Vampire Parrot

I live pretty close to where the closures are going to be and know the roads that are going to be the diversions.

Knowing how busy the M3 between J2 and J3 is - sometimes almost stationary even on Sunday - it's going to be "interesting" over the next few days. Anyone driving to Southampton needs to really plan ahead... Please folks, don't miss the ship!

VO

A synonym for Gala is Carnival....

VP

I'm not giving anything away that isn't already easy for the bad guys to find out/things they already know :

LRADS (Long Range Acoustic Devices) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Range_Acoustic_Device

are now common equipment on cruise and military ships. Some merchant ships also carry then although the cost of the equipment and training means that not all do.... on the other hand anyone attacking a Billionaire's Mega-Yacht is going to get one hell of a surprise (and not just from the LRAD).

There are other ways of defeating the bad guys - P&O cruise ships have on average a significantly higher maximum speed than most merchant ships, they are much more manoeuvrable at high speed, and a large ship making a series of sharp turns at high speed will throw up one hell of a series of wakes - sufficient to swamp any small boat.

VP

My wife and I collect complaints....

The best way to ruin your own cruise is......

One person complained to my wife that her cruise had been completely and utterly ruined. The reason: the previous evening at dinner, this person asked for cheese and biscuits, and they needed additional butter as they couldn't possibly eat cheese and biscuits without butter.

The huge, cruise-ruining problem was that the butter was brought on a regular small plate instead of a butter dish, and the butter had been put on the plate with a knife instead of being the proper shape.....

VP

Adding on from my previous post:

Any binocs at all - that you will always have with you - are better than none.

The little binocs I have with me almost all of the time show me things I'd have never seen. Get small cheap binocs and you'll see so much more than folks without binocs. Spend more and see more. The choice is yours.

VP

I'm one of those folks who like to watch the world... which at sea is one of the most enjoyable things that can be done.

What's that bird?

What is that bird doing?

Is that a whale? What's it doing?

See that ship, is it the Apartment of the Seas?

Is that glacier going to drop a growler or bergy bit?

And so on.....

My wife and I have spent many hundreds of days at sea, and given the price of time at sea (don't work it out, it will scare you) we don't want to miss anything. So at sea I use full weatherproof Image Stabilised binocs - yes, they are expensive but they get a LOT of use at sea and I get to see things that 99% of people completely miss. Beluga whales, glaciers calving, a puffin diving into the sea to avoid a skua.... all memories that are priceless. But they are large and heavy, too heavy to carry everywhere, especially ashore.

So ashore my wife and I carry small pocket binocs, strapped to our belts. Depending on your own needs and eyesight you can get them for anything from $50 to $$$$. And to be honest even the cheapest will capture much of what I use the big binocs for.

Thus it's up to you as to what you want to see/remember, and what you want to and can afford to pay.

On my last cruise out of an Icelandic Fjord, with my "big" binocs I saw 14 separate pods of humpback whales, I could observe them on the surface, and I could see them prepare to deep-dive.....memories that I will always have.

VP

Edited to add: the previous poster wrote that 10x are hard to hold steady for any length of time. My Image Stabilised are Canon 15x50IS designed for marine use and they are very easy to hold steady - but they are expensive.

One final comment - you say your son is "the perfect age for all things Disney". And yes, that's very true.

Because in my not-so-humble opinion, "any age is the perfect age for all things Disney" :)

I've been to Florida quite a few times both on business and for pleasure - and I agree with the majority of posters, stay in Tampa, you'll love it... three days isn't really enough to do it justice!

VP

Here are the deck plans for the Koningsdam :

http://www.hollandamerica.com/assets/deckplans/ko.pdf

From looking at those deck plans, the "Pinnacle" class (which she's the first of) is yet another development of the very successful Holland America "Vista" class.

Personally I'd like to see a Pinnacle class ship in P&O's fleet...I'd certainly book a cruise or three on her.

As for anything bigger than Azura or Ventura.... no thank you.

VP

The weather in Norway in July can be anything from glorious sunshine to constant drizzle to sunshine and showers.

I've been to Norway more times than I can recall and always had a wonderful time no matter what the weather has been like. Just take appropriate clothing that you can layer up and you'll be fine....

Being summer, it's very likely (but not 100% guaranteed) that the voyage across the North Sea will be smooth.

VP

Southampton to Gatwick is between 80 and 90 miles by road depending on the route and will take about 1 hour 40 minutes if everything goes perfectly. The routes are all notorious for delays so allow two hours and hope that there are no major holdups.

So work backwards from that....

VP

Yes, you'll have both a steward and a butler.

Ah - I see Dai answered at the same time I did....!

VP

The Wetherspoons in the High Street is a short walk and does good food, we use it when we stay at the Holiday Inn.

As I'm sure we all know, the Wetherspoons pubs vary hugely in the quality of their food - but I have to say the Wetherspoons in Southampton is one of the very best, it's also a great place for breakfast.

VP

Southampton city centre is just a short walk away and has a lot of restaurants, many of them very good indeed. See tripadvisor etc. for recommendations....

VP

That's a very nice and totally safe flypast. I can't see what the fuss is all about!

VP

I heard that high winds delayed the departure. The navigable channel out of St. Petersburg is very narrow so I'm not surprised high winds would be a problem....

I heard that on the current cruise J612 Arcadia spent an extra night at St. Petersburg and so missed out Tallinn. Does anyone know if this is true, and if so, have any details?

VP

The crew on a ship are effectively a small company which consists of several departments - deck, engineering, hotel, entertainment. (Have I missed one?)

Each department has it's own head.

Deck (Bridge officers) - it's the Deputy Captain/Staff Captain.

Engineering - it's the Chief. (Chief Engineer).

Hotel - it's the purser/hotel manager.

Entertainment - it's the Cruise Director/Ents. manager.

Each of these reports to the Captain, and they have their own organisation to run, with their own managers, heads of sections etc.

The Captain will generally only be driving the ship when mooring up and unmooring, and manoeuvring in confined spaces (e.g. when turning the ship through 180 degrees before bringing it alongside etc). Sometimes it will be the Deputy Captain on the controls.

Some ships are harder to manoeuvre than others, for example ships with Azipods instead of props & rudders. There are several reasons for this, for example with so much power for manoeuvring available it's very easy for the ship to get away from you! Also there are restrictions on what you can do with the azipods, for example the wash from one azipod's propeller must not impart directly on the other pod as it could damage it. Also the propeller rpm must not go below about 30 rpm (On a Vista class ship such as Arcadia) for lubrication and other reasons. Which means that slow-speed manoeuvring is effectively a real-time mental exercise in thrust vectoring - e.g. to remain stationary, the azipods are pointed directly at each other so that the resultant thrust is zero - and so on!

However a Captain who understands all of this can make a Vista class ship manoeuvre in ways and sea/wind conditions that would be impossible for almost any other ship, unless tugs are used.

At sea, Arcadia is driven by the autopilot under the direct supervision of the officer of the watch. They can of course taken manual control if required. Approaching a harbour, a helmsman could be on the helm which on Arcadia is a wheel. But for azipod manoeuvring when mooring, the pods are controlled directly and only by the Captain or Deputy Captain.

VP

On M/V Arcadia (P&O's Vista class ship) on a cruise just after her first refit she did a speed run and maintained 24.5 knots for an hour in completely calm conditions. I still have the GPS log.

The last time I was on her she was generally doing about 13 knots between ports, except for one day when we did 18 to 20 knots.... the days of 22 knots between ports to maximise time in ports have long gone :(

They use some fuel, I would not say "lots", and they really use little energy to do their thing, compared to the power used to move the ship.

In theory that is true... however the accountants at head office then require a detailed written explanation why the fuel burn was 8030 kg/h rather than the 7985 kg/h they say it should be...:mad:

I've found with P&O photographers that a smile and a "Yes please" or a "Thank you but no thank you" works wonders. That's not true with some other (Mostly American) lines.....!

There have been a few special occasions where my wife and I would like a photograph to be taken, e.g. we're having dinner with one of the crew that are friends of ours. So what we do is the day before we'll go to the photo gallery and ask if a photographer could pop up to table xyz in restaurant abc at 2145 and take a couple of photographs of us... they are always happy to do so even if we don't end up buying the photographs. Because the photographer isn't busy - i.e. they aren't just snapping away at every table - the photograph they take have on most occasions been excellent, very memorable and well worth the money.

VP

Taking photographs and videoing during a show is a big NO-NO.

But - it can be possible to get permission to take photos during a show, and I usually do. The camera I use is completely silent, it has no visible indications it's being used (i.e. no screen, no lights, no flash, the viewfinder isn't visible either) and I although the copyright to the photographs remains with me, I always grant the artist rights to use the photographs I take of them for personal and publicity purposes - and it's nice to see the photos on their websites and their agent's websites

:)

VP

You should be able to make a 2pm flight from Heathrow if all goes reasonably well - off the ship by say 10am, two hours to Heathrow, and you'll make the flight 90% of the time.

But a much less stressful and more enjoyable experience would be to check into a hotel at Heathrow, and then go to London for the afternoon/evening.... perhaps catch a show and see what a "West End Style" show is really like :D

VP

The ship's phone number is printed on the Horizon every port day so in case of emergency you can notify the ship.

It's amazing how many people don't read Horizon or the port sheets.

The ship's number is programmed onto my mobile phone when I get on board... the other phone number to always save is the port agent.

VP

It is possible to buy good quality items on ships at a reasonable price but the buyer has to know exactly what they are buying and what it would cost to buy elsewhere.

My wife and I have each at some point bought each other a nice watch as a present; in her case I bought her a Dreyfuss, in my case she bought me a Tag Heuer. We both knew what they would cost to buy from a UK jeweller, from the Caribbean (St. Martin), and from Gibraltar (after haggling!).

The on-board price was about 5% higher than the best price we'd seen anywhere - however as we get 10% onboard discount we were getting a very good price indeed.

I agree with many of the previous posters; "inch-of-gold" is indeed just costume jewellery and the quality varies enormously. But some of the solid gold chains from the on-board jewellers are sometimes not expensive, especially after 10% onboard discount.

VP

Just remember the motto of I.T departments:

"We're not happy until you're not happy!"

VP