arxcards

1 hour ago, Chiliburn said:

Maybe just change this whole forum to the ANZ Princess Medallion forum.

Everything else discussed ,is disruptive and off subject .

What, like your cougars, upside pineapples & clips of monkeys?

You Mr Chili are a hypocrite.

10 hours ago, Chiliburn said:

What, this thread is digressing into another Princess Medallion one too .

It is on-topic to the surrounding discussion. 

Maybe you should become Host Chili.

Usually x 3 for me.

No slappers, but a similar idea with arch support. A bit like the smooth masseurs.

A pair of casual sketchers.

A pair of good black shoes for dinner. It is good for us men, colour co-ordinating our whole case to black or brown belt & shoes.

Add a pair of reef shoes for the relevant itineraries.

I have access to those cheap slippers on Princess, but rarely use them.

Barb is trying, but has worked out that packing a clothing colour theme does halve the number of shoes she needs to pack.

6 hours ago, Jean C said:

We've struck it a couple of times, once an elderly couple who booked an inside cabin at last minute prices and boasted about it. The other time was a couple who booked the cruise, again when bargain prices were offered to fill the ship, but had booked the cruise in segments and got an overall very cheap price. 

We have also had it a couple of times, where it would seem that travel agents aren't on holidays when they are on holidays. Their agency is always the cheapest.

2 hours ago, MicCanberra said:

It was a good game, although 4th quarter I was flipping between the game and the soccer, women's semifinal.

Flipping between Swans, NRL, Supercars, Grand Prix for me.

1 hour ago, MicCanberra said:

Depends on what they ate previously I suppose

They look like pork & beans kinda people.

57 minutes ago, MicCanberra said:

I know what you mean about the ones that state they have done??? Cruises. When asked we just say we have cruised a bit.

Similar. Done a few.

Avoid those that place their cards/medallions on the table when they identify status level or a suite - they are setting a trap, waiting for you ask why their card is a different colour.

Some of them want to use you

38 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

And that is exactly why I want a table for two for breakfast! I am not civilized until I've had a pot of strong tea. Even Rolf knows not to ask me anything serious before I've had some food and my tea!

Yep. I would agree .... and it is much more civil in Sabatini's for breakfast 🤣🤣🤣

5 hours ago, ceeceeDee said:

Couldn't believe it when I first came across this 'trend' (some people were promoting it as a hack).

a) Very unhygenic

b) A lot of effort to wrestle off the beds and maneuver through the balcony doors

c) They'd get very damp in the sea air

d) Highly likely to p-off the poor cabin steward

e) Flammable

In the main, those cruising in suites or with elevated tier status are very discrete. At the breakfast table, over time I have found it is those with 10 to 15 cruises or those in a balcony for the first time are most prone to talk up their importance. If you have cruised long enough they will identify themselves at breakfast, with an opening line - Is this your first cruise? Usually fun to play along.

We really don't care, having cruised inside, outside, upside down - and a few nice suites to boot. Suites are not allocated on merit to those most deserving, but those who paid a premium for some extra real estate and a few perks.

1 hour ago, Bubbeh said:

Any cruise out of Freo or into is going to be expensive.  We're booked on a 10 day Princess Coral Coast Cruise in September which has cost $6900 for a balcony for 2 of us - for those challenged by numbers that $690 a day which divides to $345 each.  However, there are no airfares or pre/post cruise accommodation involved. There are very few people in the world who enjoy a whiskey or a wine more than me yet, after doing the sums, we've never bought drinks packages or any of the other packages.  I'm perfectly happy with the 'free' coffee and tea, don't do specialty dining or bother with Wi Fi etc.  In fact the only thing I'll ever pay for once I'm on board is drinks and the odd ice cream.  

The final Freo to Freo cruise for Coral. It is a little on the dear side, but it has sold out and you are aboard and I hope you get to enjoy her us much as we did. There is N/C soft serve at the solarium pool and different ice creams in the dining room each night, so maybe a little more value for you.

I would certainly be paying the premium to cruise from home too. At this stage, we have only been tempted to fly across the country for a Freo cruise once, and that was when airfares were more reasonable. I hope you can get some more ships based in Freo in the years ahead.

In a balanced world, everyone is entitled to an opinion, but those pages are far from balanced or democratic. Sadly these non-affiliated social media pages are just a fan club, often moderated by people that will prevent contrary opinion. In the case of most unofficial P&O pages, it is only OK to negatively critique other cruise lines. To become part of the collective, resistance is futile.

So, a contrary opinion is shouted down. Even facts are dismissed if they don't fit the agenda of the group, and once again, everyone nods in agreement.

2 hours ago, MicCanberra said:

The issue we have is we often have other travel and flights as well. You don't want to be lugging big bags around when doing all of that.

Yes, Barb has a crook shoulder, so I become the mule and prefer not to be muscling around two heavy cases if I can avoid it. There will come a time when that will no longer be possible.

Two weeks would usually be 1 x 23kg case between us, plus a carry-on each. If we are travelling with winter clothes we will go with 2 x cases, but heaps of weight to spare.

As a packing guide:

a) Get out all of your clothes ready for packing

b) Pack half of those clothes

c) Grab your wallet and take double the cash

10 minutes ago, wintrev said:

I am presuming that this is an oversight and glitch with the app?

 

Yes, a limitation with the way their data reports to the app. As a $US cruise, it presumes plus was purchased as the US version.

13 hours ago, fishtaco said:

Seems I have been banned from P&O FB pages for telling the Truth about my recent P&O12 night cruise experience? I was neither scaving nor over critical! and am on the same ship again in 9 months, I really wanted to compare "Now and Then" Which is obviously no longer allowed in this Social media world of "Mac Donalds" dining accepting millennial moderators??? This is why CC "Cruise Critic" Is the place to assess! Way too many first Time Cruisers rave about a cruise with Zero experience of how it was, so their experience always out ways your own! No cruise is a bad cruise because you are cruising but when new cruiser "Flamers" out weigh experience then its time to stop posting genuine experience!

 

Cheers

You say pages.

P&O has one page, and I have not known them to ban anyone. If tagged, they will try to engage you with a "Sorry you are disappointed, please direct message us the details" kind of effort.

These other pages have nothing to do with P&O, and are run by cruisers for a group of like minded passengers - a fan club. There is a varying degree of over-moderation by page admins with a hive mentality who just want agreeable members. Those pages are not a great place for rocking the boat.

I agree, I don't partake in FB cruise passenger groups for those and other reasons. I learn more here, and enjoy contrary discussion, but at times I miss out on connecting with groups of fans on our cruises. This is much more than just about cruising.

1 hour ago, phoenixx said:

How do you get onto the "never upgrade this person" list? Thanks

I don't know. It wasn't by design. Perhaps by upsetting someone at Princess.

4 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Except these days you rarely get to talk to the local office, just an off-shore call centre that I suspect handles calls from everywhere and who actually don't know much. 

 

What is more reliable is looking at the summary page on the Personalizer for your cruise where it clearly states the onboard folio currency. 

Yes, that is easy to confirm - after booking. By the general rule, a ship coming or going between an Aussie season & Asia is $AU, with a fare that has absorbed any daily gratuities. Princess literature confuses this more than we do.

1 hour ago, ceeceeDee said:

I'm surprised they don't advertise the chute as an adventure activity! 😂

For P&O Edge, it would be a $50pp charge.

5 minutes ago, Chiliburn said:

You need something to dream about. We have plan A,B,C and now thinking about Plan D .

Genius 

5 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

I guess they make a mistake occasionally. After all we are the only region in the world where the ships operate in a local currency onboard, and repositioning cruises are confusing in that respect - different rules for different start/end locations. 

And that's why we have a local office to dot the T's 😉

1 hour ago, MicCanberra said:

Most likely due to demand.

Getting in early for the cancellation credits? 😉

For those looking forward to sliding down a chute into a raft, it would only be in a dire emergency mostly when not all the life boats could be used.

Correct, there isn't enough life boats for everyone aboard, but on most ships there are enough for every passenger plus assigned crew manning each lifeboat. Most of the crew get to practice drills getting into life rafts, as that is where most of them will be huddled if the ship has to be abandoned.

For the newer ships, you will see a letter like this in your cabin:

You would think bigger ships would need to provide more lifeboats, but it becomes an issue of how quickly you can get passengers into all of them. The life raft system allows for a more rapid evacuation of the ship.

In the event of an evacuation at sea, I would be following this bloke to find the quickest way off the ship.

10 minutes ago, possum52 said:

 

Both Rob and I have Campbell ancestors - his from Cork in Ireland and mine from Northumberland. I assume they were originally Scottish. I have not been able to go back further in tracing where they originally came from. 

I have a fair bit of a family trace from Northumberland, but definitely not the Campbell clan. By some connection, I live in Northumberland County (the early pre-council pastoral & parish boundaries). Have a fair bit of my ancestry from around Hadrian's Wall