OzKiwiJJ

You keep making comments like this yet have not been on a recent cruise lately, apparently have not taken any notice of comments by people who have been on recent cruises, and have not taken any notice of the reported ship's status' published by the NSW government. The only serious outbreak a few weeks ago was reported both to the governments and to passengers due to board the next cruise(s). That's not secret squirrel stuff, they are reporting to the appropriate people at the appropriate times.

Except that then involves international flights hotels, and onboard and shore costs in other currencies which are subject to exchangevrate fluctuations. That may make it too expensive for some people compared with doing a week or two on a ship from Australia.

I haven't heard of anyone being moved to inside cabins on Princess. But I know what you mean. I've been ill on cruises - once with bronchitis, and a couple of times with migraines - when we've had inside cabins and it's pretty boring. I don't even like watching TV, I just read. My Kindle is always well loaded with books. Anyway from now on it's balcony cabins for us. No more inside cabins. I want access to fresh air if I'm confined to my cabin for any reason.

I've seen a few posts on FB recently by people who were enjoying their balconies while in isolation so maybe they've relaxed that rule. Andvit did seem a bit strange forcing people to change cabins. Perhaps they were worried about virus particles floating out into the corridors when passengers were opening their doors to get their meals. They may have decided that is not a risk and that it's easier to leave people where they are. However it would be sensible to have separate crew isolation areas as I understand crew quarters are more crowded so more risk of the virus spreading.

Exactly. Which is why there are so many NZ cruises in the summer cruise season - Princess knows damn well, as do most of the other cruise lines, that international visitors to Australia want to see NZ as well. It does get a bit boring for us locals though!

Have a great cruise. 😊

With Princess I've heard of some passengers being removed to different cabins, especially in the first few cruises, but also some more recently who have been allowed to stay in their cabins, and use their balconies if they have one. Regardless of where they end up they are given FCC refunds for all the days they were in isolation.

I have vague recollections of seeing Fiji cruises out of Brisbane in the past but I may be wrong. I know they do Fiji out of Sydney as our first cruise was on Sun Princess to Fiji. And Brisbane is closer to Fiji than Sydney so a shorter itinerary.

Melbourne isn't an ideal port for winter cruising which is why the cruising from there is limited to the peak season. Brisbane is a good winter embarkation port (apart from the odd East Coast Low, that is), and Sydney also works well. It's easy to combine the two especially if the cruises are dove-tailed like the Hawaii/Tahiti and World Cruises are. The issue with longer cruises is that they mostly suit retirees. It's harder for those still working to get longer periods of leave - many prefer to split their leave into smaller chunks - although they could use long service leave. It's also harder for families with school-age children. But given how quickly the current long cruises sell out, and how popular most of the restart itineraries have been, hopefully Princess will consider Australia a year round cruise destination again. And doing double embarkations, Brisbane and Sydney, means they can also offer short breaks to fill some of the cabins when transiting between the two ports, as they have done in the past.

It would be great if Princess had a second ship wintering over here to do those sorts of itineraries while Coral was off doing the big cruises. They used to do that. Dawn Princess was here in winter 2016, Golden in 2017, then they stopped doing that. To get sufficient numbers for longer cruises they'd have to operate those itineraries from both Sydney and Brisbane which, again, they used to do in the past. Hopefully as they build their fleet up again they will consider a second permanent ship for Australia even if it's one of the older Grand class ships (which I prefer anyway).

The current cruise is QLD only so NSW wouldn't report it. The next cruise, departing on Friday, is Brisbane to Sydney so NSW probably won't report on that either but will probably show the status for the 22nd August cruise ex Sydney.

I think it would take 16 or 17 days to cover all those ports but it would be an interesting itinerary. If they dropped the Bay of Islands it would fit into 14 days. They don't even do this from Sydney so I can't see why you think Brisbane is being "done crook". Most of the current itineraries from Sydney are also available from Brisbane. In fact Princess is very clever about having multiple embarkation ports on most of the bigger cruises so Brisbane doesn't miss out. And remember, Brisbane gets the best ship! 😊

Hopefully nobody caught Covid on the reef excursion. How was that excursion? Is it good value for money? I like snorkelling but DH doesn't so we're tossing up between that or the Whitehaven Beach trip. However we are going to wait to see what the weather forecast is like before booking anything. We'll take the risk of missing out but never mind.

I've never heard of Rapid Trace in Australia, and the cost of testing done here is in AUD.

It's still on that board as well as here. Different replies in each.

The Premier package is $85 pp per day which includes the Premier drinks package, a photo package, a four device internet package, two speciality dinners and entries in the door prizes. If you paid the original Plus package fare that would cost an extra $45pp per day, or $35pp per day over the current Plus fare As far as I know there is no way of just upgrading the drinks package. Most of the drinks are covered by the Plus package, there are just a few cocktails, top shelf whiskies and cognacs, and wines that are Premier only ... but ... if you choose one if those you only pay the difference between the Plus maximum of $16 and the Premier price. For the wines that averages at $3 a glass. I crunched the numbers and for us it works out cheaper to stay with the Plus package and just pay the extra when we want the Premier wines.

On your phone have you tried this: Ensure Mobile Data is off. Log out of the Medallion app then log back in again using Quick Access and your cabin number. That's what Guest Services recommended when I was having problems onboard. It worked perfectly after that.

This company appears to have a Margaret River testing facility although it is only open on weekdays. https://www.clinipathpathology.com.au/our-locations/MR2/Margaret-River-Covid-Drive-Thru/

And the answer is that P&O don't know yet. It's a fluid situation and, as far as I know, P&O don't have a crystal ball to accurately predict what will happen in 82 days time. But here are my guesses.. 1. The cruise will go ahead as scheduled. 2. If Vanuatu won't let cruise ships in P&O will try to add in another New Caledonian port such as Mare or the Isle of Pines. 3. If New Caledonia won't let cruise ships in your cruise might end up being a Queenland coast cruise. Fiji is two sea days away from Brisbane so on a seven night cruise it could be a viable alternative - two sea days there, two port stops, two sea days back.

Our unexpected cheque was an ANZ bank cheque posted in Sydney.

When you consider some of the other fashions around that time the safari suit was one of the more sedate ones.

If you're not happy with the situation I suggest you cancel your cruise under P&O's Cruise with Confidence offer: "For cruises departing on or before 30 November 2022 and booked prior to 18 October 2022, cancel your cruise 76 days or more prior to sailing with zero cancellation fees and receive a full refund of the paid cruise fare." There are 82 days before your cruise starts at the moment. Then you can book another cruise once cruising has fully returned to normal.

Ours turned up about three weeks after our 26th June cruise ended. We weren't expecting it as I hadn't realised the Shareholder OBC was refundable. It was a nice surprise, but what was more surprising was that it was actually a cheque, not a credit to our credit card on file. However I suggest checking your credit card as well just in case.

Because the cruise lines are hoping, and expecting, the ports will be open, and they probably will be unless there is a massive outbreak of a new variant of Covid. Unfortunately the cruise lines don't keep Cruise Critic members informed as to what they expect to happen so we can only guess. And our guesses are just that so not reliable.

It is highly likely that P&O don't yet know whether those ports will be open.