OzKiwiJJ

When is your cruise, Duncan?

Thanks. We're doing a short cruise on Diamond at the end of October so I was interested to read your comments. We've booked a table for two evey night in the MDR Were there Japanese dishes on the MDR menus? Sorry to hear about Sabatinis, usually it's very good. It certainly was on both Coral and Grand but we did have one less than steller experience there pre-Covid. I can't recall exactly which ship it was though, it may have been Diamond. We've been to Japan a couple of times but not to most of the ports our cruise will go to (northern side of Honshu). We've booked short morning excursions in most of the ports and hope to be able to potter around ashore in the afternoon and have lunch ashore.

I guess it depends on how much luggage you have and how easy it is to manage the luggage. Sydney taxis can be a pain!

That's the email address we use too.

When we did a big land trip around Ireland and the UK in 2013 our satnav insisted on taking us down little country roads whether we wanted it or not. It didn't matter what setting we used there was always a section down a country road, sometimes leaving a major road then rejoining it further along! It was very strange but a lot of fun although the Y intersection of three narrow lanes where we encountered a tractor on one arm and three horses (with riders) on the other arm was a bit nerve-wracking. Luckily they sorted themselves out and gave us a clear path through. Phew!

They did for one of the cruises we did last year from the OPT. It gave the feeling of being more efficient than the other way around but, in reality, probably just shifted the queue to a different place. Although once you get your medallion they could scan that and see whether you need further check-in processing or not. I'm not sure I trust Australia Post to deliver the medallions on time. I had a parcel, sent express post, that took 8.5 months to get delivered!

Yes, I realize that but as people in AUS/NZ don't get medallions sent to them at present I doubt they'll start having Green Lanes at ports just for US passengers when they never bother having them under the previous system.

I've been on six Princess cruises out of Australia and NZ since cruising restarted here, embarking in Brisbane, Sydney, and Melbourne, and I never ever saw a green lane sign at any if those ports, just the usual Suite/Elite/Platinum priority lane. I doubt they will create one for the few US passengers who might have green lane status.

Water, coffees, cocktails, spirits, liqueurs.

And being near an MRT station is a must in Singapore IMHO otherwise you end up walking a long way in the heat and humidity, and half the time it decides to rain just as you get halfway between your hotel and the MRT entrance! I used to tag along on some of Rolf's business trips to Singapore before he retired. A couple of times the hotels were a fair hike (uphill) from the nearest MRT. Lovely 5-star hotels though.

Thanks. That gives us some options when we get to that level of planning.

If you're going from the Overseas Passenger Terminal there is also the light rail that runs from Circular Quay right down George St to the Central Station area then goes through Surry Hills along Devonshire St.

Unfortunately there aren't many cruises that go South Africa to Australia. Princess used to do an Indian Ocean Circle from Fremantle every few years but most of the world cruises go the other way around and mostly through the Suez Canal - probably because there would be too many sea days going around Africa.

We've done two repositioning cruises, both Australia to Asian ports. The timing of both of them suited our needs at the time but if that hadn't been a consideration I would have preferred to fly to the embarkation port and cruise home.

That's not really what we want but thanks anyway.

Looking at Google Maps it appears that pedestrian access starts at the intersection of Robert St and Buchanan St. A long walk from the nearest bus stops. There is no ferry service at present. I doubt that Holland America would offer a shuttle service. Realistically taxi or Uber is the best way to get there.

I'll have to remember that when we have a port stop there next year on the Australian world cruise. We're also stopping in New York for two days and are thinking of going to a jazz club the night we stopover. Any suggestions?

This is the list from Grand in March. The only one over the Plus limit is the watermelon one.

I crunched the numbers for our 2024 world cruise where we have the Plus fare at $40pp. It worked out marginally cheaper to buy the decent Princess wines by the bottle at the 25% discount than to buy the local wines we like and pay the $30 corkage, plus lugging dozens of bottles of wine onboard would be almost impossible. We'll still get our money's worth out of the Plus fare with cocktails, coffees, and bottled water etc, and we don't care about the other stuff. But that cruise may very well be the last we do on Princess. If there was another cruise line doing a world cruise out of Australia I'd cancel the Princess one.

Remember the corkage has doubled for Australian cruises, from $15 to $30, which makes it too expensive to bring wine onboard. 🤬

Avoid January if you can as it's school holidays in Australia and NZ. Also it's best to do NZ first in Feb/March, that way you get better weather in NZ (usually) and by the time you get to Australia it will be starting to cool down a bit.

The pie thread will never die, it just has a rest every so often. 🤣

There are some nice wines on the Australian wine list but most are only available by the bottle unfortunately. I'm so annoyed with Princess. We don't buy many expensive wines for home consumption, and usually manage to pick up very good quality wines from Dan Murphys. But Princess serms to have mostly gone for very low-budget wines thus downgrading the Princess experience accordingly. I always classed Princess, along with Celebrity (and possibly Cunard) as being a little above the rest of the mass market cruise lines, sort of deluxe lines but not luxury class. But sadly they are becoming very average.

Not quite right, Thrak. Do NOT go to the Medical Center as you may put others at risk of catching it. Phone them and they will come to you, test you, and provide medical care as needed. But it is very important to advise the Medical Centre of any typical Covid symptoms. I had Covid on Coral Princess last year and they were wonderful. It's a shame that too many people have not learnt anything from the pandemic. Wandering around the closed environment of a cruise ship, unmasked and coughing and/or sneezing, is the height of selfish entitlement IMHO.

There are a lot of people on the main Princess forum that probably haven't taken much notice of the various "upgrades" to the packages so are just catching up with what is happening. We did a cruise in March, booked under one of the earlier Plus fares, so I can absolutely confirm the drinks price limits are the new ones. Of course they also put the drinks prices up, some (wines) to the point of ridiculousness - i.e. a glass costs twice as much as the retail price of a whole bottle! 🙄