kiwimeggles

Inline with when you fly into NZ you cannot bring non-commercially bottled or packaged water or food for example home made chocolates, confectionary or biscuits etc as the ingredients or in case of the water the source is unknown. Whilst the water on the ship may have been treated for drinking the origin is unknown and may still contain foreign bodies not native to NZ. It is clearly explained on the NZ government department of primary industry biosecurity webpage for all incoming tourists. They have a page specifically for cruise passengers. I think if travelling to NZ the regulations should be respected these rules are in place to protect our beautiful but sensitive ecosystem from foreign organisms. 

There must be reasonable suspicion of criminal activity for them to ask to view your phone. You will be subject to an interview prior to being asked to access your phone. I guess they will view your phone if the offending criminal material is electronic in nature. Nz customs have had the ability to search electronic devices since the late 90s. They just updated the customs legislation to expressly include the password statement but they have always had that power. I think customs stats say less than 1000 devices were searched in 2017, out of approx. 15 million visitors to NZ. As many people have stated this legislation is in line with Australia & US. I have never been asked when entering NZ. I get pulled aside by both border force and NZ customs for carrying too many electronic devices (2 phones, tablet,kindle and work laptop) but neither have asked for password. 

Hi missmiaow.  Nz immigration website info pages and press releases state Australian citizens who are travelling on Australian passports do not need a ETA and are exempt from application...as long as you meet the requirements to enter NZ visa free such as subject to criminal records etc. If you do not hold an Australian passport and hold a foreign passport with an Australian permanent residence visa you need to apply for an ETA. 

Hi. I booked insure and go for a recent cruise for myself. Im a kiwi living in oz and that required me to read their PDS to make sure i was covered. The pds does state the insurance is only available to oz citizens/perm residents or non-permanents with a medicare card and if making a claim you maybe requested to provide a copy of your passport/ residency docs or any other official documents confirming your citizenship or oz residency. They are not under obligation to pay if proof cannot be supplied.

We did a tour with Fullers which operate the ferry  to the island and also do the hop on hop off bus which meets you at the ferry terminal. So our ticket included the ferry over and back plus bus ticket. Love Waiheke. Man o war vineyard is a favourite!  Fullers ferries have a great website with a very informative section on Waiheke and the bus or drive options available. 

Hi. We sailed on spirit in September and no BYO alcohol was allowed. Only the soft drink as you said. Alcohol was confiscated at embarkation if found. The do have a wine package that can be puchased on board. I believe it was called cruise the vineyards. There should be info on the carnival aus websitemthat will list the types of wine included. There was a deluxe and premium package. 

We stay at the Grand Mecure Auckland. Great central location and a short downhill walk to Queens Wharff.

Following along. Love your world cruise blog.

No worries. Thank you for your help

Yes sorry should have mentioned that. That would be the only place i could think to fit some bedding.

Hi folks. We have a cruise coming up on carnival spirit in a quad room with myself, husband & 2 kids (12 & 15). The 12 yr old recently had a tumble off a bunkbed at a slumber party (all ok just a good fright) and is now a bit nervous about sleeping in a bunk bed on the cruise.

My query is if, once on the cruise, she cant sleep in the bunk are we allowed to take the bedding off and pop it on the floor for her?

Hopefully she will be fine but im curious if this arrangement would be ok as a plan b. Thanks in advance! :)

Looking forward to reading your posts as my aunty and uncle are on this cruise also.

Hi. We booked 5 night stay in syd before our cruise at the Best western stellar in a 3 bedroom apartment .great price and near hyde park. Museum station is very close by (400m) which will take you to circular quay. We enjoyed our stay there.:)

Hi.

We did this cruise 2016. We took local cash for the cities where we would not be doing a organised tour. Generally enough cash for hop on/off bus, lunch etc. I also took a preloaded travel cash card. This had a visa function so it could be used anywhere but was not a credit card and not linked to any accounts for fraud. Can only spend the cash loaded on it . I loaded it with my local currency (aussie dallars) and used that in places like oslo to buy the bus tickets as we had no set plan for that city as we were in port til 10pm. Due to there being so many currencies i just used that and had it converted at the days exchange through the card. Worked well. Never ran out of money and used it in stockholm and Copenhagen. I also got a couple 100 rubles for st Petersburg. Whilst we did a princess tour i found it handy to have local cash as we brought coffees and drinks from local carts at various attractions. These stalls did not accept foreign currency. The remainder of my cash was spent att the port souvenir shops.

From a post on Instagram under the carnival spirit tag it was mentioned it was a injured crew member. Hope they are on the mend!

We chose the princess tour best of St Petersburg tour last year when we did the Baltics on Regal. This was our first time to Russia and wanted things to be as simple as possible. The tour was very hectic but covered everything we wanted to see (we also did the night outing to catherines palace). The guide was fantastic and had a lot of experience including an arts degree which made the Hermitage tour very informative. We had a full bus but were fortunate that all people were considerate and returned to the bus on time. We had headsets for all tours which I found great as I like to wander on my own but still listen to commentary and wander back to the group if I find it interesting as what is being discussed. On the day we were in St Petersburg there were 27 tour buses going out of princess tours alone. There were 2 other cruise ships that we knew of in town and to say there were a lot of people is an understatement. However princess co-ordinated their tours to split across the days things went smoothly and we weren't fighting 27 other buses at all the same stops. I felt this worked well. Our guide was excellent, knowing all the tricks of the trade and had us first in line in the mornings for Peterhofs and the Hermitage which was great! We enjoyed some moments of solitude in these incredibly crowded places. I cant comment for the private tours, except to say we ran into the same ones at all the stops we went too. We chose the ships tours solely for the convenience. We didn't have to have a group organised or join anyone else's. We just worried about ourselves and what we wanted to see.

I use Insure & Go Australia cruise insurance. They have an online questionnaire to complete for pre-existing conditions and will cover lots for free and others for an additional small premium. All completed online at the time of completing the quote. I have found them excellent as i was born with a congenital birth defect that most insurers have never heard off & hence would not cover as they didn't know what it was. It is included in the insure and go database and popped up first time (a huge surprise) and they cover it for free. Including on 4 trips to the usa. And they give a certificate to show im covered for this

Hi. Im just off the regal for the may 26 baltic cruise. We were originally set to tender at nynasham however about 4 months ago it changed to stockholm. It was said on board this was due to weather and tides as its quite a long sail through the archipelago. Im not sure about captain confidence through the archipelago as we had a pilot on board both ways for over 5 hours each way. 2 pilots actually. Our time in Stockholm was severely reduced due to going through the archipelago as we had to sail at 3.30. Tendering does give you more time which is great as we felt we did not get enough time there with such an early departure.