Big Foot

Hello,

I'm after some advice please!

I've booked a 2 night cruise on Britannia departing on Friday 24th March as part of my Parents Golden Wedding celebrations.

It's their actual anniversary on Saturday 25th.

I know you can purchase cakes via the cruise personaliser, however, these seem pretty small / standard designs etc.

I was wondering if, as I've booked them into a suite, I could have a word with the Butler & arrange for a cake to be made & delivered to the table during dinner.

But then I thought that's probably not enough notice so started looking at the P&O website. Mum & Dad aren't the sort of people who would enjoy the renewal off vowels ceremony, but whilst looking I stumbled across this ....

http://www.pocruises.com/ceremonies-at-sea/finishing-touches/cakes/

Does anyone know if you can only order these cakes if you are having a ceremony?

Has anyone ordered a special cake in advance?

Now the other potential issue I have is that they say cakes have to be ordered no later than 56 days before departure & if I'm counting correctly I'm at approx 53 days!

I'd appreciate any help / advice.

Thank you.

Can somebody point me in the right direction or link so I can see a sample copy of the daily Horizon news sheet. I would like to see how comprehensive it is.

I am on Ventura March 7th

Hello,

I am rather sad & keep things like this .....

Hopefully, this will give you some idea.

I'd say they are pretty comprehensive ....

https://flic.kr/s/aHskHXyiqp

Hope this helps.

Joan

Has anyone taken a superior deluxe cabin, and found the overhanging balcony above a nuisance? Not too happy about being overlooked, but to what extent did it affect your privacy and enjoyment of your balcony. Any help please!

We've had a superior deluxe on Azura.

As previously mentioned you are totally overlooked from above as opposed to having an overhang.

Yes, you might get a couple of people on the balconies above looking down occasionally when you're docking etc but they're not really looking at you.

Remember you've only got chairs, as opposed to sun loungers on the balcony, so it's unlikely that you're going to be sunbathing on there.

Everyone is different / has different expectations, however, we personally didn't have any issues with it & it certainly didn't spoil our cruise.

In fact we've booked adjoining superior deluxe cabins on Ventura for a back to back cruise for my parents Golden Wedding Anniversary next September.

Joan

Thinking of booking a suite on Azura. Wondering if there is much advantage of a butler over a steward, considering the extra cost involved.

Just to deviate from the subject of Butlers, have you done any research on which suite you may want to book?

The reason for asking this is that we've had a mid ship suite on Riveria deck & suffered terribly with noise from the deck above, scraping of chairs / sun loungers etc very early in the morning. The balcony is very narrow you don't get a sun lounger.

We've also had an aft suite, A750 which has a large, albeit covered balcony which was far less noisy; we would always try to book this as our first choice. It's actually cheaper than the mid ship balcony suites but in our opinion much better.

Just also bear in mind that some of the aft suites have the metal beam running through them which impact on the balcony.

I hope this helps.

Joan

Someone may correct me, but I don't think you can spread it over 2 days, I think it's from when you start. Personally I take my tablet ashore and use the free wifi in most terminals or when I have a coffee.

The wifi is for 24 hours from activation.

In theory you can spread it over 2 days if you don't activate it until the afternoon.

I used it on Azura last week & on Britannia last month & purchased the £12.50 option.

It lets you use one device at a time, however, if you are willing to share your log on details & remember to log out :rolleyes: then you can allow others to share your package. I'm not talking random people here; we travelled with some friends & I let them have my log on details so they could check their emails etc when we weren't using it. It worked very well.

Joan

I've just seen the new show produced by Jason Wilkes on Azura this evening.

It is called "Evolution" & is described as Mad Max meets Avatar!

We are a group of 4 ranging in age from late 40's, early 50's & early 60's & have to say that after a very long 50 mins we left the theatre feeling very underwhelmed!

Not only that, but not one of us understood what the show was actually about. :confused:

The cast worked extremely hard during the performance, so nothing against them, but we just didn't get it.

We've been chatting to 2 young ladies whilst doing the quizzes in Brodie's each night, who are currently studying musical theatre & asked their opinion of the show. They both said they didn't understand it either, so its clearly not necessarily an age thing.

itll be very interesting to see what everyone else makes of it & whether or not you enjoy it.

I for one will not be rushing to see it on my 2017 cruises, assuming it's still being performed, which I suspect it will be.

Joan

Hello,

Can anyone tell me who is the current CD / EM on Azura at present?

We sail on Friday & were informed on our cruise last month that it was Tracy Clegg.

However, understand Tracy is currently on holiday.

Thanks

Joan

Got off Ventura last week and we managed to dine in either restaurants with freedom dining. We were cruising with family and were allocated to different restaurants but no problem in interchanging. One thing that I did notice was the fewer people were using the restaurants deeper into the cruise. Definitely more people ended up in the buffet.

Our bookings are now linked; however, it's good to hear that you were able to eat in either restaurant.

Thanks good to know :)

Thank you.

That make sense re trying to even out the numbers for each etc, however, as you say how would they know / remember which one you were supposed to be in.

Thank you for your prompt response.

I don't know what made me think of it, but glad I did & asked the question!

Joan

We're off on Azura on 21st Oct & for the 1st time have selected Freedom Dining as opposed to Club Dining.

I (sort of) understand how it works, but do have a question.

When you are on a ship that has 2 Dining rooms allocated to Freedon Dining, do you still get allocated one or can you simply pop along to either one?

The reason for asking is that we've booked the same cruise as some friends but we're not cruising "with them"(it's just a coincidence we've booked the same cruise) & therefore the bookings are not linked.

They are also on Freedom Dining & we might want to dine together a few times (or not!). They are in a forward cabin on Lido deck, whilst we have a midship cabin on C deck.

Any advice greatly appreciated & also on tips re vegetarians re Freedom Dining. I know there is a separate menu as we enquired about that for our friends on our last cruise.

Thank you.

Joan

What package would you be able to use just to check your e mails and messages on while using an ipad? I am a bit confused (easy for me:D) as to what you can really use differing packages for?:confused::)

They haven't made it easy (well I don't think so!) we purchased the £12.50 package which I used on my iPad & was able to check emails etc.

Someone did post a while ago that you could actually get your emails using the cheaper package, but I didn't try this so am unable to confirm. I didn't want to purchase the cheaper package & then find I couldn't check emails. However, it seemed that you could "upgrade" your package so if you bought the cheaper one & couldn't get emails then presumably you could then upgrade to the £12.50 option.

We've had 2 aft corner suites C736 in May 2015 & B726 2 weeks ago.

We've never had any problems with noise from the shows or other passengers on their balconies. The only noise / vibrations you get are when the ship is docking.

As someone else has hinted at, the layout of the F & D deck aft suites are different due to the position of the balcony doors.

We'd book another aft suite again without hesitation.

Hi, Just wondering if there are any Ship wi-fi offers while Cruising?

 

Given the moans and groans surrounding the pricey new wi-fi system cost it occurred to me that there might be some temptation to offer "on board special" promotions to increase uptake.

 

I am sort of assuming the wi-fi on board Arcadia will have migrated to the new system by now....even though I was assured by c/s a few months back that it would still be minutes as opposed to days when we sail on October 22nd.:)

I didn't see any 'daily specials' etc whilst on our Britannia cruise earlier this month & certainly no sign of the old 'minutes' package.

We only bought the £12.50 / 24 hour package twice on a 14 day cruise whereas I'd have purchased the old 240 mins or whatever it was for £62.50. I just used to draft my emails off line & send them once logged on, spending about 10 mins a time actually logged in.

That said I found the signal to be pretty good on Britannia & (in my experience anyway) didn't have any issues using the internet.

Enjoy your cruise.

Joan

Hi,

 

since this thread was started has anyone used an aft suite which has had a sofa on the balcony. We are on B631 and have a aft suite so would be interested if someone can update this.

 

thanks in advance

Hello,

I can confirm that our aft suite B726 had the sofa, although we didn't really get a chance to use it as it wasn't very clean, due to the smut from the funnels.

In hindsight, there were some blankets in the wardrobe which we could've used to cover it but just used the loungers instead.

Be warned though that in trying to kept the balconies clean the cabin stewards (or at least those on our cruise did) hosed the balconies down everyday.

We weren't aware of this at first. It was only when on the 1st sea day that we used the balcony that we started to feel what felt like rain drops that we noticed the cabin steward hosing down the balconies above. This meant we had to retreat inside until he'd finished & then again when our steward wanted to wash ours.

It was a bit of a pain on sea days when I wanted to sunbathe on my balcony, but I suppose it's finding that fine balance of trying to kept them clean & not disturbing guests.

We tended to agree a time with our steward & would pop off to lunch.

Joan

we have B726 so plenty of room for a party would he serve cocktails beer ect and how ? would her set up a bar thanks all for your help

I had this suite a couple of weeks ago; it was wonderful.

Enjoy & happy birthday :)

As Im sitting on my case trying to squeeze as much in as possible just wondering if the suites have an iron and trouser press? Do the suites have any perks re disembarkation? We usually opt for an early self disembarkation. Thanks. So pleased the thread has been so popular and thanks to all the contributions. Much appreciated!

There isn't a trouser press in the suites on Britannia, just the iron & ironing board.

From other threads on a similar subject it seems that these lists have been removed as they were considered to be a security risk. The best you can hope for is 2nd or 3rd hand info from passengers who got told that so and so is on this ship for the next x number of cruises.

 

BTW there hasn't been a cruise director on a P & O for many years, they have been renamed to the more correct title of entertainment managers. They are managing the entertainment, not the cruise holiday. The previous title was always confusing.

Um didn't think of it from that point of view.

It's sad that P&O (& no doubt other companies) have to think like that these days, but I guess it's a sign of the times we live in.

Yes I know they are now called 'Entertainment Managers' but they were 'Cruise Directors' when I started cruising & the title has stuck with me :)

Joan

Hello,

Does anyone know if there is a way to find out who our CD is going to be?

We're sailing on Britannia on 3rd September & on Azura on 21st October.

It looks like P&O have removed the "Senior Offiers" list from their website:confused:

Thank you.

Joan

Would the butler bring a bottle of wine to the room or would that be room service? What about booking a trip. We have a fair amount of onboard credit and don't want to use it up booking beforehand. Also wondering about the retreat? We probably wouldn't want to book it everyday but perhaps the odd day. Would the butler arrange that? Thanks for any advice.

Hello,

Yes your Butler would book your trips for you.

In fact when were we in Flam a couple of years ago there was a Butler in the queue at the train station booking tickets!

With regards to the retreat, I've found this can be a bit hit & miss, depending on how good your Butler is.

We've asked one of our Butlers to do this for us previously & he did it without any issues. However, on a cruise the following year the Butler advised that he couldn't get us booked in. However, I wasn't overly impressed by him so not sure how hard he actually tried!!

I'm off on Britannia in 2 weeks & again don't want the use of the retreat for the full duration of the cruise but would like to try it for a couple of days. I'm going to ask our Butler if he can try and get us a couple of day passes & see what happens.

If we can't get booked in then it's not all bad as we've got a lovely aft corner suite :)

Joan

Hi,

 

Yes, that's correct. I was expecting to have to buy one of the 24 hour packages after reading on here, but was very pleased to find that this was a better deal for me.

 

Let me know if you have any other questions [emoji1]

 

 

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Thanks Monica, that's great to know as I too was expecting to have to buy one of the new packages.

I got off Britannia two weeks ago and I paid £62.50 for 240 minutes of Internet. It was a pretty good connection but hated having to watch clock all the time though.

 

 

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Hello Monica,

I know I'm stating the obvious here, as you've already said what you got / paid for etc.

So just to confirm you can still purchase the 240 mins package as opposed to having to buy one of the new 24 hour packages?

If so, that's great (well as great as it can be :rolleyes:) as I always type my emails etc off line in draft & just log on to send them. I find doing it this way 240 mins will last me a 2 week cruise OK.

Joan

Just for info if you don't have a suite next time; you can order a carton of milk from room service. I usually take fresh milk on board with me and if that runs out before I get to a port, I add a carton of skimmed to my breakfast order. It's UHT though [emoji16]

Thanks Florry, that's good to know. Have never considered that before.

It just goes to show it doesn't matter how many times you've cruised you can still pick up useful tips.

Joan

Joan

 

I have just looked and we have B725 which is the other corner suite. :) Pity we were not on the same cruise we could have waved to each other.

 

Dai

 

 

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Hi Dai,

We most certainly could have done :)

Enjoy your cruises.

Joan