Russell21

You've got my vote. I'm sorting out, hopefully, our last of the group of 6 on Thursday. I even had to feed her the info about going to the local Medibank Office to get a copy of her international Covid certificate.

Thanks to an email yesterday I was informed that InsureandGo are now taking applications for cruise insurance. Grit your teeth folks. Pre Covid we were paying about $480.00 for your typical NZ or Fiji 13-14 day cruise, this price including a $200.00 jump when I turned 75, and a 20% discount which was a combined Seniors/Loyalty beg thing. Now that they are back with an admittedly good cover as usual, their silver cover price for a 12 dayer that pokes out into the Pacific but does not land in a foreign country, at 78yo for me and 74 for my wife, I just paid $1,147.00 with a 20% discount, for the same cover with the same personal afflictions, as before Covid. This is a warning not a whinge, just thought I'd get you ready for the shock.

As far as I'm concerned it is clearly explained here as of the 3rd June 2022:- https://www.princess.com/plan/cruise-with-confidence/cruise-health/frequently-asked-questions/au-cruises/?accordion=covid-test-prior-to-boarding

Having at one point in my life spent 3 months working on a project in Brasilia I have been fortunate enough to sample some of the world's best coffee, along with, very surprisingly, some of the worst. Believe me, the Horizon Court coffee is far from the worst coffee around, and I find it quite drinkable. Then again I don't pollute my coffee with milk and sugar, and I don't mind if you can stand a spoon up in it either.

Ondine did you actually speak to someone or did you do an online dry run? The reason I'm asking is that about a week ago I spoke to them and was informed that they were not doing cruise bookings until the end of the month.

Any Digger is welcome at my table, I wore green too. The freebies usually end up living in a drawer, I paid an extra $2700.00.

We've got just over 100 days to our next cruise and one of our group can't even get the renewal form for her passport. Edit, Just discovered that a renewal can now be made on line.

My wife starts 2 nights before sailing, and takes the tablet just at bedtime. Cruise number 9 coming up and we have had our share of weather in the past, but she is still a very happy cruiser.

Cruising is like camping, camp long enough and sooner or later you are going to get wet.

I can only assume that the people with hearing aids who are having a problem with background noise in the dining rooms, or elsewhere for that matter, have a cheap hearing aid. I wear hearing aids in both ears and my hearing aids have 5 programs easily accessible by the press of a button or from my relevant smart phone app, one of which reduces the background noise by a considerable amount by only using the microphones pointing forward to speakers and filtering down the residual noise. Can honestly recommend Hearing Australia, which has been and still is a Government run company since the end of the second world war.

Rang InsureandGo during the week and was told to ring back at the end of the month for Cruise insurance.

Thank you for that, I can now finalise our transport to and from.

Gone yellow for 26th Sept too.