Cruise Addicts R Us

[ceeceeDee]

7 hours ago, arxcards said:

No I wouldn't. I would be in the same boat 😁

Oh, ship. So would I!!

[MicCanberra]

This may not work for everyone.

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/MjbQwHxf4v433LQ5/?mibextid=D5vuiz

[MicCanberra]

[MicCanberra]

On 9/17/2024 at 7:16 AM, MicCanberra said:

This may not work for everyone.

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/MjbQwHxf4v433LQ5/?mibextid=D5vuiz

 

[MMDown Under]

i would be a cruise addict if Australia was offered more exciting cruises.

if i lived somewhere like Vancouver, Southampton, Dover, NY, etc I'd definitely be a cruise addict. If 'fly cruise'to exotic destinations were offered, i'd definitely be a cruise addict. If our cruises matched our weather, Id definitely be a cruise addict, eg to darwin in winter.  Instead I Fly to darwin, when I'd rather cruise to Darwin.  Ive cruised a couple of times to Darwin and absolutely loved it.

Just a thought how many cruise destinations are designed by Australians for Australians? I have no answer for my American friends why there are no interesting cruises in Aust/NZ in their summer/our winter.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[arxcards]

4 hours ago, MMDown Under said:

Just a thought how many cruise destinations are designed by Australians for Australians? I have no answer for my American friends why there are no interesting cruises in Aust/NZ in their summer/our winter.

P&O Australia evolved most of itineraries and opened up ports in PNG, the Pacific & NZ as an offering to Australian passengers. Based on that, most of our itineraries were designed by Australians for Australians. Alas, as Australians we struggle to fill a limited number of ships over the winter months, so that is why there are limited options. Those extra seasonal ships are mostly plying their trade in Alaska, where they only cruise in their summer months too.

 

If you lived in Canada, you would likely have the same lament. There is more cruise variety from Sydney than there is from Vancouver. Vancouver/Seattle are great for cruising - but almost exclusively to Alaska. Great ports, but much less variety than here. I feel no need to be apologetic to my American friends who love coming down here to cruise when they can afford it.

Edited yesterday at 09:40 PM by arxcards

[Ozwoody]

17 minutes ago, arxcards said:

P&O Australia evolved most of itineraries and opened up ports in PNG, the Pacific & NZ as an offering to Australian passengers. Based on that, most of our itineraries were designed by Australians for Australians. Alas, as Australians we struggle to fill a limited number of ships over the winter months, so that is why there are limited options. Those extra seasonal ships are mostly plying their trade in Alaska, where they only cruise in their summer months too.

 

If you lived in Canada, you would likely have the same lament. There is more cruise variety from Sydney than there is from Vancouver. Vancouver/Seattle are great for cruising - but almost exclusively to Alaska. Great ports, but much less variety than here. I feel no need to be apologetic to my American friends who love coming down here to cruise when they can afford it.

I agree except.

They probably think the same thing I am, only from their side of the world.

 

"Yeah it's ok for those guys coming here for the odd trip, but we're here all year, every year and it's same old same old for us".😅

 

[OzKiwiJJ]

4 hours ago, MMDown Under said:

i would be a cruise addict if Australia was offered more exciting cruises.

if i lived somewhere like Vancouver, Southampton, Dover, NY, etc I'd definitely be a cruise addict. If 'fly cruise'to exotic destinations were offered, i'd definitely be a cruise addict. If our cruises matched our weather, Id definitely be a cruise addict, eg to darwin in winter.  Instead I Fly to darwin, when I'd rather cruise to Darwin.  Ive cruised a couple of times to Darwin and absolutely loved it.

Just a thought how many cruise destinations are designed by Australians for Australians? I have no answer for my American friends why there are no interesting cruises in Aust/NZ in their summer/our winter.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Princess used to have two ships permanently home-ported in Australia when we first started cruising (Xmas 2014). One did the big cruises including the world cruise, the other did runs between Sydney and Fremantle, interspersed with PNG and other Pacific Island cruises, during our off-season. They stopped doing that in 2017 I think. 

[MicCanberra]

The only option then is to spend a season in each home port around the world and then you can cruise all the itineraries from those ports and be totally satisfied with their offerings.

or have the same feeling of same old same old.

[arxcards]

10 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Princess used to have two ships permanently home-ported in Australia when we first started cruising (Xmas 2014). One did the big cruises including the world cruise, the other did runs between Sydney and Fremantle, interspersed with PNG and other Pacific Island cruises, during our off-season. They stopped doing that in 2017 I think. 

They sacrificed a Princess to put Carnival into Sydney instead, as well as having 5 x P&O ships zipping about.

[arxcards]

39 minutes ago, Ozwoody said:

I agree except.

They probably think the same thing I am, only from their side of the world.

 

"Yeah it's ok for those guys coming here for the odd trip, but we're here all year, every year and it's same old same old for us".😅

 

Their addicts (I know one in Seattle) still love cruising Alaska 3 or 4 times every year. 

[Bubbeh]

Trying not to sound like I'm whinging but, try living on this side of the country!  We get the very occasional cruise out of Fremantle (a chat with the Cruise Consultant on board last week advised that Princess had no planned cruises out of Freo for the foreseeable future) and this fills up within an hour or so and almost always does the same route eg, Singapore/Bali/Lombok and down the east coast to Sydney or, up to Broome/Exmouth/Geraldton and back.  If I lived in Sydney/Brisbane/Melbourne I would consider myself blessed for the various options available to me without requiring flights and hotels.  Now please don't anyone get the sh*ts with me, I'm just trying to show that there are worse places to live for us cruise addicts.

[ceeceeDee]

2 minutes ago, Bubbeh said:

Trying not to sound like I'm whinging but, try living on this side of the country!  We get the very occasional cruise out of Fremantle (a chat with the Cruise Consultant on board last week advised that Princess had no planned cruises out of Freo for the foreseeable future) and this fills up within an hour or so and almost always does the same route eg, Singapore/Bali/Lombok and down the east coast to Sydney or, up to Broome/Exmouth/Geraldton and back.  If I lived in Sydney/Brisbane/Melbourne I would consider myself blessed for the various options available to me without requiring flights and hotels.  Now please don't anyone get the sh*ts with me, I'm just trying to show that there are worse places to live for us cruise addicts.

Absolutely. It's a great bonus to be within driving distance of a cruise terminal. All we have to worry about is to decide if we will get a friend to drive us, take a transfer service or drive ourselves and pay for parking at BICT. You're definitely not whinging, Bubbeh.

[fairywren]

6 hours ago, Bubbeh said:

Trying not to sound like I'm whinging but, try living on this side of the country!  We get the very occasional cruise out of Fremantle (a chat with the Cruise Consultant on board last week advised that Princess had no planned cruises out of Freo for the foreseeable future) and this fills up within an hour or so and almost always does the same route eg, Singapore/Bali/Lombok and down the east coast to Sydney or, up to Broome/Exmouth/Geraldton and back.  If I lived in Sydney/Brisbane/Melbourne I would consider myself blessed for the various options available to me without requiring flights and hotels.  Now please don't anyone get the sh*ts with me, I'm just trying to show that there are worse places to live for us cruise addicts.

Yes, we are resigned to the fact that we have to fly both ways to join a cruise, add to that at least one night in a hotel prior, and it gets even more expensive. 

[MelbTone]

8 hours ago, ceeceeDee said:

Absolutely. It's a great bonus to be within driving distance of a cruise terminal.

Even better - just to make you all jealous - I live within walking distance of Port Melbourne. Admittedly it's a 40-minute walk but mostly on a level shared path. I could take the tram but given all the excess that lies ahead, the walk wins.

[Kiwi_cruiser]

[arxcards]

1 hour ago, MelbTone said:

Even better - just to make you all jealous - I live within walking distance of Port Melbourne. Admittedly it's a 40-minute walk but mostly on a level shared path. I could take the tram but given all the excess that lies ahead, the walk wins.

Looking ahead, I would be jealous if you still had a ship to board, as it seems like a waste of a good walk when the ships stop calling.

[Ozwoody]

1 minute ago, arxcards said:

Looking ahead, I would be jealous if you still had a ship to board, as it seems like a waste of a good walk when the ships stop calling.

That's mean Geoff, that's mean.🤣

[Muffinz]

2 hours ago, MelbTone said:

Even better - just to make you all jealous - I live within walking distance of Port Melbourne. Admittedly it's a 40-minute walk but mostly on a level shared path. I could take the tram but given all the excess that lies ahead, the walk wins.

I could walk to the cruise termial in downtown Auckland... ok so it would take well over an hour and wouldn't be possible because pedestrians aren't allowed on the Auckland Harbour Bridge 😇

[arxcards]

Mr Google tells me I could walk to OPT in 31 hours, but I think that is without luggage.

[MicCanberra]

1 hour ago, arxcards said:

Mr Google tells me I could walk to OPT in 31 hours, but I think that is without luggage.

I walk to the OPT for every cruise from there. Sometimes it is from the hotel, sometimes from the train station at CQ, sometimes from the tram stop at CQ.

[Muffinz]

4 minutes ago, MicCanberra said:

I walk to the OPT for every cruise from there. Sometimes it is from the hotel, sometimes from the train station at CQ, sometimes from the tram stop at CQ.

We've booked the Hilton in George St for 2 nights before our cruise in December - apparently the light rail / tram stops outside and goes straight to CQ 👍

[cruiselover53]

1 hour ago, arxcards said:

Mr Google tells me I could walk to OPT in 31 hours, but I think that is without luggage.

Ever thought about one of these

 

[MMDown Under]

22 hours ago, MicCanberra said:

The only option then is to spend a season in each home port around the world and then you can cruise all the itineraries from those ports and be totally satisfied with their offerings.

or have the same feeling of same old same old.

I got spoilt when my daughter lived in London, where I cruised from Southhampton or Dover to Europe.  We also did a short trip annually on Ryan Air, using their inexpensive fares.  Destination depended on cheapest fare available at that time.  Once my daughter went to lunch, thinking we were going to Austria, to return to us going to the beautiful border region of France near Germany.  The fare went up whilst I was looking where the town in Austria was! 

[MMDown Under]

Just now, MMDown Under said:

I got spoilt when my daughter lived in London, where I cruised from Southhampton or Dover to Europe.  We also did a short trip annually on Ryan Air, using their inexpensive fares.  Destination depended on cheapest fare available at that time.  Once my daughter went to lunch, thinking we were going to Austria, to return to us going to the beautiful border region of France near Germany.  The fare went up whilst I was looking where the town in Austria was! 

The choice of cruising from the UK was enormous - Scandinavia (Hurtigruten), Europe with Fred Olsen Cruises, Rivers of Europe cruises, plus lots of small ships. I am a destination cruiser.