Transpacific cruise Australia /Hawaii or Hawaii / Australia

[JohnGc]

Curious to know if on a transpacific cruise you favour Australia to Hawaii or the opposite direction and why ? Would you book your own Air flight or through the cruise company ?

[sewgood]

There is no easy answer for me.

For a more restful trip I would prefer to sail back as no flights at the end but in terms of packing I would prefer to sail over and use my medical and my cosmetics/hair supplies up on the longer journey so I had more room for purchases on the flight back home.

In terms of the clocks going foward or back I would rather sail back from the States so I get an hours sleep in on some days. 😀

[Auscruisefam]

I would rather sail back to Australia. We are looking at a trip like this as well. Fly to Hawaii spend at least a week probably 9-10 days and get on a cruise ship back to Australia. But I like to shop so I will be bringing extra kilos back. 
Fights we will book ourselves, I don’t care who we fly with, whatever is the cheapest. 

[arxcards]

Personally, we would fly to Hawaii and spend a few days at a hotel in Waikiki, see the sights, then cruise home. With only a train to get home afterwards, the only weight consideration is my shoulders, so an opportunity to buy some stuff along the way.

 

I wonder about the time zones too. You lose hours on the way over, but cross back to the previous day at the dateline. While you get extra hours coming home, you also jump a calendar day and I wonder if the equivalent cruise sees you charged an extra night heading home.

[OzKiwiJJ]

Fly first, cruise home. Take an extra bag for the shopping that can be packed in a suitcase for the flight.

[Hammer61]

We are sailing back from Honolulu in October, we booked via a travel agent as a package and just as well! One way flights with full service carriers from Sydney were around $1200 when I looked, pretty sure before COVID etc it was more like $700, you could get Jetstar for a little less but it wasn’t much

 

Package was Balcony Cabin, One way flight, 2 nights hotel and all transfers airport-hotel-cruise, only drawback was when the flights were issued they asked us to go 1 day earlier and pay and extra $100 each for an extra night at the Hotel, then we got the direct Qantas flight of about 8.5 hours, had we gone on the original date giving us 2 nights, the included flight was via San Francisco and about 20 hours with airport layover or we could have paid a $400 surcharge for the QF flight, we opted for the 3 nights in the hotel!!!!

 

Overall though the Travel Agent we booked through have been pretty good, we originally booked the Radiance of the Seas crossing that was 16 days, but it got cancelled and we were moved to the Ovation sailing in the same category stateroom that was 19 days for no extra cost and got US$100 OBC, then one of the stops had to be cancelled, Bora Bora due to new restrictions on ships being able to stop at that port, so another US$100 was given to us for the disappointment, it was the best stop of the trip, but we get 2 nights rather than 1 in another of the Tahiti ports instead.

 

Cost wise it’s just a little over $4000 each which I think is very good, but as said we got moved at no extra cost to a sailing that was longer and picked up OBC along the way which was never included in the original booking.

 

Pricing it not as a package, booking direct with RCI, Hotel and Airlines and adding bit for taxi rather than transfers it was well over $5000 and could have even been nearer 6K depending on when we flew out (or had booked early enough!), so on this occasion the package was well worth it.

Edited August 27, 2022 by Hammer61

[Mikamarii]

7 minutes ago, arxcards said:

 

I wonder about the time zones too. You lose hours on the way over, but cross back to the previous day at the dateline. While you get extra hours coming home, you also jump a calendar day and I wonder if the equivalent cruise sees you charged an extra night heading home.

When we booked the transpacifc from hawaii to Sydney it was originally listed as a 20 nighter (Oct 09 to 29).  We booked a drink package and internet package. A few months later it was changed to a 19 nighter becsuse of the date line. RCI actually refunded us a days worth of drink and internet package! No change in the cruise price though. 

 

Actually i dont know. We did get a price drop and my TA called and got the lower price but i dont know if that was just a price drop or because they dropped the day. 

[Hogbay]

43 minutes ago, Mikamarii said:

When we booked the transpacifc from hawaii to Sydney it was originally listed as a 20 nighter (Oct 09 to 29).  We booked a drink package and internet package. A few months later it was changed to a 19 nighter becsuse of the date line. RCI actually refunded us a days worth of drink and internet package! No change in the cruise price though. 

 

Actually i dont know. We did get a price drop and my TA called and got the lower price but i dont know if that was just a price drop or because they dropped the day. 

Did they put another date line in ? I have only travelled across it since 1884 . 🤣

[timtam2]

for me, its always Aust to Hawaii as the smoking policy onboard complies with Australian Government rules and is stricter. A matter of preference....

[ekka49]

For us it would be fly over and cruise back to Australia.

Plenty of days to relax on the way home.

[JohnGc]

Thanks guys, all very interesting. My wife and I have a balcony cabin &  Daughter has studio balcony booked for Oct 2023  17 nights on the Quantum Hawaii / Australia. @timtam2 as I am a non smoker I am interested in how the smoking policy differs from Hawaii rather than from Australia ? I reckon the wife & daughter will like the idea of not worrying about more weight in the suitcase on our return seeing we have no flights once embarking at Brisbane. We are so looking forward to the cruise with many  sea days. Hoping all the covid restrictions will settle down for all that are on the transpacific cruises this October. Would liked to have done the same cruise this year but needed the time for my Wife to get over the Chemo she had this year. We will still be taking a gamble with covid ( looks like it is here to stay ) because of our age but cant spend the rest of our lives sitting around. Hopefully on a big ship with 17 nights they will be able to cope covid wise if the worst was to happen. Once again thank you all for you replies. 🙂

 

[Hogbay]

Done both ,  fly / cruise my choice , get that dreaded flight over with and relax. Soo depressing if you cruise /fly cause cruise card don't work, all CC and its not cheap in Hawaii.

[Hogbay]

6 minutes ago, JohnGc said:

Thanks guys, all very interesting. My wife and I have a balcony cabin &  Daughter has studio balcony booked for Oct 2023  17 nights on the Quantum Hawaii / Australia. @timtam2 as I am a non smoker I am interested in how the smoking policy differs from Hawaii rather than from Australia ? I reckon the wife & daughter will like the idea of not worrying about more weight in the suitcase on our return seeing we have no flights once embarking at Brisbane. We are so looking forward to the cruise with many  sea days. Hoping all the covid restrictions will settle down for all that are on the transpacific cruises this October. Would liked to have done the same cruise this year but needed the time for my Wife to get over the Chemo she had this year. We will still be taking a gamble with covid ( looks like it is here to stay ) because of our age but cant spend the rest of our lives sitting around. Hopefully on a big ship with 17 nights they will be able to cope covid wise if the worst was to happen. Once again thank you all for you replies. 🙂

 

Wish your wife well . As for smoking , Royal allows smoking in the casino with a non smoking area 🤷‍♂️ for ships sailing from north America .

[JohnGc]

4 hours ago, Hogbay said:

Wish your wife well . As for smoking , Royal allows smoking in the casino with a non smoking area 🤷‍♂️ for ships sailing from north America .

Thank you, she has recovered very well just need the immune system to recover as best as it can for an over 80yr old hence our reason for booking the Transpacific for next year. I think we will still be taking a chance though. Hopefully medical science may progress by then to make covid not quite so deadly for the aged. Thanks for the heads up on the smoking I don't use the casino and can avoid any smoking areas🙂👍