rog747

FYI BIG N flights on sale with Jet2 Rome FCO to BHX (Brum) Flight Times - Mon 22 July 2024 Departs 12:25 Arrives 14:15 Fares from just EUR 126 + baggage ( + seats + meals if required) Perfect times for disembarking QV at Civitavecchia

In the past my dealings with Cunard's flights Dept has always been positive. If you have paid extra for flights from London (I noticed the flight add-on was around £450 on some fly-cruises this summer) then just tell your TA the flight options are not acceptable to you and for them to go back to Cunard for them to seek a better option... Let them know you already have booked HOTAC at LHR the night before your departure so you are happy to stick with that flight (in case you may incur Hotel change/cancel fees) and hope they can get a flight back in to LHR. Perhaps they may be able to get you something flying from BHX with Jet2 >? Trouble is on ''cruise ship'' days flights are often chock block to & from Rome FCO, and Barcelona BCN....

Yes indeed they can and could, but today costs £££ are the common denominator here. No longer do any charter airlines on short haul provide catering free on board like the good old days of Britannia, Air 2000, Monarch, Air Europe and even Dan Air. You might get the odd small Tour Operator who may specify catering on a charter but that's very rare today. Sadly we lost those heady inflight meal days and they went off in to the sunset. If Cunard were every again operating charter flights to join the ships in the Caribbean, then yes they would supply free hot meals and drinks as they did in the past. You do often get a small snack in Economy and a free water/drink on BA which is back again nowadays and they have the Buy on Board and pre-order menu too.

Cunard have only just this summer ramped up and restarted Fly/Cruises again to the Med. Starting points to join the ship (QV) are flying out to Rome Barcelona Istanbul and Trieste IIRC (no longer Venice Airport is used) It seems they have now again laid on some whole plane charter flights for the QV pax with TUI. TUI are fine, their catering for short haul is Buy on Board. They have a good range of stuff hot and cold. If you are on an early flight then perhaps grab a cooked breakfast in the departure lounge first. You may find they will also use Titan Airways as well as TUI who are good too. Again BoB for drinks/grub. In the past Cunard used to charter BA using whole planes from LHR (the 252 seat Boeing 767) for the Med Fly/Cruises but BA sold those a/c off a few years ago nd Cunard no longer charter from BA sadly. At that time Cunard charters were also sold from MAN BHX and Bournemouth, using TUI and Titan.

The shipping lines vessels was chartererd for cruises from Venice to the ancient sites of Greece and the Greek islands Turkey 🇹🇷 and the holy land for Lunns and the Hellenic travellers club, and then Ken Swan who formed Swan Hellenic cruises. There is a charming trio of short programs on BBC iPlayer called armchair voyage: Hellenic Cruise hosted by Sir mortimer Wheeler when they sail on a cruise in 1958 onboard the ss Mediterranean.

Although the new Worldwide Flexplus Travel Insurance brokers Aviva will now cover for over the age of 70, plus gives you basic Cruise Cover now included, sadly no longer do we get the ''add on a guest'' cover option. (you can pay to upgrade for longer trips, more expensive trips, and enhanced Cruise cover) To the OP: dbjhughes I assume you both have your own Flex Plus accounts as Aviva no longer allow you to purchase a guest policy. So, is the £900 upgrade for one person>? FYI The £100 bonus payment to account holders is being paid out to us all soon on the caveat you had a minimum of £100 in any of your N/Wide account(s) on 31st March. AFAIK you only get one Bonus payment pp.

I'm going to Portland today LOL (I live out in the country near Dorchester) Lunch at the Lobster Pot Cafe (great crab sarnies) and it is next to the working lighthouse which has a charming museum. Back up the hill (2-300 yards) is the National Coastguard Watch station - They often welcome visitors. At the King of Hearts ice-cream shop in St Alban's St, Weymouth they are doing 99's (Mr Whippy with a Cadburys flake) for just £1.19 ---- bargain! If you are National Trust members there are loads of places not too far from the Ship to visit but you need wheels. Corfe Castle, Clouds Hill (T E Lawrence's Cottage) plus Hardy's Cottage and his other house Max Gate. Also Hardy's Monument (but this is for the 'other' Hardy) Swanage Railway are having a big steam weekend with 8 really big Bulleid express steam loco's that used to run to Bournemouth (The Belle) and to Weymouth (The Royal Wessex and the Channel Islands Boat Trains) Weather is showing not too bad Portland weather forecast

That's good to know Many thanks for your kind reply

If I may ask please re further to my post above about going on QA in a few weeks time on a Late Deal; I've not been on board a Cunard ship since pre-covid in 2019, so as someone who likes late dinner on the 8:30pm fixed second seating what's the Britannia MDR dining room situation these days ? I really want to stay on the same table (same Waiters etc) and dine late sitting at 8.30 - is that still possible? TIA

Have a waitlist inside cabin just come up for QA on June 7th boarding SOU around the Med for 16 nights with a great deal for a Single OCC, and now just got to see my Consultant on Friday to say I am 100% OK to travel post-surgery and so I may book this as a very nice recovery trip - 16 nights plodding around the Med could be a nice boost for me. Plus I really dont need to lift a finger or move around too much, nor even got off at Ports if I don't feel up to wandering too much. I can get a deck chair on the pool deck and relax all day. I had a cervical spinal cord decompression so I just need to take it easy for 2-3 months but the Consultant says nothing to stop me sitting on a Liner for a couple of weeks and he preferred me not to fly. Just got another dressing change this week and hope he lets me off the lead.... So....Queen Anne here I come possibly LOL >!!

I gather many folk booked on this debacle are cancelling and getting a full refund. I had a lucky escape as I almost booked this as a late Deal last night LOL... No wonder it was selling for peanuts. phew, 4 nights stuck on a boat in BCN would make me heave

As the Ship's interior designer teams said a while back ''Be prepared to be wowed''. Yes, indeed the ship does look pretty gorgeous to me inside her - Smart minimal sleek art deco themes done with very nice colour shades/palettes. Very restful - I like it - alot! Just the Prom deck issue for me is the deal breaker....LOL

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I think the whole Gulf/ME region will be 'off limits' to all Cruise ships for the long time foreseeable. Cunard's ships are insured by Brokers at Lloyd's of London and the Underwriters state there is no Cover for the Region. (My Family are all at Lloyd's in London working in this field for the past 60 odd years). If these worrying troubles escalate further then we can likely kiss goodbye to Red Sea holidays (Sharm etc) possibly to Cyprus too, and maybe even Dubai. So, if you want to go and see the Pyramids, The Nile and The Valley of the Kings, then go there soon. The QA will be rerouted via the Cape as HAL has already done, and I am sure she will stay on schedule for her many US World Cruise guests to connect with the QM2's SOU-NYC crossing to get them home. Everyday is a 'School Day' for me LOL Scuttlebutt in slang usage means rumour or gossip, deriving from the Nautical term for the cask used to serve water. (or in Today's' world :The term corresponds to the colloquial concept of a gathering at the water cooler (USA) or the tea trolley (UK) in an office setting, which at times becomes the focus of congregation and casual discussion and gossip. A Navy scuttlebutt.

I concur with the other members, book your own hotels and arrange your pick ups to/from airport/hotel and the ship. If you want enjoy to NYC City then obs book a stay in a Manhattan hotel pre and post cruise. Red Hook cruise terminal is only a short taxi across Brooklyn Bridge to the ship. The only advantages in booking the add-ons with Cunard is that they will deal with things if they go wrong (such as the ship is running late or any other major changes). It's wise to book your own hotels without harsh cancellation or change penalties.

That's NYC westside highway The old Cunard piers I think with the metal sign

Just been tipped off that the Queen Elizabeth will be Miami based for the winter 2025/2026 plying Caribbean cruises. Some rather nice trips there on sale. I did not know about these until yesterday! Unlike P&O's winter Fly-Cruise offerings with their own charter flights from various UK airports to join their ships in Barbados or Antigua, Cunard have decided on a Miami base for QE (a first for Cunard in recent years >?) Therefore I guess Cunard are going more for the local and American 'Home' crowd guests, and I cannot see them chartering their own flights to Miami from the UK to join the ship. This is something that I am sure Hays Travel would rather like to do for selected departures, as their own flights from Bournemouth and Exeter on P&O's offerings are always a sell-out. There is a shortage of UK charter airlines with spare wide body aircraft (Hence P&O's Maleth Aero awful contract debacle, now cancelled) and I am not sure if Virgin Atlantic or BA with whom Cunard have used before on Fly-Cruise charters, will have any spare capacity if approached for flight contracts. Miami is not on the charter flight list, unlike many Caribbean airports. I guess Cunard (for UK guests) will just buy in seats on VS, BA, and AA from LHR to Miami, or use Norse from LGW. One way to get to the ship from Heathrow and from the UK's many regional airports is to use the Aer Lingus Miami (MIA) flight from Dublin and add on the Aer Lingus feeder flight from your nearest UK regional airport, say from Bristol, Exeter, Southampton, Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, etc etc Your luggage will be tagged right through to MIA, and what is all rather cool, is that you can pre-clear US Immigration and Customs in Dublin so that when you get to Miami you arrive as a 'Domestic' passenger and walk straight in.

Done quite a few of the pre-xmas DEC SOU-Lisbon-Funchal-Canary Islands cruises and we were lucky on all of them with balmy weather all the way there, and back each time. Even Lisbon although cool was sunny clear and bright. Funchal and the rest were always T-shirts and shorts. A real tonic for the approaching UK winter. We always got back to SOU around DEC 23rd... Had a mixture of Cabins - Inside, Outside and Balc's. A Balcony on this cruise was possibly not really used much but was nice of course, to have. Always found that this cruise was sold off cheaply and we always got a bargain. Last one I did was on QE DEC 2019. The ships were decorated for Xmas which was lovely.

I like both QV and QE, but QE for me wins hands down. The Lido restaurant on the QV is IMO abit like a slightly too bright John Lewis cafe whereas the Lido on QE had darker wood and feels rather more elegant. In the Britannia MDR on QV the entrance staircase from deck 3 down to 2 (pour le Grande Descent) does a reversal on itself so you end up back facing the doors, whereas on QE (like on QM2) has quite a spectacular staircase in to the MDR, set with art deco uplighters. The Theatre on QE is a bit nicer too. Just my tuppence lol. Of course QV (pre-refit) was 'prettier' when she had the tiered decks at her stern, but the trade off with that was a small Lido Pool sun deck area.

Yes QA, like the HAL Pinnacles has a full wrap/walk around Prom Deck but it is not wide enough for any deck or steamer chairs. There maybe a few wooden benches (with Life jackets in). The sea views are very limited due to the placement of the large lifeboats at deck level. The Top Pavilion pool and some upper deck areas/QG Terraces and the rear/aft Panorama Club Pool deck are pretty spacious. The Panorama Pool Club may not be always that peaceful for some folk as it has themed DJs and live bands lined up, so the area and Bar could be more lively on some cruises. There is also the Sky Bar and Observation deck on the Top forward deck. All of the Vista/Signature Class ships plus the QM2, have the Prom Decks that we all like and love on to sit on to watch the world go by.....As does the the P&O Aurora.

BA do fly from T3 as well but on some mainly longer flights, but just check your booking details and the Terminal will be displayed.

BA Rome FCO will be T5 which is just off the M25 and the first terminal drop driving from SOU. BA Euro flights check-in closes (and bag drop) at 60 minutes before departure. If you are flying Club Europe then there a a few Lounges to wait in at T5. I think keep an eye of the ship docking time in case of any delays, and let the Car firm know you are getting off ASAP once the ship clears. They usually know the drill. They may suggest 7.45 or 8am is quite OK just in case of a late clearance. Give them your flight number and times of course.

Check-in closure at -60 minutes before departure is the latest for the baggage drop/check-in. That is what airlines work to to 'close out' the flight and begin to do the load sheet and take any Standbys etc. Some Europe flights, airlines may work to -45minutes, as do BA at some outstations. Just saying this as should one get held up, then panic stations can kick in at after -60 LOL

I agree with the poster above and would self disembark carrying all your own luggage off the ship if you have a 12.50 flight. The ship normally clears by 7.30am. So a car booked for 8am or 8.30am is fine. It should normally be a ride of around 90 minutes, and Terminal 5 is the first drop, and the quickest. If you are going from T2/T3 or T4 it may take 10-15 minutes more. But the journey could take more if traffic is bad or there is an accident on the M3 or the M25. Friday can be busy but traffic usually builds up later in the day. The airline check-in closes out at one hour before your flight (ie:11.45) That is the last moment you can arrive at the Desk and get on!

BTW if you are looking for a lovely small family owned hotel right on the lagoon just down from S.Marco then the Pensione Wildner is a treat. Great food, and breakfasts with a view. Its old,quirky and charming with no lift, and it's cheap! Book a lagoon view room. Water taxi stop 1 minute walk away, the hotel is right on the promenade of Riva Degli Schiavoni and almost next to the San Vidal Church near the Accademia Bridge, the Church where Vivaldi practiced and now concerts are held. Rick Stein ate at the Hotel on his Venice to Istanbul TV series.