_Biscotti_

I personally didn't mind the amount of formal nights, but would have been happy with 3 too. For me, doing hair & makeup every day always gets a bit tiresome towards the end of a two week cruise whether it's a formal night or not. I think everyone would welcome a pyjama themed evening in the second week 😄

New to this forum, but have just come back from the same cruise on Britannia and wanted to give my review. Hopefully it's helpful for future Britannia cruisers 🙂 This was my 4th cruise with P&O and sadly, Britannia was my least favourite ship (with Aurora being my favourite). Some things I didn't like about the ship itself: The lack of promenade deck that you can walk around - I don't think the walking track on deck 18 really counts as a proper promenade. The atrium and the open plan layout of it. Whilst I love the big ceiling decoration that hangs, I miss the grand staircase and do prefer the Glass House/Java area to be a bit more separated. One pool too few - I'm not sure if this is down to the fact there's about 3.5k guests or that the no reserving sunbeds with towels rule isn't really enforced, but it could take some time to find an available sun lounger on the sea days. Things I did like: The seating areas are modern and plentiful. Whilst the furniture on the balconies look a bit tired and the tables on the aft starboard side of deck 16 need a good clean/replacing. The rest of the furniture and décor was quite attractive. Service We found the service to be very good and all the staff were friendly. I only encountered one seemingly miserable waiter at the Lido bar, but maybe he had just had a bad day. The number of very happy and friendly staff far outnumbered this guy. It is clear the staff are more stretched than they used to be. Our cabin steward was brilliant, but had 21 cabins to do every day! The waiters also seemed to have a bigger workload than usual and the lack of a wine waiter was probably the most noticeable difference about the pace of service. Food The food was enjoyable. Would have liked some more variety in the buffet, but the food that was there was nice, I particularly like the salads in those little blue bowls. The meals in the main dining room were also good, with my two favourite mains being Mozzarella & Tomato Gnocchi and Beef Wellington. The small plates in the Glass House are actually quite big. I got 3 for £6.95, but really one or two would have been enough for lunch. Sindhu was the most amazing meal I had - I had the Tandoori Ratan to start and the Sindhu Signature Plate as the main. I cannot recommend these enough. The Beach House was nice, but nothing special. The portions are huge, which given the £7.50 cover charge is brilliant, but I would probably skip this restaurant next time. Room service had mixed reviews amongst our group. My Grandma really enjoyed the wrap she got, but my boyfriend ordered the 'Double Decker Burger' and the meat was really cheap quality. Room service is inexpensive, but the free burgers from the grill were much better, and I got peanuts instead of giant corn on my Tex Mex Combo - still not sure why. They also charged the room service to my boyfriend's card, despite the fact that I ordered it and I am the lead guest on the cabin. I think this is because I get 5% discount, but he doesn't as they also charged Sindhu to my sister's boyfriends card (where she gets discount and he doesn't) despite her being the one that booked, so just keep an eye on that! Drinks The mocktails are very good, as are the cocktails - my favourite of these being Raspberry Crème Brulee (imagine a slightly alcoholic Raspberry Ripple ice cream flavour). The bars offer the same small selection of cocktails, which were good, but I would have liked there to be some unique ones for each bar to make the menu and each venue more interesting. I don't drink coffee but my parents tried everywhere for coffee and their favourites were Java, Rivera Bar and the Crows Nest. They said the Glass House coffee wasn't as good and they had to wait a while because they only have one coffee machine, so they recommend you buy a coffee from Java and walk over to the Glass House if you want to sit there. Other Pros: The Headliners circus show is brilliant. Itinerary was great - the only port I didn't enjoy was Toulon. Other Cons: No evening turn down - I personally don't mind this, although I did miss the little chocolate 😋 They don't sing Happy Birthday to you with the music anymore - they said this stopped because some guests didn't like it, but I really enjoyed when they did this little touch, it just made the Birthday's more special and memorable. No photographers - would be nice to have these on the formal nights at least. Overall, our entire group enjoyed the cruise (there were 7 of us ranging from 26-80 in age), there were a few small cut backs that on their own aren't so bad, but added together make a noticeable difference. I imagine these are across all P&O ships though. So I would say that overall it wasn't bad, but wasn't too special either - 3.5/5 Next time, I would try a ship with a few more activities and a bigger variety of restaurants and bars (I'm 29 and found myself wanting more variety). Perhaps Royal Caribbean or Arvia will be better for me.