jwattle

When you shop at Nordstroms and Macys you have a great distance to "haul" your stuff. On a cruise ship, it's a "de minimus" distance, and I believe that they figure the bag would just clutter your luggage. 🥂 They're really helping, when you think about it.

G'day mates (okay, so it's really almost 2000 hours or 8:00pm), We're shortly to bed for our next to the last sleep before we head to the undisclosed location prior to liftoff. I'm like a kiddo doing "the peepee dance!" The housesitter came by for briefing today; picking up last minute have-to-haves tomorrow, dealing with the terrorists (oh, s**t, sorry, trick-or-treaters) tomorrow evening, and then wake up, change the bedding and bathroom linens, and head off to Santa Rosa! I appreciate all of y'all (yep, Arkansas is in my DNA) following for the shenanigans! Let's go have some fun!! We have some great reservations for restaurants in Sydney, some exploring to be done in Australia, an amazing time to be had on the ship and then the post-cruise crazies in New Caledonia. Who's with me?? Step aboard the plane, ship, automobiles, and whatever else we find and let's get this party started!! 🍸

Takes it from "yeah, we're going on a cruise", to "OMG, we're going on a CRUISE!!!"

You work your way up the chain of command...you also don't necessarily need to "meet" with the Captain, but you can guarantee that your message catches his / her eyes.

Wait till White and Gold on the Majestic next week! 🥂

After what I've paid to be on the cruise, my time is worth more than hiking down to guest services to save a few bucks...JMHO 💞

Looking forward to meeting you! We'll be enjoying the flight somewhat as we have Premium Econ on Air NZ, and I've heard good things about them 🙂

And it continues...

G'day mates! And the ceremony begins! Yes, we geek out over this...Every. Single. Time.

G'day! Two more sleeps and we are on the road, but look what arrived, exciting and new!! Now I have to wait for Tom to get home for the unboxing ceremony!

Thank you for another wonderful live from, but I'm sorry that both you and Holli haven't felt the best this trip! Love to you both!!

That looks absolutely lovely! The anticipation is getting even greater! 🥂

We did look at the SkyCouch, but decided that their Premier Economy was so highly rated, that is was a go for us, and through EZ Air, it was a nice rate. I'll be doing a detailed report on it, as well as on my other site.

Welllll, since you're twisting my arm...😂🍸🍸

@c-boy (Tom) sure perked up when I mentioned Martini night!

Thank you! We are in the same cabin we were previously, R616, and I read your write-up excitedly! Looking forward to meeting the concierge (Darko, I believe?) based on your writing also, thank you! 😊 The Majestic is definitely our "sweet spot" so far with the Princess ships💕 and we're anticipating Catch. Appreciate all of your previous writing!!

Just checked, and we have our QR codes for boarding and Journey View populated in the last day or three. According to our tracking numbers, our medallions will be here tomorrow, so apparently, this is NOT a drill, repeat...this is NOT a drill. We ARE going to Australia! 🥂❤️

G'day mates and welcome to the adventures of jwattle and c-boy aka Jo and Tom (aka...well, IYKYK). We will be hitting the road for an undisclosed location in Santa Rosa, California on Wednesday, 3 days hence, for one night prior to our "official" holiday beginning, but I thought this would be a good time to start the trip report. (Plus, I couldn't wait anymore, getting a bit over-excited!). Itinerary: Leave home on November 1 for our undisclosed location in Santa Rosa for an overnight. We'll take the amazing Groome's Transportation (Airport Express) from the Sonoma Airport to San Francisco airport where we will fly via Air New Zealand Premium Economy, with a bid for Business Premier. (***To any who do this: if you are flying to Australia with ANY stop in New Zealand, you will need an ETA or Electronic Travel Authorization for New Zealand as well as Australia even if you just sit on the plane). We'll arrive in Sydney on November 4 for a three-night stay at the Radisson Blu Plaza in a Business Class room which has free breakfast (brekkie) and access to the business class lounge with noshes and drinks. We board the beautiful Majestic Princess on the 7th with a suite for a back to back Fiji and South Pacific / Tasmania with the Premier Package (no, let's not turn the thread into a debate about the merits and downfalls of the packages please). We return to Sydney for an overnight on the 27th, and on the 28th fly to New Caledonia (Noumea) where we will spend four nights in an overwater bungalow that we picked up for a song somehow. I just checked and the weather for our arrival down under is low 70's and rain. It's a bit warmer than here, but other than that, I think they're trying to make us feel at home with the rain. For those who don't "know" us, we are mid-50's / early-60's, have a fairly extensive background in cruising, definite happy when cruising types... Thank you to any who follow along, and let's enjoy the ride!

One of our recent cruises, there was a guy (I can't say gentleman) who had a knee scooter and was at guest services. His complaint was that he was at the buffet, and the server wanted to carry his food for him. He was insulted by this, and he, at this point, was "going to wait until the Captain himself" served his supper to him. Didn't see that happen at all. Quite the opposite.

It doesn't show on the deck plans as accessible, but it does on the Sky's deck plans, if this helps. 🙂

Ours are coming up fine...?

Yes 🙂

Sometimes the app is glitchy and doesn't credit your free dinners. You can either pay now and get OBC onboard, wait and hope the system "unglitches", or wait and reserve once onboard.

And the adventure begins! 🥂😊

Sur la Mer is now Catch by Rudi on the Majestic.