gumshoe958

London isn’t great for Christmas markets tbh, but what few there are (Trafalgar Square, South Bank, Leicester Square, Covent Garden) should be open by then. Christmas lights will be on by then in the major West End shopping streets (Oxford St, Regent St, Bond St). There’s also the incredibly popular Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park which you have to pre-book (not free). Finally I highly recommend the Kew Gardens Christmas light trail which is always beautiful and, while very popular, feels a world away from the hustle and bustle of central London. Again, you need to pre-book.

I think it comes down to your attitude to risk. If Anthem’s on time and you’re among the first off, you’ll make it. But there’s very little room for manoeuvre and even a 30 minute delay in disembarking would scupper you. I’d be minded to go for the 4pm flight. Yes, it’s a pain having to hang around Southampton but you don’t want to spend your whole cruise worrying about disembarkation day. And the 4pm flight would get you to EDI at roughly the same time as the train.

The EI124 arrives DUB at 10:25. The earliest LHR flight you could reasonably catch leaves at 12:00 and arrives 13:25. So once you’ve got your bags and gone landside you’re probably looking at a 15:30-16:00 arrival at Southampton, and that’s as long as all the stars align. Sorry, but I fear that’s a non-starter. With the earlier EI122 you’d have a very good chance but even I, who quite enjoys the thrill of the chase, wouldn’t dare try this one.

If your ship is due to dock at 10:30 you won’t be allowed off until 11:00 or later, so there’s no way you’ll make a 10:45 train. It’s a very popular train with limited space so I’m not surprised that the departures when the ship’s in dock are already sold out.

Air Canada flights arrive at Terminal 2B at LHR, the satellite terminal which is indeed a long walk to immigration and customs. Aer Lingus flights arrive at Terminal 2A, the main building with significantly less walking and - crucially - no immigration checks. If @Jack E Dawson has an option to fly directly from Dublin to Southampton, though, that would be a no-brainer in this situation. Just have a Plan B ready via London in case the Chicago flight is late or the Southampton flight is cancelled.

You will have to clear immigration at Dublin before proceeding to your connecting flight. Thanks to the Common Travel Area (CTA) agreement between the UK and Ireland you won’t have to clear immigration again at Heathrow, but you will have to clear customs. 99.9% of the time that’s just a walk-through though - no queueing involved unless you’re extremely unlucky and get stopped.

That’s the trouble with Google. Type in “Do I have to wear a mask on a cruise ship” and this is what you get: Click the link and you’ll see Google has just taken a selective quote from a similar question on CC 6 months ago, and presented it totally out of context. You can see why people get confused.

It’s a frequent question. No update.

Utter rubbish. He’s probably reading something written 3 years ago.

I absolutely think it will happen. But will these new smaller ships just be new versions of Radiance & Vision which are popular with many on CC because they feel more like ‘classic’ ships without all the bells & whistles of Oasis & Icon? No, they absolutely will not.

I think Royal are perfectly happy visiting a very limited range of ports. The market they’re now chasing doesn’t care about quirky destinations. The ship (and Coco Cay, obviously) is the destination. The issue is the home ports. They need smaller ships if they’re to continue operating in markets like Tampa and Baltimore. And I agree with @HBE4. Discovery class will be like a mini Icon, not a reinvented Radiance or Vision.

There is no Broadway musical on Odyssey. Just in-house Royal production shows. @leaveitallbehind has already answered for Symphony & Liberty.

Yes, 2/3 Barcelona 1/3 Civitavecchia is about right. For those boarding in Civitavecchia it can feel a bit like you’re joining the ship mid-cruise but it’s really not a problem - you’ll still get to experience everything, just in a different order!

Motion sickness and seasickness are different things. On most large, modern ships you’d hardly know you’re moving so motion sickness isn’t an issue. The thing people do tend to have an issue with is the pitching and rolling of the ship if the sea’s rough. It can be a weird sensation if you’re not used to it.

You’re right. My bad. They do now stop at T4, which makes National Express a no-brainer. For an extra £5 you can upgrade at the time of booking to Change & Go which allows you to move to any coach up to 12 hours either side of the one you booked. You can call up to rebook as soon as you miss your booked coach, if necessary. https://www.nationalexpress.com/en/help/change-go