Astro Flyer

Thanks for checking! 🙂 We’ll be boarding Crown Princess in March 2025 for our bucket list Around Australia cruise from Brisbane. We also hope to meet up with Fletch1 who we’ve cruised with on two month long cruises…great fun people who I believe you might also know. Our only other Australian embarkation was in 2009 from Sydney & they were strictly enforcing wine limits. Thankfully in NZ they were very lenient & we refreshed our wine supply for cruising back to LA. 🍷😊

Here’s a statement from section 5 of the Cruise Contract for our Round Australia cruise booked in USD…is the Cruise Contract statement the same when booking in AUD? Although like other policies enforcement can vary from their stated policy. Guests are also prohibited from bringing water, sodas and other non-alcoholic beverages on board that are packaged in bottles. A small quantity of non-alcoholic beverages (i.e., sparkling water, sodas, juice, milk) packaged in cans or cartons may be brought on board on embarkation day, only if carried on in Guests’ hand luggage (not in checked luggage). A small quantity is considered a maximum of 12 sealed, unopened cans/cartons of 12 ounces each or less per person. Guests will be asked to discard open beverages in plastic containers prior to boarding.

Does anyone have any NZeTA experiences? I’ve read their website & as I understand it having an American passport I am required to have a NZeTA when flying from LAX to AKL and connecting to BNE, correct?

I just rechecked our March 2025 Crown Princess roundtrip Brisbane around Australia 28-day cruise & the water bottle package is currently available to purchase. Although that’s certainly not a guarantee…for example Princess sold coffee programs & recently said it was no longer available when passengers boarded. 🙄

Close to the Reagan Library…nice to see another VC resident. Your CC name looks familiar…maybe from a Princess roll call. We’re booked on our first O cruise in September and also in November 2024. We’re seeking a better experience after too many disappointments on our most frequently traveled cruise line Princess. Good friends who have cruised with us on Princess recommended their favorite cruise line…Oceania. We’re looking forward to having a better experience more like when we first sailed Princess in 1989.

That started about a month ago and on many of the Guarantee cabin categories the deposit is non-refundable.

Haven’t seen that on Princess although on Celebrity that was true in December.

Thank you very much for sharing that information. We’re only about an hour drive from SB so we could easily go there but for cruise passengers having their time in SB reduced is very disappointing. It’s an easy town to explore with many things to do there. TripAdvisor rates the SB courthouse as the #1 thing to do in SB. On a cruise we usually walk less than a mile to the several wine tasting rooms. Once we took an independent tour to the Santa Ynez Valley well known for their Pinot Noir & even had a movie made about their Pinot Noir…Sideways. Here’s hoping that you’ll have a full day to enjoy SB. 🤞

I know that during the pandemic SB closed to cruise ships but searching online didn’t find any info about doing it again. I found an article from a December 2022 council meeting where some locals wanted to ban cruise ships for environmental reasons but didn’t find anything else.

Thanks…we’re scheduled there on Regatta in September & that website provides a contact for cruise ship information. Angela Rodriguez Administrative Assistant CITY OF SANTA BARBARA, Waterfront Department (805) 564-5519 | ARodriguez@SantaBarbaraCA.gov SantaBarbaraCA.gov/Waterfront

On MarineTraffic it shows Grand departed Papeete on 4/16 at 2117 LT and is scheduled to arrive in Honolulu on 4/22 at 0600 LT.

From the CC AU/NZ board

It’s also being discussed on the CC Princess board including this letter from the captain.

I was a V-2 Div green shirt Airdale hooking up aircraft to Midway’s starboard cat…it was an interesting experience.

For anyone who served in the Navy this distinction was pounded into our brains starting in boot camp…it was like fingernails on the chalkboard to refer to an aircraft carrier as a boat. 🤪 Growing up with the Love Boat that works for me but it’s still a ship. ☺️ Any cruise buddy who wants to mess with me calls it a boat just to see me cringe. 😳

Based on this photo I took in Genoa, Pacific Princess might fit on the Sky Princess’ Lido deck. ☺️

There is no room service charge for any type of cabin although some items such as pizza ($3) and ordering specialty restaurant items do have a fee.

Thanks…since I wasn’t making a Deposit when booking & only a Hold don’t recall if it was possible to use an FCD when booking the cruise. Like you on the next day using an FCD as a Deposit was not an option (charge, PayPal, gift card) which is crazy and wastes their time & mine. Appreciate learning about your positive Chat experience which I would try if ever in that situation again.

Looking at a screenshot I took of my 4/4/23 Hold it stated payment was due on 4/7…3 days or 72+ hours which is basically your experience. 🙂 Our deposit was due on Good Friday & didn’t want to risk it by waiting that long hoping the transfer to my TA would be made before deposit was due. As it turned out the transfer was made on the same day the deposit was due however I wasn’t willing to risk losing our bucket list cruise.

Theresa, I had that situation last week & it has changed. On the Elite level one day early booking we saw our bucket list Around Australia cruise that was cancelled in 2020 due to the pandemic. I check cabin availability before contacting my TA & since cabins were rapidly being booked made a 3 day Hold before contacting her. Unfortunately she could not take over our Hold even though no deposit had been made. I immediately submitted the Reservation Transfer Request Form that Thrak shared which Princess said takes 3-7 days to process. That risked losing our very popular 2025 cruise so on the next day called Princess because their website stupidly cannot use an FCD as a deposit…only by charge, PayPal or gift card. The Filipino service rep was very pleasant however her English was bad & she didn’t understand that I wanted to use an FCD & kept asking about using an FCC. I cannot blame her that Princess hires these offshore call center reps who are not properly trained & have limited English skills. After 20 minutes she finally completed this simple task of using an FCD instead of the $400/pp deposit shown in our Hold. A couple of days later our booking was transferred to our TA well within their 60 day requirement. Just another example of Princess wasting staff & customers time by not having the online option to make a deposit using an FCD. I was able to do that years ago but it’s no longer an online option when directly booking…crazy! 🙄

Here’s their SOBC request form that has not been updated in several years but does provide the basic requirements & as Thrak posted using the form is not required & only submitting the required info including the proof of owning 100 shares. Since requiring advance payment for booking tours several years ago, I have been able to immediately apply even years in advance. That allows shareholders to use SOBC as payment as soon as they are available. Based on my experience last week in North America they do not enforce the share’s statement to be within 3 months of sailing. Also being a simple credit to onboard accounts from which all onboard spending is deducted it is usable for the casino & gratuities. I use the email address that ‘Mark+Anne’ posted to quickly get my SOBC added: sbpcl@princesscruises.com Shareholder Benefit Request Form.pdf

Fortunately in North America they still immediately apply SOBC after booking a cruise & the procedure should be standardized worldwide. Last week we booked the very popular Around Australia cruise (mostly only Guarantees now) in March 2025 & our SOBC was added within hours of applying for the benefit.

This CC article has more details than I’ve read about the 360 Experience. A Taste of Princess Cruises' 360: An Outstanding Experience…3/13/23 https://www.cruisecritic.com/articles.cfm?ID=7302

He was silly but enjoyed his webinars more than his replacement Carmen Roig who is too grating to me. When Princess announced he’d be the new brand champion thought his roll might be like Carnival’s John Heald which never happened. John was a 29 year Princess employee whose dad was the last captain of the battleship USS Missouri which is now docked in Pearl Harbor.

Like when they replaced Sabatini’s with Share which also flopped like Bistro Sur La Mer.