Son of Bare

Thanks. I'm slightly surprised that it isn't also open to the top 2 peninsula club tiers.

What qualifies a passenger to have breakfast in the Epicurean, is it just for suite passengers or does peninsula club membership above a certain tier also qualify you? Where is it held on those ships without an Epicurean?

Although policy suggests otherwise, its my recent experience that a blind eye is turned towards bringing alcohol aboard at ports. If your wife likes a glass of wine, my advice is to pack a corkscrew. The ship does have a supply but they can be very difficult laying hands on one.

Flew to Valetta for a two week cruise in April. I got out of bed at home at 3.15am and was lying on my cabin bed exactly 7 hours later. This inspite of the flight being delayed. Home to Birmingham airport being 35 miles. Well happy with that, less so that our bags didn't turn up for another 6 hours.

And when we flew to Valetta in April the total baggage allowance was what seemed important at check in. My wife's case was overweight (now there's a surprise!) but the total weight of our two bags together was under 46kg. We were not charged extra for the overweight bag. Make sure you're luggage labels are firmly attached, both of our bags managed to shed their labels. We've never previously lost any labels and use the same method now as we have always done, so I don't know why both were missing labels at the other end.

It could be PO have allocated cabins to all passengers on saver/early saver fares?

For two people, yes. Sounds like you also have a very good deal.

We abided by this rule until we found ourselves in St Martin last November, talking to a young couple who said they had taken a total of 7 litres of spirits on board at various ports on the cruise. 'So you'll be picking them up at the end of the cruise' I said. Nope, they are in our cabin and are being consumed, was the reply. Unconvinced, we tried ourselves to get alcohol on board at the next port and it wasn’t an issue. We became repeat offenders but our bags were not checked once. That was on Arcadia, we did the same on Azura in April without issue. Mum's the word though... 😄

This may be of interest. In November '21 whilst on board Iona, the latest cruise programme was released and I booked R318, a 30 night cruise to US and Canada in Sept of '23. I selected the lowest grade of balcony cabin on a select fare, cost £11068 with £450 obs included. I chose a select fare because it was marginally cheaper than the early saver balcony price. I paid a deposit of £100 for 2 px. I assumed at that point that the cruise price would not go lower than this launch price. Move forwards to early Jan of this year and an email from PO hits my inbox detailing a special offer of an additional 10% discount against online prices for privilege customers, I don't know how, I'm only Med tier, but I'm now considered a privilege customer. R318 was amongst the cruises with that offer. When I checked the latest balcony prices, a balcony could be had for £7,500 on a saver fare, but with my additional 10% discount that bought the price down to £6750. Becuase I had chosen the lowest grade of balcony cabin at launch, a saver fare was guaranteed to get me at least that grade, and possibly higher. So it was a no brained, I cancelled my original booking, losing my £100 deposit, and rebooked a saver fare for £6750, saving a little under 4k! I paid the balance on the cruise yesterday.

I sat next to a lady on a connecting flight to Valleta for a 2 week Med cruise in April who had paid adult price for one of her granddaughters, in order for her to join the rest of her party, a group of 8.

Not at all. 👍

I wouldn't give up on PO just yet fella. It's a p*sser that you've paid more for the cabin that's been allocated than you could get it for now, but as others have said, you were happy to part with that much wonga at the time you booked the cruise. Next time perhaps consider an early saver? At least that way you get a guarantee of whereabouts you'll be without actually knowing the cabin number. We've done select, saver and early saver, and the last is our preferred option. We've actually done quite a few cruises with PO and upto now we've only lost out once in terms of the price reducing as departure gets closer. How did you book, direct or through a TA. We book direct and think talk of PO reserving the detritus for saver fare passengers is inaccurate. We were on Iona last October and compared to other ships in the fleet she's huge. You wont know you're at sea. We've also gone transatlantic and around Iceland at the rear (and at the pointy end) on smaller ships and not had too many problems. At least you'll be able to jump in the lift and get to the MDR without too much of a hike. If you really aren't happy once you embark there's probably still options open to you...not all cabins are 100% satisfactory all of the time, we have had a very noisy balcony previously for instance. I'm sure you know what I'm saying here. Gary Barlows gaff is definitely worth checking out btw as is the Cow and Keel. You'll need to queue for the former and book for the latter. Have a great cruise.

Thanks for the replies. We are classed as priority passengers for Arcadia cruise J221 and have been given a boarding time of 13.00. I wondered, given it probably won't be at full occupancy, if this time is still classed as priority. The Sindhu is almost a must have for us. Dining options on Arcadia are limited as they are for a 40 nighter, without closure of one of the two additional select eateries. Fingers crossed PO also see it that way and prioritise a chef or two for it.

Can someone please advise what time boarding begins for upper tier and other priority passengers departing from Southampton. Particularly for Arcadia and Aurora should it be ship specific. The Sindhu on Arcadia is currently closed according to a poster blogging on another thread. Does anyone have a firm idea of which cruise it will re-open?

Thanks, will do. Yes, the dreaded last hurdle!

We were sent the full fat brochure, have just had a full 3 week cabin allocation notice period for the 40 nighter on Arcadia going out next month, were given a significant cabin upgrade on it, and as today is a 'significant' birthday, I've received an email inviting me to take part in a free prize draw for a food hamper to be drawn on the 31st. What's not to like about PO atm? 😊

To update you on this, we paid 4399 ea at launch for an EF (not ED as previously said) grade deluxe balcony on an early saver fare. We then were given 100 ea obs just before the balance became due. However today we have been allocated our cabin and have received an upgrade to an EA grade. So the currently advertised nearest equivalent cabin, an EB grade cabin midships is 5969 with an obs of 560 for a select price. And the current saver fare for mid-aft/mid-fore EB/EC is 3969. N We book direct with PO so I'm unsure how these prices stack up against those currently offered by TA.

I can help you in part with that. We paid £4,399 for an early saver balcony ED grade at launch. Then, 6 days before the balance was payable they chucked £200 obs at us. So your deal if you were to take it is considerably cheaper.

I can help you in part with that. We paid £4,399 for an early saver balcony ED grade at launch. Then, 6 days before the balance was payable they chucked £200 obs at us. So your deal if you were to take it is considerably cheaper.

Similar here. Absolutely is not like tying shoelaces.

Hurrah!

Especially impressive if Lindy, Loo, Ella and Louise all went on all 7 cruises 😁

We are on R209 departing 8/07 and with 7 days to go haven't yet been allocated a cabin and so can't print stuff off. How close does it need to get to departure before we need to really start worrying?