arxcards

Thank you. One of our fave ships from years gone by. I hope she is still in great nick, and I look forward to my February cruise. Over 11 days, we will be giving Ocean now a bit of a workout.

Or she is relocating to the Caribbean.

She is still being operated by Captain Cook cruises in Fiji, departing their fleet in early November. Hard to know what the onboard experience will be like in the med, and would be worth checking out similar Travelmarvel itineraries to get an idea of their standards. I am more aware of their brand being river cruising, yet Caledonian Sky is an expedition style small ship.

It depends what you call rough. 4 to 5 metres is quite common, but can be double that a few times each year during Tasman low weather events. Personally, rough is prolonged periods over 5 metres, or anything over 6.5 metres. The ship can be navigated around the worst of the conditions. November is usually OK, but there is no certainty. The northern end of the crossing to/from Tauranga/Auckland is usually calmer than the southern end from Fiordland/Dunedin, as the ocean currents are being buffered by the Australian coastline. This is today, quite calm on the northern crossing, a brief bit of metres 5 metres coming around the south coast of NZ. A link if you want to monitor the ocean conditions: http://www.bom.gov.au/australia/charts/viewer/index.shtml?domain=combinedW&type=sigWaveHgt

Airlie is usually pretty good for tendering, and as mentioned, even smoother on the cats. On the other hand, we have found Port Douglas can get a bit bumpy of an afternoon, due to a cross swell getting stirred up by an afternoon sea breeze. Timing for Port Douglas is indeed risky. If you have Cairns on your cruise, I would suggest doing the same reef excursion while docked. If late back, it is less than an hour by road to get to Port Douglas to get back to the ship the next day. If I had issues with seasickness, I would be more concerned about a choppy trip to the reef than a tender ride.

Sure for a cyclone, but P&O used the same tactic announcing NZ had refused entry for the ship, so they went to Tassie instead. P&O knew before boarding, yet waited till after departure to announce it as if it was a NZ issue instead of coming "clean" and saying the ships hull had failed a bio inspection. At first they only offered OBC, and a full refund came later after much agitation. For me, if it is out of the ship's control (weather, medevac, marine rescue etc), bad luck and maybe a bit of OBC as goodwill. If it is a ship problem that arises after departure, a partial refund should apply, dependant on how badly the cruise is affected. However, if it is a cruise line or ship problem prior to departure, they should come clean and spell out what will happen prior to boarding anyone. Offer a sweetened deal or the option of not boarding and receiving a full refund. It is OK to think they have a captive cruise audience that has no choice, but that audience can also become a mob if they can see through the excuses.

welove2cruise became my user tag on most social media sites as they evolved as well as email addresses, like the one in my signature (note - welove2cruise isn't me on CC, as it was already taken). I had to like your Broncos post, as ... well ... it was so sad to see them lose so badly. 😉

I believe she had a bit of update/upgrade/refresh of some of the cabins/public areas during the covid pause, and that is why it has been so long since her last drydock. As far as I am aware, she is scheduled in drydock next month. Grand suites are great, but I think we had an owner suite on Voyager and it was back when she was last in Oz. I do prefer Radiance & Ovation, but that is just personal taste.

To back-up the earlier comment, she is around 100km's out of Freo, heading for Broome.

Maybe. Barb has hated times when I have been working shifts. Not just the awake times, but meal times and family times too.

Good news.

Generally, if you want to go to the shows, it is better to dine at a similar time to the traditional early/late fixed dining times. 7:20 can be in that skipping dessert zone if you are a relaxed diner. It also depends on the popularity of the show. For the number of passengers, Crown's theatre isn't massive, and getting there 5 minutes before the show might not yield any good seats.

I could have readily jumped on Diamond Princess for a couple of days later this month and boxing day on Crown Princess. Alas, Barb burnt all of her leave for surgery earlier in the year and needs to save up leave for our big trip next year. Once upon a time I would have done them solo, but it just isn't the same.

Looking at our Feb cruises this morning had me realising that it is 6 months today. That seems way too long.

To the point, if Royal had this as a tour, it would be $600+ to do the same climb.

That makes so much sense. And here we all were, being told that $5 per head extra on port passenger taxes was going to break the cruise industry in Australia.

Yes, definitely out of control. Similarly, one cruise next Feb wasn't enough, so we have gone with 3 ships from 3 different lines with only one day on land between the 1st two. Funny how these things evolve.

Where were you cruising? UK relocation to the US East Coast?

$300 a head profit is a stretch. Royal might get 10% off for quantity plus the value of the booking fee. I reckon cost for them is around $260, so that "only" leaves them $250 profit.

It tricked me at first too Chili. $311pp is very reasonable for a 9hr tour. That is the going rate for this tour and operator, sold via many of the various tour outlets. Royal charges $502.64pp for exactly the same tour, except it would leave from the ships' tender dock. Enough passengers think $500 is a good price too, but it does remain: - The tour operator gets paid $311, less booking commission, for doing all of the work for 9hrs, paying for fuel & maintenance on the boat, wages for their staff, lunch, marina charges, snorkelling gear etc. - Royal, and it would be the same for other lines to a large degree, make $190 for doing what? Yes, there are limited safe options for doing a reef tour during a cruise day in port. Do it and get gouged, or find something else to do independently.

I trust you enjoyed some wind and a few waves over the past couple of days. We have found it hard to sync with Carnival's activities, so we usually give most of them a miss. Sadly, our most interesting activity on our last Splendor cruise was putting coins into that "tipping point" machine at the edge of the casino. Yes, the house still won, but there was more entertainment per dollar than losing it on the pokies or at bingo. Still, our food was great and we made the rest up on the run. Pity about the lack of enrichment. Make sure management knows what you think of their level of integrity.

Not for the 9-5 bit, but the public spaces/venues are not to scale and the cross traffic in the thoroughfares is a problem. Our cabin (same both times) has been mostly fine, but that was an Ocean suite. The only real detraction was that the cabin TV wasn't much bigger than my galaxy pad. I would much rather "downgrade" to a grand class Princess mini, as we are doing on Diamond, Emerald & Crown over the next 18 months. I hope we find Luminosa to be better for us than Splendor when we bord on 6th Feb. Yes, I would agree, the grand class inside/outside/balcony cabins aren't compatible for any more than two people.

Speculation indeed, but Carnival will match ships to ports. If there is extra capacity that isn't being filled on Encounter, Carnival will look at how/where they can maximise passenger numbers. Yes, they are older ships, but Carnival has been happy to have ancient ones in their fleet. The difference with those US Carnival cruisers is that they don't see a swap happening, but just to add those ships to the US fleet. That would be very pie in the sky. As far as ship layout goes, despite the age difference, I would much rather be on a grand class Princess ship that on Splendor. Also to note, Luminosa is still seen by many in the US as a Costa ship.

Keep your fingers crossed Cilla. At least Carnival is showing their intent, so it is on their want list. She already has bookings at the terminal though till April 2027, but none through the winter. The key confirmation will be if Luminosa starts showing winter bookings at BICT, and that will show months ahead of any JH announcement. On the other hand, Luminosa could also swap roles with Carnival Encounter at some stage.

I think Justin is looking after this booking for Carnival - Justin Case. These bookings have been there for several months. They also had year-round bookings in Airlie Beach, Cairns, Port Douglas for Luminosa in 2024-5, but they didn't materialise when the schedules were announced. Carnival has held an ambition of cruising year-round from Brisbane since BICT was announced. Initially Spirit was going to cruise full time out of Brisbane from October 2019, but covid squashed that. While they still hold that ambition, the absorption of P&O has come along since those bookings were made, and Carnival is not going to keep Luminosa here year-round if Encounter is not sailing full through winter. They have to discount Encounter to fill her now, so things will have to go gangbusters before any of those "in-case" bookings become a reality.