Megabear2

Mind you on a February winter cruise it might not be too bad. I have just been quoted £1100 plus £240 OBC for one of these as a single. Luckily the OP has a deck 9, still a disappointment for her but a lot better. I don’t think I'd take one on a hot weather cruise tho7gh.

I was in town this afternoon and walked past an art display that looked very familiar. My sister in law stopped too and we realised why it was familiar as it was identical to stuff we'd seen on our recent cruises. Considering we sailed on different ships it would seem there's quite a lot of this stuff in Whitewall Galleries ashore so I'm not sure why you'd buy it onboard particularly as Devonuk points out tax would need to be paid to "import" it.

Did you book a balcony or is it an upgrade?

Good idea. If that's something you booked especially for they will hopefully help. Interestingly there are 14 mini suites on deck 8 remaining to book on the website yet only 1 balcony cabin. A dummy quote for just me was cheaper by £9 on select than saver - £1124 plus the OBC. I think that's all a bit unusual so maybe there have been others affected. Somewhere on another thread there was a poster allocated a deck 8 balcony on his saver inside fare for this cruise. Sounds like a lot of musical chairs for something showing very limited availability.

Thank you. I see that all deck 9 mini suites on that are apparently sold out with only deck 8 available. Those are selling at £2258 with £370 OBC at present or £1698 for a saver. Any change to deck 9 most likely meant someone else being shuffled to make room for you. I assume they just told you its this cabin take it or leave it as there's nothing else available. Are you keeping your Epicurean breakfasts etc or is that just swept up in the 50%?

When did you originally book and what type of fare as a pure matter of interest? Is this the G304 Western Europe cruise or the Canaries one

There's been a few posts coming in from the world cruise but they've mainly been about not being able to call at ports. There was apparently Norovirus onboard so a deep clean took place in Fort Lauderdale after the Bahamas refused entry. Not much else heard since then. Suggest you keep an eye out on the various threads as some do have friends onboard or joining along the route.

Are you happy with that? It must be a disappointing but are they giving you ample compensation if you accept it, there's presumably a big difference in the fare. 50% refund sounds a lot but did you book a long time ago, book a select fare or get a big OBC at that time. Surely there's OBC at least for your disappointment, even £50 or so.

Apparently the one on Ionabis meant to be fleet wide. Will be interesting to see it.

As the big OBC has currently bitten the dust for most cruises and the thousand pound gap between select and saver fares is back , I wonder who they think will be buying these highly priced items on a ship that is clearly far from high class cruising at present.

I appreciate that but as they're now clearly avoiding it in its purest form. Clearly available if you pay so cost is most likely but I bet they'd use one of the other reasons if you challenged them!

Freshness? Allergies? Religion? Risk of food poisoning - sadly the freshness of buffet salad left a lot to be desired at Christmas after the first week.

You do access it in airplane mode on the ship. You effectively piggy bag on the ship's WiFi with just limited access. That way you can use it without buying WiFi.

Mr and Mrs is extremely popular on Princess. They, of course, have a dedicated gameshow room on their ships which are extremely popular it seems with versions of a large number of tv gameshow adaptations. They even do Deal or No Deal in the main theatre which the US and Australian guests seemed to love.

Well I suppose they could give me a microwave to do some McCain micro chips ... would go well with my fish finger sandwich mentioned on another thread by someone.

In 50+ cruises I've never queued for anything for long bar an ice cream when a lady couldn't decide on her flavours. There's queues which are quite normal but nothing untoward. I hope my Iona cruise isn't going to destroy my faith!

Did you watch Years and Years? A very dangerous proposition that one! I can auure you I'll be long gone before I'd accept microchips in my body.

If it's a mini suite I hope to goodness it's not one of the conservatory suites on deck 8. I really would demand a fortune if they took me from my nice deck 12 full suite to one of those!

We now seem to have four threads all dealing with these dining issues, this one, food on Iona, food on Ventura and cutbacks on P&O. Perhaps we could ask Sharon to organise them all into one thread re restaurants and dining before it gets too complicated?

As I understand it from my previous Celebrity Edge cruise the menu in the dining rooms were the same every night plus one daily special. However every restaurant had a totally different theme, ie French, Greek, Italian and I think steak house. P&O offer nothing like that so the choice is now totally reduced to take it or leave it. Paying the extras is fine if you can buy a dinner package in advance or book in advance. P&O offer no equivalent and the very limited specialist dining venues are frequently not available to all. Reliance of the MDRs on P&O ships is subsequently very high and decent varied menus essential for most I'd guess. Personally I'd budget to do the pay restaurants on Celebrity and I bypassed the package by choosing to pay the higher price to get a time before boarding but that option isn't really viable on a ship such as Azura or Britannia, although slightly more choice on Iona/Arvia.

At least you're getting one! Judging by Bobstheboy's post over on the Iona food thread after his meeting about menus we will not see such a thing for a very long time on a P&O ship!

Other people recently moved from their suite on Arvia for "operational reasons" had the same problem. It's strange they say safety issues. Perhaps the ship is undergoing some maintenance but assumedly others would be affected too. As you're being downgraded have they given you a choice to where - which deck for instance - and assumedly a refund between the fares and compensation?

How many of you in the suite please? Any children for instance?

I assume the sample menu is a long way off what's on offer now then? If you get a chance without hassle covid you post an example please?

Totally agree with you. The food is now very basic and samey in the buffet. It was also mainly calorie laden! As someone directed by my doctor to eat shellfish regularly I missed the mussels and prawns very much as my lunch choices became quite limited. Sadly I personally found the salad selection drastically reduced as well.