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35 day round trip or 2 x14 day fly cruise?


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Hi all, Had planned 35 day round trip S/hampton to Carribean but accident stopped us booking.

2 years later and we are ready again....BUT....have booked 2 x fly cruises to Carribean from our local Newcastle airport in consecutive months, with Marella. Have decided that getting into the heat/sunshine on same day, coupled with the convenience of AI and no gratuities which together make for cheaper holidays more than make up for the "extra" 7 days we would have gotten with P&O, especially when there would be at least 3 days each way of cold sunless days. The only things I think I'm going to miss is the drive and overnight stay at Dibden guest house which we used to enjoy and the Panama canal 1/2 transit.

Yes we realise we have 2 bookings to manage, 2 lots of packing/unpacking/packing/unpacking. can't think of any other drawbacks.

Any comments ? :cool::cool:

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To my mind, the disadvantage is that you now have four quite lengthy flights, with their associated jet lag, rather than none, but you are obviously far keener on air travel than I am.

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I tend to agree with both the responses above.

 

I did my first Marella cruise in January aboard Discovery 2 and certainly have no plans to book Marella again. I felt every aspect on board was inferior to P&O (and so you know I am not just a P&O stalwart, I sailed with CMV in May this year and would happily book with them again).

 

One aspect I did feel was very good with Marella was the TUI flight in a Dreamliner. I upgraded to Premium and felt it was a really good product.

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Joking apart, I agree with the above posts. 4 lots of jet lag, 2 overnight flights, 4 lots of airport hassle, and less days at sea. Can't really see any upside, apart from the fact that you have 3 days or so at the beginning and end with cold weather.

 

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The round trip is very relaxing with no stress at all. I do 35 days pretty much every year.

 

You visit ports outside the main Caribbean area. For example we're doing Bahamas, Bermuda, New Orleans, Florida and Caribbean islands on Ventura in 2019

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Can't comment on Marella but as a working person I'd go for 2 x 14 nights with at least a month in between. In fact I did that last year and it was great (I went with P&O though as I like the experience).

 

If I were retired I'd go for the 35 nights because I don't like the jet lag.

 

Also you tend to get a larger diversity of pasengers (agewise) on the 14 day fly Cruises, which you may or may not like. I'd guess a 35 day cruise from and to Southampton would be almost exclusively 65+ (someone please correct me if I'm wrong on this).

 

Personally I prefer a mixture of age groups on the ship (teenagers not so much).

 

I think it's also worth mentioning, that the cruise line is just as important as the itinery.

 

That's the main reason I stay (relatively) loyal to P&O.

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My last cruise was Oriana 17 nights with 2 days in Venice. I even downloaded Venice map to a paint app, airbrushed out the rubbish and added the Vaparetto routes; then printed 4 of the routes in credit card size and laminated them. We visited Burano, Murano, the Lido, had a night out in Venice as well as a trip down the Grand canal. I like to make the most of holiday's and enjoy every minute. BUT, 3 months after, I fractured my lower vertibrae. Agony, pins & needles etc. Was on tramadol for months. To this day I still have discomfort. We had planned the 35 dayer but that was out. No holiday for 2 years then we chanced a Hol to Lanzerote for 4 weeks. Back held up, but we decided a flight would be better on my back than a long drive down to S/Hampton, not that 300 miles is so far( I have driven 850 in one go before, but was a lot younger) Also, we have a beach hol planned to Cyprus in Oct/Nov this year ahead of the 2 cruises in Feb and March. So cost had to come into it. 3 Hols are to get us out of the north east winter! Wish I'd thought of 2 back to backs! We are used to Pando, both good and not so good. EG, we have walked out on the Headliners more than once, food in the MDR is to us only fair to good, and the gratuities are too high. Also, a few drinks each day will rack up the cost.

We may well get back to P&O...I would love to do the 35 dayer.

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Whenever I have been slightly tempted to book with Marella, the cost has been more than P&O even after taking into account gratuities, drinks etc (Unless you are a serious drinker). And, call me a snob, but I think I would prefer the clientele on P&O than Marella, but I also prefer the clientele on Princess to P&O. Just my opinion as always

 

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We paid £300pp more for the equivalent cruise than P&O would have been. By the time you factor in gratuities and a couple of drinks only and perhaps a bottle of wine every couple of nights then there was no difference. I don't drink a lot but would also have a couple of beers during the day, the wife would have the odd lager; so P&O would be more.

As for the clientele, P&O has it's fair share of sunlounger bandits, lift hoggers, people who don't wash their hands and MDR tables for 8 where it's like getting blood out of a stone engaging them in conversation.

Not expecting Marrella to be any different.

If there were more flights from Newcastle, we could perhaps try another cruise line.

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I think it is a no brainer to do 2 back to back fly cruises, rather than spend all that time sailing over the Atlantic twice with a lot less ports and the risk of bad seas as well. As you say, you can go straight from/to your local airport then, rather than the horrendous drive through the busy roads of the UK. Prices of fly cruises are a lot less pppn if you stay for 4 weeks, rather than just two as you are only paying for one return flight.

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Personally I would take the 35 night round trip, we have another one booked on Ventura 2019 having done this last year. We have taken the 14/15 night fly cruises many times with both P&O and Marella before we retired. Albeit the drive to Southampton can be a bind it is certainly better than driving to the airport, hanging about for 2-3 hours (if you are lucky) then being stuck on a plane for 8 hours. There is no issue with luggage with the round trip, you get 2 or 3 days to settle in before you hit the nice weather then it tends to heat up over 2 or 3 days which avoids getting sunburn.

 

If I was flying I would likely do the cruises back to back to cut out 2 of the flights (extra 10% discount on P&O for back to back) not sure about any difference on Marella.

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We have just returned from a back to back cruise in April with Marella (TUI). There is no discount on these cruises so you are paying for two flights to the Caribbean which you are not using. In future we will be returning to P and O who give 10% off any back to back cruise.

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We have just returned from a back to back cruise in April with Marella (TUI). There is no discount on these cruises so you are paying for a flight to the Caribbean and back which you are not using. In future we will be returning to P and O who give 10% off any back to back cruise.
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I'm considering the 35 night cruise on Ventura in 2020 with half Panama Canal transit .... worried that the sea will be rough all the way to the Caribbean or does it get better after the first port of call (Madeira). Trying to weigh up the pros and cons of rough seas v lengthy flights. Look forward to any information from previous passengers on similar cruises.

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We've done two 28 night transatlantic cruises on Ventura and one 50 nighter on Oriana.

 

The only 'rough' weather was outbound on the Oriana cruise between the Azores and Bermuda.

The Captain took a different route to avoid the worst of the swell - it lasted about 36 hours.

 

The return crossing between the Amazon and Cape Verde was fine as were the four crossings on Ventura.

These were all done in Jan and Feb.

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I'm considering the 35 night cruise on Ventura in 2020 with half Panama Canal transit .... worried that the sea will be rough all the way to the Caribbean or does it get better after the first port of call (Madeira). Trying to weigh up the pros and cons of rough seas v lengthy flights. Look forward to any information from previous passengers on similar cruises.

 

 

 

We have already booked on this one, it will be our 4th Cruise of this type. Never had an issue with the weather or sea state. Don’t leave it too long as there are many repeat cruisers on these cruises.

 

 

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We have already booked on this one, it will be our 4th Cruise of this type. Never had an issue with the weather or sea state. Don’t leave it too long as there are many repeat cruisers on these cruises.

 

At the moment the price is showing as £1100 pp more than we paid and we have £200 more OBC.

 

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We had two days of force 10 winds approaching the UK on our Arcadia round trip in December. Lots of cruisers stayed in their cabins ! But, the weather is never consistent. Just because it is rough one year, it has no bearing on future years. It is all down to chance. If you are not a good sailor, I would fly.

 

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