barbeyg

@JeffB Thanks for the firsthand report. Those seem to be mostly reassuring, and a reason we are reconsidering sailing in December. ?

Ours are with our passports as well, stored in our safe. ?

To add to @BrianB, when I dry my hands in the public restroom (on land and ship), I take the paper towel with me, and use that for contact with doors, handrails, etc. Just drop it in the garbage when I get where I'm going. We love sailing in December, when the flu and Noro are usually hanging around. We have had Noro once, and once is more than enough for both of us. ?

I checked pricing on our AK cruise next May when this thread first came out, and there was less than $20 difference on our two balcony cabins. I was good with that because I had just saved over $1100 total on the two cabins last month during a sale. That was a real thrill, let me tell you! lol Then, yesterday, just for the fun of it, I checked again, and lo and behold, we saved an additional $420 total between the two cabins! I usually check when new sales come out, but will have to check more frequently now. I don't really expect any more discounts on AK, even though I will check. The balcony pricing is as low as it was just before the cruises were cancelled back in 2020. Thanks for the heads up, OP!

I’m sorry. I didn’t understand the rules. ?

We were on an early December sailing once, right after the beautiful decorations had been put up, and observed a woman walk up to the elaborate gingerbread village, and break off a piece of one of the roofs to eat. As if we don't get fed enough on the ship. lol On another cruise, we ate breakfast in the Windjammer at the same time that an older gentleman did...in his robe and slippers. ? We got to enjoy his eccentricity 2 separate days. If you were on an Alaskan cruise back in May 2016, and saw a tall, skinny teenage boy eat three plates heaped full of donuts for breakfast in the Windjammer (27 by his count)....yes, we did teach him to eat a decent meal. And no, we weren't eating with him. He finally fessed up long after the cruise. ? Hmmmm. All our strange encounters involve food. ?

I agree with @AshleyDilloabout Ketchikan. The downtown area is nice and very walkable. We had hoped to go to Totem Bight State Park, but it was a rainy day. So we donned our rainjackets and trampled around town. http://dnr.alaska.gov/parks/aspunits/southeast/totembigshp.htm We walked around Creek Street, tasting samples of smoked salmon along the way, and ended up on the Married Man's Trail, which took us up to a beautiful oversight of the area, plus Cape Fox Lodge and some totem poles to see: https://ketchikannow.com/2015/09/married-mans-trail/\ We meandered back down the hillside, and ended up watching a guy fishing as the salmon were jumping upstream. He caught a salmon on his line and we watched this fish literally jump and dance on the top of the river until it snapped his line. It was amazing to see the strength of this fish, and the guy who lost his hook, looked over and yelled, "Did you see that?!?!" ? We also went to the Totem Heritage Center. It was a great way to pass the time during a heavier downpour: https://www.experienceketchikan.com/totem-heritage-center.html It was a great day. ?

Wondering....are Kraken Coladas $13? Or can we order and pay the difference? Asking for a friend. ?

Thanks! Our state also has records we can request. I just requested ours, and it will be 4-6 weeks by email. Also wanted to say that for those of you who have an online account with the pharmacy where you received the injection(s), you can retrieve the detail of that in your account. I snipped the details of ours just in case the state takes a while to send the info. ?

Hope you have great great trips! Hope to do a Halloween trip one day. Sounds like fun! ?

Hope you have a great cruise! ? We feel the same way about sailing.

Thanks, Matt. ? We sorta figured that would be the downside to it. We plan to look across the entire east Coast (we are in TN) and Celebrity. But would be prepared for not finding something, and turn to vrbo for a deal, if we couldn’t sail. ? We really, really miss cruising, but our next opportunity is December. Sigh. Shouldn’t have planned that trip to see family next month. ?

I’m a planner. Heck, most cruises are booked right after they go on sale, just so I can reprice as time passes. ? We have multiple FCCs plopped on our AK cruise next May, enough so that it is just about paid off with FCCs, and most of them are from deposits only! We have another cruise booked for next December, to belatedly celebrate our 35th anniversary. Other than that, we cancelled our Dec 2021 cruise on Odyssey that we were really looking forward to, because of lots of reasons, not just the testing beforehand. A lot of it had to do with the uncertainty of the ports of call, and the ever-changing Covid rules by each island. We are now just going to observe for the rest of this year, and when we get about 2 weeks ahead of upcoming vacation dates, see what the current rules are for sailing and the islands. If it looks good, we will check around for a cruise to hop on. If that happens, great, if not, we will do another land vacation. Figure it will be a great rehearsal for retirement, when we plan to somewhat ‘wing it’ for cruising anyway. ? Anyone else decide to just book close-in for cruises right now? Anyone do this regularly, and have tips for newbies to this practice?

Yet another example of the truth being ‘enhanced’ and ‘dramatized’ for clickbait articles. ? There are a lot of straightforward news reports about Covid with great info…and then there are those like this. I had to wonder how much research went into this report at all.

As much as I would love to be on a ship again, the ever-changing rules have worn me down personally. I just cancelled our Odyssey December cruise before final payment, so we wouldn’t tie up an additional $5k we would be unable to spend by their deadline. If things calm down between now and December, we might try to book last minute on any ship that week. If we can’t, we will just do a last minute VRBO somewhere. I love planning our trips, it’s almost as much fun for me as the trip itself. (Yes, I’m weird.) This flipping and flopping would have me fretting every time the rules changed. Or every time there was a court ruling that flipped. Gosh, I will be so thankful when this all finally calms down. ?

So glad to hear that! We also are booked with her for next May. Cannot wait! Have a wonderful trip, and may your whale-watching cruise be exceptional! ?

Yes! It means you are still in the running. Hope you get it. ?

Thanks for sharing! It is really beautiful. ? So glad you get to enjoy it during the summer season. What an experience any kind of major home improvement can be! We had a neighbor’s tree fall on our attached garage during a freak wind event, and the ordeal of an engineer redesign of our roof structure, having it stick-built, along with all the necessary repairs, whew! Went right into a major master bath upgrade immediately afterwards. Figured we were in that ‘reno mindset’ already. Couldn’t get much more painful, right? ??? Went around quoting The Money Pit. “Two weeks, two weeks!” ?

My pleasure. We are currently in the process of booking right now ourselves. ? I smaller boat whale-watching excursions. Such a different experience from the bigger boats. ? And nothing quite like the sound of a humpback blowing as he/she surfaces, or the rush from seeing a breach. Hope you have a fantastic trip!

We sailed with Glacier Winds in ISP, and I highly recommend them. As a matter of fact, we will be booking with them again next time. ? Small boat trip, very personable captain. We had a great time. https://www.g-wind.com/about-us/ And before Covid cancelled our AK trip in 2020, we had Jayleen scheduled in Juneau. Had reserched, and she had excellent reviews. All funds were promptly refunded when we had to cancel. Here is her site: https://jayleensalaska.com We would book with her again after our experience with service.

You are not alone. We may cancel our next before final payment for these reasons. Going on vacation shouldn’t cause worry or stress. Some of us live in places where testing is expensive due to insurance not covering for travel, and results can be delayed. Not worth the cost or fretting over it…even for a cruise. ? We have a month to think about it ourselves. I suggest not rushing to a decision, but make the best one for you. ? Hope we all can cruise again soon.

Because of Delta, we have started ordering grocery pick up for now, we aren’t eating inside restaurants (pickup or outdoor seating only), no unnecessary appointments, etc. Sorta like last year, just without masks. ? We would wear them if we felt uncomfortable going into a situation. We aren’t doing this to be able to cruise, but to try to avoid Delta. My family at home has been seriously affected by Delta. Went thru my sister’s family like a brush fire. Very contagious, and the original case was a vaccinated sibling. All the rest are unvaccinated 20-50 year olds. ? Don’t know about their children, none are symptomatic for now. All quarantining. We will do the same things for a couple weeks before our cruise, if we don’t cancel.

This. I’m not interested in spending another $300 (for 2 tested locally) to cruise, then fret over whether or not we will get results in time (they can be delayed here). I would gladly pay at cost to RCI. ? It would make me sad to delay our December cruise, but will if this stands as is when final payment rolls around. Too much stress for a vacation. We will just travel elsewhere and hope the situation improves before our next scheduled cruise. ?

I echo the inside cabins for the reasons stated, AND the connecting cabins. We did a balcony guarantee once, and it had a connecting cabin. We heard the man in the next cabin talking loudly on his phone about his casino game plan with someone on embarkation day. Thankfully, he must have spent the entire cruise in the casino because we never heard him again after that loud hour-long conversation. ? Never again.

For those interested in just the medical coverage, there are annual policies out there just for that. GEOBlue, Trawick, Allianz, and others have medical insurance and medivac coverage only, if that is what you are looking for. We are looking into this ourselves. And many of them now cover Covid as well. ?