Btimmer's Almost Live Triple Denali and Southbound Cruise (6/28-7/10/22)

[Btimmer]

It was a restful night sailing into Vancouver.  We're taking a bus back to Seattle departing at 12:45pm.  So we'll do a leisurely disembarkation.  The granddaughter wants to stowaway on the ship. 😉

[Mtn2Sea]

Looks like your granddaughter had a blast on what will be a very memorable trip with her grandparents!  Have a safe trip home.

[Btimmer]

7 minutes ago, Mtn2Sea said:

Looks like your granddaughter had a blast on what will be a very memorable trip with her grandparents!  Have a safe trip home.

She was totally engaged the entire trip.  She absolutely loved Club Hal and the almost daily swim with new friends.  We did have to curb a bit her shopping enthusiasm. She even wanted to stowaway for the next voyage.

[Gray Lady]

11 minutes ago, Btimmer said:

She was totally engaged the entire trip.  She absolutely loved Club Hal and the almost daily swim with new friends.  We did have to curb a bit her shopping enthusiasm. She even wanted to stowaway for the next voyage.

She is the perfect age to enjoy a trip like this. How wonderful for both of you and her to have this special time together!  I hope that in the future we can do something like this with our granddaughter. I have enjoyed your trip “with” all of you!

[WishboneS]

8 hours ago, ewildcat7 said:

 

When were you notified that your tour is cancelled; i.e. how many weeks before 10 July?  We are on the Triple Denali on 17 July and have not yet received a cancelation, but are bracing ourselves....

we were notified about 2 weeks before we were due to leave.   We had our money back with in 14 days and we have our cruise credits on account.  It took about 2 weeks more for the credit to appear on our account.  The whole trip was canceled even though the ship is still scheduled to sail.  We feel for us that we dodged the bullet, we were notified our flights were canceled and delayed which we would have been stressed.  We have a new grandson so we are good with the decision HAL made for us.  We will re-book for next year.  Safe travels to you if all goes well.  I would love to hear how your trip was if you are able to go.  

 

[ewildcat7]

1 hour ago, Btimmer said:

It was a restful night sailing into Vancouver.  We're taking a bus back to Seattle departing at 12:45pm.  So we'll do a leisurely disembarkation.  The granddaughter wants to stowaway on the ship. 😉

 

Thank you for all of your posting.  I have been following it as we are doing the Triple Denali (going north) next week with our 7-year old daughter.

[shipshapegirl]

Thank you for all of your posts and beautiful pictures.  So glad you had a great trip with your granddaughter.  Have a safe trip home.

[Gray Lady]

4 hours ago, WishboneS said:

we were notified about 2 weeks before we were due to leave.   We had our money back with in 14 days and we have our cruise credits on account.  It took about 2 weeks more for the credit to appear on our account.  The whole trip was canceled even though the ship is still scheduled to sail.  We feel for us that we dodged the bullet, we were notified our flights were canceled and delayed which we would have been stressed.  We have a new grandson so we are good with the decision HAL made for us.  We will re-book for next year.  Safe travels to you if all goes well.  I would love to hear how your trip was if you are able to go.  

 

Agree that you dodged a bullet. In hindsight, I really wish they had cancelled our cruise tour instead of having COVID cancel it for us! 

[WishboneS]

Grey Lady,

 

Hope you are well and recovered.  Its been a strange couple of years for us all.  We took a cruise in January to Spain and had to wear a mask the entire trip and test daily.  Not our trip of a life time either,  We just have to go with the flow until it settles out a bit.  Hope your next trip is wonderful where ever it takes you.  

 

 

[Gray Lady]

4 hours ago, WishboneS said:

Grey Lady,

 

Hope you are well and recovered.  Its been a strange couple of years for us all.  We took a cruise in January to Spain and had to wear a mask the entire trip and test daily.  Not our trip of a life time either,  We just have to go with the flow until it settles out a bit.  Hope your next trip is wonderful where ever it takes you.  

 

 

Thank you. Yes, we are recovered. The shots do work! We wore masks the entire time, but very few people did. We were four days into our land tour when DH became sick. We went and told them so we wouldn’t infect others. They isolated us for five days in Anchorage, and we missed the rest of our land tour and the cruise. I know that we weren’t the only ones, as they were using three different hotels for COVID patients. Just too much pent-up demand and a short Alaskan season. We are going to wait at least another year and try again for our first cruise, and not do any land tour. Maybe the Panama Canal??

[Btimmer]

3 hours ago, Gray Lady said:

Thank you. Yes, we are recovered. The shots do work! We wore masks the entire time, but very few people did. We were four days into our land tour when DH became sick. We went and told them so we wouldn’t infect others. They isolated us for five days in Anchorage, and we missed the rest of our land tour and the cruise. I know that we weren’t the only ones, as they were using three different hotels for COVID patients. Just too much pent-up demand and a short Alaskan season. We are going to wait at least another year and try again for our first cruise, and not do any land tour. Maybe the Panama Canal??

Keep in mind that a Covid test has been required to transit the Panama Canal.

[Gray Lady]

15 minutes ago, Btimmer said:

Keep in mind that a Covid test has been required to transit the Panama Canal.

That is fine with me! Maybe more people will be more cognizant of their behavior if that is required. 

[WishboneS]

14 hours ago, Gray Lady said:

That is fine with me! Maybe more people will be more cognizant of their behavior if that is required. 

Panama is a great cruise.  We want to go again in the future.  We want to do the new Locks.  I don't mind getting tested happy to do it.  I mind the inability of getting the test results in a timely manner, but that's a whole other saga for us.  I think Alaska is probably having bigger issues because its more secluded and the people have not had so many opportunities to get the virus and perhaps don't realize they are spreading it.  Hopefully next year will be a better year.  There are amazing deals out there for all cruises.  oh the decisions 🙂

[Essiesmom]

Princess had to cancel some cruise tours because they couldn’t hire enough staff to open one of their lodges.  The summer hire pool of college students just wasn’t there.  Maybe HAL had the same issue.  EM

[Gray Lady]

5 hours ago, WishboneS said:

Panama is a great cruise.  We want to go again in the future.  We want to do the new Locks.  I don't mind getting tested happy to do it.  I mind the inability of getting the test results in a timely manner, but that's a whole other saga for us.  I think Alaska is probably having bigger issues because its more secluded and the people have not had so many opportunities to get the virus and perhaps don't realize they are spreading it.  Hopefully next year will be a better year.  There are amazing deals out there for all cruises.  oh the decisions 🙂

Since we have never been through the canal, or been on any cruise ship, do you have a favorite or two you would recommend? We were supposed to go on the NA in Alaska. I am guessing the minimum cabin would be one with a balcony? 
As for testing, I am in complete agreement with our great blogger here: Total Testing Solutions is the absolute best way to go. You do it on your timeline, and they don’t end the call until the results are in your inbox. 

[WishboneS]

On 7/12/2022 at 5:15 PM, Gray Lady said:

Since we have never been through the canal, or been on any cruise ship, do you have a favorite or two you would recommend? We were supposed to go on the NA in Alaska. I am guessing the minimum cabin would be one with a balcony? 
As for testing, I am in complete agreement with our great blogger here: Total Testing Solutions is the absolute best way to go. You do it on your timeline, and they don’t end the call until the results are in your inbox. 

We did the Canal many years ago.  We did the old locks.  We have traveled on many different lines Everything has changed over the years.  Family requirements and what you like to do helps drive which cruises you may want to do.  We started cruising when we were young and had children, back then we looked for cruise lines that were more for younger crowds.  Being retired now we are branching out and we are finding we like Celebrity, Holland, and Princess.  Each has its positives and negatives.  Our favorite is Viking but they are a bit more expensive.  Princess and Celebrity have a good mix of age groups, Holland has been for the older crowd in our opinion.  Do your research and figure out what you want from your cruise, relaxation or party atmosphere etc....Price, and what type of accommodations you might need or want can drive your decisions as well.  We try to budget our money a bit so we usually do inside cabins but for Alaska and the Panama Canal I would defiantly book

a balcony cabin. We have done a Viking this year and a Princess cruise so far this year, Alaska cancelled with Holland.  Had two great cruises so far.  Hope this helps.  Safe travels to you.

[Gray Lady]

23 minutes ago, WishboneS said:

We did the Canal many years ago.  We did the old locks.  We have traveled on many different lines Everything has changed over the years.  Family requirements and what you like to do helps drive which cruises you may want to do.  We started cruising when we were young and had children, back then we looked for cruise lines that were more for younger crowds.  Being retired now we are branching out and we are finding we like Celebrity, Holland, and Princess.  Each has its positives and negatives.  Our favorite is Viking but they are a bit more expensive.  Princess and Celebrity have a good mix of age groups, Holland has been for the older crowd in our opinion.  Do your research and figure out what you want from your cruise, relaxation or party atmosphere etc....Price, and what type of accommodations you might need or want can drive your decisions as well.  We try to budget our money a bit so we usually do inside cabins but for Alaska and the Panama Canal I would defiantly book

a balcony cabin. We have done a Viking this year and a Princess cruise so far this year, Alaska cancelled with Holland.  Had two great cruises so far.  Hope this helps.  Safe travels to you.

Thank you. From what I have read, I would consider sailing on Celebrity, Princess, or HAL. We do not care for the party atmosphere. It also seems that any of the Panama Canal cruises would be 15 to 17 days. I will look into Viking. We saved 4 years for our Alaskan cruise that we didn’t get to go on. We picked a Signature Suite because we wanted a room more like a hotel room in size. We just want to have more of a traditional experience for our first cruise. I picked HAL more for the itinerary, though. To me that is the most important thing. I appreciate all of the information. When researching Alaska, I found that reading/listening to others who had went on cruises there helped immensely. 

[Btimmer]

Based upon our experiences, we'd definitely take our grandkids on HAL. We're not interesting in supervising them on rock climbing, water slides, etc.  The creative programming in Club Hal really resonated with our granddaughter.

 

I definitely recommend a balcony for Alaska; not for the canal.  For the canal, the bow on HAL is the best, followed by the Crow's Nest, and Lido Aft.

[Gray Lady]

51 minutes ago, Btimmer said:

Based upon our experiences, we'd definitely take our grandkids on HAL. We're not interesting in supervising them on rock climbing, water slides, etc.  The creative programming in Club Hal really resonated with our granddaughter.

 

I definitely recommend a balcony for Alaska; not for the canal.  For the canal, the bow on HAL is the best, followed by the Crow's Nest, and Lido Aft.

Thank you for sharing your experience. Do you have any ships that you recommend?

[Btimmer]

22 minutes ago, Gray Lady said:

Thank you for sharing your experience. Do you have any ships that you recommend?

We sail itinerary with a secondary choice of ship.  However, we chose the Noordam specifically because we had never sailed on it.  We chose Quantum of the Seas in May because it was a large ship and the balcony price was so good.  Upcoming we're on the Nieuw Statendam  because of the itinerary to Greenland and Iceland.  After that we're on the Westerdam because it's the last HAL ship we've not sailed on plus we love the itinerary and we got a screaming deal on the fare.

 

 

[CMDE]

This is a great review! Brings back memories of a cruise we took that left Whittier in 2005 (so long ago). Lovely to see your fantastic photos.

[cruisequeen4ever]

I always enjoy reading your blogs, and this one was especially fun with your granddaughter along. It’s such a special experience to share with her; you are wonderful grandparents to want to share it with her. I remember getting hooked on cruising at age 8 and on a Holland America ship.