TA First Timers

[BirdandBaby]

12 minutes ago, SoccerMom#3 said:

I was pleasantly surprised with the wifi service.  I kept my phone in airplane mode but was able to text with other IPhones using wifi and I also was able to use Facebook Messenger to stay in touch.  I was also able to receive and send emails. I tried not to rub it in too often that I was at the pool crossing the Atlantic while my friends and family back home had snow 🙂

Thanks - very helpful to know as I try to sell him on TA. And the "rubbing it in" is part of the fun. I noticed he was always careful to drop in "I'm in Tortola" (or whatever) when calling clients from our latest cruise. 🙂

[BirdandBaby]

17 minutes ago, ECCruise said:

Exactly the same as it is anywhere in the world.  All cell phone service on ships is through satellites which are largely available mid-Atlantic.  There may be spotty outages with both the cell service and TV service.

Thanks - the "largely available mid-Atlantic" was exactly what I was wondering about.

[cangelmd]

 

1 hour ago, GerScot said:

 

We are on the Silhouette which is our favourite, particularly like the spacious Sky Lounge great place to relax and stunning views.

We did our first TA this past November on the Silhouette...maybe our last, definitely our last Broadway/Boston, although I would really like to do one of the Iceland cruises one day.

 

Thoughts - plan for YOUR worse case scenario, and you will likely have a wonderful time. We prepared carefully for this trip, we well armed for rough seas, long sea days and cold weather - what we didn't realize was that we would not be able to get outside for days at a time.

 

(We are also naive rule followers, so we didn't realize until we returned from the trip that people were going to guest services and making ship to shore type phone calls to get their plans reset that had been disrupted. We had 3 activities disrupted, one we were able to fix as soon as we got in cell phone range of NYC, one was non-refundable so we were out $200 and the third, sadly was a dinner reservation that we had made 3 months in advance, not out any money, but probably the one thing that bothered us)

 

Our sample size is 1, but based on that I have read on CC AND on the fact that Celebrity generally can charge a bit more for southern TAs than the northern route, the southern route has smoother seas, and, more importantly, less disruption of the itinerary. ALL of our ports were changed and one port was dropped entirely - and these changes were made the day before we sailed while we were in London not able to access emails. There were good reasons why this happened, and a safe cruise is the first and absolutely most important consideration, but now 6 months later, we would do make different plans if we were repeating the trip.

We really, really enjoy sea days, and we have done a Caribbean cruise where we barely got off the ship because we enjoy the sea days so much. What we didn't understand or expect was that the passengers would have only the most limited deck access for 7 straight days and NO balcony furniture - you could go out on the balcony, but the furniture was lashed down for the full week. The Silhouette and her sisters are built for warm weather service, it gets very crowded inside when people are camping out in the library for hours at a time taking naps because they can't do that on deck. There's not enough space. The ship is not designed for everyone to be inside for long periods of time, even something as simple as an old-fashioned promenade deck so that you can walk around the ship semi sheltered you miss when you can't get on the walking deck.

Finally, and I will get flamed for this, TAs are a bit cliquish, so if you like to socialize, make connections now before you go and pre-=plan some activities then follow through with that plan. We did meet some great people, but we met them during the second week when people emerged from isolation LOL, or maybe got sick of their original groups, I'm not sure which, but next time we would plan that a bit differently.

 

It is highly unlikely that you will run into many of the issues that we did - I wish I had a dollar for every time I heard someone say on that TA some version of "I've been on X number of TAs and this is by far the worst I've ever been on" - but that does us no good, because again our personal sample size is 1. Did we have a good time? Yes, we did. Would we do it again? On a different route, probably. Would we do things differently? Yes, particularly on a northern trip - it's not just the worry about rough seas/bad weather or did I bring enough Kindle books, it's more about how many days can I relax and do nothing, and when I reach my personal limit, what is plan B,C and D, because plan A may not be possible.

 

I've started taking serious bridge lessons so I can reasonably join the bridge groups.

 

Edited June 19, 2019 by cangelmd

[Blazerboy]

1 hour ago, twincheryl said:

... and I am laughing too... but not for the same reason...  have lived in San Diego for 40 years and have never even thought about worrying that I am taking a long shower.  Have I missed something with water rationing lately?  Maybe these comments are meant to keep tourists away?

Just that water conservation, whether in a drought or not, is a good idea.  We wash our cars less often, take shorter showers, change the landscaping to drought tolerant plants, etc.  I am surprised that anyone living in California wouldn't be aware.

 

But back to topic...

[GerScot]

7 hours ago, cangelmd said:

Thoughts - plan for YOUR worse case scenario,

 

Not sure I would want to think about that!!

[mek]

I've done 2 TA's, both with 7 nights at sea and a 6 night crossing from Vancouver to Hawaii.  If you are looking for activity, it really all depends on your roll call and if you have a good organizer.  Our TA last year was on Eclipse and many activities were planned for each day - it was so much fun, then the crossing to Hawaii was this April and again on Eclipse and it could have been more different.  Only a few groups got together to play cards and we're left on our own to find entertainment, which is OK, just not as much to keep us busy - we relaxed more.

When the weather was nice we  played cards on the balcony.  There were several matinees, which were nice and I  attended the enrichment lectures.

[eyecantwait]

9 hours ago, nyllrap said:

 We are sailing on the Infinity. Can't wait.

We loved the Infinity on our Chile thru the Panama Canal to Ft. Lauderdale trip!

[LuAnn]

9 hours ago, twincheryl said:

... and I am laughing too... but not for the same reason...  have lived in San Diego for 40 years and have never even thought about worrying that I am taking a long shower.  Have I missed something with water rationing lately?  Maybe these comments are meant to keep tourists away?

 

We aren't on the strict rationing right now as we were since we had such a rainy winter but we always try and conserve...if for no other reason than water is pretty expensive ...at least to us. Where do you live in SD? Never thought about scaring tourists away with water worries!! ;) :) but sometimes those "Zonies" can sure drive crazy!! :) :) LuAnn

[cangelmd]

1 hour ago, GerScot said:

 

Not sure I would want to think about that!!

LOL, I see what you mean...and when the the waves were topping off at the Deck 6 windows it crossed my mind to check what our life boat station was, but that was all OK.

Remember a few years ago the Carnival ship that had the major power outage and all the sewer system overflowed, and it eventually had to be towed to the nearest port? I live in the city that was the nearest port, and believe there were a lots of folks around that had second thoughts about cruising after that - it might be a possible worst case!

 

Please don’t mind my negative Nellie post, we planned for months for this cruise, and thought we were prepared, then it turned out so different.

one simple thing I would definitely do is get on the Roll Call and sign up for something, or get on a trivia team, start a card group, something, unless you are traveling with a group or ate naturally highly social. If you end up not needing the diversion, it can die a natural death, but you might be glad to have some options lined up early.

[sandav]

As I stated at the start of this discussion, we were on that cruise and yes it was a very rough crossing and the ship was busy inside. We never felt the need to re check where our muster station was and never did we feel at risk. Well maybe walking across the Sky Lounge floor was a bit challenging but there was always someone there to steady you when you staggered and my husband slipped on the ice on the deck as we sailed into Boston!  It wasn’t icy in Boston, cold but bright.  We have done quite a few TA’s now and truthfully we would quite happily do the same one again.Any cruise can have rough seas and I would imagine certain seas are more prone than others. That is the risk you take when cruising. Last year on Silhouette was quite extreme. As far as I’m aware Oscar reached Hurricane status. As far as contacting Guest Services about rescheduling private tours, I can’t remember how we knew about it  but we did.They were very helpful. We’re not doing a TA this year but all this talk is making me wish we were. We are doing Silhouette’s Canaries before your cruise but even though we got a good deal I keep looking at Silhouette and Reflection’s TA’s.

Sandra

[twincheryl]

On 6/19/2019 at 4:42 PM, LuAnn said:

 

We aren't on the strict rationing right now as we were since we had such a rainy winter but we always try and conserve...if for no other reason than water is pretty expensive ...at least to us. Where do you live in SD? Never thought about scaring tourists away with water worries!! 😉 🙂 but sometimes those "Zonies" can sure drive crazy!! 🙂 🙂 LuAnn

We live in Carlsbad.  It was a tongue in cheek comment... of course, we always try to conserve water as much as possible... The poster was saying that they loved taking long, hot showers and I was just laughing that a highlight of my cruise would never be a long, hot shower so that I wouldn't have to pay for the hot water.  

[ScubaDo]

Is there anything different about disembarkation when returning to the States on a TA/TP? Luggage handled the same, customs, etc