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Pit Cruising Thread

cookoutdeac said:
Nice, a trip exploring the interior is definitely on my bucket list now that I've seen the stuff on the waterways, that sounds awesome you get to do both in one trip. Also TIL you grew up in Alaska!
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It's big enough you could spend a month there and still feel like you missed a ton.

This is the last full summer the 17 year old will be home, so figured it was time for a mega trip.

Spent the first 12.5 years of my life there before moving to AZ. My parents apparently hate moderate weather.
 
We really enjoyed the Ovation on our Alaskan cruise last year. The Seaplex is a must for active children, especially teens. It will be hard to adjust to not having the Seaplex when we do the Icon next year.
 
PhDeac said:
We really enjoyed the Ovation on our Alaskan cruise last year. The Seaplex is a must for active children, especially teens. It will be hard to adjust to not having the Seaplex when we do the Icon next year.
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I'm pretty confident they will have plenty to do on Icon lol.
 
Liquid Karma said:
I'm pretty confident they will have plenty to do on Icon lol.
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Oh sure. But the ship seems geared toward little children to compete with Disney. My boys aren’t into swimming and water parks as much as they used to be.
 
Have been tracking RCL prices and I switched from a Oceanview GTY on the Voyager of the Seas to a Spacious Promenade room on the Liberty of the Seas, for $300 more dollars.
 
myDeaconmyhand said:
Have been tracking RCL prices and I switched from a Oceanview GTY on the Voyager of the Seas to a Spacious Promenade room on the Liberty of the Seas, for $300 more dollars.
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Nice! I'm a fan of the promenade view rooms. You have a big party going?
 
My wife is going on a cruise in April with my son, his wife and his mil. Holy shit, this is costing me a bunch of money. The 2 parents decided that they would pay for the adult kids and my checking account keeps going down. Now my wife wants a scooter cause her wheelchair will be inconvenient.

I’m going to party my ass off while she is gone for 9 days.
 
Mt. Olive said:
My wife is going on a cruise in April with my son, his wife and his mil. Holy shit, this is costing me a bunch of money. The 2 parents decided that they would pay for the adult kids and my checking account keeps going down. Now my wife wants a scooter cause her wheelchair will be inconvenient.

I’m going to party my ass off while she is gone for 9 days.
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If you want to talk specifics of wheelchairs vs scooters feel free to PM me. Scooters are helpful for things like zoos or Disney but they have a big turning radius because of the wider wheelbase so they can be tough on something like a cruise ship.

Might be worth talking to a wheelchair vendor about a group 2 rental instead of a scooter type of chair.
 
Anybody have any experience on Princess cruises? I read it is like Celebrity (which we love) but the ships look so different so my brain is having trouble reconciling that.

We decided to surprise the kid on her 6th birthday with a cruise so were looking at that weekend and the Enchanted Princess (relatively new ship, 2019) had some really good deals for their mini-suites. Those rooms don't come with anything too special over balcony/OV/or inside rooms, but we like the room that larger staterooms afford. Upped to Princess Premier for that 'all-inclusive' feeling (upgrading to Plus is a no-brainier if you're going to get a drink package anyway), but I know nothing about the cruise line other than what I've seen on YouTube and that it was on Loveboat. That's it. That's the list.

Going in June this year and sailing to Cozumel, Roatan, Belize City (excited about this one-first time), and Costa Maya.
We were super bummed when I tried to book with Maya Chan in Costa Maya but they emailed back that they are shutting down for 'hurricane season' from June 1 - Aug 31. Never mind the fact that hurricanes don't really happen in the Western Caribbean until the latter part of July at the earliest. Argh. Costa Maya has been on my wife and my bucket list for a while now. Old and overweight Mexican grandmas hand-making tortillas for the lunch? Yes. I want all of that.


ETA: We aren't going to tell her about it until the day before embarkation when we are going to fly down to FLL. Tell her that morning to pack a suitcase because we go on a cruise the next day on her birthday. If she doesn't freak out that morning then I am going to be le disappointed.
 
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deacvision7 said:
details! details!
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Doing a 7 night southbound Alaska cruise in June.

I'll text you our private resort spot in Costa Maya, which was $60 pp, remote, and awesome. I can also give you a rec for Belize City and Roatan. Keep in mind, Belize City will not dock at a traditional port.

Also, need to text you back about spring break. Lots of moving pieces on our end that currently have things up in the air.
 
Our last cruise was a SEA to VAN, which 4 days were to and from Alaska. Spending more time in AK this cruise.
 

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We are looking at a big Alaska cruise summer 2025. I'm blown away by how much more expensive those cruise rates are as I've never really looked at an Alaska cruise before. Each rate seems to be about 25-40% higher than a Caribbean cruise.

Makes sense after thinking about it, but some sticker shock hit me for sure. haha
 
tsywake said:
Our last cruise was a SEA to VAN, which 4 days were to and from Alaska. Spending more time in AK this cruise.
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I noticed this and why I think I like the Alaskan "repositioning" cruises more that start and end in different ports.

But I could get Sky Class on Harmony out of Galveston for the same price as just a balcony on Ovation in Alaska. That's kinda wild.


Also, completely unrelated, but I want everyone that books cruises to know about CruiseCompete.com. Your cruise rate won't really change but your OBC offers will 100% increase through it if you wait long enough to book. We just got about 150 more in OBC for our week long cruise by using cruise compete than we would have gotten just booking straight through the same agency without using CC. (I dummy booked to check.) Just a pro-tip I've learned along the way. cruiseplum.com is another good resource to research lots of the big cruise line offerings at the same time and is a great website - but you cannot book through them, just an information site.
 
For our AK cruise, we combined our casino offers and ended up booking a 2 BR suite for half price. AK is expensive in general, but hands down the most beautiful and amazing cruise I've ever taken.
 
Oh, it is bucket list, along with Norwegian Fjords. (Panama Canal - my ultimate wish, but 15 days minimum is hard to figure out with two work schedules)

Our best offers from casinos, funnily enough, are from Celelbrity, which we haven't cruised since 2016. Still offering us free oceanviews for 2 in mailers.

I love MSC Yacht Club but their casino offers are utter shit.
 
deacvision7 said:
I noticed this and why I think I like the Alaskan "repositioning" cruises more that start and end in different ports.

But I could get Sky Class on Harmony out of Galveston for the same price as just a balcony on Ovation in Alaska. That's kinda wild.


Also, completely unrelated, but I want everyone that books cruises to know about CruiseCompete.com. Your cruise rate won't really change but your OBC offers will 100% increase through it if you wait long enough to book. We just got about 150 more in OBC for our week long cruise by using cruise compete than we would have gotten just booking straight through the same agency without using CC. (I dummy booked to check.) Just a pro-tip I've learned along the way. cruiseplum.com is another good resource to research lots of the big cruise line offerings at the same time and is a great website - but you cannot book through them, just an information site.
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Huge fan of CruiseCompete. I send everyone there who asks for help finding deals. One thing to keep in mind is if you book through an agent that you find on there, make sure their OBC offer is still valid if you reprice the cruise on the chance the fare drops later.
 
deacvision7 said:
Oh, it is bucket list, along with Norwegian Fjords. (Panama Canal - my ultimate wish, but 15 days minimum is hard to figure out with two work schedules)

Our best offers from casinos, funnily enough, are from Celelbrity, which we haven't cruised since 2016. Still offering us free oceanviews for 2 in mailers.

I love MSC Yacht Club but their casino offers are utter shit.
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It's cheaper to just fly down to Panama, stay at a resort for a week and book a 1 day transit through the canal. I did it in 2018.

I'd expect any cruise going thru the canal during their drought right now is paying a huge premium in price.
 
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