Joanandjoe

If you're going to Gatun Lake, you will have a partial canal transit, so you won't need our suggestions in Panama. Look into eco tours. In Costa Rica, trust us, the tent tours were quite reliable.

Look up the hotel on www.tripadvisor.com. Old San Juan is very close to the port. When we were in San Juan, we met a friend (my law school roommate) in front of a hotel that was a block from the port. It may have been that hotel.

If you're planning on arriving two days in advance, you probably will want to be oin Manhattan. There are plenty of cabs to Manhattan, plus a shuttle bus, plus a monorail that takes you to a train into NYC. Getting into manhattan is not rocket science. If you find that staying in Manhattan is daunting (althought, really, the only thing daunting is the cost), there is a Sheraton Suites on the Hudson hotel that is right by a ferry to NYC. On the day of the cruise, the ferry will drop you very near the cruise terminal.

I thought we'd be bored out of our skulls. Wrong, wrong, wrong!

You've actually found a ship where the lobster is worth eating? I haven't even seen that on the luxury lines: the best I've seen are lobster tails, which don't begin to compare with a fresh "Maine" lobster at home. I did have wonderful lobster on a cruise, but that was on shore, in Prince Edward Island. ("Maine" is in quotes because you can get the same lobster at the dock in the Maritime provinces and as far south as southern New England.)

We've been to Colon and Puerto Limon. If you transit the canal, we have no suggestion, since both of our suggestions assume that there is no transit. We took the ferry excursion from the Pacific end of the Canal through the first two locks. Definitely the experience to have if your cruise ship doesn't enter the canal. Alternatively, take the observation train across the country. Either way is a great way to get a canal experience; but we think being right on the canal is best. I understand that, for canal transits, there are some interesting excursions; but the best excursion is staying on the ship as you go through the canal. As for Puerto Limon, we joined up with several other cruisers, and went to the big tent booth on the dock. (It was a green tent when we went, but they change colors occasionally). There we looked at a choice of tours offered at less than half of the ship's prices, and took one that involved a boat trip through canals in the national park (we even saw a sloth in a tree), a visit to a banana plantation, and one or two other stops (including a chocolate related stop which Joe, who is allergic, had to skip). It was quite inexpensive and quite memorable. The we did some shopping in the town, and bought a guayabara shirt for Joe, a blouse for Joan, some coffee, some wonderful nuts, and other stuff. Brutally hot weather, but interesting.

My favorite meal is any meal on a ship. However, that's true for most of us. I guess what you want is a description of the most memorable meals at sea. For us, a strong contender would be the breaksfasts on the new Noordam, for suite PAX only, at the Pinnacle Grill. Simlpy a decadent, relaxing, luxurious experience, with fabulous food and wonderful service. For us, a much better experience than the Pinnacle Grill in the evening. We are big breakfast eaters, and are definitely not meat and potatoes people. Best dinner at sea? A tie. The best food was at the Odyssey Room, the old alternative restaurant on the Rotterdam. For us the Pinnacle Grill at dinner is many steps down from what it replaced. The best dinner experience was every meal on the Regent Seven Seas Navigator, especially the entertainmnet when the alternative restaurant was turned into an Italian steakhouse. Best lunches? A tossup between the buffets on the Wind Surf and the Seven Seas Navigator, with a slight nod to the Wind Surf. Food on both was many cuts above the buffets on the mass market lines. The seafood salads on the Wind Surf (we had perhaps 10 different ones on our 14 day cruise) were beyond belief. Having said that (and consistent with our remark about not being meat and potatoes people), it's hard to top the delicious and beautiful (our photos are amazing!) Asian buffet last December on the new Noordam. Food from four our five east Asian countries, much of it exotic, all of it delicious. If we have beef on a cruise ship (which is a rarety for us), why not beef satay? Nasi goreng, anyone?

With 860 PAX and a dress code, Angel is probably referring to Crystal. It does sound like our "luxury" cruise on the line that is now called Regent (Radisson wehen we sailed.) Even before my morning tea, I'd rather have a cheery server than a gloomy one. Actually, Regent spoiled us so much that normal service on Celebrity, our next cruise after Regent, seemed not up to standard (even though it was probably quite good).

Sure, we're not joined at the hip. On our last cruise, we had a day when Joe took a shore excursion and Joan went shopping. We like to do most things together, but a day where we do different things on vacation is a refreshing change.

Joanandjoe 11 Total 344. Isn't this information available in each crazy's profile?

The thermal suite has different costs for differebnt packages, On our 11 day Noordam cruise, the cost for two people was something like $300, which was well worth it for a cruise with 2 1/2 sea days at each end. It certainly added to our feeling of luxury. Check out the cost early in the cruise. We did not feel we needed excursions in Ketchikan or Sitka. In Ketchikan, we wandered around the town and went to see the spawning salmon. Fascinating, paticularly the people dressed in 19th century clothing as miners and women of the night! What's avialable now may be different from what we did in 1998, so check your guidebooks. In Sitka, we wandered over to the tourist office, which gave us a map that enabled us to see the totem pole park and the raptor center on our own. The Russina folklore show was sold out, mainly because of the shore excursions; but, instead, we saw a wonderful native American folk dance and folk tale performance that was of great interest to the two of us. (We're big fans of Northwest native art, whether Kwakiutal, Simishan, or other.) Much lower cost than the shore excursion, and more interesting for our tastes. In Sitka, we even had time to mail excess packages home from the post office Beware of shopping in Sitka: you may get hooked. Joan bought two Russian nesting dolls in Sitka in 1998. Now she has aabout 100. (I've just counted 99, but maybe I missed a few.) There's a lot of native and Russian stuff to buy, but shore excursions will eat into your free time. Do your homework, then do a mix of excursions and on your own. In Victoria, you ordinarily wouldn't need an excursion; but because of the crazy evening timing, one m,ight be helpful. Again, do some research, then decide.

For those of us who like small to medium size ships, there finally has been some good news recently, with new ships of 1,200 or fewer (usally much fewer) PAX planned for Silversea, Oceanea, and Seabourn, and rumored for Sea Dream. Is Regent, our favorite line, next? Will Windstar, our second favorite, go back to being a four ship line (as it was before the Wind Song fire) with a new build? We hope so! All of these will become alternatives for us. We are not fans of big ships: five of our 11 cruises have been on ships with less than 500 PAX, five 1,000 to 1,500, one 1,500 to 2,000 (and that felt gigantic to us!), none on ships with 2,000 or more PAX. For a while, it seemed as though only monsters were on the drawing board. Thank heaven that has changed!

We can help you regarding the ship, which we took to the Caribbean last year, but not with the itinerary, which is new to this ship. Our only Alaska cruise was on the Noordam - the old one - in 1998. The itinerary was very different from the Seattle round trip: leave from Seward, go to Haines, Sitka, Juneau, Ketchikan and Hubbard Glacier, end in Vancouver.

If you're familiar with the "critical" board, they have a big article on Hamilton. Of course, what you do depends on where you'll be docked, whether you want to go to a beach or play golf, etc. If you don't want golf or a beach, try one or both of the following 1) The new and wonderful Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute. Great fun, especially the simulated "deepwater submersible trip". Open every day 10-6. If you're a member of a science museum at home, you might even have reciprocal free admission. 2) Afternoon tea at a hotel such as the Fairmont Princess Hamilton. Do some research on Bermuda web sites. There's lots to do, even if stores are closed. If you're at the Dockyards and don't want the maritime institute, try a ferry ride to Hamilton and a bus back--or vice versa.

Call X or check with your TA. You'll need to have your Captain's Club # handy. I understand the pricing isn't too bad. Joe

If you've sailed on Celebrity, and are a member of the Captain's Club, you can now book the initial cruises on the new, huge, Celebrity Solstice. From today until July 4, the bookings will be open only to Captain's Club members; after that, they'll be open to the general public. See http://www.celebritycruises.com/captainscl...me.do?cS=NAVBAR That gives a link to the Solstice site, https://rccl.bridgetrack.com/07/solstice/cc...p;SRC=PGI110127 For now, the only cruises open are fairly standard 7 day Caribbean cruises, with dates from 12/14/2008 through 4/12/2009. Since most CC members seem to prefer the Caribbean, there may be some good opportunities for them. (For us, even if we loved the Caribbean, which we don't, the ship is too large and the December through April dates are unavailable for vacations.)

Definitely. Our first cruise of more than 1 night was to Alaska in 1998, and we are definitely considering taking an Alaska cruise in 2008. Because of uncertainty regarding my vacation time (I don't even know when I can take another vacation this year, much less have any clue about next year), we can't book it now, and that probably means that we won't be able to get the cabins and itinerary we want.

We've had two cruises since we made our original comments, and haven't changed our view. Including the tip in the fare won't happen unless all the cruise lines agree to do it; and that's just the opposite of how things are going in the cruise industry. The trend is toward rockbottom fares, with more and more things treated as extra cost items. As between the other two choices, for the two cruises since our response (HAL and Avalon Waterays), Avalon was true pooling of tips, which you could either pay in cash or put on your shipboard account. We also gave individual tips to our room stweard and the bar staff. Dining was a true team approach, so the pooling was appropriate. On HAL, we gave the standard tip plus individual tips. We still haven't voted.

Good work, but on our computer all we see is the original map, without the places people have added in Iberia, Scandinavia, Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia/Oceanea, and Latin America. None of the countries we added is shown: Spain, Portugal, Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Gibraltar, Morocco, Costa Rica, Panama, Honduras, and several Caribbean islands that are not shown in red. Are we missing something?

Once again we're in the minority. We've had 11 cruises (3 Europe, 3 Canada/New England, 3 Caribbean or Bahamas, Alaska, and Bermuda) including our last four vacations (totaling 5 cruises, including a B2B as 2 cruises) and 7 of our last 8 vacations (8 cruises). We're "cruised out" for awhile. Given our dislike of hot weather (ruling out Caribbean and Mexican Riviera) and the exhorbitant cost of cruising to places other than hot weather places, our cruising from now until when I retire (hopefully 3 to 5 years) will be very limited. For example, yesterday we received a Holland America brochure for the cruise we most want to take: 10 days, British Isles and Norway. The least expensive balcony room is more than $5,000 per person including air, while the cheapest suite (which is what we prefer) is about $8,600 per person. That's before tips, wine, purchases, shore excursions, laundry, transfers to and from the airport, etc. In contrast, our Holland America Caribbean cruise from New York, which we drove to, cost $2,300 per person for 11 days in a full SA suite. That's the conundrum: we can easily afford the Caribbean but don't want to go back there; while Europe, where we want to go, costs more than twice as much (in this case, about three times as much for an equivalent room). Alaska is about half way between the two extremes in cost; but we've decided not to go back until we have the time for a cruise tour, which won't happen until after I retire. If any of you can figure a way out of that situation, maybe we'll start cruising again.

We're not counting our 1972 one nighter as our "first cruise, although it is included in the total shown in our profile. Our first more than one night cruise was to Alaska in 1998 to celebrate our 30th anniversary.

On Sunday, 5/20 we saw our second concert by a group called Work o'the Weavers. They are an authorized cover group for the original Weavers--Pete Seeger, Lee Hayes, Ronnie Gilbert, and Fred Hellerman--who had a lot of huge hits in the late 40s and early 50s, and were the inspiration for such later groups as the Kingston Trio, Limeliters, Peter Paul & Mary, Brothers Four, etc. The three surviving Weavers (everyone except Lee Hayes) support the group and sometimes appear with them. The concert was fantastic. Why is that relevant to CC, other than the fact that we all seem happy when other members have a good time? Because they were giving out flyers for a Work o' the Weavers theme cruise on the Carnival Victory next summer, August 9 to 14, 2008. The cruise will be New York round trip, with two sea days, shore days on Halifax and St. John, aq cocktail party, and two Work o' the Weavers concerts. Will we go? Probably not, because we've already had three Canada-New England cruises, August is perhaps my busiest month at work, and a ship that will have over 3,000 PAX including kids is too big for us. Crazies who can travel in August might enjoy the cruise very much. I am not familiar with the cruise packager, Fan Club Cruises. The web site for this particular cruise is http://www.fanclubcruises.com/weavers.htm . If you're interested, you can check the web site. If you're interested in Work o' the Weavers, we can give more information.

Also: Cruise crazies door hangs Post it notes Hand disinfectant A lanyard or other way of wearing your room card around your neck. The front desk will punch a hole in your card to allow you to use the lanyard. Lots of dollar bills (25 or more), and a few fives, for tips to room service, tour guides, etc. If you look at the Cruise Crazies packing list, you'll see a list of most of the things you'll need, plus things to do before you leave.

We agree that it's a matter of taste; but it's also a matter of how much the cruise lines spend on food. We've been on a couple of upscale cruise lines, Regent and Windstar; and the food on both was significantly better (particularly Regent) than on the two mass market lines, Celebrity (X) and HAL, on which we've sailed. As between X and HAL, probably two thirds of cruisers like X better than HAL. We're in the minority. We found X's food to be saltier and more bland than on HAL, and we don't like either salty or bland. We also thought that X food did not reflect the areas in which the ships sailed: they have the same menu fleet wide. At least on HAL, there are some dishes to remind you that you're in the Caribbean, or Alaska, or Canada/New England. Considering how little the lines spend per passenger per day, it's amazing they do as well as they do.

We're glad we're no longer the only small ship fans on this thread.