rwisles72

Thank you Bob and Biker. Was sure i would get the upgrade, have had success in the past. You win some, you lose some.😀

On 6/30/2019 at 12:04 PM, John&LaLa said:

 

Pays to be a smart consumer. 

However, your example is unique to your situation, and it's not always that cut and dry.

Enjoy your balcony.

 

BTW, now you may get offers for a suite. 😉

John&LaLa, or any one else, was wondering what your thoughts are regarding our situation that looks like it has fallen under the not always cut and dry category.

We are booked in an inside room for our upcoming 13 night Scandinavia cruise and we have put in low bids to upgrade to ocean view and balcony. Over the last month i have notified my travel agent on the balcony guarantee price drops a couple of times and they try to get it but are always told that it is only available for new reservations. I want to upgrade to a higher category and we are not allowed to. Is this pretty much the norm or do i need to worry that my travel agent isn't putting in the effort. Will still hope for upgrade, but either way , very excited for cruise. Thanks

Hi everyone... First of all, thanks for all the great information on here. Today we received our upgrade to the Haven on the March 24th sailing on the Norwegian Getaway.

How we got there... I booked this cruise about 6 weeks ago. Started off with balcony guarantee, sail away rate with no perks. Cost was 1825.00 total for the 2 of us. Then a few days later mini suite balcony dropped to the same price and we were upgraded, same exact price. Our travel agent also told me i could apply 2 next cruise certificates and that brought it down to 1325. So 1575 total when including the 250 for the next cruise certificates.

This particular cruise had a lot of rooms available in every category right down the line, including the Haven. When i started the bidding process there was 15 Haven spa, 14 Courtyard penthouse and 12 two bedroom villas available. 

Seemed like a pretty good chance to possibly get the Haven experience. This will be our 4th cruise with Norwegian. 

I played around with the bids quite often but these were my final numbers as of this morning when 1 of my 3 bids was accepted.

Haven spa                       850 pp   (knocked it up from 800 pp last night)

Courtyard penthouse    750 pp   ( knocked it down from 780 pp last night)

2 bedroom villa              1000 pp

This morning i noticed that i no longer had the upgrade page available so i went to an old email and the first thing that pops up was Haven spa, expired. Then the other categories are listed and i see a couple that i cancelled and the another expired, the 2 bedroom villa. Then i see processing next to Courtyard penthouse. First thought was that its a good sign. also thought that its pretty early to be eliminating me, so this must be happening! Checked credit card and no change, checked rooms available and saw some off them dropping of the board. Little while later i checked my reservation and saw that it was changed from min suite to Haven courtyard on deck 15.

So we have been upgraded to the Haven courtyard for a final total of 3,075 for the 2 of us which included the 1500 bid,(750 pp) with no perks.

I do hope this information helps future cruisers as i did want to report back. One important thing to remember about this cruise was that there was a lot of rooms available right up until today.  While i do realize that it's not fair to the people that paid full price, Norwegian made these rules and we are very happy that our bid was accepted and also many thanks to all the great information on this thread. One last thing, the winning bid was just at  the lowest part of  good offer.                                                                                                                         

Rolf

Just got off the Escape on Sunday. My first cruise with Norwegian. I was so happy and shocked to see hockey. All my cruises on Royal and i never saw a hockey game.

The channel being discussed is called Sport24. This channel is shown on every TV throughout the ship. O'Sheehans. casino, out on the Waterfront. In the room it is shown on channel 19 and 27. This is the only sport channel on the ship. You will never see 2 different sport events at the same time on the ship,at least I didn't. And i would guess that this is the sport channel also on the Breakaway/Getaway.

Out of the 7 nights, I think I saw 5 hockey games being shown. Bruins-Lightning, Sharks-Vegas and Jets-Predators games. Never showed Penguins-Capitals.

Yes, there is a lot of soccer. German Bundesliga and English Premier leauge. Also NBA playoffs were on. So when a hockey game was on, it was NBCSN, and with the NBA it was TNT coming thru on Sports24.

For the week that I was on it was a really good balance of NBA and NHL playoffs along with soccer. Was really surprised.

When you get on in Barcelona you will be part of the new stragglers joining a cruise that's already in progress.

We did a B2B on the Harmony this exact time last year and we did not have to leave the ship. I think there was close to 200 b2b cruisers and we all had to meet in one of the dining rooms. We were told that the previous week also stayed on the ship on turn around day.

On our turn around date, 1/28/17, we had over 180 b2b people and we met in the dining room on deck 5. We never had to get off the ship. Customs came on board and we were released around 11:00. We were told that the previous week on the Harmony they did the same exact thing with over 160 b2b passengers.

I received another email today stating that we are 3 days from our 3-Splash trip and if I had any questions or concerns to respond back or even go live connecting through the email site. Matt is holding down the fort while they tend to emergency family matters back in the states. This all makes sense now as to why things weren't looking too good and some had disappointing issues in the past several weeks. Sounds like they are still taking care of family matters and now have someone trying to smooth things over in their absence. They truly are a wonderful young family that are enduring a family crises back in the states while trying to run their small business going on the island. I'll report back after our trip and let you all know if it's still as fabulous with their substitution. Chances are that it will be however, I will definitely miss not seeing Fab and Kristine. I pray that their family matters will have a happy ending for them. 🙏🏻💕🎄🌴⛱🎅🏻😎

Can you please stop already with this misinformation and nonsense. You have spent the last couple of months bragging about your pinnacle status with Blue Safari. I hope you have great trip with a company that no longer exists. Family emergency!!!! They split and left a lot of people with ruined day trips and no refunds. My friend and his wife just returned last week and I asked him to find out what was going on, and its not good. They went their own ways owing a lot of money. I came on this thread looking for information and let people know that there were problems with Blue Safari. Many people followed telling their stories and problems with Blue Safari. And thru all this all you did was continue to defend a company that was no longer interested in honoring their commitments to their paying customers. And yet somehow, you are the only one in contact with them. You really should be embarrassed. Continued terrible reviews on Trip Advisor and your continued blind loyalty. We should have some compassion...I don't think so. Cant wait to hear about your trip on the 27th. I will make sure to report back on my trip with Captain Bob on the 25th.

I just read a post stating they never showed up! I'm so disappointed and haven't a clue as to why. I'm not getting a good feeling about this for my family next week. Such a Bummer.....To think that we had such great trips in the past. I've tried contacting them this past week to confirm and have not heard back. This is so not like them that something awful must have happened. I can only speculate and that would not be fair of me to do. Ugh......:(:confused:

You know them better than all of us. Is this a husband/wife operation?. I read on trip advisor that the wife is back in the United States. Not sure if true, vacation, or business problems. The signs were all there that Blue Safari, if still in buisnrss, is having big problems the last 3 months.

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We tried to use Blue safaris in October. They cancelled the night before. Thank God I had wifi on the ship where I could read my emails and found out and was able to rent a car the next day. I should have written about the whole situation on Trip Ad because I was upset and really not a big fan of this company. They told me that the squalls to get to Anquilla were too much. I found out that 1. They were not - the ferry ran that day with no issue. 2. They had ran their 3 island trip without any difficulty that day. I had asked them if my husband and I could go on that and got no response. I was reimbursed which was why I didn't write a bad review on Trip Ad. I just felt as if they didn't feel like going that day or maybe didn't have enough people. I don't trust them again to take me out. I am going to try Billy Bones in April 2018. We actually are going to stay in Anguilla for a few days after that cruise so I will get there finally.:D If Billy turns out to be strike #3 with boat tours in st martin, I will continue to rent cars and go on my own. I should add that there were only 3 ships in that day so perhaps they couldn't get enough people for the tour.

That's exactly what I have been trying to point out jean. Blue safari has had a tremendous track record, and it's great that 99florida has had so many great trips with them. That doesn't help people today, when for the last 3 months they look like they have ceased operations, or they just don't care anymore. It's the first time I ever wrote a bad review on TripAdvisor and anyone that checks will see I'm not the only one.

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Fair enough !! I don't know them and probably won't book with them. I just came on here to gather more information about them. As far as Blue safari goes, I wish I could have had a great trip with them as you have had many times. When I booked them they had fantastic reviews and was really looking forward to the trip. I understand things happen, but the poor customer service afterwards wasn't expected. No matter who people decide to book excursions with, always make sure your questions and concerns are answered, your emails and phone calls are answered.

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Thank you but no thanks needed. They don't pick you up unless you request it ahead of time. The marina location (new Mariana, cleaner/classier/more upscale) is a 10-15 minute easy walk at most from the cruise ship pier. Like I said before, we've done both Bob's and Blue Safaris and found Capt. Fab to be much more personable and accommodating to the needs of all on board (12 max). I am not going to bad mouth Capt. Bob with the unfortunate and disappointing stories with his business work ethics or his mix ups too. It happens to them all with the over booking. To each his own. I'll let you know how wonderful things went once we get back. This will be our 6/7 time now with Blue Safaris and have nothing but GOOD things to say about them thus far. Happy Holidays - Merry Christmas <3

Enjoy and have fun. Pretty funny that you don't want to bad mouth Captain Bob, and yet you do. Trip advisor rates them #1 out 0f 122, while Blue safari comes in at #37. And our plans along with everyone else's was done months ahead of time, they never showed and seem to be using the same excuse. They are very unreliable the last 3 months, as they have 5 terrible ratings out of the last seven reviews on trip advisor. I'll stick with the info on trip advisor. Pretty sure people can make up their minds with a little research. Anyone singing their praises after recent events with Blue Safari comes off sounding like a company employee.

They are in high demand and might be a reason as to why one may not hear back right away. They are not the commercial size like Soualiga but rather a small hard working family that has started their own company about 5 years ago. One or two boats vs five six, or seven is a big difference in regards to accommodating. We have personally done both tours and prefer the more intimate personal touch with Blue Safaris. We will be doing their tour (doesn't matter which one to us) next week. Capt. Fab, here we come......:)

Good luck!! Hopefully they will actually pick you up. Seems like a great tour when they actually show up. The last three months they have not been in high demand or reliable. We learned the hard way when the didn't show up earlier this year and left 7 people stranded. We will go with the more reliable Captain Bob

Recent reviews are not very good regarding Blue Safari. They seem to have become very unreliable of late. Think we will go with Soualiga Boat Tours.

We were on the Anthem's 10/29 sailing and we had a Beatles tribute band, Liverpool Legends. There was also talk on our roll call that we would also have Journey and Aerosmith tribute bands on the 12 night cruise,but that never happened.

We were on the 10/29 sailing and third time on the Quantum class. I just went down 1 flight to the spa, changed and showered in the men's locker room at no extra cost.

Anthem, 5 nights to Bermuda. October 7,2017.

I did for our April 8th cruise on Anthem. The part about rating Cape Liberty like it was an 8 hour port day was a little strange. I went with Alaska, Hawaii and Southern Caribbean.

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At least one pool has always been open on the last morning on the Allure or the Oasis. Out of the room and finished with breakfast by 8:30 and enjoyed the pool and pool deck till 9:30.

Someone just did a Periscope broadcast of 2 games being shown on the big screen in the Aqua Theater in Oasis.

Its the same game being shown on both screens. You will most always get a 1PM, 4PM and Sunday night game, along with the Monday night and Thursday night game. The Aqua screen will usually only show the 1PM game and all the other games will be shown in the On Air Club and in your stateroom as the Aqua area will be in use during sail away and evening shows.

In the staterooms, channel 24 and 25 are the 2 Espn International channels that will switch over to CBS, NBC, and Fox and Espn for the football games. All commercials are blacked out and replaced with ESPN International commercials or a blank screen till the game resumes. The only other channel that would show sports would be TNT during basketball season.

This Amiga Island tour has me a bit confused. Last year we booked the adult sandbar getaway. We had great weather, but never stopped at a sandbar. We did go to this beautiful Island, had to be Amiga Island. Did we go on the wrong excursion. It left at 1:00 and we did spend a little less than 2 hours there, no children. Do they combine Amiga Island with the sandbar tour or did we get on the wrong boat. It was a great trip!!

We saw the Police tribute band on Quantum and Bon Jovi tribute band on the Anthem in April.

On our 12 night cruise in October on the Anthem someone posted the list of headliners and it included Journey, The Beatles and Aerosmith tribute bands.

Once you buy one can't it be reprogrammed to use on the other ships using this tech?

Yes, we used our free Quantum bands on our recent cruise on Anthem.

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6658 pictures

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