First time cruiser - My wife and I are taking the Volendam Alaska cruise next week. Can anyone give us advise on the following:
1. Can you bring bottles of wine/champagne on board in your carry on or checked luggage. And is there a corkage fee and what might it be for wine drank in your room vs wine drank at dinner?
2.If they are automatically applying a daily amount for tips to your account,do you tip beyond this and to who? Any suggestions from
experienced cruisers.
I am not sure about HAL policy on bringing your own on board, but if they do allow, I am sure, like other lines, they will take it and charge a corkage fee. Check their website. Another option is ordering it before you leave - it will be in your cabin when you arrive. As to tipping - if you order from room service, look to tip the delivery person 1 or 2 dollars each delivery; if your room service, wait staff service is exceptional, you may want to tip your steward, server and asst server more at the end of the trip. If you frequent one particular lounge and have the same server who remembers your name and what you drink, you may want to tip that person. Also, you will want to tip the porters on the dock who take your luggage to and from the ship.
You can take wine on board however there is a $15.00 cork fee in the dining room (which I thought was WAY too pricey). I do suggest putting bottles in your carry on luggage. My husband had a bottle in his checked luggage and it broke! We just brought our wine into the dining room in the special 'coke' container you get if you buy the coke card! (If you are a soda drinker, I do recommend the card) Tips are automaticly added to your bill each day. If someone does something "extra" it is customary to tip them i.e. bringing you a drink. We also tipped any special delivery to our room i.e. room service, ice. Have a great cruise!!!!! Take heed though, they are VERY addictive! HA !
Quote:
Originally posted by Peldog:
First time cruiser - My wife and I are taking the Volendam Alaska cruise next week. Can anyone give us advise on the following:
1. Can you bring bottles of wine/champagne on board in your carry on or checked luggage. And is there a corkage fee and what might it be for wine drank in your room vs wine drank at dinner?
2.If they are automatically applying a daily amount for tips to your account,do you tip beyond this and to who? Any suggestions from
experienced cruisers.
Thanks for your feedback on our questions.We are so looking foward to our first cruise.Can't wait to set sail Wednesday.
A quick question for clarification :
Would you be also paying corkage fees for wine drank in your room ?
Thanks again for the information. This site has been very helpful to get little bits of inside information for first time cruisers. We are almost packed and ready to go for Wed. Look out Alaska here we come.A special way to spend our 25th anniversity...
We always take a few bottles with us, but never have brought our own to the dining room though, I believe thier (HAL) policy is that you're not allowed to bring any alcohol with you. I smuggle ours aboard and never have any problems. A travel agent suggested that I use empty ginger ale bottles and fill them with Rum or Vodka or ??, but I thought they might leak, so I risked it all and brought the bottles in the luggage as is. So far no problems on HAL or any of the other lines we've traveled with. Went on Voledam 2 years ago on a Southern Caribbean, had the best time. Hope you have fun!
I spoke with Holland and they said I could bring wine and champagne on board, no problem, so we're bringing 12 bottles and bought little plastic wine openers ($3 @ liquor store) for our room. There is a corking fee, so we plan on having our first glass in our room, then take only 1 or 2 bottles to the table, we're a party of 7. The hard liquor we're packing in luggage in bubble wrap and zip lock bags. They said we couldn't bring hard liquor. Good Luck and Have Fun.
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