CHICAGOPAUL LIVE!!!! Our First ALASKA CRUISE on the ECLIPSE!!! May 19th Sailing

Jim_Iain · May 30, 2019

Thanks for a great blog and photo review.

Gimpy McFarlan · May 30, 2019

2 hours ago, chicagopaul said:

Cruising the Hubbard Glacier

Wow! Hubbard was really clouded in that day. We were lucky on our second visit of the B2B...

chicagopaul · May 30, 2019

4 minutes ago, Gimpy McFarlan said:

Wow! Hubbard was really clouded in that day. We were lucky on our second visit of the B2B...

It was. We were lucky to even see it. It was dense fog most of the day and thankfully the fog lifted just in time.

chicagopaul · May 30, 2019

Last day Bridge Tour and Lunch

chicagopaul · May 30, 2019

Sunset Bar

World Class Bar

World Class

Martini Bar Crew!

Salvador

Nicholas

Cforlani · June 1, 2019

Amazing amount of detail as usual. Thank you!

Mike981 · June 1, 2019

Holy cow this is good!

Thank you for all of it.

JennAngel9 · June 1, 2019

On 5/27/2019 at 7:49 PM, jaeg1982 said:

Hello Jenn, This is John, current MCC on the Eclipse. Bianca is indeed amazing. She is currently on a well earned vacation and will be back in 2/3 weeks. Bianca will be here as Suite Manager so many congratulations to her!

Katya went on vacation a little while ago, unfortunately I'm not sure what her next assignment will be.

Hi John, thank you so much for taking the time to respond. I'm sure you are just as wonderful as Bianca and we haven't made a final decision yet, but perhaps we will see you later this summer. My husband and I had been gravitating towards Seabourn in our 30s, but now that we have kids we feel that Celebrity suites with Michael's Club/Luminae is the perfect balance of luxury for us with the big ship entertainment and programming for the kids. Thank you again for updating us.

Chicagopaul-- my sincere apologies for the thread hijack (frolic and detour?) -- I really appreciate all the effort you put into sharing your experience with us and I suspect I will read the first 10 pages of the thread several times while planning our Alaska cruise with Celebrity. 🙂

abbydancer2003 · June 1, 2019

On 5/27/2019 at 7:49 PM, jaeg1982 said:

Hello Jenn, This is John, current MCC on the Eclipse. Bianca is indeed amazing. She is currently on a well earned vacation and will be back in 2/3 weeks. Bianca will be here as Suite Manager so many congratulations to her!

Katya went on vacation a little while ago, unfortunately I'm not sure what her next assignment will be.

I was on the Eclipse in January and I seem to recall that Katya wasn't sure what she was doing next. And John, thanks for all your help with my assorted issues throughout the cruise (we were the first people to ever stick a DVD into the control computer?)

jcpc · June 1, 2019

Paul,

I thoroughly enjoyed reading your daily postings and your pictures are spectacular. They made me want to do another Alaska sailing. Looking forward to reading all about your next adventure.

chicagopaul · June 2, 2019

18 hours ago, JennAngel9 said:

Hi John, thank you so much for taking the time to respond. I'm sure you are just as wonderful as Bianca and we haven't made a final decision yet, but perhaps we will see you later this summer. My husband and I had been gravitating towards Seabourn in our 30s, but now that we have kids we feel that Celebrity suites with Michael's Club/Luminae is the perfect balance of luxury for us with the big ship entertainment and programming for the kids. Thank you again for updating us.

Chicagopaul-- my sincere apologies for the thread hijack (frolic and detour?) -- I really appreciate all the effort you put into sharing your experience with us and I suspect I will read the first 10 pages of the thread several times while planning our Alaska cruise with Celebrity. 🙂

Haha, no apologies at all necessary! I'm glad John was able to chime in and correctly answer the question for you. Good luck planning your cruise and if you have any other questions feel free to ask. I should have the youtube videos up in the next 24hrs or so.

chicagopaul · June 3, 2019

Finally have one video put together. This is about 10 minutes long and has video and photos of our Pilot's Choice helicopter glacier tour and walk in Juneau. I would say this was the highlight of our cruise. We did book this through Celebrity.

sdnich · June 3, 2019

Another great review blog and your pictures are absolutely amazing ! I do have a question about insurance starting all the way at the beginning of your blog I have the Chase reserve card so I know I don’t need travel insurance I went onto the website insure my trip that you had stated how do you decide on picking out the plan three came up for myself and the one that you quoted the Geo blue voyager did not but there was an AIG ? Do you use just whatever is best for you at the time or do you go with a specific company for coverage thanks for any input .

Stefanie

yoshi · June 3, 2019

thank you for posting the great helicopter glacier tour video-must have been an awesome experience.

chicagopaul · June 5, 2019

On 6/3/2019 at 6:10 PM, sdnich said:

Another great review blog and your pictures are absolutely amazing ! I do have a question about insurance starting all the way at the beginning of your blog I have the Chase reserve card so I know I don’t need travel insurance I went onto the website insure my trip that you had stated how do you decide on picking out the plan three came up for myself and the one that you quoted the Geo blue voyager did not but there was an AIG ? Do you use just whatever is best for you at the time or do you go with a specific company for coverage thanks for any input .

Stefanie

Hi Stefanie - Sorry for the delay in answering here! Thanks for following along! Usually we've purchased the AIG Travel Guard but ironically this time around only the Geo Blue was showing for medical so that is what we went with. Strange that the Geo Blue didn't show up since that is what I see the most. But to answer your last question, yes we just look at what is typically best for us at the time and book it. Usually we purchase the medical about a week or so out from the cruise.

sdnich · June 5, 2019

14 minutes ago, chicagopaul said:

Hi Stefanie - Sorry for the delay in answering here! Thanks for following along! Usually we've purchased the AIG Travel Guard but ironically this time around only the Geo Blue was showing for medical so that is what we went with. Strange that the Geo Blue didn't show up since that is what I see the most. But to answer your last question, yes we just look at what is typically best for us at the time and book it. Usually we purchase the medical about a week or so out from the cruise.

Thank you so much for getting back to me ! We just got the Chase Sapphire reserve card this year and thought it would be enough insurance but I like the idea of having a back up medical insurance plan I believe it was only $77 for the two of us and will also wait until the cruise gets closer in October .Once again thank you for the info and look forward to reading about your next adventure .

Ariyel · June 6, 2019

12 hours ago, chicagopaul said:

Usually we purchase the medical about a week or so out from the cruise.

I've never shopped for standalone medical coverage for a trip, but I'm really curious about this and considering it for an upcoming trip. Why do you wait until a week out? Do the prices drop as the trip gets closer since there's less chance of cancellation for a medical reason or something?

Ravbo · June 6, 2019

I think this is Medical coverage only.

Probably does NOT reimburse cruise cost for cruise cancellation.

Also probably does NOT cover pre-existing conditions.

You would have to read specific policy inclusions / exclusions.

Edited June 6, 2019 by Ravbo

cbm27 · June 8, 2019

Just read this entire review of your trip to Alaska .... it was really great. Thinking of booking soon.

Have one question ..... did I miss the recipe of the Chicken Tagine by Daniel Boulud?

Thank you

chicagopaul · June 8, 2019

3 hours ago, cbm27 said:

Just read this entire review of your trip to Alaska .... it was really great. Thinking of booking soon.

Have one question ..... did I miss the recipe of the Chicken Tagine by Daniel Boulud?

Thank you

Thanks for the reminder! Here it is! Keep in mind the recipe is written for the larger kitchen prep so you’ll of course want to reduce the portions. Also it starts out with the playing of the food. Quite interesting how it’s written. I think I’ll attempt to make it this week.

ok hopefully the above appears in the correct order

cbm27 · June 9, 2019

Paul,

Thank you for your quick response. Recipe looks very interesting. I’m going to give it a try ... just hoping my math doesn’t let me down when I bring it down to 6 to 8 people.

Again thank you for the recipe and your wonderful review.