More proof of them 'discounting' cruises as much as they did in Australia - yet that was used as the excuse by some as to why they had to leave Australia.

11 hours ago, Jamietravelstheworld said:

I will be on a Princess cruise that tenders to Moreton Island. What are the options for activities/excursions if one doesn't choose to do a ship excursion? From what I've read online at the Tangalooma Island Resort website (which I believe is where the tenders come in and where most of the ship excursions happen), activities at the resort are limited on cruise days to hotel guests and ship excursions only (no day passes). I'm not finding much else to do then other than ship excursions. Thanks.

Each time I've been there, there have been local activity operators selling options straight after you get off the tender, just as you enter the island.

Not sure how big the ship is, but being tenders it may take some time for you to get off the ship, in which case the more 'popular' tours may be gone by the time you get there. e.g. Often the dune buggy tours are sold out.

So I'd say you very will likely have some tour options on the island. 

But if you are selective/have a strong preference what you want to do, you are best off getting off as early as you can for the best selection.

They don't mind if you bid or not, but they're not going to second guess you and exclude you from bidding on higher categories - there's nothing to gain, and of course possibility of loss for them if you had have been interested but were falsely excluded.

So as long as you qualify, you get the offer. Many others who had booked your cabin would be fine to upgrade. So even though your situation prefers having the extra bedroom, it's an option for those who don't - without them guessing as to who might not want it.

16 hours ago, Stewie0353 said:

We were booked to sail Australia this coming December and built a family and friends Christmas around it. Virgin decided to cancel that and are now booking the Resilient Lady for more profitable voyages. To date I have only been refunded the 2nd payment but have no news of where the $1590 deposit is! There will be many thousands of Australian travellers in this boat. Can anyone enlighten me where we stand with the deposit, travel insurance and destroyed plans? I have booked with Princess in May 2025. 

For the deposit you should contact them. If you booked direct you should be able to get it fairly quickly, but if you went through a TA then it will take longer, and may involve fun and games with them as some of them make refunds difficult. (They shouldn't - but some do.)

As for the travel insurance, contact your insurer - they may likely be able to transfer it to another cruise when you explain the situation.

23 hours ago, Wildcatllamas said:

I don't know about the prices for the fresh squeezed juices but the specialty coffee prices are definitely in line with what I pay at my local coffee shops. Actually they are a bit cheaper and a lot better.

Yes, coffee and alcoholic drinks are reasonable. As said, it's just the juices/non-alcoholic drinks  which are ridiculously overpriced.

Maybe to pay for the overpriced juices, or coffees/teas?

2 hours ago, DCGuy64 said:

What would you have had them say instead? "We lost money on the Aussie market, so we're out of here?" I can't remember the last time a corporation said something like that.

Then that says more about corporate ethics than whether it's the right thing to do.

We're all adults - in fact, they make it that way by not accepting children - so how about treating us like that and being upfront with us instead of lying, so you never know what's true or not?

13 hours ago, Actuality251 said:

Do all cruises rely on apps as heavily as VV seems to?

Others have a more traditional base -most started before apps existed, so keep more of the old methods.

Whereas Virgin is a very new cruise line, and came up with new ways to do things, without ever adopting the old ways. Hence, others still have more traditional methods instead of only the new app way.

I see where VV was going, and it makes sense - but there are some big flaws.

Unfortunately on the very first day of my cruise with VV, there was some server failure - so you couldn't even see the bookings I'd made for that day - but other days appeared. And I wasn't 100% sure of the time of my restaurant booking - and they don't send you any confirmations or any other records when you make a booking (unlike other lines). So there was no way to see what booking I had - it appeared I had none, so though it had been accidentally deleted. But I knew all restaurants were completely booked out, and they also told you if you weren't there in 15 minutes then tough, your reservation was gone. So there was a bit of a panic.

So I called guest services. They couldn't help either. But they said go to the maitre d in Razzle dazzle. So I went there - they'd closed (early), and said they also couldn't help. But said "there'd been some reports of problems - just go and see how you go". Great - aside from wasting the time and giving a lot of stress, there was no resolution. 

Anyway, I went to the restaurant and time I thought I had booked - slightly earlier to be a bit safe. The maitre d' there could see the booking and said all was fine... But it's not a great way to run things.

Not only the above, but also the fitness classes have to be booked through it. Plus it's where you get primary visibilty of the schedule since they don't distribute them directly either. They do have printed copies in a few locations, but you'd have to make a trip there to get them.

So yes, it is a pain, and is glitchy - but the cruise operations are based around it, so without it you will have a tough time.

22 hours ago, doghog said:

 

No recipracol program between RC and Silversea. 

It could be added, just as Azamara used to be.

Much simpler than the speculation about having a single program for all.

16 hours ago, Ex-Airbalancer said:

 

if you got 10 points for the cruise on RCL , you would get 10 point on the new system 

If you get 10 points for the cruise on Celebrity , you would get 20 points on the new system

if you get 10 points for the cruise on Silverseas , you would get 30/40 points on the new system 

or something like that 

no system will be perfect 

Which then means one cruise on Silversea and you're immediate Diamond on RCL. 

As said previously, the question as asked was silly as they already have that loyalty transfer between programs. And trying to broaden it to a unified scheme makes no sense for multiple reasons, and doesn't have any signficant benefit.

No need to go back to the hotel. Check out when you prefer, take your bags to the terminal and just before the entrance is the place to drop them off. It will be open when you arrive and they will take them then.

Then, if you're too early you can spend time around Circular Quay and the Rocks while you wait, but you should be able to board from 11-11:30, dependent on successful clearance of the arriving passengers.

Virgin voyages: "We just want somebody's credit card we can charge."

On 3/16/2024 at 5:13 PM, george_sf said:

There are 2 penthouse suites on the ship. A guarantee for 2 rooms is "selling it." (Some ships have over 100 Sky Suites. Those are "guarantees." ) Also, these reservation types are not available to average passengers and not available to travel agents. 

 

Also, we asked specifically - "Did this other reservation come in after we were assigned the room?" The STAR manager says they don't know and they can't find out. Our BS meter went high again.  

Not defending the situation, or Celebrity's handling of the process.

However, the reason given still is possible and potentially plausible.

It doesn't have to be that it was a Penthouse Guarantee, but they may have sold any intermediate grades between Celebrity and a Penthouse as well, as a guarantee. e.g. a Royal Suite guarantee.

In this case, they still couldn't assign that passenger booking to your Celebrity suite, so the only 'spare' one may be the Penthouse. It may even be that there had been an additional Royal suite when booked, but it became unserviceable for whatever reason.

That would also do away with the speculation about them being a VIP - anyone could have booked that. 

22 hours ago, PH2 said:

I'm still trying to understand the algorithm for the Move Up bids where they offered me, as a minimum bid amount, a price that would basically equal (or possibly exceed, on any given day's pricing fluctuations) the price of the suite if I just booked it outright and received the full allotment of benefits from booking versus Move Up. It's a headscratcher to me, for sure.

Their bidding is to maximise revenue. They seem to place minimum bids based on similar amounts to the cost of the cabin. This is likely as they are sailing full on most sailings so there aren't a lot of empty cabins to fill in any case, and so the few if any available can be sold to those who have had a change of circumstances .e.g had a subsequent bonus, or extra cash now available for upgrade, or just the psychological separation between the upfront cost and the upsell (e.g. it's only x more, disregarding costs alread paid) or just availability when they booked i.e. they want that cabin type but it wasn't available when booked.

17 hours ago, DaKahuna said:

 

 I am not sure I see it the same way?  What would be the benefit you see of combining the programs?  

 

 After answering this question, I think the next subject was a pretty solid stance that they would not be changing the benefits of the programs to match across the brands, e.g. Royal Caribbeans C&A free drinks anytime vouchers, most anywhere, will not be replacing Celebrity's CC Happy Hour.

 

Yeah, that was a weird one since the way the question was asked (that you can get your loyalty benefit level in one program when you sail on another) is already the case!

But the answer seemed to hedge around just having a single program instead - but agree with you, that would be a bad thing since it would complicate benefits between ships i.e. you're xxx level but on Celebrity these are your benefits, and on RCL you have these benefits, plus mean an overall degradation of earning, since progression could potentially be much faster now - so to compensate they would have to slow down progression.

16 hours ago, RTShaker said:

 

 

 

All I heard in the webinar was blah, blah, blah, blah, carefully culled question, generic non specific answer, blah, blah, blah. Rinse and repeat.

For me, one of the big turn-offs was the answer about adding 2 types of wine to the premium package, and they're looking at adding some upsells - but she made out it was all such a big deal.

One of the biggest disappointments of my last celebrity cruises was the food and drink offering - and then I sailed on Virgin Voyages and it was a breath of fresh air... yet not so different to other mainstream cruises with a wider beverage offering.

The last Celebrity cruises only had 1 cider (and it even ran out for a short while), and that's all. Plus anything modern, or exotic just isn't carried. Whereas others have a much wider range of drinks, including juices and cocktails. Yet here at Celebrity, adding a couple of additions to the small wine list is a massive deal. (When they often run out of stock as well!)

They really have a lot to do to live up to the premium label they now claim - and used to hold.

On 3/4/2024 at 8:00 AM, Wansbrough said:

A quick write-up of my wife's recent vegan experience on Celebrity Solstice.

 

2024 – Vegan Options on Celebrity Solstice, Singapore to Hong Kong 15-27 Jan

 

Mostly positive and a couple of blips but overall a big improvement.

Well done Celebrity. 👍🏼

 

 

Agree with your experiences.

Evidently what Celebrity has offered is additional choices, rather than being integrated into the regular menus. This is supported by it being a separate section in the buffet, rather than having good choices integrated throughout. 

I have only seen the additions in the buffet as recent sailings have been dining in Luminae and Blu. So it's good to see an addition in main dining, although as you say they don't change the menu, unlike the regular menu. Blu doesn't have special options, but fortunately its regular menu has more options by default that are vegan, vegetarian, or pescetarian. 

Unfortunately, Celebrity really misses a trick in Luminae and hasn't made any changes there, which means it is the least appealing of those available. There's only one vegetarian (not vegan) dish a day, not always very good, and they don't customise, and even getting alternative menus from other restaurants is in practice problematic.

It's a bit like the vaping trial in the casino, and removing butlers with no notice, despite paying for them (as well as many other things).

Celebrity reserve the right to make any negative changes to your cruise, and are not concerned with how you feel about that.

I'm sure they'll have an announcement, and update their web site when the butlers are back, the same as when they were removed. Rather than just bringing them back quietly and... surprise.

So as there hasn't been an announcement/update yet, I'd say not yet.

17 hours ago, Patsy1921 said:

 VV disputed this!!.  

If VV disputed it, they had to have given evidence of the charge to do so.

Ask your bank for the evidence they gave, and then you'll know.

I figure they'll either come up with a new one - or if they haven't, they'll extend the current.

They won't just let it end with nothing to replace. But equally it's not their permanent go-forward, so will only be extended if they haven't sorted out the new one.

7 hours ago, jon81uk said:

But on what basis do you think they are lying? They may have performed as expected for their first season in Aus, they wouldn’t have expected to sell out the first time and they would use this one as an advert to get word of mouth for next year.

 

I think they did want to go back to Australia but the slower route via Africa isn’t as popular and on balance they decided it’s more worthwhile to go to the Carribean.

Simply put, as another poster said, if they considered themselves successful, they would have stuck with their original plans and stayed for 24/25.

Cutting and running only 9 months out, with all those cancellations to process, all for the sake of avoiding a single relocation cruise (that they'll be doing in another direction anyway) tells you it's purely a commercial decision. Which is not what they're saying.

The fact they are happy to make such drastic changes so often - and without supporting travel compensation - means I consider them very risky, especially to make long distance, far off travel plans. Which is not what they want, but the message they are sending.

16 hours ago, CruisingWalter said:

 

Honest question for those of you who sailed in Australia.  How full were the ships?  From the little information I was able to glean, it didn't sound like the sailings in Australia were sailing full.  Just curious for those who actually sailed the ships in Australia, were the ships sold our or sailing light? 

For the one I sailed a week ago, was completely full, and sold out a few weeks before sailing.

That said, mine was out of Sydney, which is the main hub for cruising, so those cruises were more popular. VV based most cruises out of Vic (and got government incentives to support that), but the trade-off was lower demand there.

18 hours ago, Korimako said:

I have yet to hear of anyone who comes to New Zealand and raves about the spectacular beauty of our cities!😂

Very little of our magnificent scenery and landscapes are within a day's coach trip from any of our ports. On a cruise, you will barely scratch the surface.

Which is why most people recommend a land trip for NZ.

If you want to advocate against people cruising to NZ, you're probably on the wrong forum.

In any case, the OP has said they want to visit by cruise, so I'm trying to answer for their scenario. Feel free to offer a constructive suggestion of your own, instead of just arguing without helping the OP.

And incidentally, I have heard many enjoy visiting the ports of Dunedin, Wellington and Auckland, amongst others - including others in this thread. So not sure who you're hanging out with, but it's a poor claim to suggest cruising to NZ is not a good experience.