Harters

Liverpool - the Museum of Liverpool is next to the Albert Dock, mentioned upthread) and is well worth a visit. As is the Maritime Museum at the Albert Dock (which also houses the Slavery Museum and the Customs & Excise Museum). As is common here, entry to the museums is free. And, whilst youre on the waterfront, why not take a ferry across the Mersey (cue Gerry & the Pacemakers song) and look back to the skyline from Birkenhead (home to the park that provided inspiration for New York's Central Park). Shopping and a range of eats, across the road from the Albert Dock at Liverpool One. Mainly chain eats but Lunya is independent and a favourite for tapas. You could happily spend a day in the city without moving from the waterfront area (and, if so chosen, without involving any Beatles stuff either).

We are small islands - in Great Britain none of us live more than 70 miles from the coast. You'd think great seafood should be everywhere. But it isnt. Even in coastal towns. Yes, you can go to some and find great seafood. But for others, it can be as disappointing as you will generally find inland - cod, haddock, sea bass and defrosted prawns and that's about it. I live some 35 miles from the coast, in a diverse metro area of some 3 million - but there's only two seafood restaurants (neither of them particularly good). It's often reported, by our fishing industry, that most of the catch landed in the UK is exported, whilst most of the seafood we eat is imported from elsewhere. And don't get me started about how our national dish of fish & chips is so often vile. Even a half decent version is an experience to celebrate.

I used to be a big fan of Pizza Express. And I'm old enough to remember going to their first outlet on Wardour Street in London. And it's always been a reliable option for decent pizza. But we went recently for the first time in a year or so and what a change. Very poor menu choice - with few pizzas now with toppings you'd find in Italy. Poor quality dough. And what on earth are "pizza wraps" now on the lunch menu. I'll stick to independents in future.

Not statistically. CC forum contributors form a very tiny percentage of O's customers. My guess is also that we probably do not form a particularly representative sample of those customers - regular users of forums tend to be more committed to the subject than a wider group who have an interest in it. I reckon O probably gets more useful feedback from its end of cruise surveys than it ever would from reading this forum.

Although if you pick a transatlantic, for instance, you can avoid the port intensive. I'm looking forward to ours. Or, you can just treat some ports like sea days (as we did earlier this year). Best of both worlds - the enjoyment of O, without all the ports.

I was never a fan of Lucozade, although my partner regards it as a wonder drug. By the by, Italian restaurant Vero Moderno in Salford is on the site of the original Vimto factory, the name preserved in the address - Vimto Gardens. Decent scran, IMO.

Vimto.

Same here, JB. And I don't carry a mobile phone of any sort, so am now pretty much excluded from visiting the town centre.

I think you may do right to consider cancelling, particularly as you are celebrating an unrepeatable event. Covid put a stop to two celebratory cruises for us - my 70th birthday and our golden wedding. Of course, what you may find here are positive subjective reviews from anonymous people to weigh against the negative subjective reviews from anonymous people you've read elsewhere. Good luck with that.

Not that I've noticed as yet round Greater Manchester. But I suspect it's going to be a coming thing. By the end of this year, the constituency where I live will not have a single bank in it. That's meant that the number of ATMs has reduced alongside with the closures, so an issue for customers. But the growing problem now is for small traders in that they don't have a convenient bank at which they can pay in cash takings. It's bound to lead to more looking to "card only" business. I don't usually find that a problem although, by co-incidence, I've been out for breakfast this morning to the nearby Turkish cafe. Card machine wasn't working but, fortunately and unusually, I had enough cash with me to pay.

Apart from the early stages of Covid, I have not come across any retailer here that refuses cash. That is not to say that there aren't any, just that they must be few and far between.

Something to ask the cruise line. Could they be doing the airport drop-off first and that takes up the time?

Hadnt appreciated Hadramout was Yemeni. Ta for the heads-up. Looked very manky and uninviting when I had a nosy through the window about 18 months back. I'm not too far from Rusholme. Jaffa on the main drag is a long standing lunch spot for us but that's about the only place on the Curry Mile that we go to these days. Should start calling it the Kebab Kilometre with all the changes in recent times.

Just out of interest, how (if at all) does a New York pizza differ from, say, a pizza in Italy (or other European countries)?

Yes.

I don't think we have a specific Yemeni restaurant near us. I wish there was, as I've never eaten the food. As a young girl, my partner spent several years living there (in Aden).

Our diversity has been in cooking at home, rather than restaurants. Saturday night is our "big meal of the week". Some years back, we decided to cook a different national (and sometimes regional) meal each week. It took us two years to work through the list. As for restaurants, we are a small island off the coast of Europe and simply do not have the diversity of cuisines to match that of America. But, if I take regional variations (such as with Chinese or Indian food), as well as distinct national cuisines eaten both here and overseas, then I may get the number up to 25 or so.

I have eaten it but find it very underwhelming in flavour. Would much rather have crab (so long as lots of the brown crab meat is used, along with the white).

I've sailed once on a smaller R class (Nautica) and once on the larger O class (Marina). I wouldnt discount an R class for future cruises and would make sure that, as on Nautica, we booked a penthouse for the extra space (we'd read about the shower space in the smaller cabins). . That said, all things being equal, I would prefer the larger ship. More going on by way of speciality restaurants and just a more spacious feel to the public areas.

That would be replicating the change on land based restaurant menus with businesses deciding that, as they need to include a plant based dish, it might as well be vegan so everyone can eat it. I'm fine with that - unless they include vegan "cheese" which is generally deeply unpleasant, in my experience. .

I'd also agree about the train unless the flexibility of having a car would allow you to get out and about from Liverpool's city centre and see something of our region. Driving round the city is no different from driving round any British city. If you do decide on the car option, make sure you check out that your accommodation has parking.

As an omnivore, I'm as interested in the plant based dishes as I am in the meat based ones.

If the visit is in the not too distant future, the port authority will know where it's intended for the ship to dock. Email them, as I did, to ask. They were very helpful, giving me the actual birth number in the city, so I knew exactly where it would be. I emailed in English (with a Google Translate into French) and received a reply in English.

The city does "war" quite well. The Museum of Liverpool has an exhibition, mainly focussing on the local regiment - the King's. Also available at the Museum is a database recording information on the many thousands of men who served with the Regiment during the Great War. It was researched and produced by a pal of mine (and fellow amateur military historian), as a hobby project over many years. Joe lives in Cheltenham but, every Saturday for years, he would drive the four hour round trip to do the research at the National Archives in London (this was in the days before all the info was available online).

That name suggests to me someone of South Asian heritage. If so, then no, that wasnt the head chef doing the tours of the tables in the restaurants (we also spotted him having dinner with colleagues one evening in the Terrace). This guy seemed to me to be more of a Latin heritage.