christraveller

What a grand actionable list, arrived at by tireless collaboration on many levels incorporating customer culture, wants and need!

The marketing folks at Princess ought to have a great meeting when they realize they tried to market a nothing burger with fanfare.

Shockingly, it is an older demographic that is on cruises. I know, this is not the news the corporations like. This does open the door to opportunities in a competitive world. Knees and hips get painful with time. Seating surface heights need to be raised. Occupational therapists help with this issue. Hearing against a background of conversations or music becomes more difficult. Presbycusis is the word for it. Worth looking up in Wikipedia.com. Sound engineers can have a crack at this, so that the large number of hearing impaired folks can enjoy socializing. thanks!

Legionella resource from the Center for Disease Control: https://www.cdc.gov/legionella/about/causes-transmission.html the facts from the ultimate scientific source.

Throwback? Sure. but… Healthy. Nice feature. Count me in with the pro- veggies crowd, along with my dietitian.

Yes, run, don’t walk and book yourselves in. SB checks all your boxes. We had a 14 day cruise between Barbados and St Martin this year. Simply fabulous. port hint: find an itinerary with lots of French islands. Guadeloupe, Martinique and their islands as they are amongst the safest and most prosperous. Sidewalks in good repair there, so much more pleasant for us with fear of orthopedic issues! Tour the ports on foot. You have built in beach time at Carambola Beach once a week. The 600 passenger size is just right. Fellow passengers were very nice, chatty, friendships easy to make.

We stayed at Eurostars Grand Marina in the port area at the foot of Avenida Parallel and La Rambla. . Easy walks to public transit, beach area. Modern, fairly expensive, value for money. Great breakfasts. Best to book on their website. Cab to ship took only minutes. Less expensive, nice hotel? Try an H - Hotel. Chain headquartered in Barcelona. Great locations. https://www.h-hotels.com/en. Pro tip: check out on a map how far the Metro station is, if you see yourself scooting around the city using public transit.

I cannot tell what the SS hotel is. Independent from that issue, we stayed in the Eurostars Marina. Superb location, (one SS cruise started literally downstairs, another a short taxi ride away), large room, friendly staff, awesome breakfast. I think we were in a junior suite. Booked through hotel website. You wouldn’t go wrong with that choice.

This may not be viable. IIRC most insurance (personal and for a cruise line) will not cover us when we enter war zones knowingly and willingly. Beautiful azure seas, Seabourn legendary service, gourmet meals, delightful fellow passengers… best enjoyed elsewhere! stay safe, everyone.

Now that Starlink has arrived, is the pricing as-is, ie one device per guest included, no streaming sites, or $20/day extra for no limitations?

Indian foods are as varied, if not more so, than European foods. sorry to hear that your experience was so poor. peace.

Bistecca fiorentina in Italy arrives at the table rare, precursor for being cut into slices. A good1/3 is bone. The slices that got to my plate were very rare, and needed adroit cutting to eliminate the 1/4 fat, gristle, and so on. 32 oz - 1/3 bone = 20 oz. 20 oz - 1/4 losses = 16 oz. Thus: each diner has 8 oz net. I prefer medium to medium rare, and hope the menu crafters add one or two more steaks to the menu at Solis. Or special order provision for steak.

We ordered an Indonesian meal, with advance notice, on an Atlantic crossing. Fabulous food! Not dull, authenticity hit 100%. strongly recommended.

Frozen fish is safe fish. Typically, frozen at the time of being hauled onboard a fishing boat. Freezing fish eliminates risk from fish parasites, which can be very problematic for humans. hooray! For freezing. All sushi in Canada is from thawed fish for this reason…

Guests arrive on board with many different culinary expectations, based on their own culture, experiences, and readiness to embrace “different”. Lukewarm foods that should be hot, under spiced, lack of variety…. my own pet peeves. I used to live in Guadalajara, so passing off Tex-Mex chili con carne as Mexican is horrifying to me. A thin Wiener Schnitzel, if covering the plate, on the other hand, sounds reasonably authentic. The breadcrumb crust should be wavy and bubbly, though. Otherwise the suspicion of factory made, and deep fried from frozen would arise, wouldn’t it? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiener_schnitzel

Taxi Pier 2 to FLL Saturday March 18 was $25 plus tip. Dropped us off at Departures for Jet Blue. We left the ship at 9:05, through immigration at 9:10, in a cab by 9:12. Plentiful supply. By the way, EZCheck through Guest Services on board costs $25. It has to be arranged a few days before you arrive in FLL. You get a boarding pass and luggage transported from your cabin door to the arrivals bag carousel at your final destination. The bag fee charged by the airline is additional. Amazingly, no weight restriction. A great deal!

On board Seabourn, are public restrooms provided with paper or with cloth towels for hand drying?

Sky Princess sea day in Caribbean today. Very good internet speed at home is faster, but home is not in the middle of an ocean!

Center for Disease Control headquartered in Atlanta has a fabulous website about terrible infectious diseases. norovirus info: https://www.cdc.gov/norovirus/about/index.html usually fecal oral transmission. Poo to fingers to surface to fingers to food or inside of mouth. That chain of transmission is broken at any point? No transmission. How do you break it? Soap and water to fingers, surfaces, or time while Virus dries out and dies. Dishwasher with sanitizer cycle and soap. i had this once. Walked into a bank dining room, felt well in the elevator and sudden inexorable projectile vomiting while approaching our table. It was surreal. Then fever chills, and more… took 3 days. Not recommended! handwashing with soap and water. Let staff serve you for the first few days (or wear gloves handling buffet utensils)… stay well.

That is, if you are fortunate!

Bringing bedtime treat chocolates is a great idea!

Paxlovid wasn’t toxic for me. Within 2 hrs of the first positive test, I was swallowing the first pill. The cough, sore throat and headache were gone the next morning. Only side effect was a curious grapefruit taste that went away fast after the last dose. I was back to work in a hospital on Day 5. Very mild brief flu like course. I have multiple co occurring conditions which would make me a high risk patient without it. My statin and my blood thinner were held for a few days. Pre cruise, my Canadian family physician has provided me with another course, just in case.

Practicalities: weight, room. Real life: it is formal. A jacket and tie with decent pants would look nice. Besides, you are taking a cocktail dress along, so out of fairness, sense of occasion, and share and share alike…

How doable is Puerto Plata by taxi, then walking, then taxi back?

Perhaps bottles were banned as they were filled with alcohol, then tops put back on? cans seem tamper proof.