non alcoholic drinks at lunchtime

[louthebowler]

just a quick question re p and o, do you have to purchase soft drinks or water with your lunch or are any included. with cruise lines all differing its hard to know what is free/chargeable. i know on liberty of the seas there was a selection of cold drinks available ( free ) in the buffet restaurant. ( mind you they made up for those free drinks with the price of any others!)

[LibraLass41]

There are tea and coffee machines in the buffet which are free with assorted flavoured teas and coffees (decaff etc)

 

There is a water machine. A fruit juice machine is free at breakfast, not sure about lunch but it is closed for some periods of day. Drinks stewards walk the buffet taking drinks orders from the bar too...

[marinefish]

Re. Oriana and Oceana, juice machines only work for beakfast until about 11am. Jugs of water, tea and coffee are free in the main restaurants at lunch time, but no juice for children unless you buy it. Same at Cafe Jardin and Horizon Grill(Oceana) and Al Fresco (Oriana) at lunch time, although Al Fresco is changing to Sorrento in December after dry dock, so who knows! We tended to order tea and juice in the cabin before going to breakfast, and often the juice finished up in the fridge and was drunk later in the day. Better juice than that from the machines as well!

[littlesteelo]

That was a definite advantage of the Windjammer buffet, the free lemonade/fruit juice. Plus there was a much better selection of hot drinks (the hot chocolate was awesome, I hoarded loads of the sachets of that :D). Plus there were a lot more drinks waiters. If you wanted a soft drink or beer etc. there was always a waiter around to take your order.

On Ventura, you had finished most of your meal by the time the waiter came along, and then it took another 15 minutes or so for the drink to arrive - it was quicker to go out to the beachcomber bar and order it yourself! :rolleyes:

 

The issue on Ventura and Azura is that there is no bar in the buffet. On RCI there is a bar in the Windjammer itself, and lots of stewards around to fetch you drinks. Plus the buffet is so much more spacious. They really have nailed it, and P&O should take some inspiration from them for their next ship.