ellay864

I hope this is allowed, please delete if not, but I thought this might of interest to anybody stopping at Monaco, or at Villefranche where Monaco is just a train ride away.

My husband was desperate to walk the F1 circuit - nothing else mattered - so when we docked in Villefranche a  couple of weeks ago we did just that.  It hadn't been easy finding clear directions with pictures to help so on return I put my own together and added it to a blog site I have neglected for years

Here is link to the post that has the details if anybody else would like to do this, albeit rather late in the season!

Monaco: A walk round the F1 circuit

Thanks for this great review. We sail in October and dock at la Spezia and lots of people are booking for Florence or Pisa. We will come and do Florence as a weekend break sometime and decided we'd try Cinque Terre with no real idea of where to start. This is really helpful

Thanks all. Have decided we prefer the look of Britannia more...the food and drink choices outweigh balcony as priority for us. And we're going to take the July hit. Now going to forget any school kid stuff and focus on looking forward to it

Thanks everybody. We spent ages looking at this, really prefer Britannia in terms of the ship facilities and have decided to go for it. Now putting aside any thoughts of kids and getting on with looking forward to it

You do know Scottish schools will be on holiday then.

 

I would go on either ship however in school holidays or out. Our main reason for avoiding the holidays is cost. I don’t mind children at all but if it is cheaper the week before then I will choose that one.

 

 

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Sorry, should've said English! I'm very active in some FB groups that have a US v Brit split and went into auto :o

We sailed on Britannia to the fjords in August with our son and family, there were a lot of children on board, but obviously we could not complain.

My preference would be Ventura but Britannia is newer, showers have glass doors rather than curtains, buffet is better laid out and dining rooms are quieter. But overall it is too bland for us the balconies are a sham and the lifts are totally inadequate.

I've read about the lifts, but what do you mean by balconies a sham? I heard they are bigger on Ventura

Thanks all. It seems even the first of those weeks is holidays for US kids, and second week might be right at start before some British ones break up. Also it's Norway. I would expect loads of kids somewhere like Spain, France, Greece but not sure if Norway would get so many

Thank you. September isn't an option, and May might be difficult. I was also aiming for warmer weather time! I might look again at longer ones but these two for next year did seem to fit. From what you say, either will hit US holidays anyway so it may not actually make much difference between the two

Hi, am considering a fjords cruise and narrowed to Ventura 7-14 July or Britannia 20-27 July. My understanding is that Ventura is a more family centred ship but the Britannia cruise bills itself as being in school holidays. Now ours are grown up we prefer to avoid multitudes of children and so undecided between these. I know the later one is right at the start of holidays and some schools may not break up until a little later, but also wondered if fjord cruises are very popular with families. Any advice welcome, TIA

We've never cruised with P&O but looking at our first next year doing fjords. We know we want to do the itinerary with Flam in and have some date constraints which leaves us with the choice of Ventura 7-14 July or Britannia 20-27 July.

We're an older couple, kids all grown up so usually avoid school holidays, or at least places with lots of kids. Did do a fantastic cruise 2 years ago Scandinavia/Russia in holiday time but very few families there. A friend who has sailed on both ships said to avoid Ventura as it's very family orientated, and she loves Britannia.

So would you choose Ventura at the earlier date of Britannia in first week of holidays? Can anybody give the pros and cons of each ship, and maybe also any views on just how family full it will be given the destination

We're looking at doing Spain, France, Italy on Connie October 2018. We've only done 3 cruises, all Celebrity, Equinox and then Silhouette twice. Was trying to figure out the restaurants as their wesite deck plan still shows Ocean Liners and it's only been through posts here I've found out it's gone. Bit gutted as loved Murano. So now it's just Tuscan and Qsine, right? I don't do Sushi so ruling that out! How does MDR compare with Solstice class? And what about the Oceanview buffet?

I've just made a booking...maybe...am not sure what the heck is going on! Tried several times and each time I chose an available stateroom it then said I couldn't select it and when I went back that cabin (and loads more) were suddenly not on the available list.

Eventually I found a one that seemed to let me book it and went for it, completed the booking, completed the payment, got the screen came up with reference numbers. All good. But going onto My celebrity it firstly showed as no reservations; when I put the booking reference in it brought it up but says it's on hold, expires in 24hrs.

Is this just part of the booking process, it takes a while to show fully on screen? Or should I be worried? I thought the disappearing cabins was down to people taking advantage of the half price offer (I was) so was glad to have got through and booked, now just hoping I actually have

Brilliant - thank you :)

sorry...if room sleeps more than 2 won't main bed be by bathroom - is that what you're saying? we want the bed by the balcony so presumably should avopid the ones with the symbol for extra beds?

Hi, looking to book on Silhouette for next year and in our 2 previous cruises we were lucky enough to have the cabin layout with bed by the window, sofa nearer the door. Is it possible to tell the layout from any of the symbols on the deck plan on the Celebrity website?

We're sailing on Silhouette in August. Last time out on Equinox we booked on the day of arrival for dinner that evening in Tuscan Grille, and got a discount for doing so. We did end up also dining at Silk Harvest and Murano during our trip.

This time we'll probably want to do them all again so I'm wondering if we're better looking at pre-booking now (there's offers that seem to be doing discounts by booking for 4 dinners upfront) or whether the best offers are to be had on boarding

I could kill for the recipe for the butternut squash soup I had in the MDR. The book is still $59.95 but I dread to think what postage to UK would be and I can't pay that much when that recipe might not even be in there!