mummsie

Hi All

Westaussie,Mummsie,Cinnabel,

Thanks for the replies,really looking forward to the experience. As already mentioned we are departing on 16th September. Is any one on this cruise?

Does the ship dock alongside everywhere. We are going to KL,Penang,Langkawi,Krabi,Phuket,Koh Samui,Ho Chi Minh,Tioman.

Is there suffieicent time to get to the Fantasea in Phuket as the ship arrives at night and the Fantasea starts 8.30pm ish?

I thought of doing the KL ship tour as others have mentioned, Langkawi arrival is on holy day I think, is it worth doing anything or styaing on boat? Are Pax more western or asian? Is the social scene ie: meeting other couples similar very good? I am also travelling with my Mother, is older age group well catered for. What is an average cost of shorex on Gemini as I gather it is best to book straight away on embarkation.

Thanks again all

This a a great forum by the way

 

Les

The ship docks alongside at Port Klang but then its about an hour drive to KL. Penang I have a feeling was a tender but quite close to the city. Langkawi is a dock and about a 20 minute drive to the city. We went on holy day. There are a few things open - prices aren't particularly good - cameras were dearer than buying them in Harvey Norman. Good to stretch the legs though. We missed Krabi because it was too rough to anchor so had an extra day at Phuket. If the ship organises the Fantasea trip they will get you there on time. We had about 5 bus loads on our trip. Can't help with the other ports as we only did a 7 dayer.

When we travelled about 80% of passengers were Aussies, the remainder made of of Asian and European travellers. We aren't particularly social (we enjoy our own company) so we didn't reall mix too much with other passengers but there were lots of folks who did. Its up to you. Your mother should be fine. There are usually quite a lot of seniors on these trips as its an easy way for them to travel. Can't remember the cost of Shorex but its wasn't as expensive as some we have booked. Mummsie:D

Hi Les, You will love the Gemini for dancing. I am a competition ballroom dancer and when we were on last year they had fantastic dancing. Before dinner in the main show lounge and also in the bar right up the top - can't remember the deck now as we have been on a couple of ships since. Dress code in reality is good casual. They would not allow shorts or tshirts into the dining room in the evening but a pair of casual trousers and a polo got by most of the time. The only night which is a little more dressy is the Captains dinner night. We didn't go because we didn't take any good clothes but we could have got by ok with what we had. Just a good pair of trousers and a business shirt would have been ok and a nice coctail dress for your lady.

We found the entertainment (shows) were top class especially for such a relatively small ship. They had 4 live bands playing in different venues each night so there was always something to listen too.

You should book your tours from the ship - they open up the tour booking desk the afternoon you embark - get in early for the ones you want. You fill out the forms and from memory they gave the tickets out straight away. For any you book a few days in advance they put the tickets in the pocket outside your stateroom door. One tour not too miss is the night one in Phuket. It was amazing.

We have been on quite a few cruises now and we never book private tours - if something happens and you are delayed they leave without you. If you have a tour booked by the ship, they will wait for you. Not worth taking the risk of being stranded.

You will need cash for most places even if its just to buy food while you are out. You can change your money on the ship. If you buy food make sure its cooked fresh and don't eat anything cold like salads. We actually ate in McDonalds in Phuket and KL as it was the safer option. Mummsie

As Mike said there is a small casino on the Gemini. We though it took $1S but you need to buy tokens to put in the pokies. We never tried it except to put my $1S in which didn't work but there always appeared to be machines available. Gayle

Thanks you for the Info

Langkawi play by ear.

Langkawi next time we will just stay on board and have that as a rest day. Very unexciting place - usually get there on a Friday and most the shops are shut for their holy day. Its supposidly duty free but prices in Aus were comparable for cameras and other things we saw.

 

How hard is to get a taxi/bus to Phuket at the port when you first land or is better to just take the ships transfer?

 

Taxi drivers are waiting at the gangplank to talk you into driving into town. Make sure you work out a price before you leave. The ship company advise against going in the Tuk Tuks as the drivers have no insurance if you are hurt.

 

If you want to do shopping, go about 2 streets in from the main drag on the beach. I think we paid too much for things because we didn't realise there were more shops further in. We caught the bus which dropped us of at Ocean Plaza so we assumed that al the shops were along the esplanade. It wasn't until we caught the bus back that we realised the shops went forever and we could have got much better prices.

 

Mummsie

I hope this is the right thread (I’m a newbie)

I confess I’m not a cruise fanatic. I just want to have a good holiday. I do a lot of traveling for work and usually our gang fly to where I’m staying for our family holiday. So I suppose we are well traveled, however we have not been on a cruise before and even this time it happened by default (lost booking). Pleasing everyone or even finding a decent compromise is next to impossible

The Little Madam (6) just wants water, sand and a bucket. Our son (8) just wants to play with his Play Station. His big sister (12) wants Foxtel and to see the Petronas towers in KL. Her even bigger sister (16) wants the backpacker experience in Phuket, but without the backpack and with enough hot water to boil all the tea in China. My wife doesn’t care as long as I organize it all. What I want is no stress, good food and a bar with stress-free people that also like good food. (no I’m not an alcoholic I’m a social drinker) So finding a holiday to suit everyone is difficult. The travel agency lost our booking to Thailand they suggested a cruise on the Gemini.

I have read as much info and reviews from as many forums as possible, to be honest with the exception of this forum there isn’t a lot of info out there. Regardless, I have been very happy with the reviews I have read so far. So we are flying up to Singapore and then cruising to KL, Langkawi, Krabi, Phuket, Penang and back to Singapore.

I have some questions that I hope you can help me with. The first one being, is it likely that this cruise will come close to filling the above criteria.

 

Best regards Awbeg

PS I wear a suit all year I really don't want to wear one on holiday!

Hi Awbeg,

This is the exact cruise we did in July. You will love it. As BJC said you will need a shirt with a collar for the 'formal' night with the Captain. We didn't go because we didn't take anything formal to wear and then when we saw what people were wearing we could have got by with our wardrobe requirements. The formal night is very informal on the Gemini :D The Gemini's televisions are NTSC I think so your son's playstation may not work. There are about 15 cable channels but not all of them are English. The food is excellent on this ship and the bars are good with reasonable prices. Just make sure you tell them specifics if you want a special type of spirit. They have special kids menus as well in the dining room - just ask the staff and they will tell you what it is that night. The staff just go crazy when there are kids around especially little ones - they love them. The Gemini Bar is a good place to spend a quiet afternoon. They have board games you can book out (scrabble, monopoly and also decks of cards I think) - a lot of people go there with their kids and have some quality time and have a quiet drink or two. The kids usually meet up with others their own age so you don't see them too much. The cruise we were on there was only about 20 kids on board but they all seemed to have a great time. Mummsie :D

We are Masters II level 4 NV and 3 Standard. I was the supervisor for the card collection kids for the Qld Open so you would have definately seen me :-) We didn't dance at either of the Qld Open or the Superstars (I also worked there). haven't Seen Rob or Doreen for ages - they seem to only dance at the majors. Will ask John & Bev from our studio (they are good mates of theirs) and let you know.

There is a fairly active thread over in http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=133289&page=2&pp=25. Mostly American stuff but its interesting sometimes.:)

How did you go in NZ? Is it a good sized comp? If so we may thing about doing it next year as part of a holiday :D Gayle

Hi Mummsie

I note from your profile that you have sailed on Sapphire Princess. I am also a ballroom dancer, can you tell me anything regarding the size of dance floors. We last danced Oz at South Paks. We may have meet at some stage

 

Paul

Hi Paul, Best place to dance is the Wheelhouse Bar - they usually have a 3 piece band or a very good pianist/keyboard player there. The floor is not huge but we managed to do a fairly decent waltz. If you are the only dancers, they will usually play requests for whatever you want. They even did a tango for us one night :D The rhumbas are a little off putting though as they are usually the American style so you can't do Inter Rhumba - we just used to do a box rhumba but it gets you around the floor. They also had a very good latin band in Club Fusion I think it was. They were excellent although they played a lot of salza and meringue. They also double as the rock and roll band so be prepared for some fast jiving :D

As for comp work we don't usually go to the Souths. Not even at the Australians this weekend although my son is dancing there today :D Lately we have just been doing local Qld comps as we have gotten over travelling to do comps. :D What level/grade do you dance? Gayle

Hi Bruce, Question is not vulgar at all. They have coctails and moctails of the day and happy hours - Gemini Bar is the nicest place to enjoy a quiet drink, but the list doesn't seem as large as the ones on Princess. The drinks I can't remember exactly the price but they were reasonable. My husband usually has scotch and water and I was drinking gin and tonics and they were quite ok. Be careful to tell them what sort of spirit you want if you like specifics though - once my husband asked for a scotch and got a bourbon which was really awful. The wines on board were of excellent quality - we like a good Merlot with our meal as well. Cost was about the same as any of the other ships we have been on. Not sure about bringing your own wine/corkage as its easier to just buy what is available. The beers on board are local ones - Tiger seemed the most popular. :D Gayle

Hi Tracey, I agree - far too much paranoia. That's why bugs become resistant to antibiotics and such - too much antibacterial wiping going on. We do take the handwashing liquid when we go off ship because sometimes the water isn't that clean but on board we don't bother except for when we go in the buffet line or after we have been playing the poker machines. Just got to be sensible and use normal precautions. I however do try not to touch the stair rails too much unless I am in rough water - would rather a bout of novo than a broken leg. Gayle

Hi Dub Girl, While the majority of people on the Gemini will be baby boomers, there will still be quite a large number of other age groups. Don't let our age fool you - we can out party many younger people around :D Age is in your mind not the shape of your body. :D Some of the most wonderful and interesting people we have spoken too on cruises have been in their 70's and 80's.

As for being too quiet - we found this a VERY busy cruise. Our next one in 5 weeks will be much more relaxing for us with lots of sea days which we prefer.

Our daughter and son in law just got back from a cruise for their honeymoon and the ages on their ship ranged from toddlers to 90 year olds and they had a ball. They had traditional dining at a 4 person table. Their table mates were in their 50's and my daughter said they got on really well.

A cruise is what you make it :D Mummsie

Hi Mike, I am not sure. We didn't bother with finding out about eating late at night - we are not big eaters and only eat a regular meal times. I think there was another restaurant that you could pay to go but we found the food excellent in the main Ocean Palace. We were seated up in the raised portion a couple of evenings and it didn't cost us. Gayle

Hi Bruce, Yes we are really looking forward to it. It was my husbands one dream cruise and we had too good a price not to go. My son is very cranky because he is the only one in the family that hasn't cruised. We sent daughter and son-in-law on a cruise for their honeymoon so we have decided to do a whole family cruise probably on the Gemini in July of 2008. Hopefully my son will have saved up enough by then :D Gayle

Hi Bruce, I didn't see a USB plug on the PC's - like I said they are old klunkers but then I wasn't really looking for one. They are running a really old operating system like Windows 95 or some such thing - they are really old.!! :D

January we are off around the Pacific again out of Sydney and in May we are going to Alaska before all the ice is gone forever.

cheers - Gayle

just wondering what is the average age of travellers on the gemini

 

also told there was just two resteraunts on the gemini is this correct

thanks hazel:p

Hi Hazel, Ages on the Gemini go from very young - primarly school to the older travellers in their 80's. When we were on I guess the majority would have been baby boomers but there was a lot of families as well. Only one restaurant and the buffet. Its a very small ship :D Gayle

Hi there Mike,

 

 

Sorry mate you’ve probably answered this somewhere in this thread but I’m a lazy b... and don’t have the time to go looking, so will ask them again.

 

 

What access is there available to e-mail and the internet on Gemini, and if available what are the costs please?

 

 

Also does this and or the Photo Shop extend to downloading your JPEG photos from your SD card onto either your own USB Thumb Drive, or burn them to a CD or preferably a DVD, and again at what cost?

 

 

We have a still Dig Camera, and 3 SD cards 2 x 512 and 1 x 256 also a 1GB USB Storage, and normally take 1.2MB photos, is this enough if we can dump to the USB?

 

 

Also do they print your photos for you on Gemini, or would it be better to get it done in Singapore at the end of the Cruise?

 

 

Any assistance and or recommendations would be very much appreciated thanks mate.:)

 

 

Regards, Bruce

Hi Bruce,

As Mike said there is internet access from the library - there are 2 oldish pc's. The cost is around 50 cents a minute but its very slow. I used it to keep in touch with my kids. It was never hard to get onto them - it wasn't widely used.

The photo gallery is very small on the Gemini and from what I recall they don't have any facilities to dump your stuff to CD and I don't believe they will print anything for you. They don't push the photos like other cruise lines - its all very relaxed. The Photo gallery isn't open all the time - just a few hours a day. The photos are very cheap in comparision to Princess and P&O :D Gayle

Hi everyone,

 

I've been trying to get some idea of how the Gemini compares to the only other cruise ship we've been on, which was the P&O Fair Princess, now known as the China Seas Discovery. I'm curious as to how they compare size-wise.

 

I found a report from someone who cruised on the CSD and it sounds like the ship we have fond memories of is even more past her prime than when we were on board.......... :( although we had a great time. It now is a very 'non-western pax' cruise apparently.

 

Tracey. :)

Hi Tracey, You will find a huge difference. The Gemini is a floating resort not a people mover that the old P&O ships were. :D The Gemini is beautifully set out and its very easy to find your way around on her. Gayle

Forgot to mention, if you do decide to book ship tours - do them as soon as the tour desk opens - basically about 4.00pm on the day you embark as a lot of them book out really fast. Gayle

Hi Everyone

 

I am taking my husband on the Strait of Malacca cruise for his 40th birthday next March and was wondering which shore excursions people have been on from this cruise and what is recommended. We have never been on a cruise before and my husband has no idea that I am planning this - can't wait!!

 

Any info would be of help :o

 

Also, is anyone else going on the March 25 cruise? If so, where are you from/ages etc???? :) :D

 

Thanks,

Ouisel

We went on a lot of ship organised excursions. Its the first time we have done this on a cruise but because we were unfamiliar with the languages etc we thought it was the safest option. The tours weren't that expensive compared to others we have seen on cruise lines. I can tell what ones not to go on. We picked some bad choices and were very disappointed. Don't go the shopping tour of KL. Don't do the shopping tour of Langkowi - the ship usually docks there on a Friday which is their Muslim holy day and every thing is shut in town. Its supposidly duty free but the prices you can get in Australia are cheaper than some of the things we saw. All the duty free shops sell suitcases, chocolate and alcohol and very expensive perfumes. Do go to the Night Fantasy in Puckett - very enjoyable evening.

You will find a huge range of ages on all cruises - from babies to very old people - there will be something to do to suit all ages on the ship so don't sweat it. Just enjoy. Gayle

Can you help me?

 

this is my first cruise and i am nervous!!!

 

is she bumpy? what is there to do on Gemini? whats the main lobby like?

 

whats the food like??

 

are the rooms big???

 

tell me all tell me all!!!!

We were on the Gemini in July. The straits are very smooth - in fact you should feel no movement at all - I get really bad seasickness even if I go across the bay here but let me tell you I wouldn't have thought we were on a ship if I hadn't gone up the gang plank. ITS THAT STABLE!!!!

Its a very busy cruise so you don't need to do anything on the Gemini - each day you wake up in a different place. If you do decide to stay onboard, you can play bingo, listen to good music, go for a nice long walk around the Promande deck - we usually go twice a day 10 times around to get some exercise. You can relax with a good book and a drink up on the pool deck or down on the Promenade deck out of the sun. There is a small library to borrow from.

The main lobby is quite small - I don't what else to say about it. You walk through it a few times a day.

The food is fantastic. Breakfast you can go to the dining room or the buffet. We did the buffet. They cook your eggs while you wait out on the back of the ship - the omelets are fantastic. You just tell the cook what you want in it. Lunch we did the buffet on the 2 days we were there for lunch. Dinner - don't go to the buffet - the restaurant has much better food and its very well presented. We had some wonderful meals in the restaurant - not huge serves but sufficient when you have 3 or 4 courses. They always have a steak and chicken dish (the same every night) and they also have another meat, fish, vegetaian choice as well. All the meals we had were absolultely fantastic.

The rooms are very small. Just big enough for a bed and a small bedside table. But then you are not in the room very often - really only to sleep and shower. :D

Gayle

Outlets are standing English /Singapore 3 pin. Gayle

can anyone recommend a good hotel in singapore for pre and post cruise accomodation I was thinking somewhere around clarke quey but any suggestions thanks:o

First time in Singapore we stayed at the York Hotel which is about a 5 minute walk from Orchard Road. Last time we stayed at the Phoenix on Orchard Road and it was fantastic. They have a cafe downstairs that sells sandwiches cheap which we used to have for lunch. The rooms were very nice and they have those massage chairs in all rooms - it was a godsend after spending hours walking around Singapore. We would definately stay there again. We booked online and got very good rates which included breakfast :D They also use a smart card system so that your room key can also be used on the MRT which made it very convenient. :D Gayle

There are no laundry facilities on the Gemini. We basicially took enough clothes to do us. They do have a line you can string up in the shower but we didn't bother. Mummsie:)

hi hbellman,

No dining is not 24/7. They close the buffet for short periods between breakfast, lunch and dinner. I am not sure about late night because I never eat anything after dinner. The dining room is open for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner only from memory. Again we don't graze between meals so didn't check out if it was open any other times. We were in cabin 6011 which was in an excellent position - we loved the convenience of it. So close to the Gemini bar - just up one flight of steps and just along from the restaurant. Mummsie

hi, You will find its a very busy cruise. There is only one sea day which is the second last day so you will find that you will be off the ship pretty much all the time during the day. There is a small casino on board - we didn't try is as you need special tokens. We thought it used Singapore Dollars but they just fell through.

Don't miss any of the shows in the evening - they are fantastic. There are also 3 live bands that are excellent. In the Gemini Bar they usually play in the evenings so you can have a quiet drink. The other 2 bar areas they have dance floors and will play requests if you wish. The big band is very good in the main Galaxy Lounge where the shows are.

Also as was mentioned by Mike - there is free style dining but if you turn up at 6pm the service is a little slow. We always eat early so it gives our food time to digest before we go to sleep so we were waiting to be served sometimes. The food is excellent quality - not huge serves but adequate. If you want to sit alone they will accommodate you without any problems. Likewise if you don't mind sharing they will also be happy. We did both - we shared a few nights and ate alone the rest of the time. Formal night isn't really that formal on the Gemini. We decided not to go to the dining room that night because you have to make a reservation (do this straight away after boarding) and because we didn't take any formal clothes with us. We could have easily gone because many people didn't dress up or even wear a tie. That is the only night when there are set times for eating - there are 2 sittings. :D Mummsie

We were on deck 6 around midships and it was a fantastic location. The Gemini bar was just up the stairs and the restaurant was just down the corridor. It was really convenient. :) Mummsie