OzKiwiJJ

We've done Christmas cruises in the past, on Princess and Celebrity. Princess had a formal night on Christmas Eve with carol singing and "snow" falling in the Atrium. They did a traditional Christmas dinner on Christmas Day with crackers on the tables. Celebrity also had carol singing on Christmas Eve. They had turkey and Christmas pudfing for lunch and dinner. Crackers on the table at lunch time but not at dinner which seemed a bit weird. Both ships had lovely decorations in the Atriums. Princess also stuck a small decoration on all cabin "mailboxes" - I wonder what they'll do now they don't have those. It will be interesting to see what HAL does.

Uber is easy. Wait until you are outside the terminal then book it. It will pull into the pick-up/drop-off area.

I expect it will be more American but I don't care. I don't have to cook! 🤣

We did get a bit carried away this year - I blame Sydney weather! We were only going to do three cruises, the June one and two B2B in September but after we stopped in Sydney between the B2B and it was still cold we booked the 26th Sept cruise, then on that cruise we looked at the Sydney weather forecast and booked the Round Australia cruise! Oops! 🤣🤣🤣 We changed our minds about our upcoming NZ cruise a couple of times but finally ended up with the Westerdam cruise. It will be nice to try a different cruise line and havevthe added bonus of Xmas and NY onboard. My brother and his family live in Dunedin so NZ cruises are a nice way to catch up with them. Sadly he recently had a couple of strokes and is now in hospital care in a rest home.

We felt the same when we first boarded Coral back in June. We're home! 😊 I wonder if Princess has expanded the size of the laundries on its ships. Most of the time we were onboard (66 days this year) we had the same 24 hour turnaround of laundry. The only exceptions were the last bag we put in on the 26th Sept cruise three nights before the end of the cruise, and the bags we put in during the last ten days on the Round Australia cruise when the laundrettes were closed - those took two days. I was expecting it to take three days on the Round Australia cruise as there were a lot of Elites onboard. I hope you're starting to feel better, Don. Did you get anti-virals? If so watch out for rebound Covid, and also be prepared to feel a bit tired for a few days after testing negative again. I think the button lady must have been on Coral as well. We got into one of the aft lifts once. There was no-one in the lift but all the buttons were pressed. Although it might have been kids that time, I think it was on one of the cruises in school holidays.

Dictionary definition of "accident" "an undesirable or unfortunate happening that occurs unintentionally and usually results in harm, injury, damage, or loss". Accidents can happen anytime, anywhere and to anyone.

In March last year we spent a few days in Melbourne on our way back to Sydney after a trip to South Australia. We stayed in an apartment at the top end of Lonsdale St. We were quite surprised how busy the city was at that time despite Covid, both during the day and by night. Sydney was dead by comparison.

That's a different matter - a communication to passengers, not to the ship's crew. I mentioned Carnival Australia as they are always quoted as the local authority for all Carnival, Princess and P&O Australia ships operating here. I would have expected directives to go out to each ship warning that Covid was on the increase in the Australian community, especially in major cities like Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, and that ships should follow Covid protocols closely. By the time Grand and Majestic started operating here the Coral outbreak was well underway. Signs of Covid on Coral were noticeable probably from about day 8 from the Sydney embarkation - I can't remember exactly when we saw the first table in our corridor but it was around the time we reached Darwin (day 10) and may have even been a day or rwo before that.

What surprises me is that Princess, or perhaps Carnival Australia, don't seem to have communicated the lessons learnt on Coral - both with the July outbreak and the Round Australia outbreak - to other ships in the fleet(s) operating here. Each ship seemed to be doing it's own thing regarding mask mandates and dealing with Covid cases. Or did the officers on each ship stick their heads in the sand and say it won't happen to us?

We've got to the stage where wearing masks actually feels right, and not wearing one feels wrong! 🤣

Condolences to you and your family, Stu.

What did they expect? That they'd all get moved into suites for isolation? They chose to book those cabins! However it does seem that Grand wasn't doing a good job of handling the service of some things to people in isolation. That would be hard to cope with especially meals. We were so lucky on Coral, we had excellent service. Again we've had another clear example of what happens when masks aren't mandated right from the start of a cruise. Too many people don't realise how much Covid is circulating in the community. It's only when they go into a closed environment like a cruise ship that reality strikes.

We were originally booked on Cunard for this Xmas/NY and it was overnighting in Auckland on NYE. We cancelled that cruise for various reasons. It's probably booked out by now.

I'm fairly certain Auckland used to have NY fireworks but not quite on the scale of Sydney. We had booked a couple of Cunard cruises that would have overnighted in Auckland on NYE. Auckland could be restricting the number of ships for that night, just like Sydney does. Too risky.

Plus good beaches, both surf and harbour, and hot water swimming pools just a short walk away. Nice cafes at the Mount too.

I suspect cruise ship cases are just a drop in the bucket on the new wave. NSW reported 19375 cases last week, up from 12440 cases the previous week. However if Professor Catherine Bennett is correct they are only seeing 10% of cases in the community so that would mean close to 200,000 cases in reality. 800 cases from a cruise ship isn't going to make that much difference. Cruise ships get the blame because they are closed environments that are required to report cases of infectious illnesses. It's impossble to quantify the number of infections from theatres, pubs, shopping malls, churches, etc as they are places people don't go to every day. Schools and workplaces are a little easier to track I guess. These latest varients are very infectious I believe. Unfortunately many people don't want to report having symptoms because they don't want their fun spoilt by having to isolate. Cruise ships need to start requiring mandatory testing of all passengers every few days until this wave is over.

That timing sounds about right. And by day 3 those passengers who had unknowingly (?) brought Covid onboard with them would be infectious even if they hadn't started developing symptoms. I wonder how well the governments are/were communicating with the cruise lines about the possibility/probability of a new wave of Covid ramping up.

The restart cruises for Princess were surprisingly cheap. We paid less for a suite pp per day on one of those than we have for a regular balcony on other bookings. The Round Australia cruise was the first to operate under regular pricing. I don't think it much dearer than other ones we'd had booked that were cancelled.

3-4 days is far too long to wear the same surgical mask. I was surprised they only provided one each at the start of our cruise, then another over a week later. They did switch to KN95 masks once the outbreak ramped up and you could request extra masks at any time through the app or Guest Services. We took a good supply of P2 masks with us. The problem is that there are too many people who don't understand how to wear a mask properly and how often you should change them. I saw people wearing them inside out, people wearing ones that were screwed up and gungy-looking, and far too many noses poking over the top of masks. But there hasn't been much feedback about what masks the other cruise lines are supplying, and how many, so it's a bit unfair to judge Princess for the poor behaviour and lack of common of passengers. I think they've done reasonably well overall.

Apparently they aren't insisting on hand washing at the buffet. It will depend on how long the cruise is. If it's seven days or less passengers will be off the ship before things get too bad but if it's a 13/14 day cruise they could end up triggering higher Tier levels.

That's bad. Also I've seen some posts elsewhere that people who are in isolation aren't getting the same level of care as we did on Coral. Grand seems to have dropped the ball a bit.

Depending on how many people brought Covid onboard with them my guess is that it takes at least ten days for obvious signs to be noticed. Coughs might be noticed prior to that, of course, but they may not be Covid coughs. On Princess it was very easy to tell which cabins had people isolating because of the tables outside the doors, but other lines may not do this. On the Coral Round Australia cruise I think I started noticing tables around the time we reached Darwin. Darwin was day 10 from the Sydney embarkation. I developed symptoms on day 14. I tested negative again on day 20 and by then there were tables everywhere.

They're $12 a glass onboard! I wonder if the powers that be at Princess actually realise how cheap those wines are? Or did their supplier con them?

It was mandatory on Coral Princess in theatres etc. Unfortunately at the start of the Round Australia cruise a lot of people didn't wear masks properly if at all. And too many people don't understand that their noses have to be covered as well as their mouths. 😡

They should hire a few ex-rugby players! Big ones! 🤣🤣🤣