john watson

Ships dock alongside 50/50 so choosing port/starboard cabin is a lottery. However if you are sailing predominately in a single direction to East or West it is easy to select a South facing balcony. Roundtrip it evens out. This is the only reason I favour a specific side. Regards John

There is a thread on YouTube "Man arrested for cruise scam and other news" which relates to a US citizen who allegedly was taking payments from people for cruises but not making booking arrangements with cruise lines. It seems to relate to Alaska. Regards John

This was never a problem years ago when ships sailed with two or more classes. Regards John

Strange cabins above and below nothing appears to be a potential issue. Regards John

Sorry to hear this, whereabouts is/was your cabin situated? Regards John

Have you thought about a shirt and kilt? Regards John

I hope to goodness sake that I am wrong but everything about what has been said on this booking sounds well dodgy. Regards John

When you say Canada, could it be Nigeria? Regards John

I was wondering where cruise lines get these fascinating names for loyalty tier levels so I looked it up. Palatium comes from being of the Palatine hill, one of the seven hills of Rome where aristocrats built fabulous mansions. Dimond build the most beautiful and sophisticated bicycles in the world in all the styles for sports and high class leisure use. Very interesting. Regards John

They were quite happy! Regards John

On one of the Muster Drills in the theatre on a Princess cruise on a very hot day I looked at the couple to my right and they had brought their lifejackets and were wearing warm clothing including woolly bobble hats. I asked the guy if he had his medication and got positive confirmation. I asked him if it was his first cruise, "yes" he replied so I simply said "well done!" Regards John

I am thinking they may have completely sold all cabin just above your booked one. It may be that only cancellations of suites will cause a knock on effect right down the rankings. Regards John

Sounds camp to me. Regards John

The problem is exacerbated by people sitting for long periods in a fixed position. You can minimise the effect by moving and walking about, standing from time to time. I tend to get up a few times and walk to the furthest toilet and queue up. Let others jump ahead of you and walk the long way back to your seat. Just move about as much as possible. Some people recommend wearing slippers as your feet swell up. If there is a galley wander in and ask if there is any possibility of a coffee, this can lead to standing and chatting. Regards John

Princess use the loyalty programme as just one way they can sort out sales problems and increase revenue. Having a 500 days as a top level tier qualification is not going to impress newcomers in the same way as years ago cigarette coupons could be saved and redeemed for "gifts" from the catalogue where the top item was a helicopter. They probably have difficult periods in the calendar and have to put on special themed cruises, tasters to get new people to try the line and pre-existing cruisers to have a cheap short break with points. I do not think anyone would base their cruise booking significantly on getting cruise credits to achieve the next level. It is all about a multi-strategy marketing campaign trying to maximise revenue without any consideration as to whether benefits are fair. Regards John

You may also get the cabin steward to reconfigure double to twin beds or vice versa once on board. There have been cruises when I was sharing with my daughter and beds needed to be separated. Regards John

The situation with P&O is that passengers sailing out of United Kingdom had very few different cruise lines to choose from and a huge proportion of them chose P&O. Over the years this led to a high proportion of top level loyalty passengers. On a number of occasions they decided repeatedly to have a different cut off dates to calculate the points accrued. The idea being to level the playing field somewhat and give newcomers a chance by reducing ancient points. At one point Princess and P&O cruises were counted by both lines evenly. After they were separated by Carnival, Princess accepted P&O cruises at full value and P&O accepted Princess cruises at half points. The situation changed when Princess, who only had a short ex-UK season changed to operating all year round out of Southampton. When this happened both cruise lines decided to make their loyalty systems independent. Princess cut off at 17 December 2017 and cruises sailed with P&O prior to this date were still counted by Princess but only for passengers who had completed an actual Princess Cruise by that date. Regards John

This explains why the cruise wants double occupancy in every cabin as a basic minimum. This is not my problem if I only drink water from the cabin sink and never go on shore excursions and have a big win in the casino. Same as Mrs. Watson. Not my concern that we are not spending on board You still have not explained how you have total confidence in your second passenger. Regards John

I think you have missed the point when you say the person did not gain anything. They attempted a booking with just one passenger listed and the cruise line refused to accept the booking. When suggest it is not a good idea to book someone who in the end wont show up. How confident are you that when you book a cruise that the other passenger wont become sick, have a close relative die, just change their mind etc etc. Regards John.

Why would you get a bill when a full amount of money has been paid for two passengers and you have turned up. Princess would need to pursue a legal case with a non-existent person Regards John.

When we were on Sky Princess, I had booked S219. It has a standard size balcony on Deck 17, Sun Deck. Instead of having inside cabins across the other side of the corridor you have a glass wall and a view of the Retreat Pool for quiet swimming. Very atmospheric late at night when you traipse back to the cabin You are also near to public toilets in case someone hogs the shower. Plenty of towels available near the pool. Regards John

Nini, I took a look on YouTube and found some Dolphin Deck Balcony videos of the big balcony type. They are of the more aft Premium Deluxe run. I was thinking these stick out a lot and above wont stick out the same amount but conversely wont not stick out at all. Regards John

A nice, well placed hotel in Southampton is Leonardo Royal Southampton Grand Harbour Hotel. You can see some of the berths and ships, from the hotel. It is opposite Holiday Inn, Herbert Walker Avenue, which is cheap and cheerful but the restaurant is a bit basic there. The cruise berths are very spread out at Southampton. The taxi guys know which ship is where. Regards John

They are larger balconies on Dolphin and I am pretty certain they are 50/50% covered/open. Regards John

If you are willing to pay 200% single supplement, can you not just book a second person on your booking and tell them at the terminal they are running late knowing they are a no show? Regards John