JVes

I love Vegemite, does that count? I'm planning to do a wardrobe try-on soon. I have friends who I can trust to say 'don't pack that'. I hope I will have two lbds that fit me with enough ease to allow for sea air. Thanks for the warning! Koalas and wombats are both hard to find. My parents used to live next to a state park that had lots of koalas living there. They commonly saw koala claw scratches but only very rarely saw the koalas. I've seen two wombats - one of which was in a shelter, healing from injuries. The other one was amazing - this wombat just walked out from the side of a path, waddled his way along the path ignoring us, then went back into the wild grass and completely disappeared. The pademelon, wallaby and kangaroos are pretty much the same thing; they're in the family macropodidae. There are other macropods in the family, but .... ahem. Let's just stop that before I wax too lyrical about my country. I kinda love it. 109 days!

FINAL PAYMENT IS MADE! My cruise is 110 days away. I've been trying to fill in Ocean Ready, but it seems that I'm too excited and eager. I have travel insurance. I'm making a mermaid picture to magnet-attach to the room door. It's one of the 'colouring in for adults' pictures. I think it's Art Deco in style but don't quote me on it. The important thing is that it's distinctive, and it's distracting me from compulsively digging through my wardrobe trying to decide on everything from 'which shorts' to 'I need to buy a hawaiian print skirt'. Hawaiian print skirt. In Australia. In the south of Australia. So yeah. Final payment made, and I'm excited. Could you tell?

I hope 'thank you' posts don't clog up your bandwidth. I've read everything suggested, and viewed that Royal Caribbean video. Thank you for all those ideas and sources. I feel very welcomed. I think that's all I have. Thank you, and I feel welcome here.

Thank you for such a helpful response! I have two little black dresses, one requires a bit more 'dressing up' than the other: I'll try them both on before the cruise. The one with the cowl neck suits me better so it'll probably be the one I pack. Unfortunately for the 'formal' dress code, I need to wear prescription shoes. If I'm in a crafting mood, I'll make spats for them. I like milk. But yeah, we don't need zip lines, conga lines, limbo line.. sticks. We wanted to sail Melbourne-to-Melbourne, which limited our options, but all the research I'd been doing suggested that of the options, Princess would suit us best. Your post makes me feel better about the choice. I hope you enjoyed Australia! I have the kind of deep love of country that I think comes from having lived here my whole life. I've patted koalas, kangaroos, even a wombat. And had a zookeeper drape a snake over me and let it explore me. I've played with the bark from paperbark trees (never made a bark painting. Probably should look into that). Ghost gums in fog look amazing. Kookaburras do sound like laughter. Re wine and currency I suspect the ship's currency will be AUD, I'll check with the travel agent. As for alcomahol, neither of us drinks it. Correction: Bestie may try a cocktail or two. No enough to warrant a drinks package! I won't have any. Unless I want one of those spectacular flambe food. And thank you very much for caring enough to post all of that!

I'm delighted to see you all being excited for me & curious! Grand Princess, Melbourne-Adelaide-Melbourne, 11/Nov to 15/Nov. We're not doing any excursions, we can see Adelaide any time we want, and even get there along the most scenic road in Australia - the Great Ocean Road. The point of this trip is (cough, quote coming) not the destination, but the journey. I'm going with my best friend in the whole world, after my husband. (He doesn't want to come.) Bestie and I share a lot of experiences, and tend to find the same things beautiful, or funny, or sad. We're likely to be joined at the hip at first, but once we find out what each of us likes more, we'll split up. John Bull, I didn't think about currency: since we're staying in Australian waters the whole time, it just didn't occur to me that we might need to change currency. What I have done is buy a little 'not-smart' watch. So I can set it to ship time and it'll never switch to a local time zone and turn me into a pier runner. (Well, pier stumble awkwardly.) That's a little investment into more ambitious cruising! BKLYNBOY8, I have a cheat code: Ilana's Ultimate Cruise Planner. (Life Well Cruised). In addition to that, there are a LOT of cruise blogs. I credit Gary Bembridge (sp?) and Emma with giving me the idea that 'hey, cruising might be a way to get around my disabilities'. (Tips for Travellers, and Emma Cruises) I first heard Gary's dulcet tones because the Youtube algorithm picked that for me to listen to. Then kept picking him. And soon I was actively picking cruise vlogs. So yeah, I'm going to make packing mistakes. But (hopefully) not the obvious ones. Like no underwear. Haljo1935, I work well with prose, adequately with poetry, and not at all with images. But I'll bear in mind that you want to see how I experience cruising. Questions .. I don't have any right now, except for things like meetups. But they'll probably be answered when I follow the links in Host Kat's post. Host Kat, I've read your post and am off to explore your links and learn more about Cruise Critic. Thank you very much! Expectations Good food. Good entertainment: everything from a full-on theatre show to a small band playing in a lounge. Places to relax and see the sea. Bass Strait and the Southern Ocean, to be precise. They're both fairly unique pieces of water, and my only wish would be to have an oceanographer in the chair beside me teaching me about it. (OMG! That's a brilliant idea for an 'enrichment talk'. An oceanographer explaining the unique qualities of whichever bit of water the ship is sailing in!) And I expect a space to retreat to if I get overwhelmed (our cabin, which we'll personalise). And I expect them all to be close enough to each other that I can manage to walk (or limp) to them.

I'm sure this topic has been said before, but I couldn't find it. SO: JUST BOOKED MY FIRST CRUISE! And I am SO excited. And collecting all the cruise advice I've found. And SO EXCITED (just in case I hadn't mentioned that).

I'm 53. With (middle) age comes wisdom, they say. I use a walker all the time, even within my house. I've had too many falls and near falls. One broken wrist is enough. (walker = zimmer frame? rollator? The ones that have four wheels, a small basket, and can be turned around to be a reasonably comfortable seat.) I'm working to go on my first cruise. We don't know when, exactly, we'll be doing it. We have two critical issues. The first is my husband's effort - money. The second is my effort. I'm training my body and endurance. I've gone into the ship data for the ships that leave my home port, and found out how long they are. I'm not going to be ready to cruise until I can walk at least half the length of the ship. (Probably P&O Australia or Princess.) For those whose limitations can stretch with physiotherapy, use your cruise as motivation. It's working well for me! Also, does anyone have any info on P&O Aus or Princess and their friendliness to people who might suddenly have to sit on a chair at some random location in the ship? (Or other disabilities!)

I'm responding primarily to the Hard No. Please admit your disability to yourself. I suffered needlessly for decades because I wouldn't. So PLEASE, everyone who reads this, admit your body's needs. Even if it's something that isn't really disabling, but your body still needs it. Don't suffer needlessly. Case Study: me. I became disabled somewhere around age 18. I refused to admit to being disabled even a few years later when I was sleeping almost all of the day, and dragging myself around when I wasn't. I refused to admit being disabled even though our bedroom was up the top of stairs and I was climbing the stairs like a toddler. Hands as well as feet to go up, and bumping down on my bottom to go down. I refused to admit being disabled even when I had tantrums over trivial things. I eventually admitted to being disabled around age 40. Using a cane to walk around reduced how much it hurt, and increased my effective range. I now use a rollator (one of the ones I can sit on). It's carbon fibre, and it's very light. It does occupy a lot of space in the boot (trunk?), but it's worth that effective loss of space. Admit your disability to your doctor, to your family and close friends, and most of all to yourself. Using the tools designed to make your life less hard increases what and how much you can do.