A few weeks ago I booked a 10 da med cruise on the Viva. I screwed up the online reservation up and by the time I was done had 3 owner suites (ok 70 years old and computers sometimes kick my ass). So I called up Ncl to correct the problem and found as a vet I got 10% off. He also put my wife’s latitudes number and again…she had a 25% off coupon. Wow 35% off. Bottom line I don’t learn well from my mistakes but thought I would pass this along. Even though you and your spouse have always cruised together it doesn’t mean you both have the same discount codes. I only hope my wife doesn’t see she had all the power here and takes the pool boy with her on the next cruise.

We did a 10 day Alaskan cruise in May. We had a penthouse on the aft of the ship and got to see some fantastic sunsets. The sun is an older ship and her layout is a little strange but it also has an intimacy that you don’t get on the big ships. We found the entrainment lacking with the shows being below the current standards. The crew was great. I probably won’t sail her again. Not because it was a bad trip (10 days of sunshine in May in Alaska will make any cruise ship fantastic) but because there’s so much more additional amenities for suite passengers on the newer ships. One other word of caution. The sun is less than 100,000 ton with at 25 year old stabilization system. In rough seas she will rock and roll. For me an ex submarine sailer I love the motion, my wife on the other hand was not a happy camper for the first sea day out of Seattle. But…it’s still cruising and there’s nothing better than that.