possum52

 

If you're 56 you will qualify for the pension at 60 or 62 I don't think your hubby will till 65 though.

That is not correct as you can see below which is from the Federal Govt Human Services website - http://www.humanservices.gov.au/customer/services/centrelink/age-pension

Age requirements for Age Pension

Your eligibility for Age Pension depends on when you were born.

Women born before 1 January 1949 reach qualifying age at 64 and a half, and women born between 1 January 1949 and 30 June 1952 at age 65.

Qualifying age for men born before 1 July 1952 is age 65.

From 1 July 2017, the qualifying age for Age Pension will increase from 65 years to 65 and a half years. The qualifying age will then rise by six months every two years, reaching 67 by 1 July 2023. See table below.

Date of birth Qualifying age at

1 July 1952 to 31 December 1953 65 years and 6 months

1 January 1954 to 30 June 1955 66 years

1 July 1955 to 31 December 1956 66 years and 6 months

From 1 January 1957 67 years

My husband will be age wise eligible later this year but I won't be until March 2018.

Thanks Billy and Charlie's Mum and Seija (and Adrian) for your help. Looks like we will be able to catch up with family on the Saturday.

Leigh

Thank you all for your replies. I guess we just wait until closer to our sail date, although checking with Princess is a good idea. We are trying to work out what time to book our flight from Melbourne.

My DH and I are booked on the Diamond Princess 19 day cruise from Sydney in late March 2015. Our travel summary states that boarding commences from 1pm 27th March and that we sail at 8pm on the 28th.

The questions I have are:

1.Do Princess have different boarding times for each deck level or cabin category?

2. As we don't sail until the following evening I assume that once we have checked in and boarded we are then allowed to leave the ship as often as we want to until an hour or so before sailing?

Thanks,

Leigh

Hi David, we are on the Diamond Princess March 27th 2015 cruise from Sydney to Singapore.

Leigh and Rob

Thank you rkmw and dancinman66 for your replies. That is was what I thought or at least was hoping.

Leigh

Hello,

My DH and I have booked the Diamond Princess cruise to Singapore via Bali and Vietnam from Sydney on March 27th 2015. Our cruise personaliser has shore excursions available.We have been able to book an excursion for Darwin and it shows excursions for Brisbane, Airlie Beach and Singapore but none for Bali or the two ports in Vietnam. Does that mean that excursions are not available at all or not yet?

Leigh

Yes Jennie, I assume that would be Portside. You would have had to have walked along the river a few hundred metres to Bretts' Wharf to catch the river cat.

Leigh

Jennie,

We dropped off our luggage about 9am, attended to our paperwork, went and had a coffee and wandered around Portside for a while. We then went back to the terminal and waited a short time until our group number was called. We were well and truly on board and sitting in the Waterfront for lunch by midday. I think boarding commenced about 10.30-11am.

Leigh

Jennie,

Lunch (on some sea days) at Salt Grill is $39 p.p. and dinner is $49 p.p. We sailed on the Pacific Pearl in April and had lunch at Salt Grill on the second last day of the cruise. The food was amazing! We had previously had dinner on the Pacific Dawn in 2012 which was fantastic. We didn't eat at Luna but if my memory serves me correctly it was $29 P.P. Drinks were similar to pub prices and I think you can take a bottle of wine to your cabin, I certainly saw quite a few bottles being carried around.

We had two formal nights on our last nine night cruise. Men can get away with slacks, a dress shirt and tie, some do wear jackets but not all. Ladies tend to wear cocktail wear.

Hope this helps,

Leigh

Glad you were able to go on Puffing Billy Gae and that the rain didn't stop you. It certainly did rain! Did you stop at Portland?

Leigh

Glad you are enjoying your cruise. My husband and I were on the Pearl the cruise before yours. We didn't find that most of the tv shows were British, quite the contrary in fact, it was only the news which was. All other shows were Australian or from the US.

As for keeping up with Australian news, we picked up the daily newspaper each morning from reception which had a good mix of local and overseas news plus sporting results.

Leigh

We were told early Tuesday morning (15th) in an announcement by Captain Herriott that due to the rough seas (strong currents as well) we were encountering and would continue to encounter that it would be extremely unlikely that we would make it to Sydney on time to dock at OPT. Tuesday night and through the early hours of Wednesday morning it was quite roller coaster conditions. If you were told on the 14th, evidently the decision was made earlier than we were told that PP would dock at White Bay. It was a slight inconvenience for us but why spoil a great holiday by sweating the small stuff?

We are just off the Pearl today and had to dock at White Bay as we were an hour late arriving in Sydney due to rough weather caused by Cyclone Ita. As there is a curfew evidently on ships docking at OPT between 7am and 10am due to the peak time for ferries arriving at Circular Quay, the decision was made to to go to White Bay instead otherwise the earliest next time the Pearl could dock would be 10am at OPT. I would assume that this decision was made so that the many interstate passengers could still make their flights on time.

Gae, we are on the cruise before you. I've heard the new cruise control (diary) has many blips and has not really worked properly since it was implemented. When I first tried to book our shore tours, it came up with the incorrect dates so I went in through the Daily Schedule instead of Shore Tours. I was concerned that it hadn't worked and contacted Alison who is sometimes on the P&O Facebook page. She was able to confirm our tours were booked. Try this address - cust.relations@carnivalaustralia.com and and mark it Attention Alison.

Hope you are able to sort it out.

Leigh

Thanks The_Big_M and rkmw. We probably won't arrive at the OPT until 11.45ish, so hopefully we won't have a long wait.

Leigh

Good morning,

A few questions for those who have recently sailed on P&O from the OPT. We embark on the Pacific Pearl on this coming Monday and our boarding time is from 1pm - 3pm and wondered if boarding starts earlier than 1pm. Also how quickly do passengers board? Is it a long waiting time or relatively quickly?

Thanks,

Leigh

Good morning Wisiddship,

You have probably received an upgrade because the 'no upgrade' box wasn't ticked when you made the booking. It seems to be pot luck if you receive an upgrade or not, no rhyme or reason to it. Not sure if you can request you stay where you originally were or not.

Nine days to go!

Hello Wisiddship, hope you enjoy the cruise. We are certainly looking forward to it. Hope the weather is kind to us. We didn't consider the back to back as my husband wants to be back home before Good Friday as he organises our local fire brigade to collect for the Royal Childrens' Hospital Good Friday Appeal so we will fly back to Melbourne in the afternoon after docking.

Leigh

After two months of nobody being able to help, I got a person at CarnivalAustralia to make two reservations for me in July 2013 for April 2014 cruises. Everything went fine until now. You can't complete their registration as it is designed for Australian and New Zealand only. You can't enter personal data, emergency contact info, reserve shore excursions, or pay the invoices as they are all geared to Au and NZ. My contact at CarnivalAustralia is now not answering my emails and we are down to less that 90 days and I can't get my E-Ticket even though I have paid the invoices. Very frustrating.

exvpcbss, if you are not using this email address - cust.relations@carnivalaustralia.com

try it and attention it to Alison. I have her to be very helpful and she seems to answer the queries on the P&O Australia Facebook page. Good luck.

I hope you enjoy your cruise.

Thanks rkmw and gaechann for your replies. It will be approx.10.30am as we arrive in Sydney from Melbourne, so hopefully the trains will be past peak by then! But I must say your thoughts certainly have us thinking about what we will do. Perhaps we will play it by ear and see what happens come the 7th April. The towncar does sounds a great alternative.

Thanks again,

Leigh

Thanks for the information rkmw. We will have a suitcase and backpack each. Hopefully we can manage. We have used Sydney trains quite a bit on our previous trips there and have caught the train to Circular Quay. I'm assuming that there are lifts from each platform? We used the escalator last time and didn't take any notice of lifts.

Do you think we will manage or would it be easier to take a taxi?

Thanks again,

Leigh

Thanks Fredette,

Sorry for the delay in replying. I think at this stage we will use the train from the airport to Circular Quay but your suggestion re the shuttle is one to keep in mind.

Yes, it will be more convenient to sail from Circular Quay but if it is White Bay so be it. I hope if there a change we have plenty of notice as I like to plan ahead.

Hope you and your family enjoy your first cruise.

Leigh

Thanks rkmw for your reply. I guess if it is changed to White Bay, we take a taxi instead of the train.

Leigh