TravelDiva88

I can't remember what time the welcome aboard show was, unfortunately. The waters were really rough that night and I was a bit seasick.

6:00 should not be too early for nights you're in port, to be honest :)

early reservations (5:30 or so) would ensure you made it to the shows. I know the last night the show was at 9:30. It was a Vegas revue, and absolutely fantastic.

We did not make it to the welcome aboard comedy show, but we caught the comedian's show later in the week (the adult late night version) and I almost peed myself laughing, and I HATE stand-up.

Thanks, I have heard/read Intercontinental come up many times as a top suggestion, however after a quick check it appears that there is zero availability for a room there for the night we'd need (2/28). I've also looked at the Holiday Inn Bayside, which is also often suggested as a pre - cruise spot, and it does have availability (though a bit pricey, at about $240 with tax).

 

And regarding transportation from FLL to the Miami hotel, SAS looks to be a good option. Then I'm guessing we'd just do a simple taxi ride to POM in the am (EARLY for the vibe pass!), and then perhaps SAS for the transport from POM to FLL and the end of the trip? Does this sound like a solid plan to those of you experienced (and helpful) Miami cruisers?

 

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

Sounds solid to me! We left the IC at 8:30 and were in the first boarding group on the Epic. I'd assume that your experience would be similar.

I was able to find the River Park Hotel and Suites on Expedia for $146 total with tax. Like I said, it's not the Ritz- it's a former Clarion that is now independently owned, but it's clean, safe, and comfortable. The cab ride should be $12 or less, especially if you're headed over early

Fly into FLL the day before and book a hotel near the cruise port. You can do SAS, or if you're up for an adventure and you're traveling light, you can take the tri-rail to miami, transfer to the metrorail, and then take the free metromover to within a block or two of your hotel.

My #1 choice for hotels near the port is the Intercontinental Miami. You can normally score a pretty good deal through expedia/travelocity/LMT We just stayed at the River Park Hotel and Suites last week. It's dated, but it's safe, clean, and convenient. You'd be looking at a $10 cab ride from either hotel.

If we didn't have to get our vacation time scheduled far in advance, we'd always cruise this way. The element of surprise makes it very exciting.

 

Sounds like a great plan and you'll probably get a good deal on the cruise.

I'm a little confused as to when you plan to get airfare? We find the best air deals 7-15 weeks out. We don't fly Southwest however, so maybe they have different price trends?

 

Good luck and have fun. :)

Southwest's prices tend to creep up after the schedule is released. But if the price of the flight drops you can rebook and the difference is valid for 1 year from the original date of booking. We've piecemealed a vacation together form leftover travel funds (I track them in a spreadsheet) and reward miles in the past.

TravelDiva - I second your opinion on Gigi - she was fun and fantastic!!

 

What I posted above (re: give that girl a ship) was almost word for word what I put on the vacation hero card for her. I mean, she REALLY needs to move up the ranks. She was a riot.

There was one rather... obnoxious... issue onboard. I had ZERO issues with pool chair hogs, but someone decided it would be fun to have their child go to the theater and lay out sweaters, handbags, etc, on 10-15 chairs at a time in the front two rows to save seats... and then the family would roll up 2 or 3 minutes prior to showtime.

Chair hogging in the theater was definitely at an all time high. We showed up 5 minutes prior to curtain the last night, and had difficulty finding a seat, not because they were full, but because they were being "saved" for others. We finally picked two chairs about 2/3 of the way back, and as expected we were told by the women behind us that those were "taken" by their friends.

I turned around, smiled, and said "If your friends had taken these seats, I would be sitting on their lap currently. Since that is not the case, they are welcome to find empty seats when they arrive".

anyone have updated pics on any changes from the dry dock?

Not much to take pics of. The carpet has been replaced, but otherwise it looks more or less the same as it did before drydock. Which is unfortunate.

To put it in perspective, we were at the pier at 9AM for our sailing on the Breakaway. We got one of the first boarding groups, and I was 4th or 5th in line at Guest Services- I "walked quickly" ahead of my mom and husband.

By the time mom and hubby had caught up (probably 10-15 minutes after embarkation started) they were sold out of Vibe passes

According to the NCL website, the category ID has two pull-down beds. I know, not the cat. you were asking about, but at least it provides some insight.

Knowing the size of those staterooms I have to assume that it's two pull downs- there's nowhere that a trundle would fit on the floor.

With all the new ships in the works they may plan to sell the Sky and put in one of the newer ships - lord I hope so:)

That was my guess. A few NCL junkies and I were playing cruise ship musical chairs one afternoon over drinks on the Sky this past week. With the Getaway (2014) , Escape, and Bliss (2015/2017) coming online, unless they dive into new markets there are going to be more ships than they know what to do with.

I am trying to talk my hubby into doing the 3 day without the kids this time. He is a little shy because I had such a rough time on Carnival. I still have a bit of "land sickness". Everything is still rocking!!! It sounds like a great quick getaway. There are not many ships that do the quickie trips and the ones that do seem to all need TLC. Its probably the way the lines have it set up. They are not going to send their biggest all-stars out to sea for 3-4 days. But I really would like to find the best out of the few that sail. I see NCL Sky, RCI Majesty and CCL Ecstasy. I like that NCL goes to its private island. CCL goes only to Nassau. I hope to plan something soon. I just have to cross my fingers the seas and weather cooperate!

Just be prepared that oftentimes the Sky doesn't make it into the private island. Since it's a tender port, any rough weather will keep you on for a "fun day at sea".

Browsing my roll call from my most recent sailing, another member posted a link to a site with a ship that appears to be the Sky for sale for a cool $300M

I found it listed again here: http://www.qpsmarine.com/pre_owned_detail.asp?veh=2652223

I find it hard to believe since NCL JUST purchased it back, but stranger things have happened.

I would find the cruise and then book the flight.

 

My experience is that the lowest price rooms go first as do the best located rooms in all categories and on many cruises if the price goes down you can followup to get a lower price.

 

Keith

I agree with that advice if you're picky about room location :) We just got off a 4 day on the Sky over Thanksgiving. Price dropped from $299/pp to $109/pp for an inside, and the drops all came after final payment. We were able to upgrade to an OV, but it still kind of smarted.

As to wwcruiser's point- we're looking at your generic Caribbean sailings. No exotic ports or special itineraries.

And Twickenham- our plan is to book an early AM flight down on Saturday (heck, we live on the edge) and a late Sunday flight home. We'll also book a fully refundable room on both Saturday nights, and cancel the one we don't need (either on the front or back end).

If you don't have a membership already, I'd suggest finding a place where there are Cruise Deck Plans that you can view online ;)

From what I can tell (I didn't have a chance to get into one of the insides) it's a pullman on either side of the bed.

Also, a super handy spreadsheet put together by another CC member.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AkRUeqCmOMnGdFZWTVVzZndrc0NkN1N0TGpZb2ZYU2c&single=true&gid=0&output=html

Sorry for the snark this morning. I had not had my coffee yet :)

Haven't sailed in that particular stateroom, but yes, since the balcony is angled you will have a bit more room.

I'm terrible at the "which bed configuration" is this game, but from what I'm seeing it *looks* like it's bed near the slider.

DH and I are just back from a wonderful cruise on the Sky, and contemplating our next trip. We're NCL loyalists, but open to trying other lines.

For our anniversary in September, we are contemplating booking our flights as soon as the flight schedule for SW opens for a major port city (probably Ft. Lauderdale, Port Canaveral, or Galveston).

Each port has between 3 and 7 cruises leaving the weekend we would be looking to cruise. I've played the "book early" game for years, and I'm sick of getting screwed by last minute price drops. The plan would be to wait to book the cruise until 5-7 days out- we aren't picky, and would be fine with a GTY inside room.

The risk, of course, is that prices go up. However since it's hurricane/shoulder season, I'm not worried about that risk. I do plan to keep a spreadsheet of our options and use some of the online tracking sites to keep an eye on the situation. DH has not done most of the Caribbean, and pretty much all of the itineraries look appealing.

Our options would look like this:

1) Book a cruise at potentially a rock-bottom price.

2) Get priced out of desired cruises, and have a 7 day land based trip.

3) Have a hurricane blow up and cancel the trip altogether, holding our SW airline credit for a trip later in 2014 or early 2015 before they expire.

The biggest downside I'm seeing is having only a week to figure out excursions, but since many of the cruises overlap ports of call I can plan a few "for sure" options after we pick an embarkation port.

Am I missing any glaringly obvious flaws with my plan?

Cant say whether I would want Spa passes or Vibe passes because I have absolutely no idea what they are:eek:

I'm basing this off of our sailing on the Breakaway.

Vibe= a limited access sundeck. On the BA there is a hot tub, bar, and loungers and chairs with umbrellas interspersed. You're pretty much guaranteed a place to lay out if you buy the pass. I believe it was $79/pp for us. I won't cruise without it. It's nice to not have to fight for a lounge chair.

Spa pass= gets you unlimited access to the thermal spa, which has heated tile loungers (heavenly) steam rooms, saunas, a jacuzzi, a pool (indoors) and there was also a salt room on the breakaway. I believe the prices run around $299 for a couples' pass. We were upgraded to a spa balcony for just $199 over our standard balcony cost. I'm not sure I'd pay nearly $300 for the experience, but it was heavenly and I missed it on our most recent cruise.

I will say the spa is a great place to go on a chilly or otherwise overcast day.

Back from the Sky, four day Bahamas out of Miami - we left Monday, 11/25, and came back today (Friday, 11/29).

 

I plan on writing a more detailed review later, but some quick points:

 

*The Sky was kept very clean, but could definitely use a little deep TLC Agreed. For a ship just out of drydock, she looks awfully tired. If they plan to keep her in service, they really need to invest in her to bring her into the 21st century

*The crew was happy and professional - we saw none of the negativity that folks had been commenting on recently I agree for the most part. The one disappointment was with Guest Services. There was a serious language barrier, and I had to explain myself several times on multiple occasions to get what I needed. It was frustrating.

*We saw our room steward daily - he was awesome; he greeted us by name and left us an adorable menagerie of towel animals Ours was AMAZING as well. His name was Gusti, and hands down one of the best stewards we've ever had. On the last day he even left us a letter thanking us for being such considerate guests.

*This was our first inside after balconies on the Sun & Dawn - seemed like we didn't have as much storage, drawers in particular, but it was okay overall We had an Oceanview, and I definitely agree with the lack of storage space!

 

Just off the same cruise. I've added my comments above in purple.

Additionally:

The cruise director was forgettable (I honestly don't even remember his name) but Gigi on the activities staff was FANTASTIC! Like get this girl a ship, because she was everything a CD should be. She was everywhere, always on, and fired up 24/7. What a great "face" for a ship!

Activities- For such a small ship, there was ALWAYS something going on. We often ran into "down time" on the Epic and Breakaway, and we didn't get to do everything we wanted to on the Sky!

The comedian (cannot remember his name) was fantastic. We went to his adult-only show in Dazzles on the last night and he had people rolling on the floor in tears.

As mentioned above, we missed GSC, but the alternate activities were great. They even had a complimentary rum punch party on the deck, and we each had 5 or 6 glasses. They weren't super strong, but it was an awesome gesture seeing as how NCL owed us nothing.

Dinner service was slow. I'm not sure what the deal was, but our meals routinely took 90 minutes, which has not been our experience on other ships.

For those who are used to picking up your shore-purchased liquor on the last night, I want to say again this is NOT the case on the Sky. You must pick it up the morning of disembarkation. I think this is a rather asinine policy, and it simply makes for disgruntled guests and a longer time in the stateroom on the last morning since you have to wait to pack until you get your liquor if you are flying.

Overall it was a great cruise, and we will probably do it again in a few years- or if we catch a great airfare deal!

Just off the Sky last Friday. I was honestly disappointed in the offerings at the Buffet, but then again my last two cruises on NCL were on the Breakaway and the Epic, so I'm a bit spoiled when it comes to size.

Breakfast options at the buffet include a waffle bar, an omelette bar, cold cereals, fresh fruits, pastries, sausage, eggs, and potatoes- and a few other things that didn't catch my eye.

Lunch options normally included some sort of chicken, some sort of fish, and a variety of vegetables, along with desserts.

The wings at Longboards were fantastic.

Also, don't forget about FREE room service (Please tip the person who delivers!)

The biggest difference you will notice is that you will have a shower with no lip (zero entry) instead of a bath tub. There are also accessibility features (such as an emergency call button).

If you're within final payment of the cruise, don't sweat it. If you've got time, and there is another non H/C suite option that appeals to you, I'd suggest moving out of courtesy- because despite what NCL says, they WILL NOT move you if someone calls needing an accessible room.

11:15 will be fine if you don't want anything like spa passes or Vibe passes.

Call your TA or NCL. We were upgraded (no cost) from our inside to an oceanview

You work in the industry and can't figure out how to access cabin layouts?

Loved our spa balcony. There is so much to do on the ship, and you don't spend that much time in your stateroom

Just one :)