Waju

Although I’ve not been on Arvia, the main difference between select and saver fares as far as dining arrangements are concerned,  is that saver fare dining time is 1st or 2nd sitting and us chosen for you by P&O whereas select fare gets freedom dining.  As Arvia is all freedom dining it doesn’t really matter!

If you visit a port that has a shuttle bus the select fare payer will use it free of charge but the saver fare payer will have to pay for it,

Just looked and the cheaper one was called Stress Free Parking but be careful they could park it 20 miles away - like I say I didn’t research it.

I looked at CPS the other day and it was £220 ish for 13 days 😳 in September.  I googled and found one for just over £100 but hadn’t heard of them before and didn’t research it any further.

A few people on here use the multi storey at West Quay shopping centre and have no worries/qualms about doing so - we may try that one next!

4 hours ago, Josy1953 said:

When DH  surfaced this morning he suggested going to the top up our wine stock, then on the way he thought that we should stop at Wetherspoons for a totally unhealthy breakfast.  The Wetherspoons breakfast was awful, it was tepid, I asked for my egg to be well done but when I stuck my knife into it the yolk squirted all over my jacket so the jacket is now in the washing machine on hot was which will hopefully get the grease out without ruining the jacket.

The good news is that we now have plenty of wine 🍷

The temperature of Wetherspoons breakfast is one of my husbands pet hates.  When I order I always ask for it to be extra hot otherwise he will send it back and usually they will tell the kitchen but on our last visit the young lad at the bar just said it comes how it comes we can’t change it 🤣. Luckily it was ok but they do seem to have a problem getting it to the table hot!

Excuse me for butting in - would anyone have any idea how much a bog standard inside cabin might have cost on this cruise?  Very rough amount will do as I know it will have gone up and down - just curious 🙂

46 minutes ago, Eglesbrech said:

Yes the sea days are the first and last. I’m assuming that there will be a formal on the first sea day but it’s more unusual to have one on a final evening for packing etc.. as you say they don’t normally do formal on a port day.

 

Thats why I was asking.

Oh I see, yes I’ve never heard of one on the last night either so maybe just the one!  
Anyway enjoy your cruise, I love Aurora.

That was amazing, thank you!

Please tell me this is what you do/did for a living?  Your writing is fabulous.

10 hours ago, Eglesbrech said:

I’ll ask here rather than starting a new thread. 
 

How many formal nights on a 7 night Aurora cruise? There is conflicting information with some things saying 1 and some 2.

 

Thanks

I would say two, do you have (at least) two sea days?  It would be very unusual to have a formal night on a port day.

Hope that helps.

14 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

They have said that they don’t yet know whether it will be done on the ship or ashore 🙄

I remember being told "don't try and have a laugh and a joke with them, just answer any questions" but the one we had was really nice and asked if we were having a great cruise and said he hoped we would have a good time in the USA!

10 minutes ago, david63 said:

Because that is the rules that US Immigration have - and apart from a few essential crew members the whole ship (crew as well as passengers) has to disembark and go through immigration on the first visit. Not only that the ship is inspected from top to bottom which is why there will be some frantic cleaning taking place over the next few days.

Border Control do not have the word "fast" in their dictionary - they only have one speed slowwwwwwwwwww😉

Not sure you have to go ashore? - US immigration came aboard Aurora in 2018 and did ours

6 minutes ago, Snow Hill said:

Having never been to the US either on a cruise why do you need to clear customs and immigration if you are not planning to get off ship at that port? 

I don't know why either I'm afraid but I know you have to - they will call and call your name till the whole ship is done and that includes staff from my memory of doing it a few years ago!

33 minutes ago, TigerB said:

That's a bugger with the US entry shenanigans.  A word with someone high up on the ship, and an explanation of your situation, may result in you and Lady S being allowed to attend together at the earlier time.  That said, you may get a jobsworth Border Control agent that would scupper such a plan!🙄

I think you may have to have a word with someone and both attend before you do your trip.  I'm pretty sure attendance is compulsory but it probably won't take them as long to complete immigration for everyone as you are away on your tour.  Hope that makes sense!

8 minutes ago, mklions said:

Having sailed on many cruise lines , my wife and I have always found the mattresses on the beds in general extremely comfortable.

 

The premium lines tend to be slightly better than P&O but never the less we have always found P&O beds very comfortable also.

 

I am now in the market to replace our bed at home and wondered what mattresses the cruise lines use and can they be purchased in the UK.

 

Interested to hear what others think on cruise ship beds?

 

I'm sure I'm not dreaming but I seem to remember that on the P&O website if you search in the FAQ section it tells you the suppliers of the mattresses and pillows.

7 hours ago, Splice the mainbrace said:

Paynes Just Brazils or other brands of chocolate covered Brazil nuts are very difficult to get nowadays. I particularly like the dark chocolate ones.

I used to love chocolate brazils, I bought a bag of mixed nuts for Christmas and there wasn't a single brazil nut in it!

43 minutes ago, Gettingwarmer said:

Same as me. I find all of the above very sickly. Give me an ordinary piece of plain or milk chocolate any day. 

Piece, piece? what is this concept? Surely you mean bar? 😀😀

9 hours ago, CaptainPedantic said:

Here are a few of ours... This year, thanks to cruising, we have:

 

• Bobbed along in a RIB with a pod of humpback whales
• Seen and touched icebergs
• Ridden a horse through a Caribbean rainforest, onto a beach and into the sea
• Zip-lined through a rainforest and a cave
• Swam with a dolphin in the wild (that one was a complete surprise!)
• Snorkelled with turtles, stingrays, so many colourful fish and over a shipwreck and an underwater sculpture park

We feel so privileged to have been able to do these things, and yes while we could organise land-based holidays to do similar things, for us, cruising is the best way to travel 🙂 

WOW that all sounds amazing!

15 minutes ago, grapau27 said:

Good evening.

It is our Sarah's birthday on Christmas eve and I am bringing her to ours on Christmas day and she will stay at ours.

Pauline has the table all ready.

The table looks beautiful. Pauline is very organised.

Hope you all have a lovely time🎅

14 hours ago, pete14 said:

So sorry to hear of another long hospital stay. Hopefully you are now back at home and on the mend. Have a great Christmas and thanks for your efforts at keeping us in order again this year. 

Best wishes Sharon, I hope you're feeling much better soon.

I caught sight of you again the other day on a repeat of that cruise ship programme you 'starred' on a little while back 🙂

1 hour ago, Dermotsgirl said:

Thanks for doing that, much appreciated, and it confirms other reports that I've seen.

 

We have booked the Turkey and Tinsel for next year at Gunton. We've booked a room in Willow Cottage, which is close to the main entrance of the hotel, in order to avoid too much walking outside.

 

Most of the Warner's sites have a hybrid buffet/waiter service in their main dining rooms, but, for some reason, Gunton has gone full buffet, which hasn't been a popular decision in some quarters.

 

I agree about the drinks prices. We mostly stick to soft drinks to keep the expenditure down ! 

 

 

 

No problem...........

I'm beginning to wish we'd booked again for next year while we were there as the price was excellent but perhaps we'll choose one nearer to home as Gunton was a 4.5hr journey for us.

They did do Turkey and Tinsel well - the tables were nicely decorated for Christmas Day and New Years Day!

On 12/9/2023 at 3:29 PM, Dermotsgirl said:

I'll be interested to know how you get on.

 

We have been wondering about Gunton for a break next December 

Back from our little break at Gunton Hall now - I have mixed feelings about the holiday.

Our 'chalet' was lovely, very modern with nice furniture - I think it is very recently refurbished.  It reminded me of a cabin.  We only booked the cheapest room so were impressed with it.  The only thing I didn't like too much is having to put your coat on to go to breakfast/dinner etc. and then find somewhere to leave it once you got to the dining room.

The food was really good,  nice variety and good quality BUT I much prefer to be served than keep getting up and down to the buffet,  I liked that the staff let you choose your table from what was available and then that was your table for the whole break.

We like to be entertained and were slightly disappointed, it was ok but only ok.  I am aware that you can find out who the entertainers are before you book so it would be easy to choose a holiday around what suited your interests better.

We were also disappointed with what seemed to be lack of maintenance, curtains hanging off the rails in the dining room, swimming pool has been unheated for over two weeks apparently but they are still advertising activities in there.

Finally, I though the drinks prices were quite steep but perhaps I'm just a Wetherspoons girl at heart!

They must have over ordered - we got our very first one today 😀

This topic raises its ugly head at least every couple of months.  As this is a P&O board we all know tipping is included, if you want to tip extra then do so, but why do you feel the need to tell everyone else?    If you don't want to tip extra then that's fine too because you have already paid them in your fare - don't let those who won't miss the money make you feel bad.

Its your holiday - enjoy it your way!

10 minutes ago, Dermotsgirl said:

I'll be interested to know how you get on.

 

We have been wondering about Gunton for a break next December 

I'll pop back on here at the end of next week.

We're going to Gunton Hall on Monday!  This will be our first Warners break and we're looking forward to trying them out.

2 minutes ago, Waju said:

What a beautiful tabby, he looks like he has a story to tell 😟

Sorry I’m assuming boy puss cat because I once had a tabby that was a boy - he was named Trigger and we rescued him because a Frenchman was going to shoot him 😳