arxcards

World cruise on Princess usually = 4 sectors. The Ocean Now charge is listed per voyage. I wonder if that will translate to a per sector charge?

According to their new mantra, you are entitled to do it twice per cruise if you have $65 plus. Kai is the "Casual" venue on Diamond.

I see that side of it, and it makes lots of sense. There are others though, particularly of the older generations, that don't have the inclination to jump-in and choose a time, mostly as they don't use the technology to do it. For me, I don't really care either way. Whether via loyalty or knowing to check every 5 minutes when we get below 60 days, I can find the front of the queue if I want it.

Much of this angst has been around the pizzeria menus, which are replacing a price inclusive menu with a price additional menu without changing the content of the menu. Locally for Coral, that sucks. For Majestic, it sucks a bit less as they also have options at Vines & Ocean Terrace that were not inclusive. When Diamond arrives, the sushi wasn't free, but it will be included in the packages. When Crown arrives as our full-time ship, Salty Dog gastropub wasn't free, but it will be included in the packages.

Still showing as for date of purchase, at least our is on Coral cruise in February. We also have that extra DND line (do not display ???) which I hadn't seen before. At least with the latest update, they have said that these recent inclusions will be included. No Aussie departures will be affected until mid-September, so we have a bit of time to see what happens on the other ships - next week, grab some popcorn & keep an eye on the Princess board.

Turns out it is another Princess bum steer on their site. It doesn't matter what version of plus or premier you have, that page shows you having the current version. Below those boxes that show your purchased package (per Julie's post) is some fine print and a link to your travel summary. Select items may not be included in your current package. You can review your travel summary for a full list of included items. Please contact us or your travel agent to make changes to your package. The travel summary is your print-out docs, and it lists all of the components of you package at the time of purchase. If upgrading form old plus to new plus; or old premier to new premier you can't do it via the personaliser, but through your T/A or phoning Princess. That makes sense, as it is part of the fare. It looks as if T/A's also have to do this the old- fashioned way over the phone with Princess.

Plus and Premier fares are not stand-alone packages. Separate packages booked via the personaliser will show in that part of the app.

Yellow lane would be the other. This was all set-up around covid, with the intentions of keeping people apart. Boarding slot times were to be followed, regardless of loyalty/suite priority. There was still a priority check-in line in Sydney & Brisbane, and if parked in a seating area after check-in, they then called via priority groups first. Some days were awesome, others like your day in Honolulu and ours on the first day in Sydney on Majestic were painful. If they are dropping the selection of boarding groups, it will be reverting to priority boarding first, then likely allocated as deck by deck after that as it used to be.

I can't remember what it was, but 15 or so years ago they wanted to roll back some of the Captain's Club amenities or qualifications. I can't recall what it was, but a mutiny was brewing and Princess relented. I can't see them tinkering with priority boarding in their loyalty program, but they have already staged it via boarding calls, depending on numbers. A similar response would likely see elites & suites as 1st call, followed by platinum & premier as 2nd call.

I haven't looked at the app, but just the personaliser, as that has pages that can be printed and furiously waved if needed. 😂

If you have bought a $AU cruise, you have already paid extras in your fare to compensate for a market where the goods and services are paid in the one price - fare, taxes, grats, the lot are sold as an inclusive price. You have mentioned the double dip, so not much to gain out of making it a triple. I will round-up a cab fare, but otherwise very rarely tip in Australia. When in the US and other similar cultures, I will tip above minimum to make sure we haven't stiffed anyone. I know plenty of others that plead ignorant and wont leave a tip anywhere.

Indeed. If there is a swell, wind, current or all of the above down south, it will generally prevail west to east. Much more comfortable to be pushed by the swell than running into it. Sure, when the weather is favourable it makes no difference.

Something for those that are carrying the old packages to check. I asked our T/A about paying (grrrr) the $10pp per day upgrade, and he said it won't let him. On the following page where you can upgrade your package, it lists us having the $95 version and upgrading isn't possible. https://book.princess.com/cruisepersonalizer/onboard/cruisePackages.page (or click the package upgrade link within your personaliser). I don't know if I upset someone, or if these have been quietly grandfathered for premier or both premier & plus. On other tabs such as "onboard services" it still lists the contents of the old package, but I have to think if they wont let me to access the upgrade it must be taken care of already.

Except for the shorter cruises, with a couple of hundred extra priority boarders. Could be that for some of those, the priority queue will be longer than the regular queue. At least for our shortie next Feb on Coral, we have all 3 priority qualifications covered.

Anti. If there is any rough weather on the south or east coasts, you are likely going to be cruising with the current & wind, not against it. Most cruises that lap Australia go in an anti-clockwise direction.

They were hoping to mail them out in Australia, at least that was one of their aspirations last year. It would make the boarding process even slicker if they did, and there would be a blue lane alternate for pick-up for anyone who doesn't have one. Green lane for last season in Oz was pretty much only used to confirm your pre-cruise info was completed, including vaxx status and covid test. It was almost used as a carrot to get everyone to tick all their boxes, whether or not they were needed before check-in. As mentioned, green & blue were treated the same when entering OPT. Now that anyone with premier will have priority boarding along with suites, elites & platinums, it will be interesting to see how it all works without boarding slots. If it reverts, those with priority will be able to arrive a bit earlier for check-in than the other half of the passengers.

I am well and truly off the P&O wagon these days, but I do wish they hung onto either Eden or Aria. For the actual ships, they were a great mid size option. One would hope that HAL could bring back Volendam or Zaandam for our summer seasons. If they want to go to Bora Bora and some of the other Tahitian ports now, they will need to be much smaller than 3000 pax. I also suspect that locally, Isle of Pines doesn't want large cruise ships to return as they are not longer showing on any P&O itineraries. I miss IOP, but can't blame the locals for not bending over backwards to bring cruising back. As much as the covid lockouts were given for ships not resuming visits there, I think they realised during the pause that life was nicer without us swimming around their sacred rock.

$US onboard account. They often have promos that include your choice of gratuities, specialty restaurants, internet, drinks packages which help to keep the onboard spending down. The prices generally are up a bit, but often with the above promos. We haven't sailed on their current Oz based ship, but have cruised on Jewel & Pearl both here and abroad. Our local cruise was (I think) 9 nights on Norwegian Jewel, to Noumea and a couple of other island stops. We quite enjoy NCL, and will likely do a lap of Hawaii on Pride of America not to far down the track. Those are even more expensive, due to the added expense of POA being the only large US registered cruise ship. For us they compare similarly to Royal in many ways. Not quite the same, but a similar demographic and service quality. It is a pity their seasons are so short [here] atm.

Checked-in, so that you next see them at the carousel after your flight. https://oacis.io/booking-cruiseline-form/ but I figure they will also take bookings on the spot if they have the space. PS: When launched five years back, they announced it was for OPT & White Bay, yet the form only has OPT on the seaport dropdown of the above form.

I agree with above. On a good day, 10am is doable for domestic flights, but not all days are good days. The cruise lines advise flights to be after noon. Train is quicker if you line-up your disembark with the timetable, but much of a muchness if the taxi queue is short. Train is also cheaper for one or two passengers, and you can tap on/off with your credit card now instead of needing to get an Opal card. If you are not in a rush to get home, you can have a relaxed morning if the ship is on time, and have your luggage waiting for you in the cruise terminal. If you are on Virgin, you can also pay to have your cases checked-in and transported from just outside the cruise terminal.

Dollars aside, loyalty is also being diluted. Aside from a small number of suites, priority boarding was set aside for loyal passengers. Now you can add another couple of hundred to the priority line. I am surprised they haven't changed the PES lounge to the PEPS lounge. 😉

Correct. Daily grats in the fare of $AU cruises.

Premier was $AU85 when launched here last May. The $75 was the US price, which for them also included their daily grats.

It now says Premier Beverage Package - 75/85, listed on the onboard services page. I am pretty sure we paid $85, but this is becoming a blurr (thanks Princess) 😂

Yes, they put it up to $95 in December when they added those "awesome" desserts. That is still the current price, as the recent changes are just taking things that were previously N/C and moving them into the packages. In the personaliser it will list your inclusions. Ours says premier85, or did last time I checked early in the week.