Winter 2025/26 on-sale dates

[tring]

12 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

I suspect that the 25/30 year timeframe relates to how long P&O would keep a ship. As you say, many other lines don’t even take them on until they are about that age!

 

Yes, Carnival's model has always been to run the ships to the ground with very little maintenance then replace with new ones, so would be a big change for them.

[Spike11]

15 minutes ago, tring said:

 

Yes, Carnival's model has always been to run the ships to the ground with very little maintenance then replace with new ones, so would be a big change for them.

Considering the amount of debt they ran up during lock down, now might be a good time to change their policy! Celebrity certainly did a good job of completely transforming some of their older ships to bring them up to a similar standard to their more recent ones.

[Selbourne]

20 minutes ago, tring said:

 

Yes £530pp for an outside cabin on Aurora sailing 26th April next year and that is after we chose CPS parking rather than the extra OBS.  We would have got another £65pp if we have not taken the parking option.  No idea what we will spend it on after we also claim the share benefit, but it is for our gold wedding anniversary, so hitting the jeweller's sounds a very good idea to me 🙂   We were looking at a rather nice tanzanite necklace on our recent cruise, but stopped thinking of that after we booked the April/May cruise.

 

We would have preferred a balcony cabin, but the only availability was for a forward guarantee cabin which is a non starter for us, so were thinking we may be able to upgrade once balance payment stage has passed, though balcony cabins were about double the price, so maybe not as there always seems to be space on quieter open decks on Aurora.

 

 

Nice one! Do you happen to know how the £530pp compared to what was offered generally? Just trying to get a sense of how much benefit there is booking on board versus booking from home.
 

Until last week, many cruises had whopping amounts of OBC on offer but, in usual P&O style, in many cases it seemed to be associated with a high cruise price. I always work out the net cost of cruise price less OBC and in the past have found that it’s either low cruise price with no OBC, or high cruise price with high OBC - net result roughly the same! However, things seem to be changing now, so I’ve started keeping a log of net cruise prices for a selection of cruises from launch, which I will revisit every few months under different offers, to see when the optimum time to book is, although I suspect that it will vary considerably by cruise and ship!

[tring]

1 hour ago, Selbourne said:

Nice one! Do you happen to know how the £530pp compared to what was offered generally? Just trying to get a sense of how much benefit there is booking on board versus booking from home.
 

Until last week, many cruises had whopping amounts of OBC on offer but, in usual P&O style, in many cases it seemed to be associated with a high cruise price. I always work out the net cost of cruise price less OBC and in the past have found that it’s either low cruise price with no OBC, or high cruise price with high OBC - net result roughly the same! However, things seem to be changing now, so I’ve started keeping a log of net cruise prices for a selection of cruises from launch, which I will revisit every few months under different offers, to see when the optimum time to book is, although I suspect that it will vary considerably by cruise and ship!

 

We were on board over in Canada heading for the return trans Atlantic, so no idea of other prices etc., but we paid a similar price to what was listed in. Cruise marketing booklet which was on the doormat on our return, but with way less OBC than we got.  There is an additional OBC for purchasing onboard as well,but that would not account for the whole difference.  I think you just have to keep an eye on what may appeal to you prior to travel and then see what happens beyond that.

 

This was not a planned booking, but just took our eye because of the date, which ends just after our anniversary.  TBH what we are looking upon as our main anniversary celebration is a couple of months later when we are doing a very unusual Fred Arctic cruise which initially takes us over to N America with some good ports and scenic cruising near the entrance to the NW Passage, before doing the normal Greenland/Iceland ports.  In fact we very rarely head to the Med, which we find a bit crowded and overdone, but three new ports for us on this one.

 

[Selbourne]

4 minutes ago, tring said:

 

We were on board over in Canada heading for the return trans Atlantic, so no idea of other prices etc., but we paid a similar price to what was listed in. Cruise marketing booklet which was on the doormat on our return, but with way less OBC than we got.  There is an additional OBC for purchasing onboard as well,but that would not account for the whole difference.  I think you just have to keep an eye on what may appeal to you prior to travel and then see what happens beyond that.

 

This was not a planned booking, but just took our eye because of the date, which ends just after our anniversary.  TBH what we are looking upon as our main anniversary celebration is a couple of months later when we are doing a very unusual Fred Arctic cruise which initially takes us over to N America with some good ports and scenic cruising near the entrance to the NW Passage, before doing the normal Greenland/Iceland ports.  In fact we very rarely head to the Med, which we find a bit crowded and overdone, but three new ports for us on this one.

 

Sounds fabulous. Enjoy!

[Selbourne]

5 hours ago, Danamis said:

When are you on Ventura? We go on 28th. Looking forward to it!

Just in case you haven’t had the email yet, online check-in has opened today 👍

[Danamis]

8 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

Just in case you haven’t had the email yet, online check-in has opened today 👍

Yes thank you! Nice early check in time but we are on the coach😅

[mercury7289]

4 hours ago, Selbourne said:

There were some pretty big OBC deals recently. If you booked on board, did you get more again?

On our May Aurora cruise bookings,we took the free parking and then received  the basic £165 per person OBC as  if you had booked at home, plus £150 per person additional for booking on board plus £125 per person bonus,which we were told was a special offer at the time total of £440 per person

Hope this helps

[Selbourne]

2 minutes ago, mercury7289 said:

On our May Aurora cruise bookings,we took the free parking and then received  the basic £165 per person OBC as  if you had booked at home, plus £150 per person additional for booking on board plus £125 per person bonus,which we were told was a special offer at the time total of £440 per person

Hope this helps

Yes it does. Many thanks. If anything in next weeks release takes our interest I might hold fire until we are on board Ventura in 3 weeks time. 

[sweep2907]

No sneak previews of any potential itineraries, I know we usually get odd leak ahead of the day on here? Guess it be same old with few surprises. 

[Jevsy]

4 hours ago, sweep2907 said:

No sneak previews of any potential itineraries, I know we usually get odd leak ahead of the day on here? Guess it be same old with few surprises. 

I've the complete lot sent by TA today

[cruisefan2012]

2 hours ago, Jevsy said:

I've the complete lot sent by TA today

I can wait until the morning if you dont want to say but is Britannia or Iona doing anything exciting in 2026... 

 

I quite fancy the thought of going on Iona to Germany/Holland/Belgium if its doing that itinerary...

[Son of Anarchy]

Well, less than 12 hour till launch.

 

How soon after the 08:30 launch time will the website crash?

[Megabear2]

9 hours ago, Son of Anarchy said:

Well, less than 12 hour till launch.

 

How soon after the 08:30 launch time will the website crash?

If it doesn't it will be a measure of the popularity of early booking!  Interestingly on Cunard launch day last week no crashes so perhaps the IT department has improved things - we can live in hope!

 

Having said I won't book early again I'm going to reserve on one of the two one off Britannia Caribbean cruises which are actually going somewhere different, just a shame there's only the two.

Edited October 10, 2023 by Megabear2

[FamilyCruiserUK]

Just priced up the carribean over school holidays christmas 25 and yeap wont be booking that ....£6k inside room for three.......ouch. 

[sandancer]

On 9/21/2023 at 6:54 PM, jambalian said:

I'm hoping for a price of around £2000 for the 35-day round trip from Southampton to the Caribbean in January 2026. The 2024 price was £2899 (Ventura) last time I checked, but the 2025 version (Iona) is £1999. If I can get something close to the 2025 price, I'll take it.

We board Azura this week and I’m hoping to book this cruise with a £50 deposit. 

[Megabear2]

Just looked at the February 2026 Britannia cruise I liked.  Select fare balcony cabin £6,700, add on PE goes to nearly £8,000.

 

Considering we have 35 nights QM2 in Jan 25 for £7,800 in a balcony I think that will be a no for now.

 

Noticeably easy to get in to the site.  Assume it will be busier when they go to normal sales.

[IAASA345]

Not sure if I've misread something so advice please.... I'm a solo traveller and it says on the price page £1500 per cabin, but then I select that price next screen jumps to £2700..... Screen shots below. What am I missing?!

 

 

[NavyPanda]

Some early insights from a quick analysis...

 

There appears to be 201 cruises which are newly available to 'Secure Now'/Pre-book. A significant number of these will be overlapping fly cruises.

 

Average number of itinerary nights by ship (some cruises will overlap with each other due to flights) 

Arcadia    41.4
Arvia    14.6
Aurora    18.6
Azura    10.8
Britannia    14.0
Iona    12.3
Ventura    13.7
 

Average cost per night of Southampton round trip

 

Arcadia    £87.66
Aurora    £91.33
Britannia    £64.21
Iona    £68.25
Ventura    £77.50

 

Average cost per night of fly-cruise

 

Arcadia    £120.07
Arvia    £119.18
Azura    £83.29
Britannia    £112.72
 

Cheapest cruise (per night) by ship

 

Arcadia        Portugal And Canary Islands, 16 Nights (J519) 17-Nov-25    £53.06

Arvia        Caribbean Transatlantic, 22 Nights (K522B) 24-Oct-25 £76.32

Aurora        Caribbean, 24 Nights (R520) 02-Nov-25 £74.13

Azura        Mediterranean And Canary Islands, 16 Nights (A539C) 09-Oct-25 £56.19

Britannia    Portugal And Canary Islands, 14 Nights (B525) 17-Oct-25 £64.21

Iona        Portugal And Canary Islands, 14 Nights (G536) £52.07 08-Nov-25 (or G537, G538 both also of the same itineary name at the same price)

Ventura        Portugal And Canary Islands, 14 Nights (N528) 01-Nov-25    £52.07

 

 

[Son of Anarchy]

1 hour ago, sandancer said:

We board Azura this week and I’m hoping to book this cruise with a £50 deposit. 

On board booking deposits have changed.

 

We booked Ventura 35 nights TA 2025 last month on Aurora.  £600 deposit for the two of us.  Did get triple booking on board OBC pp.  This may have been a specific extra incentive at that time though.

[Son of Anarchy]

Had a quick look.

 

75 nights on Aurora going round South America looks good.  Won't be booking at launch though.

[bobstheboy]

After our experience with Iona, 35  nights Jan 25, I will not book at launch again.

[FamilyCruiserUK]

I take it for those in the know launch prices are more expensive then usual?

[Son of Anarchy]

9 minutes ago, FamilyCruiserUK said:

I take it for those in the know launch prices are more expensive then usual?

Seems to have gone way over the last couple of years.  

[tring]

We have per registered with a commonly used agent for the 16 night trans location on Azura from the 9th Oct and hoping to get the same cabin we have booked for the two week previous cruise that includes Croatia.  Always a problem with those fly cruises though, as only certain cabins available for specific cruises due to overlaps.  We will find out next Tuesday.

 

I asked the agent if they were busy and she said, "Not as busy as expected", which presumably reflects feelings about early booking now.  It is a long time ahead to have your life planned if no great advantage. 

 

Edited October 10, 2023 by tring