If you can manage the time away, there are bargains on the Explorer out of Sydney. Check around for the best price, taking into account credit card fees. RCI Australia does not charge to use an Amex or visa. Many travel agencies do.
Too bad there's not an aggregator site for cruise fares.
Visits isle of pines, mare, Vila and mystery island. Personally, I'd stay on the ship for all except isle of pines.
Is there a code for the booze?
Use code JV_ARSE for free ship
Oz cruising don't have an physical office anymore and you cannot call & speak to a human being
They reply only through email probably off shored
royal caribbean shd be a classy cruise compared to the normal p&O
It's heaps better than P&O, but there are far classier ones. They don't typically base themselves in Australia.
Second that…!! Tried a p&o last year just to see what it was like… never again :-(
What was so bad?
Ive never been on a cruise, so dont have anything to compare with.
^This. As someone who has also never been on a cruise, am interested in the differences between various cruise companies.
The food was crap. Even the chefs table was average. The Asian fusion restaurant was rubbish. The food in the free venues was rubbish. Never as described in the menu. Missing ingredients. Poorly prepared, poorly presented. We ate at Salt grill about 8 times at $50 AUD ph if I recall. Salt was very good. Staff were surly, even out cabin attendant in a suite. She did a crap job and gave us port info in the afternoon when we had just gotten back from that port. We literally only saw one employee who looked happy. We kept an eye out fir him every morning as he went around and sold beverages. On other cruise ships, it would be an exception to get a bad employee. Entertainment almost non existent. Bingo was the highlight of the trip. It seemed some days there were 10 announcements for the next bingo session. I think all of the food outside the MDR and buffet had a charge, whereas you will find that other cruise lines have free food in several places throughout the boat. My friend would order a pastry item every afternoon fir $4-5 and it was always stale. On RCI, there's free food places with lots of fresh food items and they pump it out fast and friendly. Their cowboy (oatmeal) cookies are free and legendary as are their other icoonic anc lesser known items. Room service was a charge per item. The cruise director did a horrible job. ( I don't think I much cared for the cruise director on Ovation either however. I truly felt that P&O felt like a floating caravan park.
Wow that sounds really horrible.
Had a very pleasant experience with staff and food on Sea Princess. Only trouble is they market to an older crowd. Staff were always pleasant and polite and I even spoke to some of them about the families they were supporting. Kids club was awesome for the kids. To be honest I felt bad being waited upon. One bad thing is the art sales were for the gullible as far as I could tell - fool and their money. if not for the seaksickness experienced by the whole family a cruise would be something we'd be saving for.
@syousef:
I haven't been to the art auctions the last few voyages, but I've been to a couple, with iPad in hand, checking real world prices. You can often get other people's mistakes for 90% less on eBay, still in the mailing tube from park west. Same "art".
Yes, I truly hated the P&O cruise.
I hesitate to use certain words to describe these auctions because I don't want to be sued one day, but yes, we are on the same page. They'd have a lot less patronage if Internet access wasn't so expensive on board.
P&O are the cheapest, and therefore the most full of bogans. Just poor quality everything in general.
Just my 2 cents.. went on the P&O Pacific Jewel with my wife and 3 young kids in Nov to New Caledonia - 8 nights if I recall - and we loved it. The staff were EXCELLENT, the cabins were good, the food was very good, the island tours were great etc.
We paid around 4.5k for 2 adjoining rooms (since there were 5 of us). We really really enjoyed it.
First cruise so don't have anything to compare it to, but had none of these bad experiences that others are talking about.
is this the one with water sliders just like in the waterpark wet&wild?
oh wait prob that is carnival cruise… saw the ad on tv so amazing
so this is cheap but make sure stay longer in the ship to enjoy the onboard facilities/features?
Has an ice rink, wave rider, basketball courts, rock climbing wall , mini golf. No water slide. All these activities are included in your fare, as well as activities run by the cruise directors staff. Some exercise classes are included, as is use of the gym.
Do their ships use an azipod propulsion system?
Hopefully. Refund of payment and 50% discount on the next cruise.
Actually, I doubt RCI would be anywhere near as generous.
Two Azipods and one Fixipod
Do you mind me asking how old are your kids JV?
Who wants to join me? (shared twin)
Would possibly consider it but need to renew my passport so probably too short notice.
Maybe next time then :)
Keen to do this cruise.
I'm Sydney based.
Can you PM me asap?
Thanks.
Just dropped to $531/person.
Non-smoker, rare drinker (never get alcohol package etc) Enjoy cruising.
Any way to save money booking for next end of next year, or just wait for deals to appear?
Do a shorter cruise to start with if you've never been. Spending days at sea feeling seedy and wishing you were dead is not a good holiday.
For the really unlucky ones the feeling doesn't go away when you come ashore. And for some rare damned souls it doesn't go away at all.
http://www.mdds.org.uk/
My wife was okay aboard but spent about 6 weeks feeling dizzy after coming back from a cruise. I just felt like crap when on the boat in deep ocean - and for a few hours after. Only time I didn't feel it was when I was asleep or we'd had some calm for a while. Just off the coast seemed okay.
I would take this advice if you have a history of sea or car sickness. These are big ships not your usual P&O vomit-fest and 99% of the population will be completely fine.
It really depends on how rough the seas are, and on the individual. My mother loves it even in large storms, and has been on lots of cruises. My son is mostly unaffected, despite getting carsick he felt seasick only once on our NZ cruise. My daughter vomited every day. I felt like death, and I'm fine on small boats, cars and trains 99% of the time. My mother in law vomited once and felt seedy a couple of days but was mostly fine. My father in law just felt seedy a handful of times. My wife was fine till she came off at the very end and found she was constantly feeling dizzy. Lots of people get seasick. It's not a rare thing.
Oh and that placebo crap….pressure rings etc, and even the weak meds do jack for me.
It really is best to do a short cruise first IMHO.
Its more rocky on the way back.
Sea sickness tablets are branded kwells
I love rough seas. Sadly there have only been a few times per journey when you can even feel the boat move. I like going down to the outside promenade and walking. I thnk this is usually deck 4 or 5 on RCI. You are close to the water and out of the sun.
Wow, thats cheap!
Cheapest industry rate through Dargal is $839USDpp twin!
I think if it quotes in US$, you will pay more. They discriminate in pricing depending on your country of residence. I think both European and yank residents pay more as do we if we sail in those parts of the world. I believe a lot of the cruise lines in the us also charge less on occasion for Florida residents.
I posted this on the other Royal Caribbean deal last week, but I'll post it again here as well as I think it's still important for anyone interested in this cruise to know.
Just a heads up for anyone that has jumped on this deal or is thinking about it, once you get on the ship Royal Carribean charges EVERYTHING in USD. The official currency of the ship is USD, and while this is not necessarily a bad thing (the on board prices are still reasonable considering the currency conversion) it can be a bit of a shock once you get off and you look at your bank statement and see a charge for about 25% more than you expected. There aren't really any signs on board warning you of this and they don't make it that obvious so I feel as if this is something that most people wouldn't realise until they get home and see the bill.
Also, don't pay your onboard account in cash AUD, you will get a very poor exchange rate. If you're going to pay in cash on board, take USD with you. If you're going to have your onboard account charged to your card, don't opt for the Royal Caribbean rate, go for the option that lets your bank dictate the rate, you'll be better off for it.
On a related note, take AUD with you if you intend to pay in cash at the ports of call. The ATMs only dispense USD which was also at quite a poor exchange rate.
And one more thing, in terms of duty free prices, Port Vila had the best prices for duty free, so hold off and spend your money there if you're doing the 10 day cruise. We paid $27 for a 1L bottle of Jack Daniels and Smirnoff 1L was $16 a bottle in December. Purfume was also quite cheap there too (better than the Priceline 50% off prices here from what I saw). Noumea and the liquor store on board had very similar prices, still very cheap in comparison to Aussie standards, but not as cheap as Port Vila. Port Vila also had a bigger variety than both Noumea or on board.
Great post.
Royal Carribean charges EVERYTHING in USD
Is that the case for every Royal Caribbean ship?
Yes. It's the case with the majority of cruise lines. Except P&O. So celebrity, azamara, Seabourne, hal, NCL . All us$
Yeah, Royal Caribbean is an American cruise line. Most of the ships are based in or around America, Royal Caribbean only sails in Australia during the summer from October to April and then the ships go off elsewhere. Explorer of the Seas is off to Alaska after it finishes this Australian season. All the staff are also paid in USD and the staff members we spoke with (from the art gallery) are trained in America. It makes sense that if you have cruises in a number of economic markets that move around constantly and have staff from all over the world that you streamline it and only deal with one currency.
In Vietnam and other third world countries, us$ is what you will be forced to pay with in certain circumstances. Obviously they will take any currency, but it's quoted in us$.
Correct. Especially about paying in cash on board. You can call r I in Sydney and buy on board credit with a credit card. No foreign fees and sometimes a good rate. You have to do this about two weeks in advance or more.
In regards to Vila, they do have a better selection and are cheaper, but Vila is a hole. It will cost you to get to the duty free shops. There's not much to do. We took a price care cab tour that we arranged with some random cab driver. I think it was $50 or $100. Don't really recall. But the place was a hole. I don't know if going into Vila just to buy duty free is sufficient reason to get off the boat.
That is true, if you're only going to get off the ship for the sake of duty free, it's probably not worth it to get off the ship in Vila. There isn't much else to see in town and it's not all that nice. If you intend to get off anyway and get a taxi driver to take you around and explore, then you might as well stop by shops on your way back to the ship. We paid $150 for a taxi driver to take us around for our first day in Vila (there were two of us, he drove us around for about 5 hours), and on our second day in Vila we paid $10 each return to go from the ship to the shops (due to bad weather we were stuck there for two days =( ).
"I'd stay on the ship for all except isle of pines."
Not sure I agree. I really didn't like Lifou but I thought Mystery Island was great for swimming. Same with Mare, though you need to take the shuttle bus to get to the beach.
I'd imagine that most people will get off at every stop if they haven't been there before. Trying to manage expectations. I was on the radiance in November and met a couple of yanks. The older one hurt her foot and cancelled her shore excursion in Bali. I looked after her while the younger one went ashore. It had been on her bucket list and she was very disappointed with how much if a hole it was. You have to have a go, at least once. The only port I never got off the boat on the first and only stop was this crappy port in Cambodia. It is not like the ancient parts in the interior. It is like Tijuana, but without the fun. Just filth and poverty and mosquitos. The shore excursions were the most expensive on the entire trip and they were simple things as well, a trip to the market and a meal for like $200us. Everyone at my dining table went ashore and all but one said they regretted it. The one who didn't said he wouldn't do it again but that was neutral on how he felt. So, yeah, I guess you've got to go ashore, but don't expect much. I don't go to the beach here in Perth even though I live a stones throw from it. I wouldn't bother unless there's something interesting in the water. Champagne Bay and it's supposed plethora of sea life was an abject disappointment.
On the isle of pines, there's a bay on the far side of the island that everyone raves about. We weren't impressed and found drug paraphernalia lying around. We ended up walking out of the area and getting a ride back to the ship. It wasn't easy getting that lift. They schedule something like 3 hours at that bay and there are no amenities whatsoever and little shade and it's crowded. No thanks. Walk a couple hundred metres from where the tender drops you off and there are lots of beach areas that are lovely with shade.
Ozbargain pissup?