exlondoner

I don’t even think it was universal in May. I’m almost certain we went to our cabin first.

We too are on the similar cruise in August. For Bilbao the ship docks in Getxo. Is there a shuttle to the main town?

On our last, 12 days, cruise, it got to the point where I could use our remaining diamond perk amount to buy for the rest of the cruise in one go.

You an buy a day at a time, which stretches it out quite well if you don’t have it for port days.

Genuine.

It will be very nice to read some reviews of QM2 that aren’t gloomy and negative.

There is something rather plangent about having a hand-me down penguin kit.🙂 We only children are so lucky.

Thank you. It is helpful to know about Ch. 48.

It is a choice few of us will ever have the chance to make. Nonetheless I am sure I am only one of very many who find the matter interesting.

It’s certainly progress for me. I can (just) afford it. I doubt I would have been able to in, say, 1960.

And we must remember that there seems to be a small number of passengers (occasionally some appear on here) who, long after booking, are astonished to discover Cunard has such things as formal nights. So it is not surprising if some miss out on the subtleties of themes.

And they don’t call you like they did in the weeks/months after Covid. You just look at your watch and go. Presumably at some point they come and check that nobody is hiding behind their sofa, hoping to stay on for the next voyage. 🙂

Er, how do penguins relate to Halloween? Just curious.

So, universal secondary education, free health service at the point of delivery, a universal benefits system, lots of new housing, etc. all pale into insignificance beside people wearing a different colour tie for dinner. I would have thought the other things suggested a major rise in standards after WW2. If nothing else, it has enabled far more of us to live long enough to have the leisure to enjoy Cunard.

The shore excursions page for my next cruise, in August, has been ‘down for maintenance’ for months. Luckily I don’t want to book anything before we board.

I think all those numbers might be upped slightly with extra children, but certainly one of the joys of QM2 is that she carries so few passengers for her size, and definitely not twice the number of the Vistas. I can certainly see the comical aspect of trying to persuade a couple of rather frail and perhaps slightly deaf passengers to return to their cabins, because they were half an hour early. They would be so pleased to stumble with their several pieces of hand luggage back towards the lifts, which are always crowded on the last morning, even, for some reason, the ones going up. It would be almost as much fun for the hard pressed staff, trying to persuade them, and causing even greater delays while the discussion took place. I totlally agree it is cheating for people to come down early, and I also think most people don’t. But I don’t realistically see what can be done. Perhaps any one coming down more than 15 minutes early should be disembarked from the opposite side of the ship. That would show them. 🙂

Crikey. And was the Border Force out in force?

True, it is not fair. Equally, however, it is not school where you punish people for transgressions. And it is not a universal problem. Others say the difficulty was caused by those with mobility difficulties being slow (which should have been factored in to the disembarkation plan). On our disembarkation from QV a few weeks ago, when we arrived a few (less than five) minutes early, there was nobody about. They had started embarkation a bit early, but people were keeping to their times. So don’t assume that lots of passengers are going to transgress.

Why would QG come from Deck 9? I don’t think making people wait is very good customer relations, and could be dangerous if it led to more blockages.

I think I agree with all of this, except I don’t understand what you mean by traditional evening wear on smart attire evenings, unless it is that a surprisingly large number of men wear a tie.

Commiserations on the Covid. I still feel weak, though I only felt remotely ill for a couple of days. Hope you rapidly recover.

Large and pretty fast.

There is an RNLI boat going NW not that far away.

Yes, I’m wondering about that. There doesn’t seem to be a helicopter about.

How fortunate those people have never seen my house.