Over from NZ

Exactly!! 100%!!!

Lucky you doing it twice. We've been there twice. I would do a full day trip on the longer day and spend the shorter day in Kotor old town. We filled in a whole day of each. On the excursion.. you've got places like 2500 year old Budva down the road, Perast, lady of the rocks and other places to see. Kotor old town is fun to wander.. check out the old walls.. eat lunch in the square etc.

The medallion is the key-card. It's no different.. other than you don't have to insert it in the key-hole.. it picks up that you're nearby. Don't sweat the small stuff.

I'd beg to differ and would suggest the opposite.. NZ is best suited for land-trips because it's so stunning and you just don't see the good stuff travelling by cruise-ship. It's much easier to do by land.. whereas Aussie is huge.. and you would spend all day in a car looking often at the same scenery.. and better to attack it by cruise-ship. Cities are usually near the ports.. and Aussie has the better cities. Whereas arguably.. NZ has some of the best scenery in the world if you're prepared to get inland to see it.

In NZ at least; the cruise-sector is small bananas. About 2% of total tourist expenditure. I've got a mate who's a tour guide. He boasts to me of the free money tourists are giving him. He gets paid to do a job he loves.. and then as he puts it.. the silly buggers give him cash too! lol. Of course he's not going to turn it down is he. And it could be argued that it's foreign money entering the country that's going to circulate through the economy. However.. the main point is - Kiwis & Australians don't want that culture to become imbedded here. It's not how we roll.. it's not what we want. We're already seeing it in NZ in tourist hotspots like Queenstown - where hospitality outfits are starting to expect it.. and that's starting to rile people up. They can take a flying hike if they start that nonsense! 🙂 Just tell your husband to spend more if he's trying to offload cash in NZ!! haha.

If your bids are accepted.. then obviously you hear about it. What they're saying - is if your bid isn't accepted - you won't get notified that your bid has missed out. You'll just hear nothing and keep your existing room.

We had 21-nights last June on the Enchanted in an interior room. We weighed it up. Would have been over $5k more to go balcony. We've had Balconies before.. and seldom get much use out of them.. so, although they're nice.. just couldn't justify it. Particularly as there was only 5 sea-days. I can't be bothered going on a cruise and then spending most of my time staying in a little room with a balcony.. much rather enjoy the bigger spaces on the ship 🙂.

I'm not screwing anybody. The driver is technically a self-employed person.. who's only way of doing business is to cut his margins to undercut taxi businesses. If he's not making enough with what he's charging - screw him.. his business model is faulty.

If you just want a "half day to hang out" without going far or putting a lot of effort in.. in Darling Harbour near where the ship embarks - is the Sea Aquarium, Madame Tussauds wax museum and the Australian National Maritime Museum which has the replica of Captain Cook's Endeavour ship (it is excellent) which you can go aboard (as well as a retired Naval submarine and Destroyer). All within a few hundred metres of each other and with Darling Harbour cafes and restaurants there too.. easily able to kill half a day or more.

You can't say it's going to "save them money".. because you don't know what their spend was going to be. I don't drink alcohol.. there's no way I would drink $45 worth of non-alcohol drinks a day. I would usually buy 3x long blacks and maybe 1 soda or zero alcohol beer a day. Couldn't get near $45.

That really annoys me that the cruise-lines short-change us with the amount of time spent in ports!

I think the problem is.. most of Princess's clientele is old! Hence the complaints about noise. Wife and I don't have a problem with it at all.. 🙂

Yep - here's your actual temps from last year - https://www.accuweather.com/en/it/rome/213490/april-weather/213490?year=2023

Except the "nos" are a moving target. When we started cruising, even our 10-year old son was sent away from the dining room for turning up in dress shorts and a shirt.. fast forward to this year.. I'm wearing cargo shorts and a polo shirt in the dining room on formal night. Tank-tops and swim-suits might seem a no-brainer sure.. but the "nos" of yesterday ain't the "Nos" of today.

Our recent trip on the Enchanted had 6 formal nights. Shorts were worn at all formal nights in the MDR. Wear what you want. Put a pair of long pants in your luggage just in case you strike a Maitre-D dress zealot that's new and wants to go back to the old days. Otherwise wear what you like and enjoy.

You don't need to do a ships excursion. We just grabbed a taxi from the ship there and that was cheap enough.

Take the full day! You'd be silly to just book the 5-hours.

Yes, we look at the deal you guys get.. and I agree with you up there that it makes a lot of sense generally. If the $35 somebody said above was the figure.. Take off Grats and wifi.. and you don't then need to be drinking many long-blacks or other to make it worthwhile. 🙂 Hope you get the chance to get down under sometime - I'm biased, but they say the scenery is stunning. Don't come by cruise-ship though - you'll miss all the best of it. 🙂

May seem strange to you.. but it is what it is though. And for that reason.. the maths is different for the Antipodeans. It costs us about NZD$71 a day for the Plus. $AUD is not too far different to $NZD. Gratuities are charged seperately on top of the Plus. That's about USD$44 a day plus gratuities. Internet is half price for us. There's no way the package makes financial sense for most non-drinkers from down-under.

No it doesn't. You've missed the point.

If they're booking the cruise from Australia/NZ and it's sailing from say the US or Europe - they have to pay the gratuities extra - they're not included in the Plus.

However.. the OP is from NZ. Grats aren't in the package. Be very unlikely the package is worth it.

It's Princess ships. One of them will have old people on it. The other will have even older people. Unless it's a shorter cruise over the holidays (when you'll have a mix of old people and families). Their "clients" will fit in well. 🤣

Haha. Yes, I should have instead said my dinner was no less tasty..

The "Malta Experience" is excellent. It's in Mdina though. Which itself is another excellent thing to see (particularly if you're a GOT fan).. however if you're only there for a day - you're not going to be able to see all these things.