Live from Ventura

[SarahHben]

Evening.

We really enjoyed our day in Madeira. I woke up at 6:45 and could see we were approaching the port, it was still dark out so the town was all lit up, it was so pretty.

 

We got to the buffet quite early, for us anyway, and had a quick breakfast. We haven’t had any issues finding anywhere to sit up there but I take a cardi up with me to save the table while we get our food. 
 

Our excursion was booked for 12:30 and we wanted to spend the morning exploring without wasting time so we took the free shuttle into town, wandered around lots of little quaint side streets taking lots of photos. We went into the Cathedral, which was beautiful inside. We walked along past the castle, bought a few niknaks, some Portuguese tarts 😁 and then took a slow walk along the sea front back to the ship via the Christiano Ronaldo statue.

We popped back on board, quickly freshened up before going straight back down for our excursion which was called ‘Leisurely Scenes of Madeira.

I can’t remember all the places names off the top of my head but we went right up into the mountains, round lots of hairpin bends, meeting several cars and buses along the way…very good driving by our coach driver!  We stopped at 3 viewing points, the 2nd one being a hotel where we had cake & Madeira wine then walked up to a view point that had stunning views. One valley was clear but the other one was full of mist. 

Last stop was the highest cliff top in Europe, there was a glass walkway which I watched Mr B go on, Amazing views, well worth the trip!

 

We then sat on our balcony watching the sail-away, eating our custard tarts. 
 

For dinner we went to Saffron, we went down around 6:45, were given a pager and waited 40 mins before being called. The 2 of us are quite happy to wait but are thinking of changing to fixed dining when we go on Britannia next May with my parents, I think dad might get a bit grumpy if he has to wait 40 mins or so.

It seems like they are calling 4 couples at a time and then taking orders & serving the meals as if it’s a table of 8 which works quite well except I can’t be nosey and see what other people are eating before I order 😂

Again, we enjoyed the food, I had chicken noodle soup followed by very good roast beef, medium rare as requested and finished off with delice au citron, nice but I’ve had better.

 

Then we headed off to Havana Club to watch The Privateers again, it was very busy but worth squeezing in for, they really are very good.

 

Weve just had a cuppa on the balcony, Mr B is enjoying seeing various constellations that he’s never seen before.

 

I forgot to say at the start that the Captain is  David Hudson and the Entertainments Manager is Leon? La Croix.

 

For those that mentioned the small looking portion of cream & jam and lack of butter on my afternoon tea yesterday, I realised afterwards that it might be because it’s in the Retreat where they serve healthier food? 🤷‍♀️

La Palma tomorrow, no excursion booked, just exploring on our own.

Edited August 9, 2023 by SarahHben

[SarahHben]

[Ardennais]

What a lovely day! 

[Selbourne]

7 hours ago, SarahHben said:

Evening.

We really enjoyed our day in Madeira. I woke up at 6:45 and could see we were approaching the port, it was still dark out so the town was all lit up, it was so pretty.

 

We got to the buffet quite early, for us anyway, and had a quick breakfast. We haven’t had any issues finding anywhere to sit up there but I take a cardi up with me to save the table while we get our food. 
 

Our excursion was booked for 12:30 and we wanted to spend the morning exploring without wasting time so we took the free shuttle into town, wandered around lots of little quaint side streets taking lots of photos. We went into the Cathedral, which was beautiful inside. We walked along past the castle, bought a few niknaks, some Portuguese tarts 😁 and then took a slow walk along the sea front back to the ship via the Christiano Ronaldo statue.

We popped back on board, quickly freshened up before going straight back down for our excursion which was called ‘Leisurely Scenes of Madeira.

I can’t remember all the places names off the top of my head but we went right up into the mountains, round lots of hairpin bends, meeting several cars and buses along the way…very good driving by our coach driver!  We stopped at 3 viewing points, the 2nd one being a hotel where we had cake & Madeira wine then walked up to a view point that had stunning views. One valley was clear but the other one was full of mist. 

Last stop was the highest cliff top in Europe, there was a glass walkway which I watched Mr B go on, Amazing views, well worth the trip!

 

We then sat on our balcony watching the sail-away, eating our custard tarts. 
 

For dinner we went to Saffron, we went down around 6:45, were given a pager and waited 40 mins before being called. The 2 of us are quite happy to wait but are thinking of changing to fixed dining when we go on Britannia next May with my parents, I think dad might get a bit grumpy if he has to wait 40 mins or so.

It seems like they are calling 4 couples at a time and then taking orders & serving the meals as if it’s a table of 8 which works quite well except I can’t be nosey and see what other people are eating before I order 😂

Again, we enjoyed the food, I had chicken noodle soup followed by very good roast beef, medium rare as requested and finished off with delice au citron, nice but I’ve had better.

 

Then we headed off to Havana Club to watch The Privateers again, it was very busy but worth squeezing in for, they really are very good.

 

Weve just had a cuppa on the balcony, Mr B is enjoying seeing various constellations that he’s never seen before.

 

I forgot to say at the start that the Captain is  David Hudson and the Entertainments Manager is Leon? La Croix.

 

For those that mentioned the small looking portion of cream & jam and lack of butter on my afternoon tea yesterday, I realised afterwards that it might be because it’s in the Retreat where they serve healthier food? 🤷‍♀️

La Palma tomorrow, no excursion booked, just exploring on our own.

Good to hear that you enjoyed Madeira Sarah. We are looking forward to our second visit there in October when we are on pretty much the same cruise as yours and on the same ship!

 

Interesting to hear that you still had a reasonably long wait for a table for dinner, even dining early, and I’m not surprised that you are considering swapping to fixed dining for your next cruise - as we have just done. It’s going to be interesting to see what happens going forward. Freedom dining has been the most popular choice since it was introduced, but a lot of us are now abandoning it due to all the current problems.

[Host Hattie]

I have moved some of the general discussion to the Dining thread as it was disrupting this Live from 

 

 

 

 

[Adawn47]

10 hours ago, SarahHben said:

We then sat on our balcony watching the sail-away, eating our custard tarts. 
 

 

I'm enjoying reading your blog Sarah and pleased you're having a lovely time.

Whenever we go to Portugal we always have a coffee and the gorgeous Pastel de Nata. We have recently found them in Tescos😋 

Avril

[Son of Anarchy]

I'd been wondering where Cruise Director/Ents Manager Leon was these days.  Good to hear that he's still on P&O.  Lovely chap, hosted our table at a Peninsula lunch once.

 

May or may not be your cup of tea, Leon does/used to do presentations on astronomy.  Very interesting, he's actually a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society.

[Ilovemygarden]

27 minutes ago, Adawn47 said:

 

I'm enjoying reading your blog Sarah and pleased you're having a lovely time.

Whenever we go to Portugal we always have a coffee and the gorgeous Pastel de Nata. We have recently found them in Tescos😋 

Avril

Thanks from me too Sarah. I love Madeira - can never go there too often (next time in September on Britannia).  Did you see the interesting street with the painted doors?   April - Lidl’s Pastel de Nata are quite tasty too!  

[JudithAnn1]

Hi Sarah.  I am really enjoying reading your blog too, thank you, as we are on Ventura again on the 24th September.  You mentioned earlier that you had booked the retreat.  Did you book this in advance for the whole cruise or were you able to book for particular days once onboard? 

[kalos]

Great photo's of Madeira ,same as others have said it's a place we  love as well.

My favourite bite to eat was steak prego caco de bolo , Madeira's answer to  a 

burger but better 😋

We liked the cafe opposite where the cruise ships docked . Nice memories .

 

Obrigado Sarah ! 

 

[SarahHben]

3 hours ago, JudithAnn1 said:

Hi Sarah.  I am really enjoying reading your blog too, thank you, as we are on Ventura again on the 24th September.  You mentioned earlier that you had booked the retreat.  Did you book this in advance for the whole cruise or were you able to book for particular days once onboard? 

Thank you. We booked it in advance, I can’t remember the price but can check when I get home. I thought the Retreat might be busy but it’s been lovely, we’ve just settled ourselves into a lovely Whicker sun bed for two for a few hours 😁

[SarahHben]

3 hours ago, Ilovemygarden said:

Thanks from me too Sarah. I love Madeira - can never go there too often (next time in September on Britannia).  Did you see the interesting street with the painted doors?   April - Lidl’s Pastel de Nata are quite tasty too!  

Yes we did, very pretty 😊 I took lots of photos on my big camera

[SarahHben]

4 hours ago, Son of Anarchy said:

I'd been wondering where Cruise Director/Ents Manager Leon was these days.  Good to hear that he's still on P&O.  Lovely chap, hosted our table at a Peninsula lunch once.

 

May or may not be your cup of tea, Leon does/used to do presentations on astronomy.  Very interesting, he's actually a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society.

My husband would like that, we’ll keep an eye out anything like that in the Horizon, thanks 

[SarahHben]

Hello 

We are in very warm La Palma today. We were late down to breakfast, we had discussed our plans, I came away from the discussion thinking we’d decided to go the buffet so I wasn’t hurrying, unfortunately Mr B went away thinking we had decided to go to Saffron restaurant 🥴 so we only got there just before 9:30. It said in Horizon that saffron closed at 9:30 but we were given a pager anyway. We popped back to our cabin to pack bags ready to go out, we were called after 20 minutes. Food was good as usual.

There have been a few things that haven’t bothered us but might bother other people, we had to ask for teaspoons for our tea this morning, a couple of the MDR waiters & bar waiters have been a bit stoney faced&  I had to ask the cabin steward to top up something in the bathroom which she apologised for. None of it a problem.

 

No excursion booked so we have really enjoyed walking around seeing all the buildings with such interesting balconies and carpentry details. The Cathedral area was lovely and the Cathedral itself was lovely and cool! Mr B wanted to walk along to the replica of Christopher Columbus’ ship ‘Santa Maria’ so we walked through lots of little streets. Walked back along the sea front & beach, Mr B hadn’t seen black sand before. 
 

Just got back on board and had a quick lunch on the balcony. Santa Cruz was very nice for wandering and taking photos but was getting too warm to stay out. I didn’t take loads of photos because it was a bit windy. I needed 1 hand to hold my dress down, 1 hand to stop my hat flying away, 1 hand to keep my hair out of my face because I hadn’t tied it back as I was expecting to be able to wear the hat 🙄 and 1 hand for taking photos, unfortunately I only have 2 hands not 4 🤷‍♀️

 A band from the ship called The Privateers we’re walking behind us and I was quite worried that I’d loose my dress and they’d see my privateers 😳🙈

 

There was a very welcome chilled water station outside when we got back. 

We’re back in the Retreat, Pimms for me, Aperol Spritz for him 😁🍹

 

Sorry for my long winded rambling!

 

Epicurean tonight followed by Tom Ball in the theatre late show. Tom Ball is such a lovely man. We had a chat with him the other day and he offered to do a video message for my sister who is a big fan & has been having a miserable week, we were blown away by his kindness.

[SarahHben]

[SarahHben]

[Megabear2]

All looks wonderful.  Thanks for keeping us up to date.  The Retreat looks really cool.  We were going to book it on our next Britannia cruise but needless to say it's currently telling me "Enquire on Board".  Is it now the upgraded experience like Arvia has with alcoholic drinks etc included?

[JudithAnn1]

Thank you for letting me know about the retreat, the sun beds look very comfortable.  It sounds as though you are having a great holiday.

[SarahHben]

11 minutes ago, Megabear2 said:

All looks wonderful.  Thanks for keeping us up to date.  The Retreat looks really cool.  We were going to book it on our next Britannia cruise but needless to say it's currently telling me "Enquire on Board".  Is it now the upgraded experience like Arvia has with alcoholic drinks etc included?

Alcoholic drinks aren’t included, but the Retreat waiters take your order and Cruise card and fetch drinks from the bars for you. 

[SarahHben]

14 minutes ago, JudithAnn1 said:

Thank you for letting me know about the retreat, the sun beds look very comfortable.  It sounds as though you are having a great holiday.

This one is the only bed like this but there are very comfortable sun-loungers, sofas, and big Whicker arm chairs, I’ll see if I can take some different photos later 

[SarahHben]

Sorry not sure why that last pic posted twice, I can’t delete it either

[P&O SUE]

Lovely photos Sarah

[Sussexboy]

Delighted to hear that Leon de Ste. Croix is still to be found loitering with intent on P&O ships. We have fond memories of him from Oriana some years ago. We enjoyed his humour. Looks like you are having a fab time and I am not jealous at all. I’m not. Really, I’m not. Not……..

[grapau27]

On 8/9/2023 at 11:46 PM, SarahHben said:

Lovely photos Sarah.

[grapau27]

17 hours ago, SarahHben said:

Sorry not sure why that last pic posted twice, I can’t delete it either

It was a nice photo Sarah.

Great photos of La Palma.