English Tim

Half term in 🇬🇧

My wife and I are flying from UK to LAX in May, fortunately on a Friday, staying at Residence Inn, Long Beach Downtown, on points! Therefore, we’ll be able to use the free shuttle around Long Beach. We’ll take Uber from airport to the hotel and from hotel to cruise terminal. Thanks for the local tips.

I reckon leaving the ship at 7:30 with luggage and about 40 minutes to the airport.

The Avis/budget shuttle from the port, runs every 30 minutes, which makes it tedious. If you’ve just missed one. It might be worth getting an Uber if there are a lot of people waiting, so you don’t have the lineup when you get there.

It is a domestic flight to DCA. Wouldn’t consider this for international flight.

JetBlue have unkindly brought our departing flight forward to 11.20 on a Friday, in May. Our ship is due to arrive in Port of Miami at 07.00. We are fairly familiar with the port having been lucky enough to use it twice recently. On the last occasion, we took an Uber to MIA, but in May, we need to get to FLL for an 11.20 departure. We intend self debarkation, to give us more time, and then getting an Uber to FLL. We have looked at alternatives, but they don’t seem to be any. What do you all think?

When my cruise was cancelled Explora informed US agents but not those in the UK. I discovered the news on this site.

what is the answer?

We are torn between Silversea Dawn and Seabourn Ovation, which are pretty much all inclusive, but we particularly liked drinking champagne and eating caviar whilst we watched the sunset, which was much easier on Seabourn, Due to location of bars. We also found our fellow cruises more friendly, which may have been because they are smaller ships and so you see the same people more often.

Interesting that you should say about the walls. We could hear our neighbours TV in the middle of the night sometimes and I assumed they must be hard of hearing.

https://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=711207

Thanks for your comprehensive report. We are joining in May, but have Oceania Vista to experience first.

Looks ideal, not far from Fenchurch Street and very close to Liverpool Street. Of course, when we are asked these questions, we have no idea as to the persons budget.

Sounds like the relatively new Elizabeth Line should be ideal. LHR to Stratford, East London. Stay at Stratford hotel adjacent to Westfield Shopping Centre, then DLR (Docklands light railway to West Ham, then Tain to Tilbury Docks.

Interesting that the social media page cannot be named, yet on that page cruise critic roll calls are often referred to.

Presumably, this weekend was the first of the new luxury charter flights from Gatwick to Barbados. The ones with no in flight entertainment, so hopefully someone would like to post what their experience was really like.

Last year, we flew back from Barbados on the same day that Arvia finished its cruise, and Barbados airport was absolutely chaotic with long queues snaking all around outside the terminal, so it suggest that maybe the airport is struggling to cope with the large numbers.

Thank you for all your prompt answers. They’ll be happy to be fed and watered even if they can’t watch a video.

Friends of mine have booked a P&O cruise. I’m sorry I don’t know on which ship but from the Caribbean. I am told that the aircraft was overbooked and so they are being put in an alternative, which doesn’t have catering or in-flight entertainment. it seems a bit far-fetched to me, but they are good friends and I trust what they say. Is anyone else able to shed any light on this topic?

How do you know what other companies have done? Maybe people have said things, but it doesn’t mean it has actually happened.

We’ve just enjoyed a wonderful cruise, where favourite ports were exchanged due to the unfortunate conflict in Israel. I spoke with a lot of people on the cruise and they all understood the situation and were happy they were not in Israel. There would appear to be a good number of people on this forum who are not giving enough consideration to the many thousands of people affected by this war. No cruise is a bad cruise, they may not go where we want them to go but the service is always fantastic as are the facilities. The weather will still be decent and God willing you’ll be alive at the end of your cruise. Cruise lines are still recovering from the losses of Covid and everyone needs to give them some slack. So cut out all the moaning and groaning and look forward to a different voyage.

We had a lovely day on a Turkish boat, I’m not sure of the type, but we laid on cushions, did lots of snorkelling, talk to some very interesting people, a couple of whom were on the Seabourn encore, and the desperately worried that we weren’t back at 5:30 when the ship was about to sale, unfortunately it didn’t leave until 6 pm and they waved to us as we drunk our champagne. What a grand life. we had hoped to dine in Silver Note, but they rang us to say they were full, so hopefully in two days time on my wife’s birthday, they will be more accommodating. We also missed being on Seabourn encore, but we are very happy here and on any cruise ship, particularly when we like the champagne and it’s free.

Thanks for all your input and reports, and I agree with your judgement that the line is promising and luxurious experience with top food, which they appear to be delivering. I was expecting this to also include top quality wines and spirits and so far I’ve only seen an 11 page list of expensive additional cost wines and champagne. Are you able to provide a list of included wines and cocktails, please?

We are fortunate enough to be taking town Silversea and one Oceania before then, so it should give us a good degree of comparison.

I’m delighted to say that as a result of them cancelling my cruise from LA to Miami, They have now booked me at no further cost on back-to-back cruises from LA to Panama, then Panama to Miami, with three days extra on board. Result. Still banned from FB group.