[vpFREE] xvp - Efficient Taxi Option from NYC Cruise Port

 

As misscraps notes, a return to the airport from this week's NCL 7* Sig Cruise via taxi was a bit problematic. I'll offer up our alternative - "Dial 7" car service
(212)777-7777.

A car to LGA from the cruise terminal is about $40. Add $5 for an upgrade to a town car (which we find attractive, for the added room, and because it's easily identified in the congestion at the cruise terminal) With toll and a generous tip, our fare came to about $65 in total.

We scheduled the pick-up at 6:30a from the ship. Our driver called to say he had arrived about 25 minutes early. He patiently waited for us to call back and tell him when we had cleared customs.

Within seconds of stepping outside of the terminal, we spotted our car approaching in the drive and were on our way to the airport within a couple of minutes.

Since we weren't is a rush to make the airport (3 hours to our flight), our driver took a less heavily travelled route that provided a chance to sit back and relax from the debarkation grind.

This was our second use of this service and I can heartily recommend it.





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RE: [vpFREE] Scot Krause's LVA Players Club Bonus Points Update - 3 OCT 2014

 

Checking on this. There's been a management change. Thanks for the heads up.

Scot

From: vpFREE@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vpFREE@yahoogroups.com]
Sent: Saturday, October 04, 2014 3:57 AM
To: vpFREE@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [vpFREE] Scot Krause's LVA Players Club Bonus Points Update - 3 OCT 2014

Hooters info not correct. No Friday 5X points this month. Boothling thought all multipliers were gone this month.

Sent from my iPhone

<http://y.analytics.yahoo.com/fpc.pl?ywarid=515FB27823A7407E&a=10001310322279&js=no&resp=img>

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[vpFREE] xvp - NCL Gem New England (part 3 -- comments on the cruise)

 

The NCL Gem is a nice ship, a sister ship to the NCL Pearl and NCL Jewel
which I believe I have written about before (NCL Pearl goes to Alaska). The
entertainment was quite good with three production shows with decent
(though not the world's greatest) singers and dancers. I found all three quite
entertaining. They also had seasoned comedian Jeff Harms, who was quite
good. Second City is also onboard, and this particular troop was a bit
better than others I've seen. The only problem with this improv group is that
they have troops on a lot of NCL ships doing very similar improv comedy and
one sketch show that is almost exactly the same on each ship. Most of the
other entertainers were Filipino but pretty good. There was also a trio of
folk/celtic-type musicians with an excellent violinist onboard. The
emcee/cruise director Dan Dan was better than most NCL directors I've seen.
This particular voyage had no magician or juggling act (yippee), and very very
very few children onboard (yippie #2).

The new NCL menus in the main dining rooms were good to see, and much more
interesting. We ate in several of the specialty restaurants, Moderno
Brazilian, Cagney Steakhouse, Le Bistro French, and Teppanyaki (Japanese
Benihana style). The food was generally quite good, but the service onboard in
the restaurants (even the specialty) continues to deteriorate. Service is
SLOW in all, even when you request faster service. I think the problem is
that the wait staff is spread too thin, and there seemed to be fewer
busboys/girls than ever in both the main dining rooms and the specialty
restaurants. We enjoyed the show and food in Teppanyaki probably the best, so for us
the $25 service fee was worthwhile. Cagney's strangely had the slowest
service, but my friends loved the strip steak. I thought the potato soup was
much thinner and not as good as on previous Cagney's, and the lobster and
shrimp dinner was not great (until you added some drawn butter). The
lobster at Le Bistro for $10 extra (over the base $20 fee) was really delicious,
but not all that big, unfortunately. Unless you get the specialty
restaurants free (we each got a $65 credit from NCL on this voyage) you probably
do just as well eating in the main dining rooms for free.

Since I have gambled too much on previous NCL ships, my NCL casino status
is Golden, and that provides some very nice extras, including the ability to
eat in Cagney's for breakfast and lunch with the Haven passengers. Those
meals were very good with good service.

I'm talking a lot about the food because the food is good and plentiful and
I gained 9 pounds! My thin (130 pounds when we started) husband gained 14
pounds. Oh god, I feel so fat! (Not that I was skinny before-hand, but
now - B L O A T. My diet started today.) You can order as many
appetizers, main courses, and deserts as you want, and you really should do that if
the ones you order at first aren't good.

I still love the pecan buns at breakfast (buffet) as well as the chocolate
croissants. The Blue Lagoon (free cafe on level 8) served great wonton
soup, good fish and chips, delicious brownie sundaes with ice cream, and a lot
more. Don't order the panini sandwich. The lunch buffet had a lot of
ice cream choices including sherberts and butter pecan ice cream (now you know
how I gained those pounds).

The weather was poorish for our voyage to New England - cloudy with a bit
of rain, but we saw a lot of lovely scenery. We booked our own Halifax
taxi tour, which was good and dirt cheap (about $50 a person including a heavy
tip for the driver and $16 extra for a fresh 1 1/2 pound lobster lunch),
but the 7 person "van" was very small, not the sort of van we were expecting.
In Arcadia National Forest we took the cheaper NCL 2 hour bus tour which
only had one stop on Cadillac Mountain and tinted windows that weren't so
good (the trolley might have been better). The Bar Harbor scenic tour was
excellent, with a great guide. Newport bus tour without stops at any
mansion was a bit monotonous and didn't stop for photos. The foliage was out
in New England/Canada but not at its peak. Boston was another stop.

The NCL Gem had a few more things going on during the day than on my last
Caribbean cruise on the Jewel, but still far too many were concealed sales
pitches of one sort or another. They had pay movies on the TV in the room,
but that meant that one free movie channel was missing. Internet service
was even poorer than on most NCL ships. Since we had 5 port days, often
you could connect to normal phone service instead of ship's expensive phone
service. Look for free internet in the Boston cruise terminal.

The 6 p.m. announcement every day could be heard in every dining room,
always interupting your meal if you ate early. Announcements outside our room
could wake the dead every morning at about 7:30 a.m. and kept on going.
Do not plan to sleep late on an NCL ship. I'd forgotten just how annoying
those morning announcements can be (last two cruises we were getting up
early so I hadn't been awakened by the ding dong this is your captain telling
you what you already know announcements). And why is everything beautiful?
Every time they mentioned the name of the ship, the announcer apparently
HAD to say "beautiful NCL Gem" and every announcement mentioned "beautiful
Bar Harbor" or "beautiful Newport" or "beautiful Boston."

The gambling onboard was apparently tighter than ever, but I did hear of
two quarter royals. And don't play bingo or Deal or No Deal - you might as
well toss your money overboard or to other guests (which would be more fun).

Some whales and dolphins were spotted from the ship. The Spinnaker lounge
in the bow of the ship was one of the good places to look. Some hearty
folks got into the outdoor jacuzzis, but New England is probably too cold for
most outdoor activities. That didn't stop NCL from having a by the pool
barbeque one day and by the pool events though! (brrrr)

Caesars gave its 7 Stars this Gem trip for totally free, which was good.
The best extra was the unlimited soda and bar Ultimate Beverage package.
The banana smoothies (with or without alcohol was the big hit). This ship
seemed more liberal with what you could order, since my husband was able to
order single malt scotch with the package. But if you have this package be
careful of ordering any hot cocoa or coffee drinks at the Atrium bar --
the booze is free but that bar will charge you for the cocoa or coffee.

We had to keep checking our bill carefully to make sure all charges were
correct. On this cruise Caesars gave us one free bottle of water per person
a day, and some got charged by mistake. The 3% convenience fee for
charging money to your room in the casino was also waved, and I had to correct
this charge twice on my bill. Some other drinks that were free under the UB
(ultimate beverage) package also got erroneously billed, and my sister got a
charge for a bottle of water from her room she did not use. All charges
we disputed were eventually removed, but we had to be vigilant. (And you
should be too if you go on one of these 7 Star Event cruise <or any cruise.>)

Generally speaking the cruise was a good one, though I had some annoyances
that other folks didn't have. Be aware that NYC cruise terminal is a
traffic nightmare. You might want to take the NCL bus transfers since these
buses definitely will be parked next to the terminal. Don't plan to take a
taxi away from the pier (even in good weather).

As I posted previously, anyone tall should double check the length (and
maybe width) of some of these beds on NCL! Handicapped folks need to check
the size of their rooms and realize that navigating the narrow halls of the
ship can be tricky. Also it may be hard or impossible to get on and off the
ship in some ports (two ports on this cruise are tenders with big steps,
and getting a wheelchair on and off is even trickier).

For New England, pack layers, a heavier coat, and rain gear. Be aware of
possible airline delays during the fall in almost any city (we were delayed
2 hours in Vegas because of rain in Philadelphia). Plan to arrive at least
one day prior to the cruise, and possibly leave one day after the cruise.
Fly out of NYC on cruise arrival day after 2 pm to be on the safe side and
use NCL bus transfer.

Personal note from me after at least 8 NCL cruises -- I don't plan to go
on NCL again.
All in all, if you are thinking of going on a cruise, I would not recommend
NCL unless the price is free (or almost free). Alaska is far more
interesting than any other route. The Caribbean is more interesting than Mexico,
Mexico better than New England. At least that is what I personally feel,
though others may have different tastes.

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[vpFREE] 7 star event cruise New England snaffu (part 2) handicapped cabin screwup

 

Now we come to another major Caesars snaffu or screwup or f-up! This
story is long, but that is so you can understand the details of what went on
and how it came to be that Caesars assigned a handicapped person to a
non-handicapped accessible cabin (but told her in advance it was a handicapped
cabin, even when they questioned it) and what ensued onboard the Sept. 27 NCL
Gem 7 Star Event cruise.

A friend of mine, let's call her Miss A is handicapped. She can only walk
a few steps and rides a scooter right now, and also recently had a major
operation (within the past month). On April 1 Miss A and I (Misscraps) both
signed up for the Caesars 7 Star Event special New England cruise - the
first day it was available to sign up. And both of us requested handicapped
cabins (booking directly with Caesars who assigned the actual cabins).

Although we were told we would hear from NCL within 3 weeks about cabin
assignments, no one heard anything. As the weeks passed, I phoned Caesars
representative Ashley (the same person involved in the bus fiasco). I asked
if I was getting a handicapped cabin and explained I would be taking a
scooter (and cane). She said yes. I asked about my friend Miss A, who had
also requested a handicapped cabin. I was told yes, it was also handicapped
accessible.

Well Miss A and her friend (and cruise roommate) Miss B are both 7 stars,
so they went on an earlier 7 Star Event cruise to Bermuda in June this year
on the same NCL Gem ship, getting into a handicapped cabin. At that
sailing they met a friend who was supposed to get a handicapped cabin and didn't
and by then they had the room number for the room they were assigned on
this Sept. 27 New England cruise. They began to suspect the room for the
Sept. 27 cruise wasn't handicapped and consulted a NCL cruise ship map, and saw
it wasn't handicapped.

Miss A then phoned Ashley and Caesar representative Lauren's office.
Lauren was apparently in charge of assigning the actual cabins. Miss A
explained she needed a handicapped cabin and would have a scooter. She received a
phone call back from Lauren's assistant saying (I heard the recording of
the call) something on the order of -- NCL confirms it is a handicapped
accessible cabin, even though it doesn't appear so noted on the map, so you are
in a handicapped cabin for the Sept. 27 cruise.

Now Miss A and Miss B arrive on the NCL Gem late on Sept. 27 because they'd
made their own arrangements to get from Atlantic City to NYC. They go to
their cabin, and lo and behold, not only isn't it handicapped, the scooter
can't even get through the door into the room!

They immediately go to the front desk and also contact Lauren (who was the
other Caesar representative actually aboard the NCL Gem). They are first
told nothing can be done, then told that they will try to find an unoccupied
Handicapped cabin (or a cabin with a door big enough to enter with a
scooter, such as a suite) for them. Miss A is ready to just get off the ship,
but then she is told that the gangway has already been removed (remember
they were late arriving, getting on the ship just shortly before it was due to
leave, and also you can't get to your room immediately because the ship's
stewards are still cleaning them).

Miss A and Miss B go to the NCL/Caesars onboard casino party/meetup just
after the lifeboat drill. They see Lauren and Ashley who are dismissive,
don't apologize, and just say they will contact all the people with
handicapped rooms to see if someone would switch. (Note some people who are not
physically handicapped sometimes book those rooms because they are larger, so
fewer handicapped rooms are available than you would think. Also this
particular cruise had a very large number of handicapped people with scooters
and wheelchairs and canes and walkers.)

I suggested to Ashley that Caesars should offer money as an inducement
for a non-handicapped person to switch out of a handicapped room. And later
Miss A was told that Caesars was in fact offering $300 or more to get
people to switch rooms. But although Caesars representative Lauren and the
front desk and the NCL casino host told Miss A (and me) that NCL was
contacting all the handicapped rooms, the reality was that probably many were not
actually contacted (no one contacted me for example or other people I talked
to). (The front desk later seemed to indicate only one or two rooms were
contacted)

On day 1 Miss A had to park her scooter outside her room and do her best to
get into her room, and was not able to shower. On day 2 NCL found a much
smaller (obstructed view/non balcony) handicapped cabin that was empty
(someone didn't come aboard the ship), but it was too small to properly
maneuver a scooter around for someone like Miss A who isn't all that agile, with
hardly room enough to turn a scooter around to get out of the room, so Miss
A refused that room and requested they find something suitable.

Still no one apologized to her and Miss B for the inconvenience, or for
the fact that Caesars had screwed up royally by telling her before the cruise
she had been assigned to a handicapped cabin when it was non-handicapped.

Because nothing was happening, and I knew about the problems Miss A was
having (not getting the scooter into the room, let alone into the bathroom),
my husband and I decided to switch rooms with Miss A (Caesars never
contacted us - I volunteered on day 2 because I knew Miss A was more handicapped
than I was, and I could manage better even if the scooter was outside the
room). I contacted the NCL front desk (Lauren and Ashley had never given
out their full names or phone numbers to us Caesars guests - I left a
message for them with the NCL casino host but I never heard back from them.), and
finally mid-day on Day 2 I looked at the obstructed view handicapped and
decided it was better than Miss A's balcony room (where no scooter or
wheelchair could fit through the door).

So my husband and I switched rooms with Miss A. The room was much smaller
than the balcony handicapped cabin, but by moving a table inside I was
able to get my scooter inside and turn it around (since I am more agile than
Miss A).

I got a recorded phone call from Ashley saying I would get a $100 room
credit for switching. No thank yous from them, no apologies, no $300 or more.
(Miss A also got a measly $100 credit for her troubles.)

By the end of the cruise neither Caesars representative Ashley nor
representative Lauren had apologized to Miss A and Miss B or to me or my husband
for our inconvenience. We were downgraded from a large balcony handicapped
room one door from my sister to a much smaller obstructed view outside cabin
on a different floor.

At least I was able to sleep soundly knowing that Miss A could get into and
out of her bathroom and shower and bed.

By the way Ashley and Lauren did not hang around the casino like other
Caesars hosts have done on past cruises, but instead were extremely hard to
find (unless you looked at the bars where I was told they were spotted several
times). They may have gone to the group photos, I didn't go to that.

Once we traded rooms, I stopped getting whatever gifts Caesars was giving
to its cruise guests. I know this since my sister reported getting trays
of chocolate strawberries and other goodies. I didn't get the group photo
either which was sent to various rooms.

I personally feel that both Ashley and Lauren should be fired. Not only
for telling Miss A her room would be handicapped accessible when it wasn't,
but for their indifference and caviler attitude once the mistake was found
upon getting on the ship. Their lack of any apparent empathy for other
humans, their lack of apologies, their lack of taking responsibility for their
mistakes, their incompetency throughout the cruise as Caesar's representa
tives (on this matter, in the buses from Atlantic City snaffus, in not being
available in the casino), all make them worthy of being fired in my
opinion.

I will be contacting every Caesar's executive I can think of (and if any of
you know of people to contact, please let me know) as well as my host.
Caesar's owes Miss A and Miss B major apologies, and I think myself and my
husband are due one as well.

And of course, this is not the way Caesar's should treat its high level 7
Star players either. But to badly treat someone who is handicapped is
even lower than low.


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[vpFREE] Re: Cruises

 







Announcements were hard for us to hear in the cabin, unless we opened the door. Each morning around 9 am there were announcements for leaving the ship, reminders about when to get back, the weather, etc. I found them very informative. Not a problem at all, unless you were sleeping past that time.


Time in port was short, 9 am to 4 pm or so. You had to be back on board 30 min. to 1 hr. before the ship departure time. We arrived in one port late, and the captain delayed our departure by the amount of time we were late so we all had the correct amount of port time. I totally enjoyed the cruise, and thought Caesars was very nice to have let us take this usually overbooked trip. The weather was not great, but until we got to NYC we did not experience any downpours.


The trip TO the port was too early, 6:45 am at the bus if you stayed at Caesars AC, for a 8 am departure from Harrah's AC. I don't see why we had to go to Harrah's AC at all. No one extra got on the bus. We were supposed to go inside to pick up our bagel, and juice breakfast, but I would rather have slept an hour later.
We arrived at Harrah's AC at 7:05 am, with nothing to do for over an hour. Mill around the bagel box stations.
No direction from the driver. Some people must have gotten off and boarded the wrong bus, as their luggage was not on the bus when we arrived in NYC. Easier to just depart from the hotel you are staying at. No confusion that way. Have someone deliver those bagel and juice boxes to the boardwalk hotel.


Check in at the port was busy, but it is always busy on and off the ship day. Typical.
The itinerary was great. Service on board was great. Specialty restaurants were booked up right away as everyone had shipboard credits to us. Food elsewhere was fine.


I thought the service on board and entertainment was superior to other NCL ships I had been on. Singers and dancers were some of the best I have seen. We had a fantastic time, and want to do this again next year!


THANK YOU CAESARS! FOR A TERRIFIC CRUISE!


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[vpFREE] Caesars bus snaffu with New England 7 star event cruise (part 1 report on cruise)

 

Caesars is busy taking what should be a great marketing strategy in giving its best players (7 star tiers) great free events, and turning them into a mess.

This past week's New England cruise which had about 550 free cruisers (probably over 200 free cabins) is an example. First came the registration in Atlantic City for many of the people. (Some people flew directly to NYC for cruise). A huge line formed at 4:30 pm and it took over an hour for the final people to register. The party went well though with lots of free good food and a good band. Then they gave away a measly 10 prizes for 550 people of some free play and some people got a notebook computer.

The next day the AC people went by bus to the cruise terminal in NYC. Confusion began at Harrahs when no Caesar people directed traffic onto the buses and some people milled around trying to figure out which bus to get on. Some luggage got put onto a separate luggage truck, causing more confusion. A few buses were wheelchair accessible but since no central person was directing things, there was more delay and confusion getting on the buses if you had a scooter or wheelchair.

Finally the buses took off, but one had to go back to Harrahs because the Caesars representatives Ashley and Lauren (more about these incompetent people in another post I will do later) had missed the buses! All of us guests were to told to arrive no later than 7:30 a.m, but these idiots showed up about 9:15 apparently.

On arrival in NYC 2 of the buses made it into the terminal, but for unknown reasons to the rest of us on buses (other than the traffic at the terminal was terrific and terrible), the rest of the 6 or so Caesars buses pulled in across the street and several blocks away from the pier, dumping all of us guests and our luggage out onto the sidewalk, where we had to walk across the street and anywhere from 2-6 or maybe more blocks (depending on bus) pulling our luggage to get to the pier. Some folks reported it took them hours to walk, some folks managed to flag a porter from the pier side to help take luggage. All in all a mess and hard for many older folks and handicapped folks to drag luggage to the correct pier on the busy street.

But this was a non-event compared to the return to the pier in NYC at end of the cruise. Caesars didn't supply any buses for those people flying directly out of NYC, so they were on their own. A huge downpour greeted us as we exited the terminal. I was in a scooter and was going to LaGuardia, so we planned to take a taxi. Those doing the taxi exit had to cross the street in the pouring rain, stand on the sidewalk in a gigantic taxi cab line with no roof or awning above our heads, and not very many taxis coming. Fortunately for me one guy was directing the taxi loading and he saw me in my scooter and directed us to take a taxi near the front of the line, so we only got soaked and the scooter didn't get killed. For the hundred or more people behind us they must have had to wait for an hour out in the rain getting drowned in the downpour.

According to my sister, the "lucky" people going back to Atlantic City on the Caesars buses came out of the ship to be directed to a small area in the front of the terminal under a slight roof, but where the rain still sprayed them. Then they waited for the buses to arrive and waited and waited and WAITED for over 2 hours! They were packed into a small area with their suitcases, no way to even leave to go to the bathroom because of the crowd. No snacks, no water (except the rain) and worst of all, no benches or other seating. My sister had come off the ship in a wheelchair so was super fortunate to be sitting for the duration. The wheelchair guy stayed with her (NCL wheelchair so he was supposed to take it back) and he kept complaining because he couldn't leave and had to do other jobs! (He was probably a NCL room steward.)

She got onto a bus but thought there were only two buses. If so that means there weren't enough buses to take people back to AC! She isn't sure what happened to the rest of the people. She just reported to me that there were some EXTREMELY IRATE Caesars guests waiting for the buses.

If any of you can report on what happened I hope you will post.

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[vpFREE] Vegas Values Report - 5 OCT 2014

 

Vegas Values Report - 5 OCT 2014

http://www.americancasinoguide.com/vegas-values/vegas-values-report-for-october-5-2014.html

or

http://tinyurl.com/nox5equ

*************************************************
This link is posted for informational purposes
and doesn't constitute an endorsement or approval
of the linked article's content by vpFREE. Any
discussion of the article must be done in
accordance with vpFREE's rules and policies.
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