Cruise from White Bay in Sydney

[Atleastonce]

We are cruising on RCI radiance of the seas from white bay on 28/01/2017. I am not too impressed that we were changed from the international terminal at circular quay to white bay, and our itinerary says we are tendered at white bay and not docked, but nevertheless we cruise under the harbor bridge now. My question is if anyone has cruised from white bay. The white bay website says no alcohol is allowed to be taken on board any ships sailing from there, yet I know RCI allow 2 bottles of wine per state room. Has anyone had any experience or issues in this regard at white bay.

 

[Pushka]

Yes we cruised from White Bay. It's good being up top and going under the bridge.

I didn't think RCL allowed alcohol to be brought in. That was my experience a couple of years ago. Maybe it's changed?

 

[SydneySwan]

I have cruised from White Bay - Jan 1 2015 on HAL. It was quite efficient checking in and boarding but Circular Quay is so much easier to get to. However I didn't take any alcohol on board. However I sailed on Radiance from Auckland to Sydney in Dec 2016 and did take 2 wine bottles onboard and no-one said anything.

 

[Major]

We have sailed from White Bay twice. Both with HAL and the boarding is very efficient.

Most cruise lines do not allow booze to be taken onboard, but you never know

 

[odysseus]

We are cruising on RCI radiance of the seas from white bay on 28/01/2017. I am not too impressed that we were changed from the international terminal at circular quay to white bay, and our itinerary says we are tendered at white bay and not docked, but nevertheless we cruise under the harbor bridge now. My question is if anyone has cruised from white bay. The white bay website says no alcohol is allowed to be taken on board any ships sailing from there, yet I know RCI allow 2 bottles of wine per state room. Has anyone had any experience or issues in this regard at white bay.

There's no issue with bringing the standard 2 bottles on for Radiance.

The White Bay notice was written based on their most frequent visitors, which are P&O cruises. They don't allow wine onboard so the port put the notice up based on that.

As for White Bay, the terminal itself is good. It's just getting there and out is a bit more hassle. If you've got transport sorted, everything else should go fine.

 

[RB]

I think the local residents have been more concerned about things other than alcohol been taken on board-not discounting the question of the OP

Cruising's dirty secret - Background Briefing - ABC Radio National (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

 

[Kolo]

We cruised with HAL from White Bay, with a bottle of wine in our luggage. We'd heard and read about the so called bottle ban but no one asked and no one checked so unless it's a cruise line issue you won't have a problem with the port / customs staff.

 

[Atleastonce]

Thanks for all you replies. I have taken 2 bottles of wine onto all the RCI cruises we have done and given the comments in this thread the White Bay notice of no alcohol should not be a concern. I think we will be doing Uber from Sydney Domestic Airport to White Bay.

 

[Major]

Thanks for all you replies. I have taken 2 bottles of wine onto all the RCI cruises we have done and given the comments in this thread the White Bay notice of no alcohol should not be a concern. I think we will be doing Uber from Sydney Domestic Airport to White Bay.

It's about 40 bucks

 

[AussieDisneyFan]

Whilst your checking will be at the White Bay terminal the actual ship is anchored at Athol Buoy near Taronga Zoo. You will be checked in and then transferred via a dedicated ferry service to the actual ship. With regards to the alcohol, you can definitely take two bottles of wine per stateroom onboard (put in carry on) and there is no corkage fee for consuming in the dining rooms.

 

[Atleastonce]

Just back from the cruise last week and can confirm we were moored near Taronga Zoo and ferried out from white bay. About a 2 1/2 hour boarding process but plenty of staff on hand and offering assistance and answering questions. We sat and watched many people disobeying directions and just simply thinking they could go and do what they wanted. I am sure the process would have been much quicker if everyone just did what they needed to do and stopped whinging about the process. The ship was not going to leave without them. There was a glitch with a corrupted check in computer which saw the passenger manifest not reconciling and everything from that computer re entered manually. This saw our sail out of Sydney Harbour delayed until 11:30pm but we still made the bay of islands in NZ on time. The departure process was much simpler and from leaving the ship and ferried to white bay and into a taxi took less than an hour.