OzKiwiJJ

What category of cabin did your TA pick for you? Was it under the new system which only started within the last couple of weeks or was it prior to that? I'm not sure this new guarantee system works the same as the old one did as under the old system all cabins were available for selection until a particular category was (almost) sold out. Then you could book a specific cabin category guarantee such as BA - very important if you don't want to end up under the pool deck on some ships.

That's because Princess is no longer offering the lowest category cabins the way they used to. They are all reserved for guarantee bookings only so they don't appear when you are trying to select a cabin. This is some new and crazy idea that they have just implemented. It's very weird indeed. I'm not sure what they are trying to achieve. Certainly people who prefer to select their cabin will be forced into choosing a higher category than they would otherwise select. It could backfire on them though, as some people may look elsewhere if they can't book the cabin they want and are not happy risking a guarantee option. I wonder what will happen when all the higher categories sell out? Will they open up those blocked categories for cabin selection sales?

Actually they aren't really charging extra it's just that the lowest available cabin category you can select is not actually the lowest cabin category. There has always been a fare difference between categories, except when Princess is offering one of its special promos. What you see as the guarantee fare is the lowest category fare which is no longer available for selection. The lowest selection fare is a higher category ie guarantee may be a BF but selection category may be a BD. It's a very silly decision on the part of Princess as it does make it look like you pay extra to select a cabin which will definitely annoy quite a few regulars. It also blocks out cabins that some people might wish to select.

If you booked directly with Princess, not through a TA, then they will and do help you out with booking issues/changes.

Thanks for explaining what has happened with the change to the booking process. I've been trying to figure out what the heck they were doing. Very annoying for people like you who specifically want a cabin in the now unselectable categories. I have to agree that Princess has been making some very bad decisions lately. We're starting to get annoyed with them as they seem to be devaluing their product in silly little ways. And don't get me started on the crappy wines by the glass ...

Minisuites are very popular and often sell out quickly but then some people cancel so a few may come up for sale again. You could try contacting Princess to see if you can get one of the cabins currently showing as available.

1. If you can purchase OBC in USD for those cruises I'm fairly certain you will get whatever exchange rate Princess was using at the time you booked those cruises. There was a lot of discussion here a few years back about how the Princess exchange rates worked and we can to the conclusion that the rate was locked in at time of booking. I checked a couple of my booked cruises and the earliest booked one is showing the local equivalent of US$100 as AU$135, the other which was booked more recently is showing it as AU$145. However since you may only see the USD amount you won't actually know what the exchange rate was until you see it on your onboard account. We only see the AUD amounts but experience has shown the various amounts equal US $25, $50 and $100. 2. The casino operates in the onboard currency so you will receive AUD if you cash out.

We did the Hawaii/Tahiti cruise in 2019 in an inside cabin on Sea Princess. Those cabins are quite narrow and only really work if the beds are in twin configuration. It took me at least a week before I stopped feeling like I was falling out of bed in the single bed. Never again!

Most people probably never even noticed. They'd watch the sailaway, maybe stay on deck until the ship went under the Gateway Bridge, then go off for a drink and/or dinner. It always amuses me when peoole ask why cruise lines don't offer return cruises from Australia to places like Japan. Or people eho complain that world cruises, or the Hawaii/Tahiti cruises, have too many sea days. Maximum speed for a cruise ship is around 22 knots (40kph). I always ask people to consider how long it would take to drive somewhere if they were limited to that speed or less.

Another way to look at it is that it takes 20 minutes or so by car from Hamilton to the BICT at say an average of 35kph to allow for traffic and the bad roads, so at 6 knots (11kph) it could easily take 45-60 mins - the river is more direct so it might take less than an hour even at that speed.

I think it would take longer than 15 minutes too. I imagine there is a speed limit on the river too (5 knots?) so the CityCats wouldn't be able to go four times faster than the cruise ships did even if they were capable of such speeds.

I think the issue is that the BICT is a considerable distance down river from the current last stop. I'm not sure how much more time it would add to the ferry journey and whether it would be cost effective. It certainly would be my choice of transportation on a nice day. We did it a couple of times when we were on cruises that stopped at Portside and it was lovely.

Why should I pay for a shuttle service I may not want? I'd prefer to be able to choose whether I want to pay to go into Brisbane on a port visit there. It's not like I've never been there before. Sometimes we enjoy going into the city but other times we might just want to stay on the ship, especially if the weather isn't the greatest. Many ports around the world are a fair distance away from the towns and cities they service. Some provide free shuttles out of the port if it is a working port but those shuttles may not necessarily go to the city centre on the cruise line itinerary. At Lyttelton the free shuttle only goes to the Lyttelton township - you pay for a shuttle into Christchurch. At Civitavecchia (for Rome) the shuttle takes you to the port gates where you can walk into the town of Civitavecchia but it's an expensive excursion into Rome itself. Broome provides free shuttles into town but Darwin charges for a shuttle up the hill however you can walk there. I'm not sure what Sydney's White Bay offers these days. In Melbourne you need a Myki card to use the shuttle from the terminal.

They had to build the new Brisbane International Cruise Terminal (BICT) right out at the mouth of the river as: a) the bigger ships can't get under the Gateway Bridge to the old terminal. b) the big ships need a wider turning space which is why they used to dock at a temporary terminal at the Grain Terminal on Fishermans Island but that was a working dock so was not an ideal stopping place. Shuttles ran from there but weren't free. The one time I stopped there, in 2016, it was US$25 return on a USD onboard currency cruise. This is where the new terminal is:

It was mentioned a few posts earlier - the Kingsford Smith Motel.

That's good to know. The set times put us off going into the city on one cruise as the latest return time was 1pm even though the ship wasn't due to depart until 5pm or later. It seemed weird that they had such restricted times for the shuttles compared with those in the past when we had docked at the Grain Terminal and the shuttles were running continuously. We didn't need to go ashore that day so just stayed on the ship.

I wonder what happens if everyone decides to return on the last bus? 🤔

Coral is slightly different to the Grand Class ships but, yes, normally the cabin number on all ships gives a clue to the location of the fire doors and therefore whether adjacent balcony dividers be opened or not. There are exceptions to that rule though. I cruised 66 days on Coral last year in a variety of cabins from midships to aft so have a reasonable idea of what that part of the ship is like.

Yes, that's what I recall but it still surprised me that there wasn't a change of cabin numbers. I think there was another fire door mid aft, a couple of cabins aft of where we were and the cabin numbers did change after that one.

You're welcome. Let us know if there are any more questions you have about Coral. She's a lovely ship.

I know but I'm sure there was a smokestop door between cabins in the 600s where the cabin number didn't change to a 700 aft of the metal strip. It was a bit strange but it was just forward of where the aft lifts were on Dolphin deck. The 700s don't start until well aft of the lobby, where the Vista Suites are.

The dual lane divided highways confuse people entering them from a side road sometimes. We were coming back from Melbourne one year and a car came down going the wrong way in the right hand lane of the section of dual highway we were on, between Melbourne and Euroa. Luckily there wasn't much traffic at that point but it gave me a bit of a fright.

The gratuity prices went up in February. I'm not sure whether they have changed to rules re overseas bookings for Aussie cruises. The statement at the top seems to imply they won't be charged. You might like to check that though.

Evon, I think I spotted an exception to that rule on Coral. I'm sure there was a smoke stop door mid-aft where the numbers didn't change but I can't check it on the website at the moment

Most balcony partitions can be opened unless the two cabins are either side of a smoke stop door. I can't check the Princess deck plans to see if that applies to your choices as the Princess website isn't working for that function. Both your choices have very small balconies - ie less space door to railing but are fully covered. The best balcony cabins on the ship in my opinion are D624/D626 and D628. These have large balconies and are fully covered. They are handy to the aft lifts which are less busy than the midships ones, and you can walk through to midships on decks 5, 6 and 7. Also there is a large section of public deck right at the stern that has loungers and overlooks the wake.