Caribbean transatlantic

Hi,

We are looking at booking the transatlantic crossing back to Southampton next year in March. The price seems rather good and i was wondering if anyone might know why this is? Im guessing to do with the sea days.

Anyone able to provide experience and whether its a good choice cruise?

I have booked the Eastbound Transatlantic previously and found it excellent. There is just the one very long flight instead of the traditional two; one in each direction as the ship brings you back to Southampton. If you do the Eastbound variant then you can fly out with flight luggage allowance and return with an unlimited weight of shopping.

It has been for many years one of the cheapest cruises based on the length of cruise because although you go to the Caribbean you are not there for very long in comparison to a fortnight remaining in the region. I started cruising on Cunard Transatlantic and am therefore used to consecutive sea days. I think many people view these negatively. It's not like a Cunard Transatlantic New York to Southampton inasmuch as you travel Eastwards much further South on the way to the Canaries before turning Northwards. If it gets cold it will probably be on this final Northbound leg.

The important things to choose if you can:

1 Economy plus seats are available if you book early on some flights.

2 Flying out on a Friday gives you an extra day in the Caribbean, this should

be looked closely into when comparing different travel agents prices.

3 Friday flights enabled us to do the proper Submarine excursion in Barbados this was epic.

4 Always book a Balcony Cabin as nobody is on excursions in the day, they

are all sunbathing together on the same deck so it's crowded.

5 Book a Starboard Balcony as these face the South on the Transatlantic leg.

6 Sort out your transport to from Airport and Southampton Cruise Terminal as

you need to fly out from Airport but get from Southampton to Airport on

return. A free service coach is available to return you to relevant airport.

I prefer taxis or friends meeting me at Southampton.

It's a good cruise in my opinion.

Regards John

We've booked it the other way round: port balcony midships out, facing south, 4 islands then Barbados and an extra day before flying home to Manchester. Overnight flight and i don't care what time we get in; we'll walk the 10 minutes to the train station and get on the first available train home.

Very good price, but I've heard that some of the passengers leave much to be desired! Planned strategy for avoiding the buffet/ Brodies/the pool deck!

We've booked it the other way round: port balcony midships out, facing south, 4 islands then Barbados and an extra day before flying home to Manchester. Overnight flight and i don't care what time we get in; we'll walk the 10 minutes to the train station and get on the first available train home.

 

Very good price, but I've heard that some of the passengers leave much to be desired! Planned strategy for avoiding the buffet/ Brodies/the pool deck!

We flew out and sailed back on Oceana, I think there was a stop at Madeira to break the sea days up a bit. I don't remember much about the sea days, I suspect we quickly adopted a rather lazy and well fed routine [emoji15] We enjoyed the ports and the Cosol tour in St Lucia was one of the best we have ever done, also had a happy day in Nelsons Dockyard when we found a lovely bar with a balcony that nobody else noticed. We sailed on Britannia last July, now maybe it was because it was Around Britain in term time but the buffet, decks and Brodies were all lovely - in fact Brodies had quite an up-market bar feel. Hope you both have a great time, my next cruise has about 13 sea days, with 6 in a row out and 5 in a row back, just hoping it doesn't drive me mad!

Sailing back to Southampton after the Caribbean can I ask about the sea days, did you have warm weather for most of it I know the nearer you get to Southampton it will be cooler, we like the idea of sailing home rather than a long night flight. 😎😎

Sailing back to Southampton after the Caribbean can I ask about the sea days, did you have warm weather for most of it I know the nearer you get to Southampton it will be cooler, we like the idea of sailing home rather than a long night flight. ����

If you think about Cunard New York to Southampton. They hug the Canadian coast on the shelf and continue across at a Northern latitude. It can be quite cold sometimes. Many people think Transatlantic crossings are cold because they think of this, much more Northern crossing.

P&O start in Barbados and head for the Canaries or Azores all of these places are much further South and warmer, so the chances of warmer weather are significantly better using a far more Southerly crossing route. The flying fish will be there a lot of the time for those that look. The final sector from Canaries to Southampton usually starts warm and then gets colder as you near the British Isles. The number of warm days on this final sector home from the Canaries is much more chancey and significantly fewer.

Regards John

Sailing back to Southampton after the Caribbean can I ask about the sea days, did you have warm weather for most of it I know the nearer you get to Southampton it will be cooler, we like the idea of sailing home rather than a long night flight. 😎😎

we did a Caribbean transatlantic sailing both way. shady side going, but we had the sun all the way back. In fact if I remember correctly we lost the sun and stopped sitting on the balcony the last day before Southampton. It was lovely.

We have done the Transatlantic back to Southampton twice (we flew out) and the difference in the weather was incredible. On the first occasion we got back to Southampton on 4th April - it was snowing! The weather from the Azores back to Southampton was fairly cloudy and getting colder the further north we went.

On the second occasion we also arrived back in Southampton on 4th April. The day before we arrived we were sat on the balcony and had to use sun lotion as it was so hot. We arrived in Southampton and the weather was glorious - so you can never tell!

We did the Transatlantic return as I hate that overnight flight - landing at Gatwick at 5am has definitely lost its appeal.

Thank you everyone who replied about this crossing with helpful tips, my sister and I think that we should give this a try, as we would avoid the long flight and jet lag when we get back home.

We have done the Caribbean once before with P&O and really enjoyed it , the bonus for us was once you arrive at Gatwick and checked in you didn't have to handle our luggage at all next time we saw it was outside our cabin.

We are now going to check out prices for next year, thank you for the tip on being starboard side on the way back to get the sun John.

Ten years ago, we thought we'd be 'clever' and sail the eastbound transatlantic on QM2 in July. We presumed that we would avoid the jetlag and the weather wouldn't get too bad as we approached the UK. We loved the crossing; QM2 was fab but losing an hour every day played havoc with energy levels. The crew found it soul-destroying especially as the ship had literally just done a west-bound TA crossing, so they were practically catatonic! IMHO the eastbound crossing is worse than the minor jetlag we experience from a flight. Also the change in weather after 3 days when we changed course to NE was disappointing, even in July. We'd never do an EB TA again.

On a P&O ship returning to Southampton from the Caribbean they alter the clocks at midday not during the night so no-one misses out on sleep - much better idea.