OzKiwiJJ Goes Posh!

[possum52]

14 minutes ago, Cbtours said:

Maybe it was more peculiar to where I lived in Manchester 😁

Do you still have your Mancunian accent? I have a friend who is from Manchester, she has been here for about fifteen years and is still hard to understand at times, particularly if she is excited.

[OzKiwiJJ]

9 minutes ago, Cbtours said:

Maybe it was more peculiar to where I lived in Manchester 😁

Possibly, we didn't go to Manchester.

[OzKiwiJJ]

Summary. 

 

Overall I felt the Cunard Princess Grills experience was the best cruise experience we've ever had. It gave us the best of both worlds - luxury cruising on a bigger ship, so we had all the facilities of a mid-sized cruise ship but had the peacefulness and elegance of the Grills area for dining and relaxation. OK, Cunard doesn't win best mini-suite category, that goes to Regent Seven Seas Explorer with HAL Westerdam in second place, but we were very comfortable with the familiarity of it.

 

We loved the traditional look of the ship overall, the panoramic Commodore's Club, the pub, and the beautiful Queens Room. Although we now read almost exclusively on our Kindles we enjoyed exploring the well-stocked library. 

 

Cunard had excellent trivia sessions with a wide and interesting range of questions.  

 

The one show we did get to was superb and the musicians we listened to in the Commodore's Club were excellent.

 

The one slight negative was our cabin steward. He didn't introduce himself on embarkation day and didn't attempt to get our shower fixed. After a gentle hint he did make sure we had a good supply of bottled water in our cabin but missed replenishing the coffee pods once. However our cabin was always nicely cleaned and tidied so he did that part of his job well but there wasn't the same personal interaction that we've had on most other ships.

 

Would we cruise Cunard again? Yes please, but it would be hard to not have the wonderful Grills experience.    

 

[Cbtours]

15 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Day 8 - Disembarkation

 

The alarm went off far too early! It didn't take us long to get dressed and pack the last of our bits and pieces in our carry-ons. Although we had been issued with the usual disembarkation luggage tags we had no idea what time slot our Light Blue 1 was. Not that it bothered us as we never rush off as soon as the group is called and we could always wait in the Grills Lounge if necessary. As it happened our group was called just as we were going up to breakfast. Tough! I'm having my brekkie first!

 

I had hoped to have Eggs Benedict again but the menu on disembarkation day was limited so they weren't available. So I just had my usual, berries followed by fried eggs and hash browns, and one last pain au chocolate. 

 

Sadly we left the Princess Grills MDR for the last time and went straight down to disembark. Since this was a domestic cruise it was all very easy, just find the bags and head out to the pick-up area to call an Uber, which came very quickly. We were home by 9am. 

 

Much to our amusement as we reached the bottom of the escalator in the OPT the lady standing there took one look at our carry-ons and said "I know where your bags are!" We do have a very distinct logo hand-painted on all our luggage. That came in very useful at an airport once as someone tried to make off with one of our bags. Luckily one of the security guys spotted us standing waiting for the missing bag and also spotted someone else with a bag with that logo. The guy who took it still tried to insist it was his bag until the security guy pointed out our other bags.

 

We just dumped our bags in our spare room. We had to go out shopping but I wanted another cup of tea first. Unpacking could wait until tomorrow!

Great report!

[OzKiwiJJ]

1 minute ago, Cbtours said:

Great report!

Thanks. 😊

[Drumbeat16]

We took our first Cunard cruise recently and may treat ourselves to PG one day so your report has been a great help 😀. The one thing that does concern me is the shower over the bath (my husband has some balance issues), would it put you off booking PG in the future?

[OzKiwiJJ]

41 minutes ago, Drumbeat16 said:

We took our first Cunard cruise recently and may treat ourselves to PG one day so your report has been a great help 😀. The one thing that does concern me is the shower over the bath (my husband has some balance issues), would it put you off booking PG in the future?

We love the shower over the bath. There is so much more space than in a small shower cubicle. The bath in QE is quite low and even with my dodgy knee I found it very easy to get in and out of. There was a grab bar along the side of the bath to aid getting in and out, and that could be grabbed if your husband was feeling unsteady at any time.

[Drumbeat16]

31 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

We love the shower over the bath. There is so much more space than in a small shower cubicle. The bath in QE is quite low and even with my dodgy knee I found it very easy to get in and out of. There was a grab bar along the side of the bath to aid getting in and out, and that could be grabbed if your husband was feeling unsteady at any time.

That sounds better than I thought, thank you for your response 🙂

[Mareblu]

Thank you, Julie:  absorbing, detailed episodes.  We loved Cunard, and agree not everything, every day, is perfect, but our experience was close to it.  We loved the Grills Lounge, and if we weren’t at presentation lectures or strolling around, spent sea days reading, doing crosswords and chatting with lovely people in the Lounge.   Our Q3 penthouse had a spacious walk-in shower.  We’ve both had knee replacements, so that worked well for us.

[Cbtours]

16 minutes ago, possum52 said:

Do you still have your Mancunian accent? I have a friend who is from Manchester, she has been here for about fifteen years and is still hard to understand at times, particularly if she is excited.

I am told I don’t have too much of an accent still (I’ve been here 52 years) but then maybe Julie can weigh into the topic as we’ve spoken a few times lol

[Jean C]

9 hours ago, Cbtours said:

I am told I don’t have too much of an accent still (I’ve been here 52 years) but then maybe Julie can weigh into the topic as we’ve spoken a few times lol

That's interesting 😊 I've been in NZ for 52 years and people still pick my accent. However, when visiting in the UK, people think I'm an Aussie 🤷‍♂️

[Cbtours]

Just now, Jean C said:

That's interesting 😊 I've been in NZ for 52 years and people still pick my accent. However, when visiting in the UK, people think I'm an Aussie 🤷‍♂️

I don’t mean some people don’t pick that I have an accent from somewhere but generally unless they know England never ask if I’m from there. My sister has a very broad pommy accent after living most her married life In Birmingham 

[resordanis]

15 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Summary. 

 

Overall I felt the Cunard Princess Grills experience was the best cruise experience we've ever had. It gave us the best of both worlds - luxury cruising on a bigger ship, so we had all the facilities of a mid-sized cruise ship but had the peacefulness and elegance of the Grills area for dining and relaxation. OK, Cunard doesn't win best mini-suite category, that goes to Regent Seven Seas Explorer with HAL Westerdam in second place, but we were very comfortable with the familiarity of it.

 

We loved the traditional look of the ship overall, the panoramic Commodore's Club, the pub, and the beautiful Queens Room. Although we now read almost exclusively on our Kindles we enjoyed exploring the well-stocked library. 

 

Cunard had excellent trivia sessions with a wide and interesting range of questions.  

 

The one show we did get to was superb and the musicians we listened to in the Commodore's Club were excellent.

 

The one slight negative was our cabin steward. He didn't introduce himself on embarkation day and didn't attempt to get our shower fixed. After a gentle hint he did make sure we had a good supply of bottled water in our cabin but missed replenishing the coffee pods once. However our cabin was always nicely cleaned and tidied so he did that part of his job well but there wasn't the same personal interaction that we've had on most other ships.

 

Would we cruise Cunard again? Yes please, but it would be hard to not have the wonderful Grills experience.    

 

Great review and thanks for letting us go along on the ride with you. Apart from you being in the Grills, the experience you had was similar to what we have experienced in a Brittania Stateroom and I am kicking myself for now now booking your trip and going for Princess! Thanks again and I look forward to reading about your world voyage.

[OzKiwiJJ]

11 hours ago, Cbtours said:

I am told I don’t have too much of an accent still (I’ve been here 52 years) but then maybe Julie can weigh into the topic as we’ve spoken a few times lol

I didn't notice much of an accent but I grew up with a mother who came from Lancashire so the faint remnants of a northern England accent wouldn't sound out of place to me. 

[OzKiwiJJ]

2 hours ago, Jean C said:

That's interesting 😊 I've been in NZ for 52 years and people still pick my accent. However, when visiting in the UK, people think I'm an Aussie 🤷‍♂️

When I lived in NZ people often asked me if I was from the UK. They were quite surprised to hear I was a born and bred Kiwi. 

 

Now I've added Aussie overtones to the mix! My Kiwi accent slips through occasionally here but NZ friends say I have an Aussie accent. 

[OzKiwiJJ]

1 hour ago, resordanis said:

Great review and thanks for letting us go along on the ride with you. Apart from you being in the Grills, the experience you had was similar to what we have experienced in a Brittania Stateroom and I am kicking myself for now now booking your trip and going for Princess! Thanks again and I look forward to reading about your world voyage.

You're welcome. It really was a wonderful cruise and QE is just the size of ship we like.

 

Don't expect a day-by-day account of the world cruise though. I'll probably just post on whatever thread is running for that cruise, when something interesting happens. From what I've seen of recent Princess menus the meals won't be worth commenting on for a start, unless they are worse than I expect.

[mr walker]

It is interesting to read all your stories on accents - it has something I have long had an interest in.

 

I once worked here in Sydney with a couple who were from England who had worked as entertainers at the old English holiday camps like Butlins. The guy claimed to be able to identify people to the village of their origin in England just from a few words. It was his party trick & he said that each person he met would have a different local accent & he had a very high strike rate in correctly identifying their origin.

 

Another elderly guy I worked with had a very broad Scottish accent, making it very difficult to understand at all. We thought he must have come to Australia late in life to have such a broad accent. Imagine our surprise to learn he moved to Australia at the age of 6, more than 60 years earlier! We theorised he must have practised his accent each day to keep it intact 🙂 

[Mareblu]

When we were newlyweds and just moved into our first Canberra home, our next door neighbour was Scottish.  I had no idea of my substantial Scottish heritage at that stage, only a  vague knowledge that my great grandparents had arrived here from the Highlands in the mid 1800s.  We were out to dinner years later with one of Mario’s business associates.  His accent was so broad, and when I admired the different rolls of his speech, he said I’d never guess his home town.  He was astonished when i replied, “Broughty Ferry”.  His brogue was identical to our neighbour’s.   I can pick the subtle differences in Scottish speech, and I have no idea how.  Genetic memory?🤷🏻‍♀️

[Cbtours]

3 hours ago, mr walker said:

It is interesting to read all your stories on accents - it has something I have long had an interest in.

 

I once worked here in Sydney with a couple who were from England who had worked as entertainers at the old English holiday camps like Butlins. The guy claimed to be able to identify people to the village of their origin in England just from a few words. It was his party trick & he said that each person he met would have a different local accent & he had a very high strike rate in correctly identifying their origin.

 

Another elderly guy I worked with had a very broad Scottish accent, making it very difficult to understand at all. We thought he must have come to Australia late in life to have such a broad accent. Imagine our surprise to learn he moved to Australia at the age of 6, more than 60 years earlier! We theorised he must have practised his accent each day to keep it intact 🙂 

The accent changes almost by the suburb in Lancashire it always seemed to me lol

[possum52]

On 1/29/2024 at 10:20 PM, Cbtours said:

I am told I don’t have too much of an accent still (I’ve been here 52 years) but then maybe Julie can weigh into the topic as we’ve spoken a few times lol

It is interesting how some retain their accent for years and years and others don't. Our neighbours when we moved into our home had been in Australia for eleven years, They were from Yorkshire and East London. Both Rob and I found them difficult to understand at times and still did forty years later! 

[cheznandy]

Great reading Julie, been catching up as we have been away. We did an unposh cruise on the QM2 (inside cabin) over 10 years ago and loved the experience and the beautiful ship. Can't recall seeing our cabin steward either way back then.

 

Re accents, I lived in NZ when younger and picked up an accent then moved to South Australia and picked up the South Aussie drawl and pronunciation of vowels, when back in NSW everyone thought i was South African haha!

[MMDown Under]

On 1/28/2024 at 12:53 PM, OzKiwiJJ said:

The upper level of the library.

 

 

The spiral staircase in the library.

 

Oh what a beautiful library. Did you spend much time in the library.  I love well stocked

libraries on ships, especially the big books of

maps and big books on the destination and

attractions/peoples en route.  A negative of Resilient Lady was so few books it couldn’t be called a library, just a pile of books. However, There was a big room of puzzles and games, plus another room with games - two round ? On sawdust.  A bigger version shuttlecock was on deck outside.

[Host Hattie]

Thank you for sharing your great trip report. 

[OzKiwiJJ]

23 minutes ago, MMDown Under said:

Oh what a beautiful library. Did you spend much time in the library.  I love well stocked

libraries on ships, especially the big books of

maps and big books on the destination and

attractions/peoples en route.  A negative of Resilient Lady was so few books it couldn’t be called a library, just a pile of books. However, There was a big room of puzzles and games, plus another room with games - two round ? On sawdust.  A bigger version shuttlecock was on deck outside.

No, we didn't spend much time there other than to have a good look around it. We read on Kindles these days and both our Kindles are well-stocked on cruises. 

 

It was certainly the best library I've ever seen on a cruise ship. For a start it was a real library - hard back books that you had to check out and return. It wasn't just a multi-purpose room with a bookself or two containing a few tatty paperbacks. The selections were obviously carefully chosen - fiction, travel books, non-fiction. A varied selection. My only quibble was that there didn't appear to be much contemporary women's fiction compared with the usual suspense/thriller genres.

 

Plus it was just gorgeous, especially the spiral staircase. 

 

[LittleFish1976]

On 1/29/2024 at 6:22 PM, Drumbeat16 said:

We took our first Cunard cruise recently and may treat ourselves to PG one day so your report has been a great help 😀. The one thing that does concern me is the shower over the bath (my husband has some balance issues), would it put you off booking PG in the future?

 

The showers in Queen's Grill are separate from the bath so you might need to persuade yourself that that's the cabin category you need! 😃