MuggsDad

Yes, by all means, get the FCC, (while onboard only). The FCC becomes your deposit for your next cruise when you book it (don't have to pay the 20% of cruise at time of booking), and you get OBC as well. Unlike one of the comments above, you do NOT need to wait in a huge long line to see the FCC rep onboard: go early during your cruise - they're usually readily available -- the long lines only happen on the last 2-3 days of the cruise, when everybody tries to get in at the last minute; AND you can fill in the form without talking to the FCC rep, and drop it in the drop box usually just outside their office, anytime! Even at the two year limit, they'll contact you and ask if you want it to be extended - but apparently one extension only for a given FCC. Don't know about that -- they've never lasted the two (previously 4) years around our place. Been using FCC's for years now -- great program.

Don't know if this thread has been tied up somewhere else, so here goes....

We had the fantastic privilege of first hearing him on the Grand in '08, and then ended up booked on the Grand the next year -- again Maurizio at the keyboard! As we couldn't fit a cruise into our schedules in 2010, we took a year off, and then in Jan 2011 went on Coral through Panama Canal. Again, Maurizio was there: still (as always) "wow"ing the crowds. One the second last or final night of our cruise on Coral, he indicated to the crowd (yes, a real "crowd") that he was departing after the end of his present contract, to head back to Italy as he had an offer to work there on a prestigious theatrical musical, which would have at least a year's run. "But, you never know after that", he stated.

If you've never heard of him, he had people packed into the piano lounge, sitting on chairs in the walkways outside the lounge, people sitting on the stairwells, standing around on the railings one deck up, and you could even hear him in the cardroom one deck up. They gave him the "spotlight" in the lounge one night -- both the early and late shows, both filled to capacity in no time. Excellent entertainer!

His CD's (two of them at last count, as far as I know) would be real gems to add to a music collection!!

I notice someone has indicated his wife was not well -- we, too, hope that is just a bad rumour that's floating around.