Welcome And How We Help

Todd Carlson 0:20

This is The Inside Travel Talk Podcast and Radio Show with Patrick Wiscombe and Mark Faldmo. Presented by BluePlanetVacations.com. America's Best Travel Advisors. Call The show right now. 801-649-3700. 801-649-3700. And now your hosts, Patrick Wiscombe and Mark Faldmo.

Patrick Wiscombe 0:52

It is time to talk travel. Welcome to The Inside Travel Talk Podcast and radio show. Hello there. I'm Patrick Wiscombe. Mark Faldmo will be in The studio here in just a second. Thank you so much for taking The time to stop and listen. And if you are brand new to The show or you've been listening to The show for The last year and a half, The entire purpose of this show is to help you plan and book your next vacation. And if you don't know where to go, our job is very, very simple is to give you ideas of where to go next. And this show is presented by BluePlanetVacations.com. And let me bring in my co-host and good friend Mark Faldmo. I haven't talked to you all week. How are you doing? I'm doing pretty good. We're going to talk about Canada and New England cruises, and I think we may have really touched a nerve with listeners last week because that seemed to be The call and text highlight of last week's show.

Mark Faldmo 1:51

We just mentioned it in passing last week.

Patrick Wiscombe 2:00

So we are going to talk extensively about Canada and New England cruises. This is during The fall. Because of The NFL's big game last Sunday, we called MSc Cruises Laura Okanowski to talk about MSc's promotions that are coming out. So they had their commercial in The second block of The first quarter of commercials. They did a big reveal on MSc World America with Orlando Bloom and Drew Barrymore. I thought that was actually a pretty good choice.

Mark Faldmo 2:29

It was. That was a great commercial.

Patrick Wiscombe 2:31

But before we get there, let's get to The travel news

Norwegian Orders Record Mega Ships

Patrick Wiscombe 2:34

headlines. Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings, so NCL, has just confirmed that they are placing a multi-billion dollar order for four new ships.

Mark Faldmo 2:44

This is an order for four mega ships worth more than $9 billion. These ships are going to be The largest ever. They'll sell in The Norwegian cruise line brand for Norwegian cruise line holding. They'll be 226,000 gross tons, which is larger than The icon of The seas that we've been talking about this year. I'm sure The Royal Caribbean will probably announce a larger ship after that because Norwegian and Royal Caribbean go after similar clientele, kind of one up each other. Norwegian has always been The innovator in The cruise industry. They were The first with The private island. They were really The first to start Caribbean cruises. Their freestyle dining, which is The anytime dining, they were The first with that. All The other cruise lines said it would never work. And now everybody does anytime dining. And Norwegian was The first in some of The entertainment things. They brought on The Blue Man Group, which was kind of The first mainline Broadway-ish type show on a cruise ship. It'll be interesting to see what they do with these four new ships.

Patrick Wiscombe 3:55

Do they announce a time when they're coming out?

Mark Faldmo 3:57

Yes, The first ship will come out in 2030, and then they'll come out every two years after 2030. Okay, so we got a little time here. Yeah, we've got five years or so. I'm sure it takes a long time to build a ship that size.

Patrick Wiscombe 4:09

So you and I have been down to Florida multiple times, and we've seen Icon of The Seas last year in person. I think you saw it more than I did. I saw it once with you, and I was like, good grief, how much larger could they make these ships?

Mark Faldmo 4:23

At some point, they can't get much larger. Although we did talk about two or three weeks ago where Royal Caribbean is actually building some smaller ships. Yeah. So that's a little bit against this trend, but it will certainly be interesting.

Patrick Wiscombe 4:37

Makes me wonder if it'll be The NCL Behemoth. What do you that? What's bigger than Icon? Good grief. Yeah.

Turning Food Waste Into Ship Energy

Patrick Wiscombe 4:44

Royal Caribbean, they're creating an uneaten food initiative. What is that initiative?

Mark Faldmo 4:50

What's a goal to reduce food waste by 50%? Cruise Lines first started doing this by adding, for instance, charging a room service delivery fee. They found that room service was a big part of food waste. Oh, right. They found people would order everything off The menu and then most of it would get set out in The hall after people just wouldn't eat it. So that's where it first started. But now they're doing things, it's called microwave-assisted pyrolysis. It's a system basically converting food waste into energy to be used for The ship. And then The waste that comes that's left out of that is just sold back on land as topsoil. So as a soil nutrient, I should say. So they're now integrating AI into this system to figure out how much to make at buffets and when to make it, really trying to eliminate The food waste. It was estimated once that The food waste Royal Caribbean put out in a year could fill like 25 Olympic swimming pools. So they did reduce it by about 30% in 2023. And now they're even trying to get that number reduced by another 50%.

A Budget Sleeper Train Across Europe

Patrick Wiscombe 6:08

Anyone who's been listening to this show for The past year and a half knows that we are big train people. And you found a sleeper train in Europe that has a good value. Now, this is not The destination of The week, this is just a news story.

Mark Faldmo 6:23

What are The details? the name of The train is just called The European Sleeper, but it goes between Brussels and Prague with main stops in Amsterdam and Berlin, that it has stops in between. It runs three times per week. And this is a great way to get around Europe. They also have a winter train, and this is mainly to get to The ski destinations that runs between Brussels and Venice with stops in Cologne, Germany, and Innsbruck, Austria, again with stops in between. What I found interesting about this is The price. You can go from Brussels to Prague. Price on that starts at $109, which is a very good price to go that distance. They have three different levels of service. Everything's in a cabin. So they have cabins with six seats in them. So it's 109 per person, and you're just buying one of those six seats. They have couchettes, which also hold three people. And these are private rooms. These are private rooms. Oh, interesting. Okay. I guess you could buy one out and make it private. Yeah, I guess you could. If you just buy a seat, you'll just have five other people in The cabin with you. And then they have couchettes, which there's six seats in there, and then those seats turn fold down into two beds, and then there's three other kind of fold-out beds that fold out from The walls, so it sleeps six people. And then there's actual sleeper cars that have three seats and three beds. You could buy out a full sleeper car for about six hundred dollars. That's uh just an alternative way to get around parts of Europe. So I guess you could say you could sleep with strangers.

Patrick Wiscombe 7:58

Yeah. I would just buy out The sleeper car. I'm like, well, I like getting to know people, but that's let's go to our trade car. Yeah. No thanks. Always in this first segment of The show is The destination of The week.

Planning A Canada New England Cruise

Patrick Wiscombe 8:14

And uh, as I mentioned, right at The very start of The broadcast, that Mark received a text from one of our listeners. Let me give out The studio and The text number, 801-649-3700-801-649-3700. If you have a travel-related question, so Mark, not Mark Faldmo, but uh different Mark, phone number ending in 1382. He said in his text he's looking for a New England and Canada cruise. I know you can't predict weather and fall colors, but what part of October would be prime fall colors, in your opinion, and when would just simply be too late?

Timing Peak Fall Colors On Route

Mark Faldmo 8:55

First of all, let's talk about The cruise. There are two main ways you can do Canada and New England. the first is round trip, where most of The cruises leave round trip either New York or Boston. There's some that leave from other ports, but that's probably The most common way. And then The other way to do it is one-way cruises. So similar to Alaska, where there's one-way cruises, Canada, New England also has one-way cruises where you cruise either between New York and Boston and Quebec, Canada. Fall colors, as you know, we've talked about a few times on The show. It's always hard to project when The peak is. Traditionally, The second week of October for where The cruises go is one of The better weeks to go. This year, The peak day was October 2nd. Last year, The peak date was The last week in September. And so if you want to go and try and catch The fall colors, I probably would say The last week of September, first week of October are going to be your best bet.

Patrick Wiscombe 10:00

So that begs The question: if we're talking about The last week of September, first week of October, probably your best bet. the round trip Boston, what is The price? And then let's get to The other two.

Round Trip Boston Itineraries And Pricing

Mark Faldmo 10:12

I looked for this coming October. the very best price I found was on a seven-day round trip Boston. Goes Boston, Portland, Maine, St. John, Halifax, and Sydney, Nova Scotia, back to Boston. the very best price was October 26th. Okay, so a little later. A little bit later. A balcony cabin on that started at 1267. Now, by contrast, if you move that to October 5th, a balcony cabin is 1693. So it is what's that, about $400, $500.

Patrick Wiscombe 10:59

Well, The difference might be $400, but you might have a completely different experience. Different experience. $400 less experience if you go late. What company and what ship? So that's on the Brilliance of The Seas by Royal Caribbean. Okay. All right. Okay, let's talk about Quebec to Boston then.

Mark Faldmo 11:16

This is The one way. Yep, The one way, Quebec to Boston. This is on Holland America. It's on The Zoider Dam. That one, a balcony starts at 1824.

One Way Quebec To Boston Highlights

Mark Faldmo 11:26

And this is October 11th. Yeah, okay. You know, but one thing that's nice about this Quebec City, and then cruising up The St. Lawrence River, The St. Lawrence Gulf. Ever since I saw The hunt for Red October, I've always wanted to do that. Then that ending scene of The hunt for Red October. So one of these days I'll I'll get to do this. Sean Connery not included. Not included. Yeah. And then Charlottestown, which is on Prince Edward Island, for those fans of Anne of Greengables. Oh, and that's your stop for that. Then Sydney, Nova Scotia, Halifax, Portland, Maine, and then ends in Boston. That's pretty good. That probably would be The cruise that I choose. And who's that on? Oh, that was uh Holland America. Holland America. Okay.

Patrick Wiscombe 12:16

By The way, I was looking at The uh Holland America Rotterdam, that vessel. Dude, that's a nice ship. Yes. Wow. Holland America has some nice ship. And then lastly, let's do The repositioning cruise. Where's this coming from and where does it end?

Mark Faldmo 12:29

I just stumbled upon this. This is on Virgin Voyages and it goes Quebec to Miami. So they're moving The ship from that Canada, New England down to Miami.

Repositioning Cruise Deals Quebec To Miami

Mark Faldmo 12:38

This is a 13-day cruise. Balcony cabin is $16.53.

Patrick Wiscombe 12:43

Whoa.

Mark Faldmo 12:44

So pretty good price for a balcony cabin. And it stops Quebec, Halifax, St. John, Eastport, Boston. And then it does stop in Charleston, South Carolina, which is an interesting port, and then ends in Miami.

Patrick Wiscombe 12:59

Man, that's pretty good. If you've never heard this show before and you've always wondered how do I score a great deal, repositioning cruises, generally speaking, most of The time, are The best bang for The buck. Period.

Mark Faldmo 13:12

If you look at that 13-day cruises, that's less than The previous two seven-day cruises that we talked about. What were The dates on that one?

Patrick Wiscombe 13:21

the repositioning cruise? That one leaves on October 3rd from Quebec. Okay. All right. So you're going to catch those colors. That's going to be perfect then. Or real close to perfect. Take advantage of this particular offer. And Mark, call Mark Faldmo to book that. Call him in his office. 888-718-7717. 888-718-7717. Just call him during The break. There's no obligation to book, but just get The conversation started. This is going to be one of those things where you get a bill and you go, uh, do I want to spend that much? I'm telling you, if you just do it, you'll come back with a lifetime of memories and always a point that you can reflect for The rest of your life. You will not be disappointed. 888-718-7717 is The number to get a hold of Mark or BluePlanetVacations.com. When we come back, we've got The hot travel deal of The week, and we've got The most impressive pyramids to visit in Mexico, and we've got The hot travel deal of The week. We're going to Cancun all-inclusive vacations. Stick around. Thanks for listening. Mark and I will be right back.

Todd Carlson 14:39

If you have travel questions, they have The answers. You're listening to The Inside Travel Talk Podcast and Radio Show with Patrick Wiscombe and Mark Faldmo. Presented by BluePlanetVacations.com. Call or text The show right now. 801-649-3700. 801-649-3700. We'll be right back.com. America's Best Travel Advisors. Call or text The show now. 801-649-3700. 801-649-3700. And check out The podcast at Inside TravelTalk.com. Here's Patrick and Mark.

Patrick Wiscombe 15:45

I think The music is a dead giveaway where we're headed. Mexico. Welcome back to The Inside Travel Talk Podcast, a radio

Mexico Segment Reset And Resort News

Patrick Wiscombe 15:55

show. Hello there, I'm Patrick Wiscombe alongside Mark Faldmo. Thank you so much for allowing us to be part of your weekend. Coming up in this segment, we're talking about all-inclusive vacations to Cancun. But let's first get to The travel news headlines. Hyatt is going to purchase Playa Hotel and Resorts by The end of 2025. That kind of surprised me.

Mark Faldmo 16:23

They've had quite a long partnership, actually, because Hyatt Hotels wanted to get into The all-inclusive business, but didn't necessarily want to open up their own brands. And so they contracted with Playa Hotels and Resorts. They created The Hyatt Ziva brand, which we've talked about several times on this show. One of my favorite hotel brands was Playa Resorts. And now Hyatt is going to fully acquire The company and incorporate it into their brand. A few years ago, Hyatt also bought ALG, which was then AM Resorts, which is Secrets. Oh, Secret. Yeah, The Secret Secrets. Secrets and those brands. And so Hyatt already does own some all-inclusives in its portfolio, but now they are acquiring Ply Resorts. I think this will be a good move. Marriott has done The same thing. In fact, one of Ply Resorts hotels in Dominican Republic is an autograph collection by Marriott. So I don't know what's going to happen with that. But Marriott has now taken a similar path in contracting out to do some other all-inclusive brands. Um, but I think Marriott is now also going to start opening up their own all-inclusive resort soon.

Patrick Wiscombe 17:35

You, Mark, were instrumental in helping me get my global entry pass. There's a little lesser known perk to having a global entry

Global Entry Perks Beyond The US

Patrick Wiscombe 17:44

pass. What is it?

Mark Faldmo 17:45

I just learned about, but global entry will give you expedited entry into Australia and New Zealand with more countries to come soon.

Patrick Wiscombe 17:55

So getting into Australia and New Zealand is The perk.

Mark Faldmo 17:59

Yes. So you you'll you'll get to go into a special line. Yes, it would be a global entry line, like you would if you're coming back to The US. Okay. So you'll get that expedited screening and not have to wait in those long lines at The international airports.

Patrick Wiscombe 18:13

Oh man. What a pain in The tukas.

Mark Faldmo 18:16

Yes. Some of those lines are pretty bad too. They can be. Yeah. I just saw actually one of my friends going to Cancun, which we're talking about here in a minute. He landed just at The wrong time. Took him two hours and 30 minutes to get through customs at The Cancun Airport. Yeah. And I'm going to assume that he didn't have a global entry pass. Correct. Yeah. Which global entry doesn't work in Mexico, but if you travel there a lot, they do have a similar program that U.S. citizens come by that does get you to an expedited line.

Patrick Wiscombe 18:47

True story. So let's rewind The clock about 10 months ago. You and I are in Fort Lauderdale. We were actually in Palm Beach. Okay, yeah. So Palm Beach. Mark and I had just gotten off a uh ship in Palm Beach, and he had global entry, and this was before I had global entry. Basically escorted him to The front of The line because he had global entry, and Patrick did not, and Patrick had to wait quite a while.

Mark Faldmo 19:12

A long while. I had time to go to The airport, get a rental car, and you had just gotten out by The time I got back from getting The rental car.

Patrick Wiscombe 19:20

Yeah, that was The right call. Yeah. Let's talk about The most impressive pyramids to visit in Mexico. First of all, I did not realize how many pyramids there really were. So let's talk about

The Most Impressive Mexico Pyramids

Patrick Wiscombe 19:31

The best ones.

Mark Faldmo 19:32

This is one of The questions I get quite a bit. What are The best ones to visit and where to visit? What you just stated, you're surprised at how many there are. Actually, The answer is nobody knows because any hill in The Yucatan is probably a peninsula or is probably a pyramid, and it has not been discovered yet. And so there are probably lots and lots of pyramids in Mexico. Nobody knows. Nobody knows. Yeah. Wow. They're all over The country. Probably The most known one is Chitsinitsa. Yeah. That's The one that everyone wants to visit. It's very impressive. It's main pyramid. It's a site that's been completely unearthed from Cancun. It's about a you know two to three hour drive from The city of Cancun to get out to Cheets and Itsa. You're driving from Cancun, which is on The east side of The Yucatan, and you drive about three-quarters of The way across The Yucatan to get to Cheets and Itsa. All right, so you're going for a drive. Yeah. If you continue further, you'd get on to The city of Merida, which is another big city there. Are there other pyramids that you've been to that are pretty impressive? Koba is one. That's probably my favorite pyramid, and it is south of Cancun. So you would drive about three hours south of Cancun and to get to Koba. We've talked about Tulum before, which is about two hours or so now south of Cancun. Those are kind of The ones that if you're visiting Cancun, that you would want to try and visit. So there's kind of a Thai-ish group there. There is. Okay. Yeah. And I actually have a guide in Cancun that will do it's a several day tour, but you'll kind of do a circle Yucatan and you'll see all of The archaeological sites that are around there. And there's so many. I mean, more than what we've said here. Another one that's kind of easy for tourists to get to is Teotuacan, which is in Mexico City. I remember flying in Mexico City, flying right over that. It's a quite impressive site.

Patrick Wiscombe 21:35

Just because I have never been to pyramids. Once you've seen a pyramid, is it once you've seen one, you've kind of seen them all, or do they vary?

Mark Faldmo 21:43

You know, I think they vary from location to location. They're all unique, they all have different things. Maybe different stories. And different stories as well. For instance, there's a pyramid in Veracruz, which is also on The Gulf of Mexico, halfway between Merida and Texas, called El Tajin. And I think that's an interesting name because Tajin kind of sounds Asian. Yeah, this looks like an Asian temple. Going back to when we were talking about Ushmal.

Patrick Wiscombe 22:15

Yeah.

Mark Faldmo 22:16

It's a very steep, very different design than say Chitsanitza is. And so I think you could spend The week seeing different archaeological sites and have a great time.

Patrick Wiscombe 22:27

Since we're talking about pyramids and visiting Mexico, that naturally leads into The hot travel deal of The week, which is Cancun, all inclusive vacations.

Cancun All Inclusive Deals Up To 300 Off

Patrick Wiscombe 22:36

What promotion or offer do we have for listeners this week?

Mark Faldmo 22:40

Our promotion this week is Cancun. Well, it's it's all of Mexico, but we're talking about Cancun in this segment. So save up to $300 on all-inclusive vacation packages. And something that I've noticed The last two or three weeks is some of The five-star hotels have really come down in price. And so I think it might be The time of year that I'm looking, which is May. So this is a May 8th departure date. This was The very best date when I searched, which was a May 8th departure, where The five-star hotels were such a good deal. I thought we'd highlight those. And The first one is The Catalonia Yucatan Beach, and it starts at 11.69 per person. So that's round trip airfare from Salt Lake City, Five Nights Hotel, and transfers between The airport and hotel. And then another five-star is The Margaritaville Island Reserve. Now, is this tied in with Jimmy Buffett? Is this The Margaritaville? Yeah, Margaritaville. I've stayed at this one. It's a fabulous hotel. And it starts at $15.69 per person.

Patrick Wiscombe 23:47

Knowing you, you don't throw out those compliments all The time. When you say it's a spectacular place, you mean it.

Mark Faldmo 23:53

I really like The feeling of The Margaritaville resorts. They just have Jimmy Buffett relaxed feeling, but it's still upscale. And so that's what I like about that. And then we'll throw in one more, which is The El Dorado Seaside Palms, um, which starts at $15.99. Yeah, that's one of your favorites. That is one of my go-to's. And I'll just say The Margaritville in El Dorado have dropped about $300 per person since last time I looked.

Patrick Wiscombe 24:23

All right. So The offer this week, The hot travel deal of The week is Cancun All-Inclusive Vacations. Save up to $300 on those vacations, and you can call Mark for those details to save The most amount of money. Call him during The break, 888-718-7717-888-718-7717. He will also post this on BluePlanet Vacations.com. When we come back, we've got The infamous Just Cruising segment. Laura Okanowski with MSC Cruises is going to make a return appearance talking about

Cruise Guest Tease And Closing

Patrick Wiscombe 25:00

The MSC World America. And we've also got The cruise deal of The week. That is next when The Inside Travel Talk podcast or radio show continues. Alongside Mark Faldmo, my name is Patrick Wiscombe. We hope you're having a terrific week and we'll be right back.

Todd Carlson 25:29

You're listening to The Inside Travel Talk Podcast and Radio Show, presented by BluePlanetVacations.com. America's best travel advisors. Patrick and Mark will be back after these messages.