LittleFish1976

I tried searching for the Singapore to Cape Town voyage on the Australian Cunard site yesterday to no avail - doesn't seem to be available to book through this market which will not help fill all those cabins you mention!

They also increased them not too long ago. I'm sure it was within the last twelve months.

Thank you Linda! Yes my post eneded up being pointless and I did try to delete it when I realised how unsuccessful the media links were but of course my tech abilities didn't even extend to deleting the post!! 🤣

There are two wardrobes in the Q3. There's a walk-in wardrobe with a door which separates it from the bedroom area. It has hanging and shelves and is very roomy. Then there is some cabinetry adjacent to the walk-in robe which are fitted with doors and contain drawers and shelves (this is where the safe is) and then there is a separate smallish wardrobe which is all hanging space. More than enough for two people spending weeks at sea.

Although it's okay to be old-fashioned (and do what your mother probably did) and sit in the back - I do.

I'm sure I could have got a taxi faster but I needed to have the car from that point onwards. And the off-site rental companies are fine if you're arriving within their business hours which is not always the case. Also, if you have an early morning departure you can leave the car at their off-site depot and post the key through the letterbox but you then have to have a way of getting those last few kms to the airport (which if you're a solo female traveller can be tricky - I don't want to be standing in an out-of-the-way industrial area at 5am waiting for a cab in the dark!).

I've been on both, crossed the Tasman in both. Had some rough-ish seas both times although nothing dramatic. On the QM2 we had the water from the pool on the deck above cascading down outside the PG restaurant which *looked* dramatic but it didn't feel like anything much (which probably says something) and we were eating at the time. It's certainly a comfortable ship but I also think the Queen Elizabeth sails beautifully also. I would compare to another ship I was on a few months ago (Grand Princess) and it may have just been particularly rough seas off the coast of eastern Victoria and into S.A. on that occasion, but we really got tossed around a lot on that one. As already said above, the cabins are larger on QM2 grade-for-grade but they are also more expensive than for the same grade on the Vistas.

This is a Q3 on QE which has a lovely layout in my opinion. The bathroom is in two sections with the bath and shower (and basin?) in one part and the lav and basin in the other, and they have a door between them. Here are some photos and a video of the cabin taken 12 months ago. edit: video won't work for some reason. 112E9FE7-B97C-4AA5-9CC3-ACF83E4D34D8.mov 9BADFE31-75F0-4AF1-8D2C-09F2D2619D9B.heic 0E591386-7E4A-4B4B-A63E-6839CDEB5A42.heic EAEA7EC9-26A7-470E-B967-28BF5BFC5307.heic 8E5EA859-13FB-4D8D-B04C-A9A6FC329497.heic

Auckland can be very slow. I've stood in a queue for customs at Auckland airport for over an hour (Feb. last year) - just to get through that section, and with nothing to declare. By the way, I then stood in a queue to pick up a pre-booked hire car at one of the major companies within the airport for an hour and ten minutes! It will depend, as others have said, on how busy the airport is at the time but I wouldn't count on it being quick.

Can I suggest asking this on the 'Australia & NZ Cruisers' board as there are sure to be people who would know there.

I'm not sure where you got the information from that Cunard will charge the balance of your account to your card in AUD. My experience is that they make the charge in USD and your card does the conversion. If you want to confirm this, check with the purser's desk once you're aboard. Think you'll find yourself on the QE rather than the old QE2! 😁

It was just a little joke.

Paragraph 30b suggests that if one does not have a 'Special Occasion' to celebrate, then one is not entitled to bring a bottle of wine or champagne on board! Seems rather puritanical! 😉

Why not have your wife's aunt who is in Queensland do the booking so she will be able to access the Australian version of the Princess website? Or am I misunderstanding something? Sorry I posted this before I finished reading the thread!

If you'd had your sunscreen with you, you could have stayed up on the Grills Terrace - they come around at tea time with a trolley and serve a selection of afternoon tea and icecream to you on your sunlounge. You should have mentioned your desire for more orange jellies to your waiter. They would have brought you more and possibly every night if you'd let them know. They go out of their way to make sure you're pleased. I'm very glad you enjoyed your first Cunard cruise. They're certainly my favourite line.

The showers in Queen's Grill are separate from the bath so you might need to persuade yourself that that's the cabin category you need! 😃

I'm also in Australia and make most of my bookings through the local office. Based on my experience I would be very surprised if they will allow you to transfer your deposit to another booking. This does depend on the T&Cs of your particular booking but you do mention that the time for refund of deposit has passed. If you have particular personal circumstances which are leading to your intention to cancel, you could explain those circumstances to them but I have found them to be totally inflexible with their rules. Best of luck though.

Thanks very much for your answer Kimboo - I'm also from Melbourne so our perceptions of temperature are probably similar! Appreciate very much the specific advice regarding those bottom layers.

I may be too late for this answer to be of use to you but I find the temperature of the spa very suitable for arthritis.

The butlers are usually very keen to have access to the QG cabins to commence the servicing for the next guests rather early, in my experience. They will enter the room while you are at breakfast and make a start. Perhaps you can hang around in another area of the ship but you will need to leave your cabin at the time assigned.

What sort of 'attraction' do you suggest that Carnival cruisers would want to have built for them to attract them to Melbourne? The cliche of the Carnival cruiser would suggest that would be beer barns with mud wrestling! Sydney has the advantage of the flashy Opera House well-known as an image of Australia (maybe 'the only' image of Australia a lot of Americans would know). Melbourne's advantages are not going to appeal to the usual Carnival or whatever cruise traveller; it's more to the taste of others who are coming for the food and the culture, the lovely gardens and the friendly people and great beaches; penguins, surf, vineyards. Station pier is not as bad as some of the dramatic posts about it suggest. I'd rather sail to and from Melbourne than fly into or out of Sydney! 'Prepare for incoming' as Uncle Les would say...

As the young people say, 'Tell me you're from NSW without telling me you're from NSW'. 🤣

Peters of Kensington offers very good prices for all sorts of things including luggage on-line but they do have a physical store in Kensington and some other suburbs in Sydney. You could check them out.

@Bejay219 I think it would be a shame to miss out on the pleasure of dressing up and dining in the Princess Grill dining room on the gala nights you mention. My favoured option when under packing stress on the sort of lengthy European journey you've planned is to send a suitcase to or fro to enable you to have the correct attire and equipment. I've used Luggage Forward in the past. It would be easy for you to send a suitcase containing your husband's dinner suit and accessories and your dresses and shoes to meet you at the ship when you are boarding in Southampton. If you needed to, for timing issues, you could have the case picked up from a friend or family member if you're leaving home too far in advance to organise from your own address. You can feel very comfortable wearing that level of dress every night on board so the extra clothing wouldn't be just for those two nights.

What a frustration. I've been quite lucky with that part of the process I have to say. I do also copy in the address which I understand is the Cunard office in Sydney which is cunard.aspac@carnivalaustralia.com and it usually gets processed promptly. Not sure if I'm game to try the app given I've had plenty of other 'Call Centre/admin' headaches regarding my back-to-back voyages coming up soon so I might stick with emailing which I"ll be allowed to do in a couple of weeks. I'll let you know how it goes although hopefully by then you'll already have yours organised. At least we no longer have to fax the information and request!