Aus Traveller

A lot of people take a full wine glass from their cabin to the dining room, but the permitted one bottle of wine doesn't last long. 😁

P&O has staggered check-in for our cruise next Monday. However, we found the same as you. On our cruise a few weeks ago I missed out getting the early check-in because I was away on the world cruise. I was only able to get 1pm check in but when we arrived at the terminal, no-one asked what time we were supposed to be there.😁

When I was trying to choose a boarding time for a cruise next January, a Princess rep told me I can board whenever I like after boarding starts at 12 noon. Somewhere else I came across info indicating that Princess no longer has timed boarding groups. What has anyone else found?

For P&O you can check on your Cruise Control. It will show the amount of OBC. Compare that with your booking confirmation and you will see if the extra is now included.

During the World Cruise, people I know moved up the 'loyalty ladder' during the cruise even though they had booked the whole cruise, not in segments.

I don't think any cruise ships are going to Isle of Pines at the moment. The locals have said "No". Cruises out of Brisbane going to Noumea arrive at 2pm. I am not sure what time the Sydney cruises get there.

That is probably how it would work on a fairly short cruise. Is it more expensive to book as two separate cruises? It sounds like you are thinking of buying shares. You would get $50 for the 4-night cruise and $100 for the 7-night cruise. Don't think about you and your wife both buying shares to get double the OBC unless you have different surnames. I have heard of couples who have different names both getting the OBC. I assume this is because Princess can't assume they are a couple rather than just good friends cruising together.

On the long cruises I have been on (including World Cruises), the mini bar is replenished every sector even if the booking is for the whole cruise.

$250 for the whole world cruise unless you book the WC in sectors. I did it that way for the 2020 WC that didn't go ahead. I was going to have $250 per sector. However, when I booked for 2023, (after deciding 2022 was unlikely to go ahead) the sectors weren't all available and the shareholders OBC was $250 for the booking. I suggest you compare the price of booking the whole WC against booking sectors (separate booking numbers), factoring in the extra OBC you will get. With booking separately, there is a slight chance you would have to change cabins between sectors unless you choose your cabin when booking and mark it 'no upgrade'. Free upgrades are unlikely these days anyway.

Why bother? Get a normal taxi that can take you almost to the door of the terminal.

On our last couple of times going into the BICT there was a line-up of taxis. A couple of weeks ago there would have been 30 or more taxis waiting.

We had that problem when White Bay first opened. There was a sign that said there was no access to the cruise terminal on that road but when I tried to tell our taxi driver we were already past the sign and he and my husband didn't listen. I would have thought that the Uber driver should have been aware that there was no access the way he/she went.

A gang of racketeers in the military led by John Macarthur ran the colony primarily for their own financial benefit. They imported the spirits (called rum even some wasn't actually rum) and set the price. The colony was short of coin so rum became the currency. The UK government sent Bligh to sort things out but the military arrested him and kicked him out of the colony. The racketeers ran the colony for two years before Governor Lachlan Macquarie arrived with his own military back-up.

Ha!! Ha!! The rebellion wasn't over the price of alcohol.

Whether you eat the buffet or one of the main dining rooms, you can have a table just for the two of you. You don't have to lock yourselves away in your cabin with room service meals. As I mentioned, I feel the main risks are in the lifts and in the theatre.

If anything, I think you would be safer on a repositioning cruise rather than a 'normal' cruise. If a small number of people come on board with COVID, they will be isolated. On the recent world cruise, there were maybe at least a dozen cabins in isolation after the first four or five days. This reduced until there were none. We completed the cruise without any outbreaks although there was the usual cough going around. On your cruise, with no new people coming on board until Auckland, maybe there wouldn't be any more infections brought on. If you are still concerned, to protect yourself, where you are able to I suggest you use the stairs rather than the lifts. Avoid crowded bars. In the theatre you could sit at the side where it is likely you won't have anyone very close.

You might be able to organise land excursions at Airlie Beach, but you won't be able to organise trips to the reef. At Airlie Beach, passengers go ashore by tender (water shuttle). By the time you arrive, the excursion boats going to the reef will have left. In addition, they usually go from Shute Harbour, 12 km away. Cruise ships have an arrangement with a local company that usually picks up passengers directly from the ship to go to the Reef.

Maybe they had enough in your age group.

I click the 'prefer not to say' option on the income question.

Agreed. I never answer the question on income. I was able to complete the survey.

I received the survey. I gave them my opinions on Ambassadors (why??) and Plus and Premier packages. The survey doesn't give you a chance to give you opinion on anything other than reply to the questions asked.

We went on a Pacific Sun cruise from 18th to 28th September 2010 from Newcastle. It was ridiculously cheap ($398pp) giving us the impression that P&O had difficulty filling the ship. We felt it was because the ship was leaving from Newcastle, not just because it was the Pacific Sun.

I have seen the breakfast menu. When I mentioned that I recalled a price of around $3 per item, I was referring to the breakfast menu because that was what Yaya enquired about.

I didn't order room service. From memory, the cost is a per-item price. I recall the prices in the range of $3. Sometimes I take a tupperware container and pick up what I want from the buffet and keep it in the fridge in the room until we want it.

You have a balcony cabin so you can enjoy the free air and watching the sea. A few points to keep in mind - there is a charge for room service. The buffet isn't open all the time. Check the times in the daily activities sheet. From memory, it closes at 10am after breakfast, then opens again for a few hours for lunch before closing again. If you want a little snack with morning tea, go to the buffet by around 9.45am and pick up whatever you want. You can get coffee then, or get it anytime as the tea/coffee stations remain open all the time. With P&O you cannot take wine on board, but the prices are lower than with some other cruise lines. They start at $36 per bottle where Princess' lowest price wine is around $55 per bottle. We found the food to be OK except the chips were often not hot enough. Alternate between the complimentary restaurants - the Waterfront, Angelo's (Italian) and Dragon Lady (Asian). You won't have to tidy your own cabin. The stewards will service it twice a day.