danielundecided

Did they FORCE you to leave cabins - i.e. knocking on doors telling you that you need to leave, or asking people over PA to go to the theatre?

Dan

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I don't understand as everyone on our coach is boarding at 1.30 I doubt very much we r on the same level on the. Ship

 

 

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If you're using the coach service booked through/by P&O your coach arrival time will always override the arrival time on your e-ticket. We had an arrival time of 13:30 as we were on E deck but the coach arrived at 13:45 and we were in our cabin by 14:30. :)

Dan

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Cutting costs whilst cruising but not cutting the fun is it possible? :confused:

Depends which kind of fun you mean - over 18s-only liquid fun, or taking part in the quizzes fun!

On that note regarding the "liquid fun", drinks do cost about the same as a pub near me, in the Midlands; so they are quite reasonable. We're not huge drinkers but it's always nice to have a little tipple on holiday :) P.S. you can take your own alcohol on board within "reasonable" limits, so we took a bottle of white wine on board.

It all depends whether you consider the on-board activities fun to be fair, and a lot of them seem to be dancing or quiz based, for example a few from our recent cruise were foxtrot classes, quizzes etcetera. As you're going in November the seas may be rough enough for the pools to close, in which case you may choose to go to the costa bar and get a nice cake and drink :)

Lisbon is an easy and beautiful city to explore on foot, lots of public transport and quite simple to navigate. Gibraltar we did a DIY cable car visit to the top of the rock to see the monkeys; I recall it being a decent cost.

Go on with an open mind, don't worry about money too much (if you can afford to, try to save as much as possible for spending money, so you can relax knowing you're covered) and you'll have a great time!

Dan

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Not sailed on her recently but we've been on her twice and she's a beautiful ship. Beautiful decor, lots of bars, lots of places to eat, and there's always a quiet place to relax :)

Dan

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I'd say go for it and get the 7am flight if possible. If the flight is cancelled you have another one (albeit cutting it a bit fine time-wise) or you could get a flight to Gatwick as you say and get the train.

I'd book the comedian tickets, if needs be or you change your mind you can always resell them.

Dan

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I know this will not help with this booking but your first booking at the turn of the year was at the most expensive time. If you want a bargain you have to book when the cruises are first released. So for November 17 we are talking March/April 16. That is when the best discounts are to be had. Sometimes the prices come down as in your case but for our next 3 cruises, in September October and January the price they want now is way more than we paid in fact up to 40% more. And I think we are in the same type of cabin as you.

 

There is also the November factor. It is very noticeable that the best deals are to be had in this month.

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It's definitely best to book early for both price and cabin choice.

I curiously looked at the price for our cruise next year - it's gone up by £1,600 in 8 months! Obviously it will probably go down in a few months a bit but not that much.

Dan

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The tea is all Twinings however they only have breakfast tea in the cabins. In the buffet they have lots of varieties like fruit, peppermint, camomile etc. therefore you could always take some down to your cabin to drink there.

Dan

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I'd stay a bit further out i.e. Winchester and book a taxi to Southampton as it's not that far.

Dan

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We had a midships C deck cabin on Emerald Princess on our most recent cruise on her, and it was a quiet location with virtually no motion. Not the same ship but they're the same design :)

Dan

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How else would they have got onto the balcony in the first place? How would they replace damaged ones? :)

They're chairs though. Not Sun loungers. ;)

Talking a sun lounger or two seems a better idea than a chair anyway, you can take benefit of the half uncovered park of your balcony and do some sunbathing!

Dan

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We had neighbours who just went and "liberated" sunbeds from the lido for their balcony very early in the morning. The steward didn't take them away.

Would a sun lounger even fit through a balcony door? It would be worth knowing that before attempting it, only to find you can't get it into your cabin [emoji23]

Dan

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Can anyone tell me what the security procedures r for p and o in particular Britania? Just slightly concerned going on a giant ship with a Union Jack flag on it may be a possible target. (I do have an irrational fear of terrorism which is why I'm not flying on holiday this year) just need to stem my fear but reassurance there is a robust system in place. I take it they scan well when u get back on ship at each port etc

 

 

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We've always found P&O security to be thorough, from arrival at the terminal to disembarkation. The security staff getting on/off the ship have always looked to be alert and doing their jobs perfectly - I have no doubt that they hold their security standards as high as they can and we've never had a worrying experience :)

Thoughts going out to everyone affected in Manchester - it's a really scary, awful world we live in at the moment.

Dan

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hi....I would say that of course it is possible to request them! Now whether they can provide them or not is a different matter!

 

 

 

Seriously, I would certainly ask...cant do any harm...there could well be a few spares specifically for that purpose. And if they say no...then have a quiet word with your cabin steward, he may be able to help. Otherwise...there will be at least one chair in your cabin...just take that outside when you need to.

You know what I mean :)

Not really sure who we'd ask apart from the cabin steward. I recall reading somewhere that only superior deluxe balcony cabins get extra footstools however I also think I saw a video of a normal balcony cabin with 4 chairs in. I can't see why they'd say no logically; it's not exactly that there isn't the space!

Dan

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Hi,

Was wondering if it's possible for us to request extra balcony chairs/footstools for our cruise next year? We've got a nice big C Deck balcony but there are 4 of us and only 2 chairs/1 footstool. Not the end of the world if we can't but it'd be nice if we could.

Advice appreciated!

Dan

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You can sign up for the kids club on the first day until 3, then there's another sign up session at 5:30-7:30 I believe. The last day you can sign up is the morning of the second day :)

Dan

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Can't specifically speak of P&O when I say this as the only cabin of this type and location we've had was on the Emerald Princess, but they're the same ship design.

The balconies are lovely because you still get the sun but it's shaded so it's not harsh. We were in cabin E721 and we couldn't hear anything. I've read that E730 gets a lot of noise though as it's above the loudspeakers. The cabin vibrated quite a bit at night, but it wasn't dramatic enough to keep us up or wake us up in the morning.

Dan

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We were on the bay of biscay on the 3rd of April, and gosh, it was quite rough! The way back was quite calm though. The seas around the northwestern Spanish coast (around Vigo) was quite rough as well.

Even though we were mid aft we still felt it quite a bit - try and get a midships cabin, take some seasickness tablets if need be and wait it out. :)

Dan

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It's the convoluted way my brain works.:cool:

 

 

 

But to get back on topic, after viewing yet another Regal Princess video I do have to ask, why on earth did the P&O design team take away all the Wow factor from the Royal design and substitute it with Britannia bland. The atrium on a Princess ship is its focal point and a great venue for all sorts of entertainment, Britannia's would struggle to bring life to a bingo session.

I much prefer the Emerald Princess atrium to that of Ventura, and from the looks of it, Britannia's as well. Ventura's seems a bit cramped, dark, small, and understated, whereas Emerald's is a bright, showy focal point. P&O may have done better by designing their atriums somewhere in between modern and glitzy.

While Ventura's is nice, I know which one I'd prefer any day.

Dan

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BBC HD's been on Ventura since at least April 2.

All I ever noticed on it was repeats of Stella. Over, and over, and over, again. Even the same episodes sometimes!

Dan

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I also agree about Azura rather than Oceana with a 12 year old. Just out of curiosity tartanexile81 - why do you prefer starboard?

You're going West to East, therefore the starboard balconies will be south facing. :)

Dan

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That's going to be marginal at best as the food costs will be higher if pax aren't buying lunch ashore

However, P&O will probably make quite a bit of money on drink sales, especially if it's nice weather. The food in the buffet is also going to be there regardless of whether people eat it (on a sea day), or not (on a port day).

Dan

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Has the number of sea days increased because the ships have been slowed to save fuel costs?

P&O ships do seem to deliberately travel slower than the competitors' ships, namely RCI and Celebrity.

RCI frequently do Canary Islands (i.e. Lanzarote) to Northern Spain (i.e. Vigo) in 2 nights, when for P&O it would take 3 nights.

RCI and Celebrity also do Southampton to Funchal in 3 nights, when with P&O it takes 4 nights.

Celebrity Eclipse also sails from Southampton to Lisbon (and vice versa) in 2 nights whereas P&O take 3 nights for this sector of a journey.

Fuel economy is probably a factor, but more likely than not there's a lot of reasons P&O organise itineraries the way they do.

On the other hand, I have noticed that RCI occasionally seem to deliberately put sea days onto the itinerary when there is no need for one and the ship could be in port.

P&O sometimes do this, for example sailing straight to Madeira instead of to Northern Spain, then onto Madeira (they don't do this as much anymore by the looks of it), or by sailing straight to/from Lisbon instead of stopping off at Vigo/A Coruña/Oporto on the way to/from Lisbon.

This is possibly to stop the itineraries being too port intensive. If I was being cynical I would suggest that one reason is to ensure people stay on board, where they will pay for drinks and make the cruise line money.

Dan

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On the Christmas 28 night cruise on Azura bought as a full cruise not B2B we still had to attend both Barbados and New Orleans Musters'.

 

 

 

I think this is a really good step forward however I think they should make it a ship wide event that ALL passengers attend without exclusion.

 

 

 

It's time this procedure was the same on all ships and when sailing from any country.

I don't get how they enforce you to go to both. The second is also just the same as the first, right?

On Ventura, the captain clearly stated that "those who joined Ventura today" must be attending.

Dan

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We disembarked her on Sunday.

MDR food was great quality (comparable to Princess from what I remember it to be like) but an awful lot of fish and seafood on the menu. Not much variety in dishes for vegetarians. What the food was described as on the menu was often very different to what you'd be expecting from the description when it arrived!

The buffet was okay during the day, we didn't go there at night. A somewhat good selection of food. The deserts were, as they always have been, disgusting IMO.

RE. te ship looking tired, we never noticed this really. There was the odd wicker chair on the top deck that looked a bit worn but that was it.

The passenger mix actually surprised me - I would estimate that about 1/2 of everyone on board were families, with quite a lot of the other half being young (around mid/late 20s) couples. No problem with any other passengers whatsoever, they were all polite when passing, sharing lifts etc etc and I never felt any of them disrupted my holiday.

So no; I don't think you've made a mistake in booking on Ventura. She's a lovely ship and we can't wait to be back on her next year. :--)

Dan

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We had a £400 bill at the end of a week, mainly alcohol and soft drinks. I think it would be better to have the gratuities AI style and for P&O to just have some decent soft drinks and alcoholic drinks packages, so you have an extra option if you drink enough to make the packages worth it. I'm not sure going completely AI including the drinks is a good idea as it will force P&O to make price hikes and this would probably frustrate people who wouldn't take advantage of the free drinks.

Dan

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