First post-COVID cruise!

 Well, more than two years later, it has finally happened!

And I was so excited I completely forgot about doing updates until now - day 2 of the cruise.

So, this started last Saturday - 25 June - with an early morning departure from Canberra.  QANTAS is unfortunately getting a bad reputation at the moment for delayed / cancelled flights and for luggage going missing.  So, I bought a four-pack of Apple Air-Tags - one for each suitcase and an extra for my keys, just so we'd be able to check on things. Not that it would help them appear if they were left behind of course, just that we'd know for sure where they were if they did fail to appear. 

As it happened, the flight was on time, and I even saw my suitcase get loaded onto the plane.  And, I definitely saw Paul's and Adam's on the trailer waiting to be loaded up.  Imagine my unhappiness when we got to Brisbane and my phone told me that my suitcase was with us, but that Paul's and Adam's were back in Canberra.  But I then realised that it was also telling me that my Apple Watch was also back in Canberra, even though the watch was no longer in airplane mode, was fully connected up to my phone and sitting about 3 cm away from it!   Luggage was fine in the end, it had all made its way onto the plane and offloaded quite quickly.

We tried a new place to stay this time - in the Quest Apartment Hotel at Ascot.  Any time the three of us are traveling together an apartment is usually a cost-effective option for a bit of comfort.  This one was interesting  - they booked it for us as a two-bedroom apartment, but it's actually a one-bedroom apartment and a separate studio apartment that they can either book separately or as a two-bedroom apartment with a single front door. So, this meant that Adam had a completely separate room or could join us for food etc.  The people running the place were really helpful and friendly - for a start, they pointed us at a really good bistro for dinner.  Overall though, although the apartments are clean and functional, my overwhelming impression of the place was that the rooms are in desperate need of renovation - e.g. 70's colours.  Still, it was a convenient place to stay and a LOT cheaper than a two-bedroom apartment closer to the city.

Sunday morning I had to rectify an error on my part - realised that I had cleverly bought my toothpaste and the bottom half of my toothbrush, but not the actual brush!  Fortunately there's a Woolies about 600 metres away from the apartments so I was able to get a new one. Also picked up a few extra pairs of socks because although I was sure I had packed enough, I could only find one pair.  I now have many, many socks as of course they were all there, in my suitcase, where I had packed them!

Taxi arrived on time and drove us through the depths of Pinkenba out to the new terminal. Boarding went really well - we were supposed to be in the first boarding group at 11am, but we arrived early as we had to leave the apartment by 10am and it was only about 15km to the cruise terminal.  There were already heaps of people there to check in as we arrived, and they must have got the previous lot off the ship really quickly because we were all being allowed to board as soon as we got through check-in and security.  So, onboard and in our cabins by around 11am.

As for the ship itself, in a lot of ways it is just like we were never away.  The only real difference is the need to carry a mask because there are place on board where you can't socially distance and so mask wearing is mandatory.  Most people seem to be following that requirement in most places. 

Food is a little different - maybe not quite as many items in the main dining room menu or in the buffet.  But, the buffet is self-service which wasn't the case for a lot of places where cruising restarted last year.  They're quite insistent on mask-wearing and hand-washing to get into the buffet though, which is a good thing.  One good thing about food - clearly they have invested a lot of time and effort into upgrading the way you get food and drinks - they now have an App where you can order food or drinks to your room or wherever you happen to be sitting around the ship, and they bring it to you.  We've used it for room service twice now, with excellent results!  I guess that they're quite keen to avoid physical queues whenever they can.

A bit disappointed that although we said we would share a table at dinner, the fact that we have made bookings for each night seems to mean that we're going to be seated by ourselves.  Still, not the end of the world.  And it does mean that even though tonight is "formal night" we'll get away with just good casual clothes again.

And, the good news is that I only needed one sea-sickness tablet last night and this morning had totally found my sea-legs.  And, the same for Adam.  Paul of course hardly ever needs any medication and this time was no different.

That's all for now.  tomorrow is our first port of call - Airlie Beach.  Adam and I are going on a shore excursion while Paul might go ashore just to have a look around.  Hopefully I'll remember to report on this tomorrow night.

Hopefully the last COVID-19 update

Following on from the previous post - Princess did get in touch with us, and we have cabins on the 26 June cruise.  

Adam in particular got a fairly good deal from them. Cruising solo is never cheap - on Princess you basically pay the price for two people if you want a cabin to yourself (and most other cruise lines are the same).  But he got a balcony cabin next to ours for a price that's noticeably lower than the prices they're offering on their website.

As I'm writing this, it's 84 days until the cruise is due to leave.  And although it's looking far more promising than the 17 (!!) previous cruise bookings that I have had cancelled due to COVID-19, there are still issues to be sorted.

Main one is that the State governments need to come to an agreement with the cruise lines about onboard protocols.  I don't think this will be a huge issue - most of the mainstream cruise lines have been operating out of the USA for almost a year now under ever-evolving COVID-19 protocols, and I'd imagine that the State governments here aren't going to come up with anything more onerous than the USA CDC guidelines were when cruising restarted there.  I'd expect that they'll want all passengers and crew to be fully vaccinated (and actually the Australian Government announcement when they lifted the ban said that will be mandatory at the Federal level anyway), they might want us to take a test before boarding, they'll probably want us to wear masks when we board and leave the ship and maybe in crowded areas onboard.  I can live with all of this. 

COVID19 update number 18

 On 15 March 2022, the Federal Government finally announced that they will not be extending the ban on cruise ships when it expires on 17 April.

On that same day, two separate cruise lines contacted me to notify that due to COVID related redeployment needs, they were both cancelling a cruise we were booked on - P&O cancelled a short cruise we were booked on from Brisbane to Airlie Beach and return in July, while Princess cancelled a cruise to New Zealand in October.

It's not all bad though.  Our booking for the cancelled Princess cruise is hopefully being moved to a booking on an almost identical cruise a month or so later.  

And, we are hoping to replace the P&O cruise with a slightly longer Brisbane to Cairns and return cruise in June.  Bookings open on Thursday and no doubt their website will crash - just as it did last time they announced some new 'end of COVID cruises' (which of course never happened) - but I'm hoping that they carry out their promise to contact me before-hand to organise bookings.

COVID-19 update number 17

 Paul and I have been in isolation due to catching COVID-19 since 5 February, and just to sink the boot in, in those few days we have been notified of two cruise cancellations - our 15th and 16th cruise cancellations since 2020. 

There is still no real sign of the government(s) opening up the country for cruising.  The Australian Government is the main blocker here - they still have a complete ban on cruise ships entering the country.  But, they want to make sure that the State governments take the blame if anything goes wrong, so they're insisting that the State governments have to agree to lifting the cruise ship ban and trying to make it sound like it's all a State government responsibility.  And the State governments of course are equally blame averse and are insisting that they can't make any decisions until the Australian Government ban is lifted - which to be fair, they can't.  It's ridiculous to suggest that any State Government of any political leaning could announce that cruise ships are welcome and start making firm plans around this when cruise ships are in fact completely banned from the country.  

The first cancellation was for a cruise in June, from Sydney to Cairns and back, on the Carnival Splendor. Carnival has had one ship based here full-time for 5 or 6 years now, and have usually bought another one out for the summer each year. But, it seems they have given up on Australia - one of their ships will now not return until October 2023, and although the other one will supposedly return in September 2022, I don't really think it's that likely.

And the second one was a NZ cruise in October. This one is with Princess who is the cruise line we most often sail with.  Since COVID started, when they have cancelled a cruise they've most commonly offered you a replacement 12 months in the future (or a refund or Future Cruise Credit of course).  This time though, the replacement is only 20 days after the original cruise, so maybe they really do think that the Australian and NZ governments will have opened their borders to tourists and to cruise ships by then.

But - if anyone feels like joining us on a cruise, all the cruises listed above are with Princess, except for the 12 July 2022 cruise to Airlie Beach, and Adam's eclipse cruise in April 2023 - they are both with P&O Australia.

COVID-19 update number 16

Well, there's no longer any need to worry about whether they'll let us onto the March 2022 cruise even though we're not from NSW, as P&O has had to "further extend their pause in cruise operations" and so that cruise is also gone.  

P&O and Carnival are still offering cruises from April 2022 onwards, but I'm not sure if I can bring myself to book another cruise just to watch it get cancelled.  I keep my documents about holidays in separate folders on my computer, and there are now 17 folders that are flagged as cancelled due to COVID19, and almost all of them were cruises.  Of course we wouldn't have gone on that many cruises - I was just re-booking a new one as each cruise was cancelled - but it is still getting a bit sad!

Our next booked cruise starts on 4 October 2022  - but there's no guarantee that it will happen either, since it's to New Zealand and there's talk that NZ may not completely open up to tourists until 2023.

Like most people who work where I do, I'm not allowed to work from 24 December to 3 January, so I was hoping to just get away for a day or two during that break.  But even if it was permitted, I can't risk visiting Dad until I have my booster shot, and that can't happen until the middle of January - when I'll be competing with all the 5-11 year olds who become eligible from 10 January.  And, even though we're not officially banned from traveling to Sydney (which we were for a while) even going there for a couple of days is a bit of a risk given the number of cases they're getting.  I know everyone from Canberra goes to the coast over Christmas but it doesn't appeal to me, and in the other directions it's all very very hot this time of year.  So, it seems I'm stuck in Canberra for just a bit longer........

COVID19 update number 15

 Well, no surprises, P&O have extended their "pause" in cruise operations to 3 March 2022, which means our 80's seabreak cruise is not happening.

Another issue has also raised its ugly head in the meantime - the state government is talking about only allowing NSW residents onto cruises leaving from Sydney, which would also exclude us from our March 2022 cruise.  Hopefully they decide that this is one of the situations where the ACT is just part of NSW.  

Anyway, time will tell.

COVID19 update number 14

 I forgot that when they cancelled our P&O cruise, they wouldn't refund the money to us - Paul, Adam and I each got a $49 Future Cruise Credit instead.  Impossible to use really, because they're still insisting that to use it, the cruise has to be booked by 31 December this year - i.e. only about 6 weeks away - and taken by 31 December 2022.  At this point, I still expect to be working full-time for all of 2022, and I've already got three cruises booked in 2022 so taking another one would be a bit of an issue.

The obvious thing to do is to lose the $49.  In my case, this same $49 has been the deposit on I think three different cruises already, and I had written it off as a loss long ago.

Instead, I've booked us a long weekend cruise from Sydney - leaving on Friday night 25 February 2022 and returns on Sunday morning after spending the weekend sailing around, probably just outside Sydney Heads.  Apparently celebrating the 80's although not a lot of detail - and the fact that the advertisement shows a 70's disco ball is a interesting!  Anyway, if it all happens, this one will now be my first cruise in more than two years.  And, I'd only need to take one day off work, which is also a bonus when we're still trying to work our way through house renovations.

Have to say though, the chances of it happening seem to be low.  Although the powers that be are finally at least talking about allowing cruise ships back into the country and admitting that it needs to happen:

• The Australian Government is inexplicably claiming that they need the State governments to act first, even though the  State governments have absolutely no control over the Australian government's long-standing ban on cruise ships and it would make zero sense for the States to start making cruise-related announcements while that ban is in place.
• The State Governments claim to be keen, but interstate travel is still highly problematic.  I mean, at the moment, the only States I can go to freely are NSW and Victoria.  Queensland I can go to if I want to spend 14 days in quarantine and maybe NT is the same.  The rest, absolutely not.  And the NSW Health department was absolutely and quite unfairly savaged about the Ruby Princess, so they're going to be less than co-operative, I'd think.
• It's generally conceded that it will take a cruise line 60 to 90 days to get a cruise ship that's in a warm shut-down to the point where it's ready to take passengers.  As of today it's only 97 days until this cruise.  
• And, the ship in question couldn't be much further away from us - it's currently somewhere near Trieste in Italy where it has spent some time being changed from the Golden Princess to the Pacific Adventure.

Still, you have to be hopeful, so, here's to our upcoming 80's weekend!