joejoe 59

We got off Encounter after a 10 night cruise to PNG in August. It wasn't school holidays & was mostly an older demographic like Princess. I noticed many people liked to dress up at night & looked beautiful especially the 2 formal nights & Gatsby. We went on fully aware it was a $100 a day P&O cruise, we were pleasantly surprised & would definitely cruise on them again. We mixed our dining up by rotating through the 3 resturants with one pantry dinner.  I'm coeliac & still found enough variety. Hubby ordered icecream with his desserts in the dining rooms & always got it. I take on my own gf biscuits & chocolates so always a sweet treat at hand if i wanted it.  We have cruised with Princess & Rcl as well in the last year & honestly food standards have dropped on all of them. Princess charge double per day , you can buy a lot of biscuits  icecreams & eggs Benny for that. On Quantum there were added foods on the menu & no fresh cream to be had. We cruise on Princess again in January out of Brisbane, it will be really interesting to compare it to our recent P&O cruise. 

On 9/25/2023 at 4:37 PM, arxcards said:

I am able to book the specialty restaurants for the Crown world cruise in nearly 2 years time, so it isn't a date thing.

One other possibility - do you have a current credit card registered in the app, as you won't be able to book specialty dining without one.

 

If you have vouchers, since the changes they are best sorted 

Yes we do have vouchers so it looks like I'll  have to wait to board.  I didn't want to add my credit care because we have the plus package (old) specialty dining vouchers & $350 on board credit.

On 9/25/2023 at 2:21 PM, OzKiwiJJ said:

That never works.

 

Here's the sequence in photos: 

 

Thanks for your instructions.   I followed them & can see where I will eventually be able to book,  but I think my problem could be because I haven't added my credit care like Geoff mentions in the next post. 

2 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Had you clicked on "Explore Dining Options" when that happened? 

Yes that's when I got that message. 

6 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

On the app, go into Dine My Way, then "View or Book Individual Daily Reservations", Add Reservation, Speciality Dining, and then you should see the restaurants. If they're not showing they may be fully booked. If that happens try booking at the restaurant once onboard.

OK I just tried what you said & I get a pop up saying...Please check back closer to your journey date to use this feature.  So obviously now I know it's not just me😄

1 hour ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Platinum and Elite guests get early access to make Dine My Way reservations, otherwise they open up after final payment which is usually 90 days prior to embarkation.

Thanks for replying. I am Elite & can prebook the main dining room, which I have done already. I was hoping to book a specially restaurant beforehand for my husband's birthday but can't find them. 

47 minutes ago, Korimako said:

What can I expect if I choose not to do a Princess shore excursion? Can I just sunbathe and swim for a few hours? I presume the tender will return regularly to the ship and I won't have to wait hours to get back?

 

Thanks for any advice.

Yes you can definitely do Mystery Island in Vanuatu on your own.

You would get more info relevant to the area on the Australia & New Zealand board's.

3 hours ago, Thrak said:

 

Smoking on the balcony is not allowed on any Princess cruise. Period.

Good

I don't  have the ability to even look at specialty restaurant's, do they only become available closer to the cruise? We have 120 days until our Tasmanian cruise. 

We have 2 included specially dining vouchers. 

13 minutes ago, c-boy said:

🤨 hmmm, even if the cruise line has a designated indoor venue ? 

Absolutely no smoking inside, not even your balcony.  There is a designated area out on one or two of the open decks only.

Thankfully in Australia nobody is allowed to smoke inside, that goes for cruise ships departing & sailing in Australia 

On 9/12/2023 at 11:38 AM, cruiser3775 said:

I have booked a cruise this year with Princess through a US agent, saving many thousands of dollars, mainly because they got me a solo traveller discount I could not get through any of the big Australian cruise travel specialists.  The agent I used is mentioned in the article in post #5, and I found their service to be excellent. They did tell me that they could book only a few cruise lines for Australians, and others were not possible.

Had you previously booked with them in the past?

I know prior to covid when I tried looking up prices on that us site I was denied.

On 9/5/2023 at 5:52 PM, OzKiwiJJ said:

I believe most cruise lines have topper pads which they will provide if the mattress in your cabin is too hard for you. I've never had a bed that was too hard on a cruise ship though.

 

Princess beds are wonderful. The base is firm enough to give good support but then there is a cloud-like topper over it. Soooo comfortable. 

Have you tried Royal Caribbean their beds are as hard as a plank. 

Princess & p&o are wonderful. 

On 8/30/2023 at 11:12 PM, lucymorgan said:

That sounds awful - understandable but the length of time taken sounds excessive.  Perhaps they were tipped off about something.  

 

My worst experience was being pinged when I went through one of those new whole body scanners at the airport.  I have had a double mastectomy due to cancer and was wearing false boobs.  They were picked up by the scanner as crosses on my chest and I was asked to rub them with my hands then touch the explosives detection wand. Quite embarrassing! 😟  (But also a bit amusing) Since then I have not bothered with the falsies until after I am through security.  

We were told by someone on board that there was a problem with drugs being brought in from png & to expect delays...& delays we had.

20 hours ago, bazzaw said:

Yes - I can only handle one can of it - but that seems to keep my thirst for an "adult drink" under control and hence I remain financially solvent - but wine at up to $20 a glass?? is a no-no for me. 

You can buy wine by the bottle starting from $36.00 you can take it away unopened from the restaurants & take it anywhere you want. I bought 5 bottles on a 10 day cruise🍾🍷🍾

We were on this same png cruise. We started lining up to leave the ship at 7.15am & got into our car at the port at 8.45am. We had wooden products & fruit... preservative free prunes which I wasn't willing to ditch unless they told me to. We ticked the box for both, our cards were signed & we moved on. We were very surprised nobody wanted to check them.  I actually commented in the car that you would hate to be caught up in the back log.

We came back from NZ in March & getting through customs & boarder security was completely different & fast.

On 8/7/2023 at 5:03 AM, kywildcatfanone said:

Nothing has been sent to booked passengers.

We have received no updates regarding the new pricing here in Australia.  We have the old plus package & cruise in January. 

We have the old plus package , still haven't had any info from Princess regarding what's included or been taken away from us.

On 7/30/2023 at 3:21 PM, arxcards said:

On face value, you will get the Plus package as it was ($30/40/50 version. No idea on the room service charge except:

If you order your coffee/tea on the card for breakfast and hang it on your doorknob the night before, there is no charge,

- If you order it via the medallion app, there will be a service charge. If that is something you will do often, it would be much cheaper to pay for a one-off delivery activation charge than it would be to pay the extra $35 per night. I think the $US charge will translate to around $AU22, but I would be one of many lined up at the desk to try to get it reversed.

 

As it is, I have the semi-old $85 premier package for our next cruise, and am in a suite, but it looks like if we want cabin delivery through the app that we will be facing an additional charge. Our 1/2 world cruise in 2025 got a bit better, and the $65 plus will give us some extra that we weren't expecting, that is as long as the Prix Fixe menu is worth dining-out for.

I think everyone on the old priced drinks package should go to the service desk & ask for activation charge to be removed,  just on principle. 

So I've read the link that Geoff put up regarding the new packages but still I'm a little confused. We booked our cruise for January 2024 in March 2022. We got the plus package at $30 as many others did.  I can't work out if I'm going to be charged for a room service cup of tea or coffee for instance if I don't upgrade. I'm definitely not upgrading so what do you all think? In my eyes I didn't think they could change the contract once agreed on🤔

On 7/10/2023 at 4:30 PM, OzKiwiJJ said:

From memory it is on the main road, across from the markets. You can't miss it - Alotau village is very small.

Thanks for that info.

On 7/8/2023 at 9:57 AM, By The Bay said:

I went to the bank in Alotau and had no problem exchanging $AUD for Kina. Lots of security.

That sounds like a good idea. Is the bank far from the port & easy to find? We cruise png in August. 

12 hours ago, Gwendy said:

As DFAT says if you can’t afford travel insurance you can’t afford to travel.

I thought P&O required travel insurance for all cruisers, particularly with regards to covid and medical evacuation.

P&O strongly recommend cruise insurance for all cruise's but not enforced unless travelling to Noumea, as they require passengers have it. 

In defence of the lady that had no luggage...Rcl do not sell underware in their shops or anything much suitable.  I forgot to pack undies for my hubby on our recent nz cruise & he had to wash & dry them overnight until we got to our first port & could buy a pack of  bonds undies for $34 nz so her money wouldn't have gone far.

The shops on rcl are very expensive brand name stuff like bags & jewellery very little clothing. We were on Quantum. 

Princess & P&O have a much better selection of regular clothing to buy.

I would have gone op shopping if I had a chance & just got rcl to wash it for me before I wore it.

On 3/24/2023 at 3:12 PM, LittleFish1976 said:

I'm quite happy with liquid soap in a pump container thanks, or even a cake of soap - not fussy. As long as there's something to wash the hands with!

 

Was just saying that I sometimes travel with a large cake of soap if I'm staying somewhere for any length of time but wouldn't expect to have to provide my own soap on a ship!

 

 

We definitely had pump liquid soap at the basin & tissues in October. The cabin staff were very helpful & would have got them for us if they weren't.