jon81uk

For the thermal suites at the spa you book in person. show bookings are in the line-up, same place they are listed before boarding.

It’s the Aussie MerMaiden. Resilient Lady has the Athens MerMaiden in May 2023 and then does the repositioning in late 2023 to Australia before starting a season in Australia.

It is a sail away, so it usually happens when leaving the first port. That means those with the deep blue extras get two separate sail away parties, the normal first night and the second night too. If you purchase Splash of Romance you get a third one. None are in Richards Rooftop.

Only guests in suites get access to Richard’s Rooftop. The deep blue extras party is at the rear of the ship.

I loved Untitled, the first 10minutes is the worst, but the last 15 from the slow dance to Downtown to My Heart Will Go On and the other live singing is fantastic. Ships in the Night on Scarlet needs to go, it didn’t make sense.

Test kitchen has a lot of high top bench seating facing the open kitchens, there are very few tables. There are some high top tables for two and some booths for six. But if you are seated at the high tops facing an open kitchen then they will leave try to gaps between parties, or you can ask them too if the restaurant isn’t busy. It’s not communal seating, just continuous seating. whereas Gunbae is communal, you will normally be seated at a table for six with an other party.

Virgin don’t offer drinks packages. Instead the drinks are reasonably priced and you can pre-pay bar tab to get bonus credit. Plus there are no tips as they are all included in the fare. Bar tab means for every $300 prepaid to your account you get $50 (or $100 of there is a promotion) extra to spend. It can be used on all chargeable drinks, including barista made coffee, juices, cocktails and other alcoholic drinks.

They don’t really rotate much but there will be some changes. A few menu dishes have changed, the beef dish at Pink Agave is different for example. But overall no big changes. sometimes there are daily specials in the Galley food court for lunch. on Valiant Lady the variety acts in Its a Ship Show will change every few months. Hopefully they will be switching out some of the shows onboard as after four cruises I’ve definitely seen them all!

Can see it in this Facebook video https://m.facebook.com/watch/?v=715170526794722&extid=NS-UNK-UNK-UNK-IOS_GK0T-GK1C&mibextid=2Rb1fB&ref=sharing

There is usually someone at the red desk on deck seven for dining reservations if you can’t/won’t do it on the app. Or go to the restaurant. Just please consider other guests, I’ve been stuck in a queue trying to check in for dinner while someone in front is trying to make three days worth of reservations!

But it’s up to the Government to decide how to manage the border, not Virgin so it doesn’t matter how they manage embarkation, they’ve got almost no control over passport control.

This is why Virgin encourages people to book a time slot to spread the crowds out. But the system used and the staffing is up to border control, it’s not something Virgin would have much say over.

oh we did just get it delivered from Ship Eats. But it’s more just a general issue with the minibar set up that you can’t walk straight in and make many drinks because there isn’t enough mixers.

You need to call and pay for it, they cannot sort out bar tab at the port it’s too late then. But I have paid for it by phone 24 hours before.

If you had a pick-up then you are mega rockstar which offers a dedicated agent for your cabin alone so they will do almost anything you ask for. Regular rockstar suites don’t get to make quite so many requests. In a regular (not mega) suite it actually was harder to get hold of the mixers. Seemed odd that we had the five half bottles of spirits but only the premium mixers and have to ask for diet coke/sprite. Would be nice if the minibar was pre-filled with softs/mixers too.

In theory whether it is US or European they should have regular, diet/light and zero available so it would be a stock issue not a regional issue. I would like them to try and offer a better range of soft drinks though, just offering Sprite Zero would have been nice so there is more sugar free options. Or some flavoured ice teas.

Coke Zero is not the European version of Diet Coke. Coke Light is the equivalent to Diet, Zero is available in Europe too. on the transatlantic trip they had limited stocks of post-mix Diet Coke and cans of Diet Coke. They rarely had Diet or Zero in the Galley and prioristed stocks for bars apparently, but they had cans of Zero on request in the Galley. Bars usually had diet in some form. Towards the end of the two weeks they were out of all post-mix and serving from cans in most bars for all soda. Diet did run out too which annoyed me as I too prefer diet/light to zero. I would expect they have regular stocks of regular, Zero and Diet now from Miami in cans and post-mix. But I assume someone can confirm who sailed more recently.

It’s written on the luggage tags that you need to keep them on.

It’s also (unsurprisingly) unique to Miami, when boarding in Barcelona and Portsmouth tips were not expected to the baggage handlers because European tip culture is very different to USA.

Yep there is trivia in the pub type venue, not so much during the day but definitely early evening. There is also Risky Quizness which is a sillier game show format.

I think originally they were allowing the full schedule to appear in the app before boarding but when they switched to all shows and classes being book onboard only it stopped showing the full description of things in the line up.

the first ten minutes of untitled is the weirdest part. The show gets much better with the best of the dances being close to the end. It’s not as experimental throughout as the first few minutes makes out. I found ships in the night on Scarlet Lady way more weird.

First to book is the smaller exercise classes, for example the bungee class only holds 6-8 people. Also if you want to pay for Grog Walk as that doesn’t hold many. then consider Never Sleep Alone and any guest comedians or similar. then Duel Reality. Other shows won’t fill up as quick.

No the pool party is the end of Scarlet Night (moves to the red room if bad weather). Pajama party is a dance party with cheesy music and will either be in the athletic club (deck 17 aft) outside or the dock house (deck 7 aft) indoors. Pack Pajamas!

Duel Reality is the stand out show, a circus take on Romeo and Juliet. untitleddancepartyshowthing is fun, the first 10 minutes is a bit weird but stick with it, it gets better with some good gags, then fun dances, then emotional dances and finally a singing finale. it’s a ship show (Valiant Lady only) depends on the variety acts onboard but is a fun show. The food is not good though, steak tartare is a weird choice. Ships in the Night (Scarlet Lady only) is skippable. A weird show about modern life. Heartbeat is a very fun club night with dancers on stage and in the crowd. scarlet night can be a bit odd if you just miss all the pop up shows. But the pool party is fantastic.