jh1809

As an introvert, the thing that annoys me is so many of the entertainers encouraging the audience to sing along to some of the songs and even to stand up. All I want to do by way of audience interaction is to applaud and laugh as appropriate. Anyway, my singing is truly dreadful.

I couldn't resist booking Aurora's 24-day Med cruise in Sep-Oct 2026. Quite a few intriguing ports that I've not been to before.

I eventually managed to pre-book one meal in Sindhu and one in the Beach House for my cruise on Aurora in about a month's time. I'd already booked my excursions and wi-fi. What I'd totally forgotten is that, unlike the £65 or £85 of OBC which is all I usually seem to get, this time I have £305 for 14 nights. As a solo traveller who is normally only a modest drinker, I might struggle to spend it all. It looks like I may have to up my alcohol intake. Alternatively, how many bars of Toblerone can you buy for £305?

Since AIUI it's a travel agent's brochure, I imagine that posting it would fall foul of Cruise Critics rules and would get taken down pretty sharpish.

Me too.

I've considered trying FO, but a couple of things have put me off. Not only are they considerably more expensive than P&O, but I'm a solo traveller, and for most of their cruises their single supplement seems to be not far short of 100%. Also I live in SE England and don't drive, and many of their most interesting cruises seem to leave from Liverpool or Newcastle. Whilst that's great for people who live up north, it's not attractive for me. I tried Saga in summer 2022 but - though considerably better than P&O - I didn't feel it had been worth playing almost twice as much. I'd have been quite happy with an outside cabin, but they make a great thing of all their cabins having a balcony; then of course you are paying balcony prices. As my cruise was to Greenland (I was attracted by being able to cross that off my bucket list), the opportunities for me to use my balcony were unsurprisingly limited. They also make a great thing of having lots of single cabins, but in spite of that there's still a substantial single supplement. I'm trying Ambassador next year. They seem remarkably cheap for what they appear to offer. I'm also going on a cruise with Noble Caledonia. I've been on ships they've chartered before now, and they've been very good, but this will be the first time I've tried one of their two "in house" ships, which are more expensive. The cruise I've chosen, though dear, was less eye-wateringly so than most on those two ships (helped by a "no single supplement" offer), and it looks like it should be very high quality.

As has been mentioned, I'd be very wary of the possibility of engineering work on a Sunday. Rail replacement bus services for part of the route are no fun, especially if you have a lot of luggage. The National Rail Journey planner may help with determining the quickest route from Purley to Southampton, but it won't tell you about things like the possible trickiness of boarding a train at Clapham Junction that was mentioned above: https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/ You'd need to check it nearer the time, though, as I don't suppose the summer timetable will be up yet.

A 250 mile glass is definitely a large one! 🙂

From those ports, it doesn't sound like you will be to be going into the Med but going down the Atlantic coast, so probably less warm and more unsettled than in the Med, maybe similar to southern England in early September. I'd think that temperatures in the 60s F would be most likely, possibly warmer if you're lucky. By that time of the year it's likely to be less settled than in high summer. Of course the further south you go the better it's likely to be.

Perhaps it because AIUI Cunard has a lot of American passengers, and they've found that the Yanks won't put up with it?

Or you could always delay buying your ticket until arriving at the station, rather than make a seat reservation in advance. So long as it's not the rush hour, there are normally plenty of seats to be had on the SouthWest Trains service up to Waterloo, and trains are fairly frequent so it wouldn't be a disaster if you couldn't get on the first one. Of course if you're going on by train to the Midlands or North then a reservation might be essential.

My brother and his wife were on this cruise, but I haven't had a chance to discuss it with them yet. It's just as well Aurora got back to Southampton when she did, as quite a storm seems to be brewing up this evening. Those on her next trip look to be in for a rough time of it leaving Southampton, assuming she is able to depart on time.

As another data point, I've not had any problem with this using Chrome on my PC.

I've enjoyed all the meals I've had in Sindhu on Aurora and Arcadia (the only P&O ships I've been on). No, they aren't extremely hot, if that's what you want, but I find them far more subtly spiced and higher quality than one finds in most high street Indian restaurants (and cheaper too!). I suppose all this shows is that people's tastes differ. Unless there's great variation from ship to ship depending on who the head chef is? Having said that, I do enjoy Sainsburys Indian ready meals too, though they aren't comparable to Sindhu.

Thanks for all the informative and entertaining reports.

They had obviously realised by this point that they weren't going to run out of grapefruit or yoghurt by the end of the cruise, and so didn't need to water it down to make it go further! I'm glad everything went so smoothly on your last day.

1st March, maybe? (Ditto for Part 2.) Or maybe all your reports have been an elaborate - if early - April Fool, and you've actually been at home the whole time. 🙂 I'm glad you had such a memorable meal to finish with. I can't help wondering how much weight you've put on during the cruise - not that it's any of my business.

After reading that, I'm hungry! Luckily I'd already planned to be going to my local Indian for lunch in a couple of hours time. Though it's pretty good, it's not a patch on Sindhu, though.

Thanks for the very informative summary. Regarding the maintenance issues, it sounds as though things may have gone downhill over the last year or so. When I did a Caribbean cruise on Aurora at the end of 2022, I didn't notice any temperature problems, and the lift display screens and floor announcements were hardly ever incorrect. Even then, though, there was some rust to be seen on the hull, even by someone as naturally unobservant as myself.

If you mean a brochure devoted entirely to the cruise that you are going on, I didn't think that P&O did those any more. So it may be a case of the web site being out of date.

Thanks from me too. I've very much enjoyed all your reports. I wonder if the attitude that only customer satisfaction scores of 10 are adequate has filtered down from P&O being part of a US company. I understand that in the US, where everything is hyped, it is usual to award much higher scores than we Brits would do. I wonder if cabin stewards and waiters who fail to get an average score of very close to 10 miss out on their share of the gratuities that are included in passengers' fares?

It's a fairly big garden that is about 90% lawn and 10% jungle. And I live in Surrey, which is probably one of the more expensive areas if one wants gardening help.

I wonder if I could get her to come and mow my lawn. I pay the bloke who does it £25, and I think it takes him about 45 minutes. 🙂

"It was a Marco Pierre White branded menu but without his dishes highlighted" Not being a fan of his choices, I would see that as a plus! Wad this the Cheryl Baker who used to be part of Bucks Fizz? I was a fan back in the day, but I suppose that day was forty or so years ago.

Looks like the best dinner menu of the cruise. There are three main courses that really appeal to me.