AdventureTwins

Hello!  Does anyone know if the EOS has had an upgrade?  

I'll be hiding these cuties on the Odyssey of the Seas this year! I can't wait! It's too bad some feel it's such a waste to spread happiness.  I think it's a fantastic idea! Hope it continues to spread like wildfire! 

Do we need to have internet everyday?  I am trying to figure out my expenses and would like to be able to watch a movie on board in my cabin once or twice.  The streaming was not good on the Oasis, but we are trying a new ship and longer itinerary, do we need to have it everyday? Can we purchase by the day? TIA

1 minute ago, Host Clarea said:

 

They will know by your stateroom number when you make a reservation.

ok great thank you! 

5 minutes ago, Host Clarea said:

 

JS Perks on Anthem:

 

Bathtub

Dinner at Coastal Kitchen

Priority check-in and boarding

Tea kettle and coffee maker

Bathroom amenities

Robes

Extra C&A point per night

Distinctive color SeaPass card

 

Ok, I see.  For Coastal Kitchen will there be a certificate in our cabin for dinner or will they just know because of our SeaPass card color?

thanks NeedsVitaminSea Is Costal Kitchen a perk? Isn't it included already?

This is our first time on the Anthem OS and having a Suite cabin. I'd love to hear your experiences with a J3.  I guess they used to be called a Family Suite? TIA

On 9/3/2019 at 12:58 PM, h20skibum said:

I will try to touch on some things that others may not have, and relate a little of our first time experiences to London, and cruising from Southampton.  We just cruised from there in July this year.  In our case, we spent one night in Southampton before the cruise, and three nights in London after the cruise.  If you want to read about how we did things, I did a review that you can find here.

 

 

First, your flights.   Your budget for flights should be more than enough, depending on what class you want to fly.  I used google flights to track flight costs, and I started tracking a year and a half prior to our cruise.  The first year, I did it as if we were sailing that year, and then tracked when flights first opened up this past year when we were cruising.

 

I found that Tuesday and Thursday flights were the cheapest, and that flight costs were the lowest between 3 and 4 months prior to the cruise.  Since we knew we were going to be in San Francisco the month before and after our cruise, I was tracking nonstop flights from there to Heathrow and back.  I would not consider anything that wasn’t nonstop, because it would just drag things out too much.  We used Virgin Atlantic, and our flights were $1,000 pp round trip.   This was for their mid-level economy.  It did go down to around $850 pp around the three month mark, but I had already bought by then.  I was also tracking United and British Airways, and their prices were about the same.

 

By the time you get in, collect your bags and make it through security and to your hotel, you will be tired, even if you manage to sleep on the plane.

 

London Eye - Buy a fast track pass online, instead of standing in the queue.  Our first day, we went in the afternoon, and all tickets had been sold for the day.  Even going back the next day, and buying the fast track at £40 each, our time to enter the fast track lane was about an hour and a half after purchasing the tickets.  The regular line was about a 4 hour wait.   If you purchase online, you will save about £3 each, and you can pick your time.  Just make sure you do it far in advance, because summer will be busy.

 

The Staterooms tour at Buckingham Palace are only open 10 weeks during the summer, so if you are there too early in the year, you may not get to tour these.   Once again, when we were there, the tours were operating on a timed entry, so if you can purchase your tickets online, do it.  One day we got to the Queen’s gallery at opening, and all tickets were already gone for the day.  Evidently, they had already sold enough advance tickets online.

 

We stayed in Victoria, very close to Victoria Station, and only used the underground once.   Our initial plan had been to use it to get to Heathrow, but after riding we knew we didn’t want to struggle with luggage to save a few bucks.  We used a car service from our hotel to Heathrow, and it was a very relaxing way to go.  Our cost was £70 for the service in a Mercedes sedan.

 

For the trip to Stonehenge, make it part of your transfer after the cruise.  As others have said, it is too far out, and will take up one of your days and take away from other things you may want to see.

 

Now, for a couple other tips.  Use a credit card with no foreign transaction fees.   If it doesn’t have a tap and go chip (which many cards in the US don’t have yet), you may find some places that can’t take your card.  We just used cash in those instances.   Also, if they give you a choice of running your card in $ or £, select £ and let your card company do the conversion.  It is lower than what they are converting at the point of sale.

 

Some hotels have US electric adapters in the rooms.  We stayed at the Park Plaza Victoria London, and they had sockets for US.  We had our travel converter with us, but didn’t need it there.

 

I know I did a lot of planning for our trip, so it is good you are getting started on yours.   And for your cruise, remember to pack your formal wear.  Unlike the Caribbean, 80% sailing from Southampton will be dressed on formal nights.

 

Enjoy your time there.  We met the friendliest people sailing from there. 

Fantastic!  Thank you so much for this! I am planning this trip myself so this is awesome for me! 

1 hour ago, WoodstockGirl said:

If I may add my little two cents worth to the hotel aspect of this discussion. I too highly recommend one of the very affordable Premiere Inns.  Their niche is to be very clean, minimalist, efficient hotels. High quality bed mattresses and linens, but save with smaller room sizes, and fewer frills. The one we stayed in in London is right by the London Eye, the Westminster Bridge and around the corner from a major train station. Across the street is a large court, with little restaurants and stores all lined up on the edge. Also a Starbucks!  Very convenient for grabbing a bite.

We compared prices of several throughout key spots in London before settling on this one.  One key reason? Besides the location, it has Air Conditioning! Not all the hotels and Inns in London do. On a hot day, air Conditioning is not an option for me; it's a must.

No AC? Yikes and we will be there in August!

3 hours ago, shofer said:

Have you tried to book the airfare through the cruise line?  We were on United which had a non-stop from O'Hare to Heathrow.  Could never have done that on our own.

They said it's not time yet. But we did want to go that route.

On 8/13/2019 at 11:13 AM, shofer said:

We did a 15-day TA from Southampton to Fort Lauderdale last November on Celebrity Silhouette.  You can read my review attached.  Our travel agent booked our airfare through Celebrity for $200/pp.   We booked our own airfare home from FLL.  If you are the least bit jet-lagged, 2 days in London won't be enough.   I thought we would hit the ground running and was not expecting DH to be so exhausted.   We did take the National Express Bus from LHR to the Victoria coach station which was 0.3 miles to the Grosvenor.  I found a good deal online for the hotel.   We just reversed it 2 days later for the bus to Southampton.  Very reasonable and comfortable.

15 DAY TRANS-ATLANTIC.rtf 46.18 kB · 9 downloads

We are planning on hitting only a few stops in London, well that was until we saw the video of a couple taking the bullet train to Paris! Bahaha! We should be able to do our airfare here in another month.  Your airfare from Southampton to FLL was only $200 per person? We can't even get across the US for that little! Great job! We are expecting it to be high and hoping it will not be crazy expensive! Thanks for your review! 

QUESTION:  For those of you in the US headed to UK or have done so, should a good guestimate for airfare be around $2500 per person? We are in Colorado, US.  Leaving August 2020 London.

On 8/8/2019 at 1:23 PM, phabric said:

Who are cruising with?

 

All the cruise lines offer air.  They each call it different.

Princess - EzAir

Royal Caribbean - Air2Sea

 

You or your agent can make air travel arrangement.

 

Princess - on your Personalizer, under your cruise, at the top - Travel Arrangement.  Once air is released, you can book.  

You choose - class, ARRIVE on (NOT the date you leave), leave on, stops.  

Choose - flexible - no payment until final payment

                               - no penalty to change/cancel

                               - can Modify/cancel up to 45 days before cruise

               - restricted - pay at time of booking

                                 - cost to modify/cancel

 

You will get a Princess Air Booking # and Airline Booking #.

 

Once booked, check daily or often your Travel Arrangement (flight), encase the price goes down

- Click Travel Arrangement 

- Your booking will show

- at the bottom of that page, GREEN section - Modify 

- add - class, Arrive on, Leave on, Information like before

- new price will show

- if the same price as what you have, exit the page

- if cheaper - continue 

- it will show old price and new price

- continue - accept

- you will receive a NEW Princess and Airline booking numbers  each time you Modify your booking

- with each change you need to re add airline member number, seats

 

I book Princess flexible and check direct with the airline and at final payment I choose the cheapest price.

 

For my Athens-Rome Cruise, my Flexible Air started at $2,340/pp Premium Economy with watching the price the air at final payment is $1,745/pp.

 

If you purchase air direct, you are locked into the price, with Princess flexible you can watch for sale/price reduction and not pay until final payment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is the Air2Sea - www.air2sea.com?  I'll check them out.  And I'm sailing with Royal Caribbean. We also would need to call them because we booked directly with them. Just wish we could do our flight early. The hotel is proving to be a task in and of itself!  

You all are so awesome! We had a wedding this weekend with friends and I'm so glad Im back! Going back to read comments!

I was checking out flights and doesn't look like we won't be able to book anything until September or early October. {Sad Face!}  They have started with July flights on Expedia.com, is there a better place to book flights? Maybe go straight to the airline? I have no idea who only flies to London! Geeze, I feel like such a new kid on the block! When we sail the Caribbean I'm so much more on top of what I'm doing! 

6 minutes ago, princeton123211 said:

Wasn't quite sure what you meant by that-- exactly what we want to do as in stay a night in Southampton, or exactly what we want to do as in stay the extra night in London. 

We want to stay in London a nite before and then go straight to Southampton.  Sorry that was confusing! :O)

On 8/3/2019 at 5:15 AM, princeton123211 said:

I wouldn't recommend spending the night in Southampton at all unless you want to specifically see Southampton. You can easily get from London to the pier in the same day for departure and this gives you much more time to see London. 

Exactly what we want to do! Thank you! 

Having the names of the hotels is PERFECT!  Thank you so much! I love having options.  

We are 1st time to UK and really do want to see as much as our feet can handle.  We won't mind being exhausted by the time our cruise starts, but it's been a long time since anyone in our family has been to Europe {besides Military} and we just want to see EVERYTHING! haha! 

Seems the hotels book quickly so I'm trying to secure that first. I thought staying in London would be great but not knowing the distance to several places makes a huge difference.  You all are absolutely fabulous with the help and direction.  I assume some of you live in London?  How lovely! I'm a native NYer and now reside in rural Colorado so I don't think the tube is going to sway me either way! Sounds exciting - I've been told to watch out for pic pocketers though!! 

Just a few last questions: 

1. Can I get the "Oyster Card" in the airport or do I wait till I get to the Tube station? 

2. What hotel do you recommend by Southampton Pier?

3. Are the souvenirs at the airport worth it? Or wait til we get to London?

4. Money:  the best way to handle cash/cards exchange in UK.  On another thread someone said that we will need cash once we leave the plane?

5. Hop On, Hop Off: Can I reserve this now or wait til we get there. Is there a link to the stops it makes? 

Thanks again everyone for being so helpful!

AdventureTwins

Thanks so much everyone!  A FEW answers & QUESTIONS

1. We are a couple. My husband and I are in our late 40's early 50s. 

2. We want to see 1. Stonehenge, Jimi Hendrix home, The Eye, and Buckingham Palace before we leave. 

3. Hotel in London - maybe $300 for 2 nites.  

4. I heard they didn't have uber in UK, but AWESOME!

5. The Tube sounds fun, but crowded? 

QUESTIONS:

5. Should we stay at a hotel near the airport? for our London touring days? or is it too far to go back and forth?

6. Is it possible to take the bullet train to Paris in a day? 

Thanks again!  

AdventureTwins

Hello!  First time UK travelers here! There may be a lot of questions!

How easy will it be to leave LHR for London - stay there 2 nights and then head to the cruise port on Sunday? 

Any recommendations for hotels in London? We would like to sight see & see Buckingham Palace, the EYE, London etc. and then head to the port.  

We have heard that it's quite a ways from LHR to Southampton?

Thanks!  

I'm on a Med cruise next August! This is fabulous. We were going to go on Indy, but they changed us to Anthem. 

Does anyone have any current prices for these classes onboard? I saw them on a cruise compass for May 2018, but they didn't have a price listed.

Thanks this helps a lot!

Are you allowed to decorate your cabin door?

We are sailing on the Oasis of the Seas & I am going with a group of first timers!

I was thinking of an idea so that my cabin was easy to pick out.

Are we allowed to decorate and If so, what can we use to hang things up?

If not, forget that last question! LOL! ;p;p

Kinda frustrating when you don't have an exact answer. I've been through all the excuses, but is there a black and white answer? Yes you have to have 2 people in the room with the same package? Or you CANT get just 1 package in the room?