Aussieflyer

I board in 2 weeks so have been reading along with great interest. Thanks JeanC

I hope you have a wonderful, wonderful cruise - just think when you get home the stories you can tell.

However, by the end of January 4000 Australians had died of COVID since the pandemic began. At the beginning of July the total number of dead had grown to 10,000. With the new immunity-evading BA.4 and BA.5 variants, this is set to worsen still.

Oh no, I hope you are on the mend and recovery quickly. Back injuries are so easy to do and can take a long time to resolve.

Are you saying that the cabins you saw for COVID isolation were being used or were they there in cases needed? Interested to know what sort of infection rate there was on board. I have had 4 vaccinations and been wearing masks when in shopping centres etc but still picked up COVID last week - possibly from a friend - and may have unknowingly passed it on to another friend. Seems to be widespread here. But, if I had had these symptoms pre-COVID, they would be put down to the lurgy/bad cold.

Perhaps a one day hire would be enough with something more local for the other day - or maybe you could 2 separate one day ones? And I did see that Grand Chancellor does have public parking (I think overnight by the looks of it). It might be worth contacting them to find out.

Thanks for the info on the aquarium - we are there on 12 Aug cruise so will look at that as an option. We are booked on the reef trip out of PD so hopefully the weather will be Ok for that.

And it will be pretty expensive to hire - since COVID, there are a limited number of cars available and something of a premium in cost. A couple of months back it was about $1700 though Avis for a 6 day hire of a Hyundai Kona (last year was about the same but for 10 days - so still pretty dear). And as advised, book early.

The ship has a tour that seems to be the same one - considering it for our August cruise so good to hear it seemed well organised and worth it.

And I am another one for the crispy bacon 😁

Actually I am quite pleased it isn't. On Golden P, the area filled up with people who stake a claim on a seat and stay as there is always something happening. Means that others who just want to sit down and have a coffee find it very difficult to find a seat. Hopefully being in a different place this won't be such an issue.