Selbourne ‘Live’ from Ventura

[Josy1953]

3 hours ago, Cathygh said:

I thought that when I first went to Lanzarote 30 years ago but it's grown on me. I love all the little white houses with bouganvillias and the work of Cesar Manrique. From Arrecife you can also get a local bus to Costa Teguise and I think Playa Blanca.

My youngest sister has an apartment in Costa Teguise and they have driven up to Arrecife to meet us when we have docked there when they have been out there. She told us that the local bus journey is OK but not very reliable, they can be cancelled without notice and you could be in for an expensive taxi trip.

[Cathygh]

4 hours ago, Purdey16 said:

We’re off to lanzarote and calling in on a Thursday and watching a few YouTube videos of what to do in Arrecife this time as we have done the north of the island and fire mountain and camels and 1000 palms etc , what I need now is Wowzz to come back on here and give us guidance of what to do as he’s a Lanzarote pro 😁

My son and DIL once went on the free blanket trip in Lanzarote, not realising they would be taken to a room for a heavy sales pitch for mattresses 🤣🤣 They thought it was a blanket tour of the island which went everywhere.

We have actually done the blanket trip twice but knew what to expect. the guide was a real comedian, very funny. We were taken to a banana farm and the AloeVera farm. If you can stand the sales pitch it's a good way to spend a rainy day. 

Another favourite of mine is going to Teguise Market, I can't remember which day it is on. I also enjoyed a trip which focused on Cesar Manrique and what he did for the Island

[Bill Y]

5 hours ago, Winifred 22 said:

I would be annoyed if my always available tomato soup was jazzed up. I make no excuse I like plain food. I am no stranger to the steak and chips option. I would not give a thank you for the enhanced menu so won’t be trying that. Great thing though there is choice. I like plain boring menus but appreciate others have more sophisticated tastes and enjoy meals I don’t. 

But can those with more sophisticated tastes tell if the "Hampshire chalk stream trout" is an imposter from a less noble abode. It's probably a case of the Kings clothes.

[jh1809]

10 hours ago, purplesea said:

Thank you, for your posts.

We are in the Canary Islands on Azura in January so am finding it interesting to read about your visits to the various islands. 

We tried the Silk and Spice wine when on Azura last May and can say we also enjoyed it.

Enjoy the rest of your cruise.

And I tried it on Arcadia in August and also thought it was very good.

[jh1809]

9 hours ago, Winifred 22 said:

They are compiled by some news agency. I suppose CUK just has a licence to print them. The USA today looks just the same with different articles. Similarly with the ones in other languages. I always find them out of date too. 

What annoys me is that they always say "A unique service for [name of ship]" when just about every cruise ship I've ever been on has had them. There's nothing unique about it! I think the news agency that compiles Britain Today is the Press Association, as pretty much every item is tagged "PA".

[jh1809]

9 hours ago, Interestedcruisefan said:

Main course looks amazing but if they aren't promoting it then no chance of it lasting

That they aren't promoting it suggests that Head Office wanted them to trial it, but that the staff on board aren't keen and hope that the trial will be a failure.

[Winifred 22]

45 minutes ago, Bill Y said:

But can those with more sophisticated tastes tell if the "Hampshire chalk stream trout" is an imposter from a less noble abode. It's probably a case of the Kings clothes.

I think you are so right and I think your quote holds good for other aspects of cruising too. I remember  quoting the same myself but can’t remember the thread it was on. I only stalk here or Cunard and seem to think it was in there. 

[jh1809]

9 hours ago, Interestedcruisefan said:

Just calling a soup

 

Tomato Soup 

 

Doesn't make it sound half as appealing as they could - poor effort there

 

Maybe

 

Classic Roasted Tomato Soup

 

 

 

 

I confess that I assumed that you were joking, and hence just added a laughing face emoji. But from your subsequent posts I see that you were serious, so sorry about the emoji.

[Interestedcruisefan]

4 hours ago, jh1809 said:

That they aren't promoting it suggests that Head Office wanted them to trial it, but that the staff on board aren't keen and hope that the trial will be a failure.

Yep

 

Moleo - sort this out please!!!

 

What's going on?

[Interestedcruisefan]

4 hours ago, jh1809 said:

I confess that I assumed that you were joking, and hence just added a laughing face emoji. But from your subsequent posts I see that you were serious, so sorry about the emoji.

Don't worry

[Selbourne]

12 hours ago, jh1809 said:

That they aren't promoting it suggests that Head Office wanted them to trial it, but that the staff on board aren't keen and hope that the trial will be a failure.

That’s rather the impression that I get. Had I not known about it from this forum (and therefore asked about it), I would have got off Ventura after 14 days and been completely unaware of the existence of the ‘Signature Menu’. 

Edited November 5, 2023 by Selbourne

[Selbourne]

Day 8 - Saturday 4th November (Gran Canaria). 

 

We had already docked in Gran Canaria by the time that I peered out. Having previously had nice views over the towns or the sea, today we have a full side on view of a Norwegian cruise ship!

 

Breakfast in Bay Tree was uneventful and pleasant, as we like it. The restaurant manager has given up on trying to palm me off with the “only sharing tables available” nonsense and now just asks us to wait for a table for 2, which we are happy to do. We really can’t face polite conversations with strangers at breakfast!

 

There are still no Britain Today newspapers. Shame, as whilst they are of limited interest (and usually out of date) I keep them with our daily Horizon papers as mementos of our cruises. I know that this isn’t just a Ventura issue, as @TigerB has reported the same issue on Iona. 

 

We had quite threatening looking skies when we disembarked, but it was still 24 degrees. I was quite grateful for the cloud cover as it was less hot pushing the wheelchair. 

 

Thankfully Las Palmas de Gran Canaria is a lot flatter than our previous ports this cruise and is less cobbled, so our walk around was less energetic for me and less bumpy for my wife! As with all the Canaries ports so far, the walk from the ship to the town isn’t particularly attractive, but neither is it too far. The town centres are heavily skewed towards small, often tourist related, shops  plus cafes and bars with lots of outdoor seating. We picked our way through this and came out the other side at the main beach (Playa de Las Canteras) which, unlike yesterday, is golden sand. There were some substantial waves out in the bay but no surfers. The breaking waves some way out probably explained why, as there looked to be rocks. There is a very long promenade (probably a couple of miles) which is extremely wheelchair friendly, so this was our best stop since Madeira. 

 

We returned to the ship for lunch and shared a table with two other couples who we hadn’t previously met. I had to smile when one lady said that she adopts a policy with P&O of a maximum of £100 pppn for a balcony cabin, as that’s exactly our approach now. We never start a conversation about how many cruises we have done (in all honesty I can never remember the exact figure anyway - it’s not a competition) but the days of us being vastly outnumbered have gone now, even though many cruisers are a lot older than us and often assume that we are comparative novices. In reality, we often find nowadays that our cruise history goes back at least 10 years more than many, but we started comparatively younger than most! I can imagine our kids when they are our age surprising people when they will be talking about their 50 plus year cruising history 😂 

 

After a rest in the cabin (well it wasn’t really a rest, as the maintenance guys were touching up our side of the ship with a cherry picker, which was beeping very loudly continuously), we went for a coffee in the atrium. My wife read her book and l caught up on the news and emails whilst I still have free internet coverage. We returned to our balcony to watch the sail out of Gran Canaria. The new Captain sounds good and gave an informative pre departure announcement, saying that we had 120 miles to go to Lanzarote at 10 knots and seas would be slight with 1-2 metre waves. 

 

I was amazed at how big the port is in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. As well as two large cruise ships, there were 3 Spanish Navy ships (there’s a Naval base here), at least 2 dozen substantial commercial vessels (including 5 with huge metal towers on them that were at least as tall as Ventura), another dozen large commercial vessels at anchor and a large container port. I can only assume that this is the only substantial port for the whole of the Canaries and things are cross-docked here for onward transit to the other islands on smaller vessels? If anyone knows, I’d be interested!

 

Tonight was our sole visit to the Beach House. As I have reported, we are entirely satisfied with the MDR, but we like to try everywhere at least once per cruise (apart from the buffet)! I do agree with others that it’s a great shame that when you book a speciality restaurant from home pre-cruise you have absolutely no way of knowing whether you are booking menu 1 or menu 2. There is only one starter at the Beach House that my wife likes and, of course, Sod’s Law dictates that the night we book is always the ‘other’ menu. 

 

We managed to get a nice quiet table (our Beach House experience on Britannia was ruined by an over tired baby screaming all night) and they also excelled by finding me a room temperature Doom Bar. My wife had the steak on lava stone (which she really enjoyed) and I had the fajitas. I was surprised to see that you only get one tortilla wrap (cut in half), which isn’t anywhere near enough for the amount of filling that you get, but I was pretty full already after the Nachos starter so I didn’t ask for any more and frankly if they’d provided any more I couldn’t have eaten them! Neither of us could even consider a dessert so we raised the white flag and surrendered. 

 

As we are both now a bit ‘take it or leave it’ when it comes to Sindhu these days, we made a management decision to cancel our  booking for next week. We are sticking with our final visit to Epicurean though. The MDR will suit us just fine for all the other nights. 

 

It is rare for us to see a Headliners Show advertised that we’ve never seen, so we gave ‘Paradise City’ a go. As with all Headliners shows, the story line was a bit daft and some singers are always better than others, but the choice of songs was pretty decent and it whiled away 45 minutes before bed. Tomorrow is our last Canary island (Lanzarote) before we begin our slow return North, via Cadiz and Lisbon. 

Edited November 5, 2023 by Selbourne

[TigerB]

6 hours ago, Selbourne said:

We really can’t face polite conversations with strangers at breakfast!

 

"Love, love, do not make eye contact; I repeat, do not make eye contact. Oh, bugger!"🤦🏻‍♂️

 

 

6 hours ago, Selbourne said:

I had to smile when one lady said that she adopts a policy with P&O of a maximum of £100 pppn for a balcony cabin, as that’s exactly our approach now.  

 

You should have told her what you are paying for your 65 nighter. 😉

 

 

6 hours ago, Selbourne said:

I was surprised to see that you only get one tortilla wrap (cut in half), which isn’t anywhere near enough for the amount of filling that you get

 

I had this the other night; on here you get two tortillas, but only the saucer sized ones. Of course, I asked for two more!🐷

 

 

6 hours ago, Selbourne said:

Neither of us could even consider a dessert so we raised the white flag and surrendered. 

 

Lightweights!🙄😂

 

[Selbourne]

I’m conscious that I’ve only been posting dinner menus. Here’s a lunch one. Looks as though they have dispensed with that daft ‘sharing plates’ (that weren’t big enough to share anyway) idea.

[Selbourne]

And here’s tonights dinner one. Unusually for me, none of the mains appeal. I’ve had a bit too much beef this cruise. 

[david63]

I notice that the "always available" salmon has gone missing from the dinner menus

[TigerB]

On 11/4/2023 at 8:57 AM, Interestedcruisefan said:

Something tells me you will be paying 5.30 for yours Tiger!!!

 

Lol

 

On 11/4/2023 at 8:58 AM, TigerB said:

Damn straight!

#Yorkshire 🤭

 

On 11/4/2023 at 8:59 AM, Selbourne said:

Yes, May price lists on here as well. 

 

I met last night with the Bar Team Leader. Before we got down to it, he got me a pint of Punk IPA.👍 When he returned he had the Assistant Bar Manager with him.

Two thoroughly nice chaps, who listened to my concerns. They had already been made aware of the incorrect menus being on My Holiday, and said it is a fleet wide problem and down to the IT team back in the UK.  An IT problem with P&O; you don't say?

Anyway, the long and short of it is that the overcharges that have already gone through will be adjusted, and there will be chilled bottle of bubbly waiting for us at our next Epicurean reservation.👍 I do hope it's the good stuff that they sell in there!😉

 

 

I also found out something during that meeting that I wasn't aware of previously. The 10% tax imposed by Spain whilst docked or in Spanish waters, doesn't apply to all cruise lines; it's down to what can be negotiated. I joked that the Spanish government are making us have it for Brexit.  The thing is, there's probably some truth in that!🤔

[TigerB]

1 hour ago, Selbourne said:

And here’s tonights dinner one. Unusually for me, none of the mains appeal. I’ve had a bit too much beef this cruise. 

 

I do hope that's not the same menu for us; very uninspiring!

Looking at the Chef's recommendation, I am left wondering what a chunky chio is.🤔

[TigerB]

1 hour ago, david63 said:

I notice that the "always available" salmon has gone missing from the dinner menus

 

I could always rely on that as a standby if nowt else took my fancy. Mind you, since they now serve it at breakfast instead of smoked salmon, they probably don't have enough to go around.

[jeanlyon]

16 minutes ago, TigerB said:

 

I do hope that's not the same menu for us; very uninspiring!

Looking at the Chef's recommendation, I am left wondering what a chunky chio is.🤔

Exactly the same menus as Aurora.  So many nights I really struggled with something I liked.  I think we had salmon once in 19 nights.

[Selbourne]

11 minutes ago, TigerB said:

 

I do hope that's not the same menu for us; very uninspiring!

Looking at the Chef's recommendation, I am left wondering what a chunky chio is.🤔

I try to avoid having chips too often on cruises, but I’ve noticed that every single time that they appear on the menu in the MDRs or specialty restaurants on Ventura they are always ‘chunky’ ones. Wouldn’t mind some normal sized ones or, dare I say, French Fries on occasion!

 

On the subject of food oddities, can I mention toast? 😂 We always ask for mixed toast, as my wife likes white bread and I like brown. Is it just me, but I cannot discern one from the other. They all look identical. Also, somebody on a nearby table today ordered “thick toast”, given that the standard toast is so thin it is bone dry and retains no warmth. I did that once years ago when someone mentioned it on here, but never again. As with today, what arrived was so ridiculously thick I could almost not fit in my mouth 😂 

 

 

[TigerB]

1 hour ago, Selbourne said:

I try to avoid having chips too often on cruises, but I’ve noticed that every single time that they appear on the menu in the MDRs or specialty restaurants on Ventura they are always ‘chunky’ ones. Wouldn’t mind some normal sized ones or, dare I say, French Fries on occasion!

 

On the subject of food oddities, can I mention toast? 😂 We always ask for mixed toast, as my wife likes white bread and I like brown. Is it just me, but I cannot discern one from the other. They all look identical. Also, somebody on a nearby table today ordered “thick toast”, given that the standard toast is so thin it is bone dry and retains no warmth. I did that once years ago when someone mentioned it on here, but never again. As with today, what arrived was so ridiculously thick I could almost not fit in my mouth 😂 

 

The so called chunky chips they promise in the MDRs are rarely that!

What you get in Epicurean though, now that is a chunky chip.

 

 

We actually prefer the toast to go cold before buttering it. With thick bread though, that's a different story, but something we would never order on a ship or anywhere else where it takes more than twenty seconds to get from the kitchen to your table. For us, a toasted doorstep has to be buttered, with proper butter mind, as soon as it comes out of the toaster, and eaten straightaway.😋

[TigerB]

@Selbourne, as my meeting last night wasn't with the Food and Beverage Manager, I didn't get to the bottom of Preservegate.

At breakfast though today though there was no jam or marmalade on any of the tables surrounding us. Either the brass had read your thread, or they are running out.

Incidentally, how on earth do you manage to run out of grapefruit juice just six days into a fourteen day cruise?🙄

[david63]

3 minutes ago, TigerB said:

how on earth do you manage to run out of grapefruit juice just six days into a fourteen day cruise?

Passengers are ordering it?

 

27 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

dare I say, French Fries on occasion

I used to like the curly fries that they had pre Covid - not seen them since

 

28 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

ordered “thick toast

Somebody once told me that if you order the thick toast then you should ask for it crustless!

[Selbourne]

4 minutes ago, TigerB said:

@Selbourne, as my meeting last night wasn't with the Food and Beverage Manager, I didn't get to the bottom of Preservegate.

At breakfast though today though there was no jam or marmalade on any of the tables surrounding us. Either the brass had read your thread, or they are running out.

Incidentally, how on earth do you manage to run out of grapefruit juice just six days into a fourteen day cruise?🙄

Come to think of it, we had no jam or marmalade on our table this morning either. I didn’t cast my eye around to see if there was any elsewhere, as I didn’t want any toast and my wife can eat it dry (she’s odd like that). I can’t for one moment think that our dialogue about it has caused its removal - at least I hope that it hasn’t or we shall become hate figures 😂 

 

Whilst I can think of nothing that I would like to drink less than grapefruit juice (🤮) I can confirm that it is still in evidence on Ventura because my wife had some this morning.