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To get off the ship that early, you would need to self disembark, which means you would have to leave all your luggage in the cabin, (even the cases) and then take them all off yourself the next morning. Works fine for some people, but be aware lifts can be difficult to get into on disembarkation day as everyone is up wanting to get to/from the restaurants at that time. Although highly likely that the ship would arrivein Southampton early as scheduled, there are very occasionally problems because of very bad weather, or perhaps mechanical problems with the ship which would delay arrival. If it is just a ticket to London though, I presume that would not be a high cost to loose in that very unlikely case it could happen.

Regards face cloths, I remember Molecrochip saying that we will be able to ask for them while stocks last, but they will not be replacing those stocks. Hence makes sense to me that they may now only be providing them on request for passengers in suites. They are something we do appreciate, not just for personal use, but mainly to be able to wipe around sink area and keep it clean/tidy during the day. We will be taking some Jay cloths for our next cruise, though will still ask for them. Taking a couple of face cloths is not a problem, but they are much better laundered regularly. Regards food, we we cruise for the ports and destinations, (sometimes along with some warm weather) and we have always found something to eat that we are quite happy with. I do wonder how people eat at home sometimes, but different people have their own preferences and priorities, so I do appreciate that is a very personal choice. The lack of an evening cabin service is something I have found an advantage as we no longer feel we have to make the cabin tidy and everything off the beds before we go to dinner. It can be a lot easier to keep things we will need later that night out and available. The larger ships have no appeal to us though, so have mainly sailed on Aurora/Arcadia, with an Azura or Ventura added for a specific itineraries.

Thanks a lot. That has just made me start a folder on Favorites to save down links, so added these. I have already looked at your links on the net and Google Earth - they are very useful, It is always particularly good to have something to do if the day is a washout 🙂 Halifax is our most southerly point this summer, so hoping for some good weather. Other stops are three in Newfoundland, Red Bay in Labrador and then north for scenic cruising near the entrance to Hudson Bay, followed by three ports in Greenland and one in Iceland after that. So very weather dependant altogether.

We have done a number of fly cruises in the Canaries which went into December and the ports were lovely in the evenings with the Christmas lights on. We especially like Tenerife, which we have been in over night a few times and have also been in the city when the lights were turned on (I think at the start of December). We also love La Laguna at Christmas time - you can take a tram up to La Laguna (about half an hour and a regular service), but will be a fair bit colder up there, so take coats if you go - nice to stay as the lights go on there, very atmospheric. If you go up to Madeira, that is also very atmospheric at Christmas time, especially after dark if you do not have an early dart. Weather generally still fairly good, but not necessarily "lying in the sun" weather. We got drenched in the old town in Gran Canaria once, though not really had a lot of rain at that time. We have only been once with P&O (Azura) towards the end of a trans-location cruise from the Med, so October then, though we like the Canary ports as they are easy to DIY, either in the port itself, or by hopping on a bus - but we know them very well.

We were there last September and got a taxi up to the citadel to start with. Spent a while there as we found the costumed guides very good. Then walked downhill in a slightly roundabout route, stopping for a drink and snack, and ended the day in the immigration museum followed by a good bar by the cruise terminal. Worked very well and the only hill walking we did was down. Cannot remember the cost, if the taxi, but not much for the short run one way and no problems finding it as we left the terminal. We are due back there in late July this year and think I had heard there was a gardens and Cathedral worth seeing, so we are thinking of just heading to those then spending more time on the board walk area. Would be interested if there are any other must do's in the City as we are unlikely to return after that as both cruises were/are long round trips from the UK if about one month in length, going in different directions. We very much appreciated help we got from this board.

I think that only applies if you have booked your current cruise through the agent you want to transfer the booking to though. That includes any cruise you had previously booked onboard and been able to transfer back to your agent, but not any cruise that has been made direct and remained as a direct booking with P&O.

We were on a round trip Caribbean before Christmas and during the disembarkation procedure, most of on hour's delay had built up before we disembarked (because of luggage levels) and and we were in a deck 3 cabin for that cruise. So could stil be extra delays eve after approximate times are given on the ship. May be worth jumping through any hoops you need to for a self disembarkation if you want an early start. As you say though, probably best to leave it until on the ship now. Hope the cruise goes well and you see the eclipse. Sounds like a bit of a gaffe by Fred's planners there. They have form from a couple of cruises we have been on. Fred normally has you off you early though.

I may have found the reason. Only two ships in Southampton when you return, but the other is Borealis, which is returning from the world cruise that day. Fred uses a different agent than the Carnival cruise lines do, so perhaps they will not have enough port staff to deal with the unloading, considering Borealis will have a lot of luggage on board. I see you are in adjacent terminals, 101 and 102. I wonder if he is giving priority to Borealis which will presumably have a lot of luggage on board. In which case, I wonder if they will allow self disembarkations later than usual for Bolette. May still be worth ringing head office to clarify the reason though. Fred's staff are usually very helpful, as are reception staff once you are on the ship.

Ahh, well 10am does sound very strange indeed, especially as you had an embarkation time of 14.00! Normally embarkation times can be as late as 3.30pm and I would expect people embarking after you to disembark after you. I am wondering which cruise you are on, is there anything that may affect that? I cannot think what would possibly make it that late though, but sometimes Fred disembarks very early as he then takes the ship on to another port to embark for the next cruise. Unless it is something to do with the port you are disembarking at starting late, or if there are loads of ships in port that day disembarking - that is purely speculation on my part though. May be worth ringing head office to ask about that and check if t is correct.

Fred is being strict about not using plastics on the ship himself and a number of stock items have been changed accordingly. Having said that we had no problems taking big plastic bottles of water on to the ship last November, but you cannot buy any plastic bottles on the ship now. I think you can buy 6 cans of water at a reduced price for cabin use, but not that cheap. Another thing you could do is take a couple of refillable bottles and you will be allowed to fill them from the water dispensers on the buffet, as long as you use a glass to dispense them and do not fill the bottles direct. Obviously we do not do that during the standard meal times as the machines will be in use by diners then.

For cabin use, yes. We always take some water and soft drinks onto the ship at embarkation and then often top the supply up as we go along, bit by bit. They will not let you take alcoholic drinks on board though. Drink prices are not bad on Fred though. If we are not on the drinks pack, we usually buy a litre bottle of spirits for cabin use, to drink with the soft drinks. No more than about £25 generally, DH thinks it was less than that for vodka (about £22). All drink prices seem to be going up a bit on all cruise lines, so not sure exactly.

Fred disembarks very early and normally has everyone off by 9.00am, or very soon after. I am pretty sure general disembarkation starts about 7.30am, (I just looked up a random top deck cabin for a cruise we have booked for this summer and the disembarkation time for that is 7.35am). I suspect if they know you still have your luggage, they will want to chase you up if late, but if not you would presumably find yourself trying to disembark with a lot of other people who do not have cases, so perhaps have problems getting a lift etc. If you do not want to leave early, why not just pop your cases out the night before and go with the flow? You do not have a particularly late embarkation time, so probably will not be off that late either. it will give an approximate disembarkation time on the link which you use to look up your embarkation time. You could always speak with the reception staff once on the ship about how disembarkation normally works, (and approximate timings), if you are still uncertain what to do. Both embarkation and disembarkation is done according to deck, with the upper decks first.

Worth searching various big cruise agents online as you may find one which deals with a lot of P&O bookings, we cannot mention specific agents on here.

If you are hoping to get something that has a very limited availability, I suggest you pre register with a big cruise agent once pre registrations are available, as they can get bookings very soon after the cruises are released, some have computer systems in place to assist with that. P&O tend to announce the dates when cruses will be released at least a few days before pre registrations can be taken. You could contact an agent now and ask to be on their mailing list, as well as keeping an eye out for anything mentioned on these boards or by P&O. As I said previously, if similar to last year, they will go on sale sometime in April as that is when our booking was confirmed for summer 2025 (and same mentioned by Becksi) No one will know the exact dates for this year until they are officially announced There will be a lead in to when the cruises are published and pre registration is possible, so nothing will become available to book all of a sudden. The release of bookings are usually split into different date ranges, with the earlier ones on sale a day or so earlier than the others. The high level Peninsula club members (Caribbean and above) are given an earlier date again. when only they can book. Hence a number of bookings will have taken taken place before the cruises go on general sale to other people. An agent will be poised to reserve your booking early morning of the date your chosen cruise is available for you to book, though they do not contact people they have booked for until later in the day, when they confirm payment and cabin number allocated (they will have asked you to give them a range of cabin numbers which you would be happy with when you pre register).

I think you will find the adherence to the dress code is similar on Fred to what is generally done on the P&O smaller ships, Aurora and Arcadia, so probably smarter than on the bigger P&O ships overall. Many men wear dinner suits and ladies dress quite smartly for formal nights, though lounge suits are perfectly acceptable for men and you will see a number of them. There are always a number of people who eat in the buffet on formal nights, as they do not wish to bring formal wear. That may well be more so on the shorter cruises. For non formal nights, a polo shirt is quite acceptable, as are smart, dark jeans, but not faded or well worn ones. Again, more men tend to wear shirts and chinos or smarter trousers, so you will not see many jeans or polo shirts, but they will not be out of place at all. It is only T-shirts without collars that are not accepted in the MDR's in the evenings, though are often worn earlier in the day. The added advantage of shirts which we see, is that they are lighter weight and easier to pack, which is particularly useful for a longer cruises. Ladies tend to still dress fairly smartly on non formal nights, but more what they would wear if going to a good restaurant, rather than something over fancy. I think the shorter cruises tend to be slightly less formal overall, perhaps partly because they have a slightly younger clientele. So I suspect you will see slightly more polo shirts and smart jeans on those in the evenings. You will find the atmosphere on Fred to be friendly and relaxed though. Enjoy your cruise.

Us too, though we also have priority now with P&O. Our favourite port for embarkation is Liverpool, not just because of it being local for us, but because we can turn up about midday and hand over our cases, them wander off into town to have a drink, bite to eat or just a bit of shopping for things we want, such as water and diet cola. The terminal is at the Pier Head, right in the centre if the city, so very easy to do that and can then just head back at our embarkation time and walk straight onto the ship. Hence no sitting around at all, unless we choose to do that on a bar somewhere, so more like flying when we always use airport lounges. They do not accept cases in Liverpool until the ship is accepting them though. That is usually about midday, but if there is any delay it could be later.

We have asked about upgrading on a couple of P&O cruises and they are resolute about charging whatever that higher grade would cost when we booked. The idea is that they really want people to offer a higher price than the minimum bid. There is a scale alongside your potential bid price which indicates the strength of your bid. We have offered more than the minimum bid for a balcony cabin, from our outside booking and are still a fair bit less than half the price they would charge us to upgrade and choose the cabin. We will likely not know the outcome until just after mid April. The price they have balconies set at currently, is in fact more than we would be charged if we rang to upgrade, so way over the bid price. Depends on your cruise and the ship.

Have always been able to stay in the terminal if we have arrived early in Southampton. I think it is just P&O limiting entry to the terminal, probably because they cannot accommodate enough people for the bigger ships and decided to use the same rules for all cruises.

Pop the names of your ports in the title or at least first post of a new thread so people know what you are asking about.

Excursions are expensive in Norway as an incredibly expensive country, which you will find if you buy a soft drink or hot drink ashore, (I suggest you think very carefully before asking for anything alcoholic in Norway). Having said that, it is a beautiful country and we did thoroughly enjoy our trip to the Brikstal Glacier from Olden, soon after we started cruising, so I would recommend that if you are up to the walk, which was fine for us in our late 50's, but probably not now. I have read that there is a bus which goes to a location accessible to the start point of that (though a bit further away) and some people have reported using that. However it is a distance from the port and if for some reason you do not get back to the ship in time, you would need to find your own onward transport and possibly hotel stays in a country with incredibly high prices high prices. For that reason we would not go any distance from a Norwegian port if we were not on a ship's excursion. That is entirely a personal decision for each to make independently though, so it is a good idea for you to ask about that. I suggest you will get a more responses on the "Ports if Call" boards from this site and another good move would be to look at the Trip Advisor entries for each of your ports and search under the "things to do" section for each port. They will bring up potential tours and photographs of various locations, though again you would be responsible for getting back to the ship, or home, if there is a problem getting back on time. Good luck with your search. I think you will find Fred has a waitlist for excursions, so you could ask to be put on that if you want to do an excursion which is not available. TBH you will have a lot of scenic cruising from the ship, so just going ashore and staying in the locality should also prove to be an enjoyable cruise for many passengers. I always use Google Earth, including street view, as a research tool for new ports we are due to visit, which gives a much better idea of what to expect. Hope that helps.

The bus system is very good in Madeira. Quite frequent too very cheap and reliable. The routes mentioned here are very regular ones. Think you can buy tickets on the bus (or could), or can buy a card and load cash on it for even cheaper travel and the card is re useable. Can check that and location of bus stops, either with a net search or could ask on trip advisor forums. There are a couple of buses which go up to the top if the cable car, which start at the bottom of the baranca. I think they were the 21 and 22, but a few years since we used them now. About 2019, I think. The buses go along the road by the seafront, not up by the shuttle bus drop and a lot go West up the steep hill to by Reid's and on to different places.

Oh right, sorry I misunderstood and thought you may have just used CPS previously for P&O and were asking more about possibility to drop off luggage before parking. A while since we have sailed from City with Fred, so cannot picture it at present and things have changed in that area with the new terminal to replace the tent at 102. I am sure they will direct you though, the operation is normally very slick.

Just a bit further down to Mayflower, by the Holiday Inn. We have used P4C for a few Aurora/Arcadia cruises in the last year or so. Once you say you are parking with them as you go into the docks, you are directed to drop off luggage at the terminal, then go over to the short stay car park to park your car. They take a little while as cars are checked carefully and photographed, then you walk the short distance back to the terminal. They took no longer checking the car than CPS have done recently for us though. I usually get out with the cases and some hand luggage, so DH just brings his own wheelie hand luggage bag from the car.

Thanks a lot for the reply, much appreciated.

That is the transfer we may get if we book a trans Atlantic as we would fly to Manchester, though not thinking about this year, so I realise it may change. Can please I ask though, if there have always been toilets available on the Intercruises transfers you have booked?