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11:40 am flight out of Vancouver
martincath replied to Kevin's girl's topic in West Coast Departures
To be fair, in 29 days there might have been another schedule change or three! But Celebrity not specifying it was a flight that early makes more sense than them knowingly trying to put you on a flight which their own transfers are incapable of getting you to the airport in time for (1st buses for all the lines almost never leave before 9am, and since 3 hours is the preflight arrival recommendation to US/Int'l at YVR and the drive is 30mins...) If this was your only option, I'd keep an 11:40am (anything after 10am is in theory doable provided you self-disembark and take SkyTrain - and if you are phsycially capable of the former, you can always manage the latter) but with another option on the table the sensible choice is to take a later flight. You might even have time to Do A Thing post-cruise then too! -
martincath started following Seattle: Which train station? Hotel? , Vancouver Tours by Locals , What is “not to be missed” in Vancouver? and 7 others
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You will hopefully get some replies, naming specific guides used, but as a general note: the company is totally legit, they actually began here in Vancouver but now operate all over the world. Like Uber and similar 'gig economy' setups though, you are not working with employees but independent guides with some degree of scrutiny, at the end of the day every guide is an individual - reviews of the company are nearly worthless (unless it's a compliment or complaint about the website, billing, other centralized matter), it's reviews of the specific guides you want! We've personally found that even with detailed research on specific guides, sometimes you just get a person who comes across differently than you assumed they would 'on paper' - a weird sense of humour, quirky food issues (we have twice ended up with guides who insisted on joining us at the lunch table after we asked them to recommend a good resto - but not eating despite our offer to join us as our treat! They just sat there watching us eat, which was extremely weird - and no, it wasn't during Ramadan or similar, one just said they weren't hungry and the other that they didn't like the resto... which they had of course just recommended to us, so we were very pleased that the food was perfectly decent when it came!) Unfortunately back in the day when we came here as tourists we didn't use TBL - and since we started living here I've given far more tours than I've taken!
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What is “not to be missed” in Vancouver?
martincath replied to maggiev's topic in West Coast Departures
Not so much more details Dennis - instead more questions! While you do have at least a full Saturday plus Friday evening/Sunday morning @maggiev that's still nowhere near enough time to see close to everything, so prioritization is a must. Unfortunately one man's Must See is another man's What A Waste of Time That Was... not knowing you or yours Maggie, I'm loathe to suggest anywhere specific. Stanley Park, and the Seawall surrounding it and much of downtown, are probably the most Vancouvery Things - but maybe you don't want to walk or bike for miles to see them, in which case no matter how good they are as parks and seawalls go they're no use to you! I'd suggest hitting up TripAdvisor - separately, have everyone in your group look for themselves. Pick 5 things (start with the Top 10 listings, maybe also check some of the short itineraries posted like '1 weekend in...' or '24/48 hours in...) that sound good to YOU - then compare with your companions. Anything on all the lists = Must See For Your Group! Split opinion? Split the group - just like when cruising, it;s easy to go do your own thing then meet up again for lunch, dinner etc. Transit is clean, safe, cheap and goes lots of places, unbeatable value for solos and even small groups - but distances are so short between many attractions, as downtown core is extremely compact, that walking is often best or a cab is cheaper than transit tickets with 2 or 3 people in the vehicle. Where us locals become really useful is optimising HOW you visit your selected Want To Do Sites - we might know that traffic is always a problem in place X at time Y, so doing certain combos works best in a certain order, or know some great food spots that are a bit off the radar but convenient to visit while you're doing site Z at lunchtime. And if you are happy to share more about your group, your interests, your budget, I'd be happy to make some specific suggestions once I have an idea of how your tastes might overlap or differ from my own. -
11:40 am flight out of Vancouver
martincath replied to Kevin's girl's topic in West Coast Departures
With several Ifs, it might be fine - but since you have another option just take that! Worst case you are indeed mobile enough to drag all your own bags off, use SkyTrain, are the only ship in port and end up at YVR very early... but if you don't check off all of those boxes, there's definitely a risk of missing it. I really don't understand why Celebrity would even give that option, all the lines generally use 'arrival time plus 5 hours' here in Vancouver and even if it's a theoretical 6am docking, they know that nobody gets cleared before CBSA show up to start work at 7am so the earliest 'safe' flight time is never before noon! -
This came up a few years back, and given nobody built any new RV-capable parking downtown since the answer remains that there really aren't any parking lots proper - but if you call one of the local towing companies, they will usually let you store vehicles in their secure impound lots! The closest one to downtown is Busters, behind Pacific Central (Amtrak) station, so approx a $15 cab ride - or if you are traveling light and avoid peak times, you might even risk SkyTrain (technically no big bags allowed on that line, as there is nowhere to put them that doesn't violate transit bylaws by blocking an aisle or wheelchair/bike spot or a seat, but a lot of folks successfully cheat the system due to lack of enforcement on the unmanned trains...)
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Agree that Cordova is the easiest - Granville also works, but involves walking uphill while Cordova is down. Howe St is the worst choice but even then, you'll get there eventually! The platform under Howe is for the wrong line - obviously you can change platforms within the station, but given the hassle of making multiple level changes up and down it's much easier to just walk right past the obvious Howe St entrance and take the first left (onto Cordova).
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There aren't many train departures - as long as you are both on a train that does enter Canada, it's easy to have some folks return by train while the rest go by bus, just make sure you book the same train timeslot for everyone. I'd suggest Chilkoot - more options, cheaper, smaller buses than cruiseline, and they sell various combos, and every we used 'bus only' some folks got off or on because they were doing a combo with the train. One time we even ended up giving a ride to a whole mess of extra folks who couldn't return by train because an engine burst into flames on the way up!
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Hopefully you'll get some more personal feedback OP, but failing that I suggest perusing last years trip reports and roll calls - if you focus on just the ones in April/May you'll get a better idea about early vs. late season issues. Personally I think your plan of let the hotel deliver bags, do lunch, come back later is a good idea - but I would add that you should request a wheelchair for your missus. Organizing one on the day without booking it in advance will be challenging - much better to request it right now. When it comes to ortho issues, sleeping in an unfamiliar bed after a flight is likely to magnify any kind of bone and joint pain/stiffness - better to play it safe!
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A couple - plus, if you are recalling the date correctly the Hons you ordered from is still in business (Olympic Village location would be the one closest of the two current restos, they use Uber/Dash etc. rather than their own delivery - the original and Robson branches both closed over4 2 years ago, so odds are near 100% it was Olympic Village who cooked last time). ChongQing downtown and Szechuan Chili both deliver to the core, would be open until at least 9:30/10pm on a Saturday, have their own delivery people, and I'm familiar with them - I've had very consistent food from the latter for several years, whereas CQ went a little up&down during and after the 'vid. If memory serves, last time this came up Milhouse had been using them more than I was so you might get a better answer soon! Use the SkipUberDash type third parties and do you have more options - personally I don't order delivery via any of those any more, so I can't say whether the speed/keeping it hot part of the experience will be good or not, but the food in Chinatown BBQ is excellent and it's close enough that delivery should be quick. Peaceful might also be of interest - Northern cuisine, much harder to find in most places compared to Cantonese & Szechuan, wheatflour and lamb are key ingredients - but I honestly can't say what their delivery is like these days to downtown as both downtown and 3rd Ave branches closed a while back; the latter was just a few minutes from home so when they used in-house delivery staff from there I ordered frequently and everything was great... I'm not sure if they even have any delivery staff now or just use 3rd parties, but if you stuck to softer meaty and noodly dishes the food should survive a longer drive OK (Cumin lamb on noodles is one of their specialties and it even reheats well; the beef rolls and XLB though suffer texturally if not eaten quickly so I'd eat those in the resto...)
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Some places absolutely will be more heavily booked at dinner as well - on the swankier end of things though I find it's the joints that have been open for decades, that generations of the family regard as their regular celebration resto, that get hit hardest, with e.g. Grannies taken out as well as Moms by the family (Sand Bar, Teahouse, Seasons in the Park, Blue Water Cafe for example) - but given it's a Sunday, I would say that mostly dinner is more of a 'perhaps as busy as a typical Fri or Sat' situation rather than 'OMG if we did not book 3 months out we are not getting a seat!' like brunch... And even then if you are someone who likes to eat say dinner at 8pm rather than 6pm, you might not notice much trouble finding resos at all, as (stereotyping alert!) in my experience 'Mom Meals' whether for mothers day, birthdays or whatever are far too often daytime meals with the kids/grandkids present, rather than romantic dinners... So book something newer, edgier, romantic, super low brow divey, or just in a dodgier part of town - anything that doesn't have a Mom Vibe basically - and you should have a plethora of options across a variety of pricepoints on the day.
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No worries - I have a vague recollection about someone asking if/when the PPs buffet would return a couple of years ago, while Covid rules were still in place... if that was you then at least you know it did come back! I think it might be technically the only actual Buffet-service fancy hotel brunch now, as Arc in the Fairmont Waterfront did indeed ditch self-serve entirely and now operates a 'keep ordering small plates from the menu for 2 hours' table service version - incidentally I checked, and they are also sold out/unavailable for this AYCE brunch on May 12th. The fancy-hotel-buffet prices also climbed heftily, to $65pp from the prior $39 if I'm remembering rightly from just pre-Covid, and frankly the menu looks a rather pale imitation of the glory days of yesteryear despite costing more! For that cash, even if it was available I would instead suggest you should make a reso ($10ea charity donation to avoid the easily-an-hour wait, and that's on a regular weekend morning!) for still the best breakfast in the city at Medina; take a cab both ways (<$10ea); splurge on ordering two breakfasts each (~$40ea), then waste half your food because it's far too much to finish even if you didn't want to add on a waffle (which you do - there's at least one other real Liege waffle place in town now, with the imported pearl sugar to give it the crispy-crunchy caramelized shell, but Medina still has the best sauce to fill the holes with in their lavender chocolate). Total price pretty much bang on the same as the buffet brunch would have been... or just walk over and put the cab fare toward another waffle 😉 But you could also call the hotel directly - maybe they got a bit delayed in opening booking for it (if so, expect an even gougier Mothers Day Special Menu Price when it does open as this is traditionally the biggest brunch day of the year for most of the continent) or if it did sell out there's a good chance at least some seats will have been held back for hotel guests, since after all Mother's Day is an American invention that has yet to spread much beyond Canada - everywhere else in the Commonwealth sticks to the original Mothering Sunday date of 3 weeks before Easter Sunday. Even if the religious side has been overwhelmed by the Female Parent meaning of Mother, fellow guests from basically every Anglican country except the US and Canada will be genuinely surprised there's some special Mom holiday brunch in May instead of March and get annoyed if they can't have their expected eggs & bacon except through room service...
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Stumbled across your question randomly - this board is for posting links to your own blogs, cruising-relevant web sites and the like. Without knowing your citizenship it's impossible to say whether you need a proper Visa or simply an ETA - but the official Aussie government website for such things has a handy bunch of info, including this page which should walk you through what is needed if you answer the questions. Note that Australia, like NZ, Canada, USA etc. who also use online 'electronic visa free' travel permission tools, only ever charges one fixed price on the government's official site or app. Every single place you found a higher rate listed is a scam - at best they will apply on your behalf so you still get the ETA, but with their commission on top but at worst they steal your very detailed personal info and payment method! Never, ever buy an ETA or Visa from anywhere other than official sources... if you are a US Citizen (or another nationality allowed visa-free entry) then the ETA only costs an AUD$20 admin fee. If you need an actual Visa to be allowed in, the costs are higher and greatly variable depending on type. Hope this info isn't too late for you, or you managed to find the info elsewhere in the meantime - I think most of this years Australia-US repo cruises are leaving in about the next month!
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Seattle: Which train station? Hotel?
martincath replied to Kingsmom's topic in West Coast Departures
Also watch out @Kingsmom - especially if using a mobile device - for Amtrak's less-than-clear icon use; there is only one morning train with the rest being buses, but since they opted for showing the 'face' of the vehicle as an image they are both little rounded square shapes! Amtrak buses are not only a worse onboard experience than the train, they usually cost more too as you cannot buy Saver tickets... Hotel-wise, while we mostly blow right through Seattle these days so double-check current reviews, the neighbourhoods we mostly stayed in were around Lower Queen Anne/Seattle Center - we walked to everything around downtown that we visited, only using transit or driving for more distant things like the zoo. Mediterranean Inn and the Pineapple hotels (the Maxwell, Hotel Five) were our most-often-booked hotels, but Hampton/LaQuinta/Homewood all featured at least once on various pre/post-cruise or weekend trips, and we have always loved taking the train. Exactly which hotel will be most convenient of course depends on which attractions you plan to visit in your X days there, but I'd put proximity to the station as your lowest priority by far - you're only going there once after all, and cabuber fare is unlikely to go over $20 unless you're staying well outside downtown. I don't think we ever broke $15 between Amtrak and hotels mentioned. -
Self-Disembarking and taking SkyTrain you can safely assume that for a ship arriving at any time after 7am you should be at YVR within an hour to 90mins... depends which slot you are allocated, as these days Self is very popular so on bigger ships there might be several waves. If you hustle and walk right onto a train about to depart, from the sidewalk outside Canada Place to getting off the train at YVR could be as low as 35mins; walk slow, just miss a train, Sunday morning have to wait the maximum possible time for the next one you might be looking at 55mins worst case.