Heidi13

There is no such thing as a "Major" port in passenger ship operations. Some ports are "Turnaround" ports, all others are ports of call, regardless of the size. When booking a cruise, it is best to be cognisant that the itinerary is only confirmed when you disembark. Another fact to consider, is while this change is clearly an issue for you, many others may be pleased with the switch. Melbourne is a port I have visited many times and it is a brilliant city, but Geelong and the surrounding area also has numerous positives and is closer to some of the attractions. Personally, I would have no issue with Geelong, as it has some great scenery around the tender dock and many of the great attractions are closer - Serendip Open Range Sanctuary and 12 Apostles being 2 examples. Another consideration is cruise ships dock at Station Pier in Phillip's Bay, not at the commercial port on the Yarra River. It is about 4 miles to the CBD. From departing the gangway, it can be a 1/2 hr to reach the CBD, especially if docked at an outer berth.

How about back in the days when you could bring friends and family aboard with you at embarkation, so they could also enjoy the ship for the afternoon. Just prior to departure you had repeated announcements, "All ashore that's going ashore", followed by the sailaway party, with pax lining the railings and friends & family down on the dock. Don't forget the tons of streamers thrown from the ship, that at times, almost kept the ship alongside.

From memory they were updated earlier this year, but they have also changed how cruise vessel tolls are assessed. They now use tonnage rather than per berth. A couple of years ago, I recall them introducing a FW surcharge. Total transit cost, including the reservation, daylight transit, surcharges, pilots, tugs, linehandlers, tolls, etc for a Panamax cruise ship is probably between $300K to $500K.

Nope, not currently a fan of Viking Air or Viking Cruises. In the unlikely event we book another Viking Cruise, we would only use Viking Air when Business flights are included with the cruise. Since we only fly on points and Viking Air will no longer book or upgrade flights with points, we would book our own flights.

You are under the mistaken belief that Viking Air is a Travel Agent and has full access to every airline seat. They are a bulk purchaser of flight on contract, for pax, officers and crew. They can only offer seats available on their contracts. If using Viking Air, you are wasting your time checking the airline websites Having experienced a similar situation, we may have waited until Viking booked flights, but during the entire time we were relaxing in one of the many quiet nooks & crannies, enjoying a meal, or chatting with other pax. We also had no cancellation fees or extra charges. Viking also took care of all the arrangements getting to the airport. It may have been an easy process to change your flights, but I expect they came with some additional costs. Negative, we have booked with Viking Air and received business flights in both North America and Europe. However, due to lower demand, I expect they have less contracted Business/First seats on short-haul than long-haul flights.

Based on other threads discussing this subject, I believe this is the only cruise impacted, at present. I believe other HAL cruises are still scheduled for partial transits, as are ships from other cruise lines. Therefore, the reason for the change could be one of many, which could be as simple as planned maintenance will reduce the ship's speed, so they are unable to make the Canal.

Not having or wanting another cell phone, I still use traditional DSLR/Mirrorless bodies and my Canon lenses. With over 20 full canal transits, I found using 2 bodies works best for me - one has the EF 70-200 f/2.8L IS II USM and the other a lens with more wide angle capability - EF 16-35 f/2.8L II USM or EF 24-105 f/4L IS USM. Current bodies are 5D MkIII & R6.

I fail to see why the Rhapsody OTS schedule was any more vulnerable than any other cruise ships visiting ports on both sides. She had an alternating home port either side of the Canal and would have visited ports on both sides of the Canal, so to complete the cruise, weekly Canal transits were required. The only difference with the Alaska ships that are repositioning, is they aren't changing home ports weekly. Based on the premium that cruise ships pay for transits on a fixed day and in daylight hours, I suspect the Panama Canal Authority is extremely disappointed with the extensive loss of revenue. Although they will have made some of it back in the cancellation fees payable. The Panama Canal Authority is a business, so I highly doubt they are asking cruise lines to cancel partial transit sailings, so they can replace cruise ships with a cargo ship paying a fraction of the fee. With a huge debt load and reduced daily transits, they require the additional revenue that cruise ships and liner service vessels provide. The Canal may also have instituted reduced draught requirements, due to the lower water levels, but this doesn't impact cruise ships, which have lower draughts than most cargo ships. Finally, with respect to the Alaska ships repositioning through the Canal, I envisage NO changes to previous years, so they will go ahead as planned. Having completed well over 20 full transits on both cruise ships and cargo ships, I can't envisage any new operational constraints that will negatively impact the transits this year. If cruise lines are cancelling partial transits, I'll suggest in these days of additional cost cutting, removing the Canal costs is a significant saving, and is their primary reason. If the Panama Canal Authority had requested they cancel any sailing (which is highly unlikely), or full season, I have no doubt the cruise lines would use this information in the press release.

I'll suggest the irony is that since we have no need to burn coal and rarely natural gas to generate power, the revenue from coal exports helps to build additional dams. In addition, over 95% of our coal exports is used in steel production, so is most likely used in the building of the cruise ships docking at Canada Place and connecting to our clean power. BTW - the City of Vancouver has no coal exports, as Neptune Bulk Terminals is in North Vancouver and most of the coal exports are from Delta Port, well south of Vancouver

If close to the bow it could be the anchor in the Hawse Pipe or the chain.

Hic!! cause I was driving😁

Our favourite ship changed as we aged. In our younger days, our preference was SS Oriana back in 1977. A truly great liner for crossing the ocean and an amazing party ship. These days it would be the Viking Sun, which brought back many great memories of the exceptional service of earlier cruises. Good food, exceptional bright decor, lots of relaxing and quiet nooks throughout the ship, interesting lectures and an amazing crew.

Tendering operations are at the discretion of the local harbourmaster. The tenders are equipped to operate 24/7, so I can't foresee any port would force them to stop at sunset. As Jim posted, the schedule will be reduced in the later part of the evening, with the last tender returning to the ship, with the shore infrastructure and personnel, about 22:30 to 22:45, for a 23:00 departure. I suspect the later tenders will have more crew than pax.

Time in port is short, so we have no wish to spend valuable shore leave looking for an ATM. Will never use 3rd party ATM's, only ones from an accredited National Bank. Therefore, we bring a small amount of local currency for each country visited. Mostly use credit card.

The Port Authority must purchase the electric power from BC Hydro, a highly regulated Provincial Crown Corporation. Power supplies in BC do not get cheaper the more you use, as the Govt is trying to make us less electricity dependent. Our power rates increase the more we use. However, I expect the Port does have fixed rates negotiated with BC Hydro. The cruise lines are not purchasing power on the local market directly from BC Hydro, they are buying from the port, who no doubt charge what they pay BC Hydro, a mark up and a fee to recoup the shore infrastructure costs. Purchasing shore power, at least in Vancouver and Victoria is not the same as purchasing bunkers.

Rob - last time I recall seeing the Noon lottery was back in the 80's. Back in those days, I don't recall a casino on any of the P&O ships.

If you are referring to the Rhapsody OTS as the vessel that cancelled an entire season, she was scheduled for full transits of the canal, not partial transits, on a weekly basis. While RCI never indicated the reason for cancelling, I highly doubt it is due to low water levels. The most likely cause is they realised the ROI was below expectations, as weekly transits of the canal are extremely expensive. Back in the days I did the Panama shuttle, we only went through every 2-weeks. Since cruise ships pay a huge premium to transit in daylight hours on a fixed day, I don't see the Canal Authority asking cruise ships to cancel so they can be replaced by cargo ships that pay a fraction of the fees paid by cruise lines.

We always had horse races, sometimes a couple per cruise. Did HAL also have the Noon day's run lottery, where pax guessed how many miles the ship steamed since departure or the previous 24 hrs. If memory is correct it was a 50/50 lottery. How about slot machines on the stairways. They used to generate a fortune on the P&O ships. Since the ships were all cash those days, pax always had money in their pockets.

Without knowing the ship, best guess is the Wartsilas are the prime movers and the 2 Cat 3500 series are emergency generators. This is similar to my last command that had 4 MAN as prime movers and a Cat 3608 as emergency genny.

Exactly. As we used to say, the ship can handle the seas just fine, the pax, not so much.

Correction to my previous reply. In Lautoka (Fiji) we also docked alongside. I recalled operating a tender, but it was officers only, as we topped it up with some lunches and cases of beer, heading over to one of the local islands.

In addition to the dinner chimes, fixed seating was the only option, you had separate wine waiters and the waiters performed flawless "Silver Service", with some dishes finished at the table - salads, pastas, desserts. Many tables also had an officer assigned, especially late seating. Bridge visits mornings & afternoons on seas days. After departure, the ship steamed 25-miles offshore, opened a shell door and conducted floatation tests with the garbage. In Glacier Bay, each week we lowered a boat bringing back a bergy bit, which the galley carved and displayed outside the MDR. Not sure what HAL experienced, as these were all P&O/Princess.

Affirmative, as similar to electric cars, in some/many cases it just shifts the problem to the generating station. The other consideration is that very few of the World's port have the supply available for a cruise ship. At least in Vancouver and Victoria it does make a difference, as overall our Provincial power is 98% renewable and is 100% on many days.

Don't know of any website, but here are just a few of the ships that have entered service since 2022 Viking - Viking Mars, Viking Neptune, Viking Saturn, Viking Polaris and Viking Octantis Princess - Discovery Princess Virgin - Valiant Lady, Resilient lady. Can't recall the name, but a 4th ship is scheduled in 2024 RCI - Wonder OTS, Icon OTS (debut late 23/early 24) Celebrity - Celebrity Beyond, Celebrity Ascent (debut late 23) Carnival - Carnival Celebration, Carnival Jubilee (delayed to late 23) Disney - Disney Wish NCL - Norwegian Prima, Norwegian Viva MSC - MSC Seascape, MSC World Europa, Explora, MSC Euribia Oceania - Vista Silversea - Silver Nova Seabourne - Pursuit

Ships also head offshore > 12 miles, so you generally don't see more shoreline except the first and last hour.