SilvertoGold

Have been reading a World Cruise Blog and it was noted that in Australia, for certain, maybe NZ, also, you cannot take anything off the ship in port except a "sealed container of water". No thermos (of anything), no sealed container of juice or soda/pop. I have looked for more information about this and can't find anything. Any experience or info would be appreciated. Thanks!

In my planning I am finding NZ and Australia have some very strict rules, much different from any cruise are we have sailed pre-and post pandemic. It is difficult to get it all straight, but at least they are trying to keep everyone safe. That is appreciated!

As noted by colbe. We saw only a few books on the exchange shelf in October. Glad to hear HAL still has this shelf!

Of a sort, not large but it has some older books, fiction and non-fiction. It is located where the Explorations Cafe is on deck 3

Agree how friendly and polite the Japanese are :) Wonderful ports! We did have problems in the train stations purchasing tickets (Aomori and Kobe espeically), as it took time to find someone who spoke English well enough to understand what we wanted.

Having your TA "link" the bookings helps a lot: same key card, onboard account carries over automatically, same cabin if booking a GUAR (not always of course, but usually), MDR knows you are onboard for the duration and you can keep same table, if you choose Fixed Dining. Having separate booking numbers get you Mariner rewards for each, as opposed to one for a Collectors.

Your description of your adventures with Covid is really excellent. It hits all my questions and is a very valuable read for anyone cruising on HAL in the near future. Thanks for taking the time to write this up!

Have used FlightEase several times, for Europe, San Diego, Ft Lauderdale, Australia, Hong Kong Each time saved a fair amount over booking identical flights through airlines, was able to choose exactly the flight I wanted (mostly non-stop with good times). Thing change, but I think it is always worth it to investigate. I always get a Hold on my cruise so I can take a look at the airfares on FlightEase for comparison and see the bottom line for the cruise + air.

Better than this typical offer is when HAL does a promo with CND discounted even more. This seemed to happen once or twice a year in the past. One thing to watch is the exchange rate and HAL's exchange rate. You can pre-purchase OBC and pay gratuities plus buy specialty dining, shorex, etc and save a lot if HAL's rate is better. We did this last when HAL's rate was 1.26 and our credit card was 1.37

Massive difference. World Cruise is an example of a Grand Cruise, as are the Grand South America and Grand Africa. On a Collectors's such as that one in March - April, NZ to Vancouver, it will be two regular cruises. Possibly a couple of extras like more professional lectures, more entertainment, but nothing like the all-out special events on a Grand. Used to be that Collectors received extras like a complimentary Pinnacle dinner/lunch, a bottle of wine, but I haven't personally seen that post-pandemic. Enjoy your cruise, the Noordam is a lovely ship. older, but very comfortable. In September the crew/officers were outstanding and some may be on that cruise :)

Brilliant!

So, who will HAL Corporate decide is their "customer", their "target market"? How will this differ from Princess? How will corporate market to this customer?

I would note that sometimes it costs more to book 2 separate cruises. You need to do the math to see whether booking one Collectors cruise two separate cruises works out the best.

You win! Each cruise gets you full benefits. Enjoy!

Can you also pre-pay your gratuities in USD now at this rate? We have done that on HAL.

We always combine spending accounts upon boarding so the app shows each persons spending. You just tell the Front Desk to combine the accounts into one.

Thanks for this wine list. It is good to know that HAL does a separate list downunder. They didn't on the cruises we have done in this part of the world previously, so this is a positive. Does anyone reading this list have recommendations? We would love to try some, but given the comments in above posts on the quality of some offerings, I would appreciate some info!

In Canada we pay $44 + 15% tax for the Cloudy Bay S Blanc in our government liquor stores. How does this stack up to the Australian pricing in your liquor stores? All this info about Australian and N Zealand wines is helpful for our next HAL cruise. We expect some local wines offered on board.

Good luck! Please let us know what happens with upsell or assignment Have a great cruise!!

Yes, we will use the printed out email as we do not have anything else to show approval. Are we supposed to have something on the app?

Thanks, Jean. Luckily all went relatively well with the NZ ETA. Took a lot of tries to get the photo done and 55 minutes to get the emailed notices for acceptance of the application and the ETA. Watching that circle going around and around and around didn't make my day any more pleasant, but it is done. Thinking now we need to do another Australia and NZ cruise in the October, too, just to get our work's worth out of these two ETAs :) Thanks for all your help with the logistics of ETA applications.

Thanks to your excellent info we got the Australian ETA done. Didn't take the 15 minutes that some people seem to take, but it didn't take an hour either :) Quite easy, no problems with camera or passport reading (+chip). I would have liked some pop-ups to explain a few items, though. Alias = maiden name, address in Australia = cruiseship? It worked is all is good. I hope the NZ ETA is as easy. I keep getting "retry" with it. I hope it isn't a hassle. Again, thanks for your help over the past months!

This is an excellent suggestion. We spent nearly 11 weeks on the Koningsdam last year and the MDR was always lined up early. Breakfast lines were bad, dinner ones atrocious.

Full on all HAL ships we have been on, Including the Zuiderdam

Are we taking about the about the NZeta NZ travel authority (visa) or what Jean in post 4 references?