bazzaw

That has largely been my experience. The best one being -We once booked a "kind of" World Cruise with P&O UK (at least that was how it was "sold") - guarantee inside, 42 days Brisbane to Southampton on Oriana, 19 days in London with my son in London over Christmas, and another 42 days on Arcadia back to Brisbane. $12K per person. We didn't have a cabin allocation for the voyage to UK until only 3 days before departure - a "superior" outside dropped for us - the "superior" being that it was an outside cabin the same size as a normal balcony cabin , including the balcony area. It was VERY comfortable. Much the same thing happened for our return - got a huge disabled interior cabin about a 50 meter walk to the Theatre entrance ( made going home after the evening shows very convenient ) 🙂

We were so poor - I had a bicycle with only one pedal. My family were so ignorant that they had no idea how to get it fixed. 🙂 But I survived. Unfortunately any similarity between the Brisbane of the 50/60s and today is purely coincidental 😞

Dress code on Australian based ships in Australian waters is - casual to the point of indifference. Shoes are required on Formal nights.

I think that guarantee fares are a VERY important part of the cruiselines business model. Else why do they mostly/normally go to such lengths to make attractive "moveover" offers to passengers who have already paid full fares so that they can accommodate lesser paying guarantee bookings?? . Seems to me like this may become a bit of an unintended disaster and own goal for them?? How many people here now will have second thoughts about booking a guarantee fare? - and how will that doubt impact the cruislines bookings model??

I am surprised that Cunard have lasted here in Oz as long as they have. We have done 10 cruises with Cunard (only 2 of which were from Aussie ports) - and I have always thought that Cunard is not a good mix with the Aussie demographic. They thought it would be easy and profitable pickings here because we are very keen to try new things - but Covid came along and things changed. They are obviously now returning to their more traditional base.

I am often amazed by some people - if we can afford to cruise , as an example, we don't really need to worry about the idea that we can get a better exchange rate for the AUD in New Guinea ports than we can get here in OZ. 🙂 Of course if we are planning on spending $5K AUD then perhaps it is relevant - but $100 AUD???? I tell people that I spill more beer than that in any day 🙂 I cant really believe how tight some people are 😞 - and I don't want to hear from any cruisers here about how "some people" are not very well off .

https://www.9news.com.au/national/carnival-australia-major-cruise-company-to-pull-ships-from-melbourne-ports/4bb4d111-2d2a-47ad-968a-4eb8e798b5d5

I have to wonder whether it is indicative of the numbers washing their hands and those who do not??

I can never understand why, when a ship has say 3000 passengers, only 300 get Noro during an outbreak . Any ideas??

I have reached the opinion that the cruiseline Companies don't really give a RATS about these kind of situations when they happen . Obviously they would rather that they didn't occur - nobody in business likes bad PR - although NO PR can sometimes be worse than bad PR - but they know that there is a never ending queue of eager customers waiting for the next cruise " Shutup - and take my money".

Because the business model doesn't allow for any breaks between major refits to "fix things"

I wasn't really making a reference to current economic conditions. Slight upticks like that mentioned here now are nothing. But todays AUD/USD is greatly different to those times when it was 33 cents to the USD or $1.00 to the USD. I have read that the reason for these wide swings is that the USD - being the Worlds Reserve Currency- is the "safeplace to goto" when stuff happens around the World . War breaks out? Sell AUD and buy AUD. US economy collapses?? Sell AUD and buy USD. So when times are dodgy around the World (which is almost everyday these days) - sell AUD and buy USD. The big boys want their wealth in USD not Aussie Dollars or Russian Rubles 🙂

Yes - me too. Remember that period well. I can never work out why, when the American economy gets into a mess, the Aussie Dollar goes down ? 😞

The Qld CHO in his latest report said that the majority of hospitalised COVID patients were older people who had not been vaccinated within the last 6 months - and encouraged those who are not "current' to get a booster . He mentioned nothing about any new/latest vaccine being necessary

Why would anyone test themselves with a RAT test - that is the only way you get Covid these days.

No - "no News is bad News" is correct - quick, we will have to think something up!!!

I am not sure that our problem here in Oz is the current unavailability of the most recent vaccine - but is that people are not getting updated every 6 months or so. I do dread the idea that we should have to be vaccinated every 6 months - and have personally got around that problem because we had the virus in Feb - and hence did not have to have another booster (total of 5 shots now) until August . I have been hoping that we might see a once per year combined influenza/Covid shot. However it appears (and confirmed by the QLD CHO) that the current Covid is quite mild (except for some people) - and I am more concerned about dying on the roads than getting Covid. I do think that there is some truth in the rumour that the only way to get Covid today is to get tested for it!! 🙂

I am sure that the same psychedelic drug was used by the interior designer for both ships.

The Qld Chief Health Officer has just been on the TV saying that he will not be recommending the mandatory use of masks. Finally, some sanity prevails. He also said that the majority of hospitalisations in Qld in this latest "wave" are people over 65 who have not had a booster shot in 2023.

You were lucky - we didn't even arrive at the commercial dockyard until 2:30 PM - also on a Monday (most everything closed) - total waste of time

"The doctor on a cruise ship stricken by COVID-19 and gastro has declared the outbreak over, but concern remains over an uptick in cases in the broader community. Passengers began disembarking the Grand Princess cruise ship after it docked in Adelaide on Monday morning following an 18-day round trip to Queensland and back. Three passengers and two crew members had gastro while eight guests were suffering from COVID-like symptoms, SA Chief Public Health Officer Nicola Spurrier said. She said the case numbers were relatively small compared to the ship's population of more than 2500 guests and 1000 crew. "I commend the company," she told reporters on Monday. "They have very good infection prevention and control mechanisms in place and protocols to deal with outbreaks. And those outbreaks came down very, very quickly as the staff instituted those measures." -- *****!!!!!!!!

The unwritten motto of the main stream motto is "no News is bad news" - anything for a headline and distraction of the peasants.

I cant see what the price is for the Salmon pieces. Thought I might be able to compare it to the $42 per kg currently being charged by our local Woolies. Many many many years ago while touring Germany - long before the Euro - we saw prawns on display for X Deutschmarks - I thought it meant per KG so I ordered 1 kg . Turned out that the sign said X Deutschmarks per 100 grams - an expensive mistake on my part 😞

How did you actually do this - book everything in advance?

Can you tell us more about the "mechanics" of organising this please. Did you book a "segment" of the overall trip and then try to get accomodation for a couple of nights in the port, before booking the ravel/accomodation for the next segment? This could be a bit of a "chicken or the egg - what comes first " thing. - maybe you could book the ship for a particular segment , but not be able to find suitable accomodation?