OzKiwiJJ

Just now, ceeceeDee said:

Absolutely and I hadn't thought of taking antibiotics in my medical kit on a cruise. Great idea and I know my GP will see the logic.

We've been carrying them for some years now, both a broad spectrum antibiotic plus the ones I need for bronchitis. This is the first time I've had to use any of them though - they've usually ended up getting chucked out when they are past their use by date. Still, it's worth having them. I wish I could get anti-virals as well but you have to test positive to Covid to get those in NSW.

40 minutes ago, lyndarra said:

Corner Brook, Newfoundland?

We're only about 120-150kms from there as the crow flies at the moment.

We've moved into the Gulf of St Lawrence, in heavy fog. I'd wondered why we were tracking so far west. I'd expected we would be going down the eastern side of Newfoundland.

We've had a fair bit of fog on various parts of the cruise but, so far, we've had very light seas, just 3-4 bouncy bits since we started and they only lasted a few hours.

Just now, Mareblu said:

Hang in there Julie.  While on Oceania Vista in May, I was also diagnosed with acute bronchitis.  Wonderful medical care, but it came with a bill of over $AUD7,000 (ouch). Insurance claim is in, so fingers crossed.  Hope you’re able to avoid that, and you recover well and rapidly.

I had the right antibiotics in my medical kit, plus cough syrup and Panadol, so have managed to avoid going anywhere near the medical centre so far. But from past experience it's going to take me longer than I'd like to recover, damn it!

I used to get bronchitis quite a bit in the past but hadn't had it at all in the past 8-9 years. It takes a fairly powerful antibiotic to knock it out. My GP has been good about ensuring I have some when we travel.

7 hours ago, Lady Meer said:

I agree but was trying to be kind! On our first morning on Regent we went to the dining room for breakfast and waited 90 minutes for 2 teas, 2 juices, 2 poached eggs on brown toast (for me) and eggs, bacon and hash browns for DH. The first delivery was eggs Benedict (for me) and a massive ‘all you can eat’ for DH. They were sent back but this was just the start of the chaos. In the evening, the wine service was dreadful. The wine waiters couldn't remember which wines anyone was drinking. Needless to say we won’t be returning to Regent.

We had a similar issue one morning on  our Regent cruise last year. 

We also will not cruise Regent again.

Just now, Kiwi_cruiser said:

After leaving Reykjavik, Iceland Coral Princess has 5 day at sea before she gets to her next port of call Sydney (Cape Breton Island), Canada.

 

She is currently on day 3 of her sea days.

Current position of Coral Princess:

 

Under way from Reykjavik to Sydney (Cape Breton Island)

 

 

 

Departure was 2 d 12 hrs 58 min ago. (at 23:00 h local time)

Arrival will be in 1 d 22 hrs 2 min. (at 07:00 h local time)

Traveled distance since Reykjavik: 966.42 nm (1,789.82 km)

Remaining distance to Sydney (Cape Breton Island): 727.96 nm (1,348.18 km)

Traveled distance since Dover: 3,076.48 nm (5,697.64 km)

Course: 226°

It's 4 sea days, not 5. I wish it was 5 though as I've been battling bronchitis for the last 6 days. I missed all the Iceland ports 😭. I'm just hoping I'll be well enough to go ashore at the Sydney port stop. It will be touch and go!

On 7/4/2024 at 5:22 PM, Lady Meer said:

Have recently been on Regent - not impressed with their so-called ‘6 star’ service. The service on our last 4 Princess cruises in Reserve has been far superior!

The regular service in Princess MDRs is usually better than Regent!

2 hours ago, MMDown Under said:

That would be too sensible!  The principle of lack of variety in quality bottles of wine would drive me crazy,  Can passengers bring bottles of wine on board to drink from ports with wineries?

Yes, they are currently allowing one bottle per person at all port stops. We have a few interesting wines that we have discovered along the way. 

Make friends with one of the sommeliers, give them a price limit and see what they come up with. You might be pleasantly surprised. 😊

Just now, Cbtours said:

I think they’re a formidable team 😁

Not really compared with some of the other teams onboard who regularly get high scores - 17, 18, 19 and even the odd 20. We do OK in regular trivia but not so well in the harder progressive trivia.

I just had a lovely chat with Carole (Sewgood). Our team were sitting next to hers at trivia so swapped papers for marking. She recognised me from the Escape article. It was really lovely to meet her. 

On 6/23/2024 at 2:13 PM, Jean C said:

Hi, I would love to have met up but unfortunately I live in Northland, and not handy to your port stops. I'm sure you'll have a wonderful time here and on your cruise, it sounds a fabulous trip.

 

As regards Te Papa, we walked there from the port, back when there was no free shuttle. We didn't take too much notice of how far it was as it was a pleasant walk along the harbour front. I can highly recommend Te Papa, it was far more interesting than I expected it to be, so worth a visit, and entry is free.

Since they moved the cruise dock after an earthquake (it's now at the Hutt Rd end of the wharf) you aren't allowed to walk off.

I think it was officially the second leg as Capetown was considered the first leg. This is based on mini-bar setups - we just received the third one today.

Just now, arxcards said:

The drinks package, purchased separately, is more expensive than the plus fare.

 

Good news is you can upgrade your fare to a plus package after boarding, or you can upgrade to a plus fare via Princess or your T/A prior to sailing. Either option is currently $65 per day on an Aussie based ship, with no additional gratuity. Upgrading after boarding on a $US ship could be more difficult, as you would be paying more for a package that contains daily grats which you already pay with your fare.

If you're cruising on a Princess US$ ship booked in Australia you pay gratuities whether you have a Plus/Premier fare or not. Note: the US Plus fare is US$60, around AU$90, against the AU Plus fare of AU$65. It works out about the same in AU$ give or take a few dollars.

10 hours ago, Cbtours said:

I’ve been watching for updates 😁 halfway wow! It goes so quick

It certainly does. I'll try to do a summary of the rest of the trip to date in a couple of days time.

I caught the cough that was going around the ship just as we arrived at Gran Canaria. Luckily the symptoms didn't ramp up until we were heading back to the ship after our half day excursion. I stayed in the cabin that evening and the whole of the next day and, thank goodness, felt well enough to do our Tangier excursion (wearing a mask) although it knocked me back a bit so I haven't felt like posting much. Luckily I was fully over it by the time we reached Belgium as the last couple of weeks have been full on. 

12 hours ago, arxcards said:

Your gonna need a bigger fridge!

Nah, there is still plenty of room on the current one.

5 hours ago, Ozwoody said:

Hi Julie

If is convenient, what is the current cost of Mocktails & smoothies?

 

Regards

John 

 

Mocktails are $10.50. There are only a couple listed on the app but I'm sure the bartenders could make other ones. 

Smoothies aren't listed on the app so I'll have to check at Good Spirits later.

It's exactly half way through the cruise for us. We've collected a lot of fridge magnets!

Small bottles of spring water are $3.50.

Small bottles of sparkling mineral water are $4.50 for Perrier or $5.50 for San Pellegrino.

Cans of soft drink are $4.00.

These are all covered under the Plus package. There is a limit of four bottles of water at a time but no limit for how many you can get in a day. We order some on the app to our cabin and also pick up some when we pass a bar.

Larger bottles of water are available but not covered by the Plus package. They are $7.49 for a 1.5 litre bottle of spring water.

Let me know if you need any more prices. I'm on Coral Princess at the moment and for another 55 days.

16 hours ago, Relaxing Robbies said:

Cherries Jubilee on Coral Princess post covid.  The serving was 2 cherries. My jaw hit the floor when I saw it.

They're serving more than that on Coral now. I had a big bowlful the other night - almost too many cherries. I always ask for the chocolate ice cream which I think goes better with cherries than vanilla. Mind you we have excellent waiter teams at the moment. We're very spoilt. 

17 hours ago, arxcards said:

I had the cherries on QM2 some years back. I had Crepes Suzette for the first time on Princess 18 months or so back.

 

After all those years waiting, I was rather disappointed at how boring the crepes were. 

The Crepes Suzette we had on Cunard in January were delicious but Princess seems to think that a small reheated crepe served in a nondescript sauce is Crepes Suzette. Not!

We've just had the special buffet brunch in the Bordeaux MDR. It runs 10am to 1pm. 

There was a vast array of foods, even lobster. Sorry no photos as it was total chaos with people getting food and too many other people taking photos and not looking where/what they were doing! I nearly lost my plate of food twice from photographers not knowing/caring who was around them. So I wasn't going to add to the chaos. 

12 minutes ago, reeves35 said:

Dividends aren't really as much of a thing in USA as they are are in Australia probably because they don't have a franking regime.  In US, shares (or stocks) are more about growth.

Up until the pandemic Carnival Corp was paying around US$50 per quarter in dividends. 😊 It will be interesting to see when/if they resume paying dividends.

Just now, rkmw said:

Carnival have a different number from Princess and p&o

They may not have realised you were the same person. 

At one stage Rolf ended up with a different number for one cruise - it took a couple of phone calls to sort that out. 

Just now, Aus Traveller said:

Yes. For a while now P&O and Princess use the same loyalty number.

Our loyalty number is the same on Princess, Carnival, and Cunard. We haven't cruised P&O.

Princess have three new production shows on this cruise. We missed the first one, Disco, as we were too tired that night. However we went to "Do you wanna dance" last night. It was amazing. It showcased the dancers with numbers covering rock and roll, Spanish dancing, some sort of Asian dance, and the most amazing Irish dancing. It was an excellent show and we'll go to it again if we can. We don't know what the third one is yet.