Can you take wine on board?

[flvol77]

with princess they let you take up to two bottles per person on board to enjoy in your stateroom....can you do this? Is their a corkage fee? I have heard you can't.

 

If not can you buy a couple of bottles of wine before hand through NCL and have them in some kind bar set up? Please help?/? My Wife loves her wine before hand dinner on our balcony.

 

Thanx

[neverthought]

with princess they let you take up to two bottles per person on board to enjoy in your stateroom....can you do this? Is their a corkage fee? I have heard you can't.

 

If not can you buy a couple of bottles of wine before hand through NCL and have them in some kind bar set up? Please help?/? My Wife loves her wine before hand dinner on our balcony.

 

Thanx

 

You can bring wine onboard @ a $15/bottle corkage fee. They do have bar setups available, you may email shipcoordinator(insert ship name).com. Liquor runs from $40-$55, also available is the anniversary pkg.(check NCL.com) and that is $79...we have it each time we cruise. Great value. Hope this helps some.:D

[KeystoneCruiser]

You can take wine on board NCL ships but you do have to pay a corkage fee for each bottle that you take. ($15 each I believe) You can also request a bar set up. Do a search for bar setups because there was a good thread on that subject just a few days ago.

[shoreguy]

As posted you can bring your own but $15 corkage is paid when you board.

 

You can pre order wine by calling reservations.

 

http://www.ncl.com/more/bon_voyage.htm

 

Best bet you can bring a bottle back to the cabin from any bar or resturant onboard or call room service - same price as pre order but better selection onboard.

 

http://www.ncl.com/more/wine_list.htm

[flvol77]

As posted you can bring your own but $15 corkage is paid when you board.

 

You can pre order wine by calling reservations.

 

http://www.ncl.com/more/bon_voyage.htm

 

Best bet you can bring a bottle back to the cabin from any bar or resturant onboard or call room service - same price as pre order but better selection onboard.

 

http://www.ncl.com/more/wine_list.htm

 

So you can go to any bar and say I would like a bottle of merlot and and two glasses and take it back to your room? Has anyone done this?

 

Also on the corkage fee...how does that work? Because my wife isn't going to take any of the wine to the dining room. It is going to be in our room only. When we check in, do we say yeah we have two bottles of wine or what and they will charge us our $15 per bottle and we can take it to our room? Because of the first things she likes to have is a glass of wine in the room to unwind (from my driving down to port of course :) )

 

Thanx

[shoreguy]

So you can go to any bar and say I would like a bottle of merlot and and two glasses and take it back to your room? Has anyone done this? What kind of cost for a bottle of wine?

 

Also on the corkage fee...how does that work? Because my wife isn't going to take any of the wine to the dining room. It is going to be in our room only. When we check in, do we say yeah we have two bottles of wine or what and they will charge us our $15 per bottle and we can take it to our room?

 

Thanx

 

I will try and make it clear - they scan all luggage if the find wine they will ask you to pay corkage (sign a slip ) put a sticker on it or it you don't wish to pay hold the bottles untill the end of the cruise. You can now bring it to dinner or drink it in your cabin. They treat all personal wine the same.

 

Part one: I for one have perhaps picked up or order from room service 25 bottles of wine. No problem. The prices are on the wine list I posted in the link to above. They will add 15% gratuity.

http://www.ncl.com/more/wine_list.htm

[uneamie]

I believe that you have to let them know before boarding that you have the wine at check in. Do not pack it in your checked luggage. Pack it in your carry on so you can claim it before boarding. They usualy give you a receipt showing you paid the corkage fee etc...at least that is what they did last time we cruised.

 

However, the easiest thing to do is order your wine from their web sit so that it is delivered to your room. I ordered 3 bottles of merlot and they were there when we arrived. I am not fussy about the brand I drink so I ordered an inexpensive merlot....I think at the time it was around $15 or so. It saved the hassel of claiming and carrying around wine bought a home.

 

Hope this helps. :)

[Mc_Cruiser]

At the rate at which NCL seem to be increasing the prices of wine onboard, the $15 is becoming a pretty good deal. Wine prices have been increased several times during the last year, but thankfully the $15 corkage has stayed the same. So far we haven't used this, but for our Transatlantic cruise in December we will be bringing some bottles of Wine and bubbly. Happy to pay the corkage as it will still mean a lower bar bill at the end of the cruise than otherwise ;)

[garycarla]

I believe that you have to let them know before boarding that you have the wine at check in. .... :)

 

NCL wishes you would do this - then they do not have to search your bags and they can collect their money quicker. ROFLMAO

 

By the way, I think we have set a record regarding questions about wine/booze. People used to start a new message thread every 5-7 days. I think it has been well over two weeks since the last one. Cool.

 

PS - Important message from the board moderator here

[flvol77]

To avoid the hassle I am going to tell them I have two bottles. Looking at that wine list the 15 fee is nothing, especially considering one of my friends is a wine rep and can buy the wine from him that my wife likes for next to nothing....She like Eco Domani Merlot....and they don't have it on the list and I can buy it for around 3-5 bucks a bottle through him.

[LuxuryCruise]

In looking at that wine list I think my plan will be to buy onboard....that is if the prices/selection are similar to the list.

 

We have plenty of wines we like in the $5-10 range and if you add the $15 corkage, we are at $20-25. I saw numerous $26 bottles that I would be OK with and some in the $30-35. For me, it boiled down to the question of if I wanted to go through the hassle and weight to save $5-10 bucks per bottle....my answer was no.

 

Now more expensive selections might be another story and I think I will bring something we picked up in Santa Barbara and maybe a celebratory offering and settle for the $15 charge.

[northwoods2]

It seems crazy to pay a $15 corkage fee on a $9 bottle of wine. But it is a lot cheaper. Don't forget to add the 15% gratuity to the ship prices.

 

Does anyone know - do they charge just $15 for the larger 1.5 bottles?

[LuxuryCruise]

It seems crazy to pay a $15 corkage fee on a $9 bottle of wine. But it is a lot cheaper. Don't forget to add the 15% gratuity to the ship prices.

 

Does anyone know - do they charge just $15 for the larger 1.5 bottles?

Oops, forgot the gratuity in my analysis.

 

Good point about the larger bottles....if they are only $15, that might be the way to go and I'm going to bring a wine stopper in case I have leftover for the next day. Regardless, I think I'm going to take a wine stopper since they are easier than pushing the cork back in and reremoving it.

 

Cheers for this fun thread.....whatever we decide on this topic, it'll end up being the right decision and extra fun! And after the first glass I doubt we'll be thinking about they few dollar difference we are talking about!

[LuxuryCruise]

I will try and make it clear - they scan all luggage if the find wine they will ask you to pay corkage (sign a slip ) put a sticker on it or it you don't wish to pay hold the bottles untill the end of the cruise. You can now bring it to dinner or drink it in your cabin. They treat all personal wine the same.

 

Part one: I for one have perhaps picked up or order from room service 25 bottles of wine. No problem. The prices are on the wine list I posted in the link to above. They will add 15% gratuity.

http://www.ncl.com/more/wine_list.htm

I am a little worried about the list that both you linked above. I found a NCL America specific wine list: http://www.ncl.com/download/faxback/4900.pdf

 

....and it is several pages shorter!!!!! The only thing that calms my fear a little is that it is dated on the top as 2005 as opposed to the other list that has 2006 on top. But, both lists can be found linked on this NCL webpage: http://www.ncl.com/more/faxback_main.htm

 

You would think that if the NCL America was no longer valid, they would have deleted it.

 

I'll end on a good note however....it appeared to have a couple less expensive bottles...not by much, but it helps.

[Mc_Cruiser]

I would expect a wine list from 2005 to be well out of date now, as I can't imagine NCL America is not increasing wine prices to offset fuel costs like the rest of the fleet. The price of wine went up even in 2006 between a cruise in April and one in July.

 

I do think the increases are back firing on NCL. On the Dream in the Baltics last month there were very few people with wine on their tables in the restuarunts compared with the majority drinking wine last year on the Dream in Alaska, and the two cruises are a similar crowd.

[theabteam]

Thanks for all the great tips here! My husband and I are wine drinkers too, so this is really good information for us. We'll definitely be purchasing wine on board as we're flying into Hawaii and then staying in a couple different hotels before getting on board POH, so we don't want to have to lug bottles around everywhere with us and (God-forbid) break a bottle after all that trouble.

 

So... a couple silly questions... the links to the wine lists provided in the posts above... will they be available online or just to pre-order ahead of time? We did pre-order one of the bon voyage packages already (bottle of non-descript red wine with bowl of fruit... did not realize there was a better wine list to choose from at the time!) Also, will a cork screw be provided in cabins? I'm guessing trying to bring corkscrews on airplanes these days would be a big no-no... And I would actually prefer them to deliver the wine to our stateroom unopened for us to open at our leisure when we're ready to drink. Is that possible?

 

Thanks in advance,

[garycarla]

...Also, will a cork screw be provided in cabins? I'm guessing trying to bring corkscrews on airplanes these days would be a big no-no... ...

 

Actually, for the past few years you could even take those little hotel giveaway corkscrews in your carryon. The bigger ones were not allowed - at least by the rules that is. We have taken them without any problem.

 

You have ALWAYS been able to take just about anything in your checked bags short of a machine gun. And the current rules really have not changed much for carry on other than some liquids.