Videophile

The Haven definitely has the best food on the ship and the best service. No question.

I totally agree. Last time we were on a NCL ship, we had a Haven suite and dined at many of the specialty restaurants too. The Haven restaurant was our favorite by far. We even left Cagney's before desert and went to the Haven to grab a bite of something sweet there. We just liked the atmosphere and service so much more.

Of course The Haven will spoil you. My wife won't let me book anything on NCL that isn't part of the Haven. :)

Drink beer or wine with your permission. Gamble in the casino. Flirt with women.

 

He’s 19 and on vacation!

Exactly what I was thinking! And I'd let him spread his wings a bit. It's a safe environment and if he makes some bad choices, better on the ship than on land.

I'd email NCL, attach the original email, and ask nicely to get 30 Euros OBC. It's important to state what resolution would satisfy you. If you don't, they don't know what you are thinking. Do you want them to pay for your hotel room? Get the cruise for free? Who knows. If you say you'd like 30 Euros there is a slight chance someone may just give you the OBC as a courtesy gesture. If they don't, oh well. Just be pleasant and don't let it taint your cruise.

I agree that the food in the complimentary restaurants is below average for cruise food. My wife and I were both disappointed whenever we ate there. f you can swing a Haven cabin, I would recommend that for the exclusive restaurant you'll have access to. The food in The Haven is very good, much better than other mainstream cruise line offerings. We won't cruise NCL w/o being in there.

Lyft or Uber, for sure. They'll be much nicer than a cab, and much less expensive than a Super Shuttle that will charge per person.

H2SO4 - Like the handle! I'm thinking about an ATW cruise and I was planning on bringing duffel bags too. Seems like a good way to transport a lot of clothes while still being able to conserve room in the cabin.

Aquadesiac - I've been following your blog for about a week now. First, I'm so sorry for your loss. You and your husband will be in my thoughts. I also hope you have a wonderful cruise! I'm considering taking Princess when we go on our trip and will be following with a lot of interest. I'm particularly curious about the entertainment activities (both during the day and at night) and if the food menu gets repetitive as time goes one. Please post pics of your cabin too! My wife and I won't be going until she retires in 4-5 years, but I'm trying to narrow down which line we would like to go on now. The main question I'm struggling with is this: should we book a nicer suite on one of the more expensive lines and go once... or get a more modest cabin on one of the more cost-effective lines and have the ability to take several long cruises? That's something only we can answer, and I'm sure I'll be mulling it over for the next couple of years.

518 days to go until my TA on the Breakaway. :( We'll be in the Haven, which makes the waiting all the harder. (I am going to Alaska on Celebrity in 48 days.)

Following... we're going to be on this ship for a TA... but not until Oct. 2018. I'm living vicariously through reviews until then.

Thank you so much for sharing. I'm terribly sorry for your loss.

The link doesn't work. :( I wanted to read about the "godmoth." :)

I’d love the idea oftrying it. Here are few of the expenses that I'm wondering about that are notmentioned.

I am thinking about this when my wife and I retire in about 9 years. We'd do it for a couple of years. I think I'm looking at it a bit differently that you are.

1. If you are not cruising 365 days a year. You will need another "home". The guy in the article has a separate condo. $$$$ - I won't have an on-land home, just as I'm not going to keep the house I'm living in now if I retire somewhere else. If I want to take a week or two off from cruising, I'd visit family or rent an extended stay hotel.
   
2. If you cannot book the same room for each cruise. Your life has to be able to move each week into a few suitcases. That's the idea... you have a couple of suitcases and that's it. An ebook readers, a light laptops/tablet, and a couple of weeks worth of clothes.
   
3. A storage unit for your stuff. Unless all your stuff fits into a couple of suitcases. $$ Nope... sell it all.
   
4. Do you own a car? Storage, and maintenance while on the ship. $$ I'd sell it. Why do you need a car if you are living on a ship for a couple of years. I'd buy another one once I stopped cruising.
   
5. You may need Air fare if the cruise ends somewhere that you can't book another cruise from. $$ Yes, but that should be the rare exception rather that the rule. I'd have my TA make sure that I ended up in ports that had a lot of cruise ship traffic.
   
6. The prices being quoted seemed like per person rates for a double occupancy. For a couple you would need to double the rate, if single then what is the single rate? $$ I'd want my wife with me, so yes, we'd have double occupancy.
   
7. Can you live the rest of your life in a "home" without a window? The low rates are for interior rooms. Balcony or "suite" rooms are going to maybe double your expenses. $$$$ I'd travel in a balcony or minisuite. It would be more expensive, but I think it would be worth it. I'd also avoid the newest ships which are often more costly, and do a lot of repositioning cruises which are less expensive.
   

I think it's doable, but it would be much different than living on shore.

Aqua. Definitely.

My wife and I have only been on one NCL cruise, but it was in the Haven and we loved it. We've booked our second Haven suite for a TA in 2018. I'm sure you'll love it.

Granted, this is from a very small sample (one cruise) but our concierge was amazing and you should really plan on coordinating everything through him/her. It was invaluable. A lot of things on board need reservations in advance, but the concierge could work miracles. We were outside of the comedy club one night and people were in the waitlist line. We called the concierge and asked if we could get in and he said "done!" We hung up and walked in.

Very interesting and counter to what I thought it would be. I thought there would be some correlation, but there doesn't appear to be.

Now someone need to write a script to pull all of the prices and inventory from the entire fleet for all departures and rooms. Then someone might be able to gleen some patterns in the pricing. I'm a nerd too!

Looking forward to the rest of your review. Sorry to hear about your husband's illness. Hope he makes a quick and full recovery.

Perhaps instead of cashing the points in for OBC you might want to look into the option of having that money applied back to your credit card balance. After Final Payment, I cash in the points as a reduction in the cruise price. Since final payment is already in, they just put that money into my credit card balance pre-cruise. It's something to consider.

I would do what Cruisestich suggested. The advantage is that you will get points for the gratuities that are posted onto the card. If you converted the points to OBC, you would not get the points. Since you're paying off the card with the points, the money out-of-pocket is the same.

The Haven is wonderful. My wife won't go on NCL if we aren't in a Haven suite, so I'd go for the guaranteed upgrade.

You can always bid $800pp which would save you $200 and increase your chances of getting the suite. If your bid isn't accepted, you can use a small part of the money you would have spent on the upgrade on a specialty dinner package. That should take the sting out of not getting the room.

Let us know what you do.

If a genie said that you HAD to go on a one-week cruise, and that they'd help you out by giving you either the cost of the cabin or an extra week of vacation time (for you and your traveling companion), which one would you choose?

I'd select the vacation time in a heartbeat. Between my wife and I, there aren't seven days in a row when we both have free time in our schedules. It's hard coming up with one week's vacation each year. So when we travel we like to go first class. We have booked the top suites on Royal, Celebrity, Carnival (we wanted to try it out), and NCL. We love The Haven. (And no, there are few kids in the area.) For us, it's worth the money, especially since another cruise isn't really an option.

Are you allowed to mention a name of a service that you like, or perhaps give a hint? Thanks.

I don't think we can mention any services, but I'm sure if you did a Google search for cruise it wouldn't tell you to go fish.

Whether booking early or late, I always use a travel agent since mine pays me to do so. I get extra OBC every time and it's usually a good amount. On the cruise we booked last week I get an extra $900 which I can take off the ship with me if I don't use it. (Granted it was a PS and pretty pricey which is why the extra OBC is so much.)

I always use a TA since they pay me to. I have an agent that I like and she gives me at least 5% back (in OBC) on each trip.

She also save me a LOT of money a couple of weeks ago. Long story short, I booked a cruise for the wrong dates (we were looking at several). I discovered my error the next day, and she was able to call the cruise line and move the reservation to the week that I needed. Since she books tens of thousands of dollars a month with the line, my feeling is that they were willing to bend the rules slightly to make her happy. I'm not sure if it would have gone the same if I just called myself.

I concur with RallyDave. The stock isn't in your account, only the mutual fund is.

Unfortunately, I booked my cruise in 2015 so I won't be able to take advantage of the offer. It's good for reservations made on or after January 7, 2016. :( Was there a predecessor plan? I searched for one, but couldn't find anything.

I know I've received credit for cruises on Norwegian that I booked in 2015. I'd just print out this form and mail it in.

And don't feel too bad about the UK politics Techno... us Yanks are having a circus sideshow too. :rolleyes:

Edit: The site doesn't like me leaving web addresses apparently. How does one do that? In any case you can find it at trinyurl dot com slash hqvbtdk

Thanks for the info on the Amex offer Dave! I'll definitely keep that in mind.

To get back to the point at hand, I too think the stock is a good buy after the 8.7% fall on Friday. I own some myself, and have for a few years.

That said, there are some caveats that I feel should be mentioned.

1) The stock hasn't done well in the recent past. It's down almost 30% this year and there's an old saying on Wall Street, never try to catch a falling knife. There are a few signs that NHCL won't take off in the near future as compared to the S&P 500. (More volume on down days than on up days, below it's 50 day moving average, etc.) If you get nervous if a stock goes down after you bought it, you might think carefully about this one.

2) The shareholder benefit is excellent, but be aware that it can change at any time. I also have Royal Caribbean stock and have used their OBC offer for stock holders to great advantage... until about a year ago when they changed the terms so that it no longer applied to virtually all of their sailings. Just don't buy the stock if the ONLY REASON is for this benefit.

3) I like Carnival a little better... the stock is cheaper than NCLH (earnings per share: CCL - 20.46, NHCL - 23.16) and they pay a 2.89% dividend.

Having said all that, I do think that now is a good buying opportunity. The company is solid and they're making money. Just be willing to hold it in the long term rather than hoping for some quick profits.

Do you have to book through Amex to get the $300 OBC? If you do, I assume you can't transfer to a TA, correct?