MARCH 21st – Takapuna, Auckland
Thanks to Maxilyn, just about all the Kiwi Cruisers on this upcoming trip, met at our usual coffee/brunch haunt, the Kings Garden Centre, Porana Road, Takapuna, just North of the Auckland Harbour Bridge.
This effectively kick-started our 2016 cruise and we had a mix of regulars and people new to the Cruise Critic group. First time readers of this blog may wonder what that means, but from as far back as 2010, a year before our first Princess Cruise, somehow or other (probably through a local travel message-board), we tripped over the Cruise Critic website. Within that website, there are individual message boards, including usually, a roll call, for upcoming cruises, created almost as soon as the cruise is released.
Through that message board for the 2011 cruise, we met a mixture of local and Australian members well before the cruise started. We also forged some very enduring friendships starting off with an arranged dinner table of 10, which proved to be the best thing we could have done. It started an addiction to cruising, which over time has developed into one less for the ports, than for the great people.
The message-board equally led to pointers towards blogs, written by cruisers whilst at sea, which we found informative and fascinating in equal measures. They were so useful, that we (well I!) started my first blog before the 2011 World Cruise and it has now become an annual ritual.
Just to be clear, my focus is not on the history of the various ports, (I leave that to others and history was my least favourite subject at school) but on shipboard and port life, only as it affects us, hopefully with the occasional hint or tip that may help others cruising in the future, particularly with Princess on these longer cruises. That means a fair few mentions of the food, entertainers and activities and probably the other cruisers.
As other cruisers get stuck into their blogs, I’ll try and post links. Feel free to post comments, though commercial advertising posts will be deleted.
Well, less than 100 days to go now and when the 75 day mark comes around, we start printing out documentation, luggage tags and so on.
We’ll probably have another Kiwi get together in May, as this first one was such a success. Meanwhile our Australian friends are having their pre-cruise catch ups.
