OzKiwiJJ

I've noticed that cruises earlier than mid-December are more at risk of missing them. NZ weather often doesn't play nice until after Christmas.

We've been very lucky then. Four NZ cruises, most at different times of the year, and almost perfect conditions for Fiordland cruising each time. The last one, on Westerdam over Christmas, was the best. For some reason the air seemed a lot clearer than usual and I spotted distant mountain ranges I'd never seen before.

The main problem we had with Sydney taxis in the past is they would refuse to pick up short distance fares when booked. Several times we had taxis booked to go to nearby restaurants or friends places and they just didn't turn up. One taxi company insisted the taxi had arrived, waited five minutes but I never showed up. It must have been an invisible taxi as I had been waiting in our carport for 15 minutes. So now we only use taxis as a last resort.

Don't blame P&O for that. Some of the islands aren't hosting cruise ships at the moment for various reasons - local politics, cyclone damage to wharves etc. It affects all the cruise lines not just P&O.

Smart casual seems to be OK on formal nights these days and I don't see that as an issue. You don't need gowns or tuxedos unlesz you want to wear those of course. Cruise formal nights aren't black tie formal. We always change for dinner. I usually wear black pants and a dressy top. One outfit I often get complimented on is a floaty black "jacket" with coloured feathers printed on it worn over a black shell top. The "jacket" is actually a swimsuit cover-up! 🤣 Most of my tops are very lightweight but look dressy. Rolf just wears chinos, a shirt (sometime short sleeved, sometimes long sleeved, and sometimes a casual linen jacket. For formal nights I wear silk kaftans, again ultra lightweight and very easy to wear. Rolf loves wearing his tux, and even bought an extra dinner jacket last year!!! Although I don't really care what people wear I do think shorts, thongs and scruffy tshirts or singlets shouldn't be allowed in MDRs in the evenings.

So far we've booked Uber Comfort but that's been pushing it a bit with cruise luggage. We haven't used UberXL yet but will probably do so later this month when we fly to Japan. It depends on the size of the suitcases I guess, we usually have two medium-large spinners, two overnight bags which fit on top of the spinners, and two wheeled carry-ons. For one cruise we had to take an extra smaller spinner suitcase and that was really pushing the luggage space issue. Note: we live in Sydney so just Uber from home to cruise terminal and vice versa. Taxis are OK from the airport but usually a bit more expensive.

I'm not sure about the airport but the cruise terminal is easy. Wait until you're outside the terminal building near the pick-up / drop-off zone and book your Uber. Then watch for it to arrive, it's usually there within minutes at the OPT, but may take a bit longer if you're docked at White Bay.

Typically cruises go through three fiords - Dusky Sound, Doubtful Sound and Milford Sound, with some coastal cruising between them. It takes all day to go through them all. Option 1 will enter Dusky Sound first thing in the morning and finish with Milford Sound late afternoon. Option 3 starts with Milford Sound and ends when the ship exits Dusky Sound.

There are no short Princess cruises out of Australia during the off-season. The only Princess ship operating here does the big cruises - 28 days Round Australia, 35 days Hawaii/Tahiti and the World Cruise. P&O have three ships here all year round so building up the status levels by doing winter escapes makes sense. The Elite free laundry is worth it! 😊

I don't recall having to do that. I'm sure I just logged into the app using my regular Princess login.

I just checked again and it's working OK for me. Try uninstalling the app and reinstalling it. You shouldn't lose any data you've entered

That's odd. I got into the app OK while I was posting the Dine My Way instructions. I did have to try twice to get in though, the first time it just spun its wheels

It seems to depend on the ship. I don't recall seeing anyone in shorts on Coral last year but I did see a guy in shorts and a scruffy looking tshirt in the MDR on Grand in March.

More like Princess but quieter, and it was hard to get decent espresso. The service in the MDR was the worst I've ever experienced. This was on Westerdam last December.

We still dress up on formal nights because we enjoy doing that. I don't really care what other people wear but it is nice to have others around you making the effort too. Perhaps Princess should have one of the MDRs for dressy dinners and one for more casual diners. Even Cunard seems to have relaxed its dress code. I was looking it up the other night and normal evenings are just shirt and trousers for men, no jacket or tie required. Rolf is very disappointed. He has a collection of very special (and expensive) ties that he bought while he was still working and he was hoping to get a chance to wear them again. He might take them anyway and wear them.

Exactly. Rolf was wearing navy chinos with a similar colour linen jacket, so totally different fabrics, but the old guy thought it was a suit. I laughed at him.

Click on Dine My way. Then choose "View or book individual daily reservations" Then click on "Add reservation" Then click "Speciality Dining" Confirm your party for dining. Then you should see the speciality restaurants and what times are available. You shpuld be able to work it out from there but let me know if you can't.

When is your cruise? Only Elite Captain's Circle passengers can book dining before final payment date so it may just be too early. Also don't click on Explore Dining Options, that seems to only work once you're onboard.

That's probably because Build a Bear isn't run by Carnival, they just lease space to the Build a Bear company.

Rolf confuses people on non-formal nights as he often wears a light linen jacket to dinner. He feels the cold more than I do and sometimes if he gets cold it triggers a sneezing fit. One old guy, dressed in well worn jeans but a decent polo shirt, got quite snarky about Rolf's outfit on one of our cruises. 🤣

Does that give you an overnight stopover or a late evening departure? If so I recommend going to the House Without a Key restaurant/bar at the Halekulani Hotel for sunset drinks and very nice bar snacks. They have a Hawaiian band and the night we were there they had a hula dancer as well. We really enjoyed it and would definitely go back again.

My "Live(ish)" thread will be for the whole of our Japan trip including both cruises, Diamond and Explorer. We fly out on the 28th of this month so I'll probably start the thread a day or two before that.

I'll probably start a "Live(ish)" thread for that trip as we're doing a cruise on Regent Seven Seas Explorer after the Diamond cruise. The Regent cruise starts in Tokyo and ends in Bangkok.

Ditto! We also have a Citibank credit card and NAB have changed the travel insurance rules on that ... in our favour. Unfortunately it kicks in 1st November so I can't get existing conditions okayed until then.

Yes, you do need to use a debit card for ATM withdrawals. The account fee is very small compared with other credit card annual fees.