Saintston

Kay longstaff is her name.

Looks like a booze fuelled suicide attempt.

Bear in mind, it doesn't take many cruises before you start getting 5% off those prices too. 7.5% and 10% discounts beckon for the most frequent cruisers.

I'm incredibly bitter because I'm sat on 49 nights on board, about to embark on a 14 night cruise, knowing that I have to wait until the next one to get upgraded from Pacific.

I think they do that already?

Correct. That is the system currently in practice. Whether or not all travel agents are knowledgeable enough to manage it is another matter.

Last night Dai the main offerings were chicken korma n rice, mixed grill and venison liver n mash!

Unless there was a problem onboard, resulting in a seriously scaled down selection of main courses, you would have been offered approximately 7 main courses, plus a Taste of Britain main course (this would be your chicken curry, fish and chips etc), plus a Classic Roast main course, plus a Daily Grill main course option.

The seven or so 'main' main courses will be a la carte type dishes (albeit pre-plated banquet style), such as Roasted Bream Fillet, Seafood Stew with a Crab Bisque, Pork Knuckle with Sage Butter (all these are examples of main course from one menu currently being served across the fleet.

Where is it supposed to do its business?

 

Without being a snob, I loved one review of the Caribbean which referred to "18 stone females with more tattoos than brain cells". Nasty, but we thought the same! Was also surprised at the lack of ambition of cruisers, booking the same cruise next year.

I don't personally think it's possible to make assumptions about fellow passengers based upon their weight, tattoos or holiday preferences without sounding like a snob, whether you preface said comment with "Without being a snob ..." or not.

I quite agree. This seems to happen on every ship and is unfair to those who wish to eat and drink.

 

 

 

Sent from my Sony Z1 Compact.

I think people need to understand that, much like in a hotel lounge, ordering food or drinks is not a prerequisite for being able to use a seat in the inside or outdoor areas on board. Passengers are fully entitled to use chairs to lounge and relax without feeling they have to pay extra for the privilege.

It has always proved significantly cheaper to book with one of the leading online only specialist cruise travel agents than booking direct with P&O for me.

There is no material advantage to booking direct so I don't see the need to pay more.

My experience so far has been that you board immediately if you don't enter the terminal before your time slot. If you arrive early, you will be asked to sit and wait, and will then be called later on. I never quite understand the race to get onboard before everybody else.

My 7.5% got me just over £80 off last cruise, horses for courses. (Can't wait to get to 8.5% and some slippers)

 

A friend of mine is cruising with me next month and will have completed 28 days on P&O and wont be recognised in the Peninsular club until his next cruise with them. He has never seen a Captains Party, doesn't know what he is missing and isn't bothered.

 

He isn't missing a lot

Doesn't membership start once you have hit 15 nights / 150 points?

Just call them if you want labels and they will send some.

Enjoy. I should say, if you are aware of and like your history, then the main bar of the Red Lion is worth a quick look. It does look old and (as you probably know) is supposedly the very room in which Henry V set up a temporary court before heading off to Agincourt.

John is right about the walk distance too; it's just under a mile from hotel to mayflower terminal. You can have a look on google maps.

I'd get lunch then get your free transfer to the terminal, if the hotel can store the cases.

I have never heard of the Red Dragon, by the way; do you mean Red Lion? If so, it doesn't really have a reputation for food. You could try the Duke of Wellington if you like old fashioned pubs with home cooked, traditional style food. It's closer to your hotel. You also have The Pig in the Wall, The Dancing Man, and The Platform, which are all closer and trendier, but I'm not sure how much of a menu they offer.

What cabin is it?

Speaking as a friend of Dorothy and as a friend of Bill W (I know, I know, friends all over;-)) the reason it's called friends of Bill W rather than just Alcoholics Anonymous is because it's not just for alcoholics. Any of the "anonymous" group members are welcome, narcotics anonymous, overeaters anonymous, gamblers anonymous, sex addicts anonymous and all the other anonymous etc etc are all welcome at a friends of Bill W meeting.

 

Personally I've always understood that cruises were the gay-friendliest type of holiday since way back. Must be something about all those sailors[emoji38]. When I did my first cruise ten years ago I asked a fellow gay friend who had been on one if we would have any trouble as a gay couple on board and his response was something like "oh god no, I've been on the forums and it's really gay friendly, no problems at all".

 

I, too, prefer friends of dorothy to LGBT(Q) it's just so lovely and quaint. Personally I think it should be up to the group organising it to decide on which name to use, it shouldn't be dictated by the cruise line. But I suspect as many LGBTQ folk are as happy with either (if we could ever agree that is lol). [emoji6]

 

 

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I'm sure they'd get a lot more interest in a sex addicts meeting if they publicised it.

For what it's worth, they don't pour a Long Island Iced Tea from a carton on P&O either.

Pricing for young children depends on the cruise. We went Cunard last winter and paid nothing for our then 10 month old. We are booked on P&O this winter and he's costing £99 for 12 nights.

 

Celebrity and Royal Caribbean charge several hundred pounds for a child of his age which is bonkers.

 

When we went last year, we took a travel cot (although available on board) and his sleepyhead and he slept pretty well.

 

Don't forget the night nursery - subject to availability, you can drop children up to two off from 7pm and collect by 11pm and they can sleep there while you have dinner and drinks. Free of charge.

 

Toys are the challenge - we just took a carrier bag of stuff last time but not sure how to keep him amused now he's older for that long!

Interesting. It's a bit disconcerting that they don't actually openly publish these fares.

There's only one thing worse than a muster drill on a cruise, and that's trying to get out of the muster station to anywhere else after the drill is complete.

I don't believe that is strictly true, with saver fares I think there is no choice of dining at booking, although I think that maybe a preference can be expressed. However once on board everyone is treated the same, except for paying for shuttles, so if the Maitre D' can switch dining arrangements he will, although some do have their head stuck so far up their a**e that maybe they cannot hear.;p

A preference can't be given with Saver Fares. You just get a card in your cabin saying what you've been given. Unless they have changed it recently anyway, because the two cruises I most recently booked were using Select Fares instead as they worked out cheaper.

New customers on Cunard have a red stripe on their cruise card, and it appears to be a way for the regular Cunard customers to identify and look down on such people.

Similar to the way P&O cards ( and probably many other lines'), print a customer's loyalty ties on them I guess.

IBut changing dining room/table allocation is a common practice and not precluded if you are on a saver fare.

It's not permitted; that's the nub of it.

I had not realised that transmission power loss could be up 7%, I wonder how far from Southampton and the proposed Greenwich cruise terminal are the nearest power stations?

Maybe the cheapest option is for Southampton ratepayers to pay for particle scrubbers to be installed fleet wide on P&O ships?;)

Southampton docks has its own power station ( which also produces power for some civic services). How much of its electricity is generated by this, I don't know. Southampton also has a larger power station across Southampton Water at Fawkes.

Levy the local businesses that are taking all this extra money from cruise passengers. The ships pay duties to land passengers, and passengers pay monies when in port on parking, hotels etc so where is all that income going?? It should be used to pay for all these electric installations.

Do that and you're penalising Joe Public by taking money out of the local economy. Port cities and their populations put up with negative impacts of cruise liners (in addition to pollution), such as traffic and excess pressure on infrastructure etc. The economic benefits are what makes them accept the negative side effects to some degree.

I would have thought it fairer for costs to be passed on to cruise lines / shipping companies, who would then have to decide to what extent they bear the brunt of it or pass it on to their customers. It's ultimately fairer for their customers to be paying an official / unofficial green levy, seeing as they are the ones choosing to use the ships.

I say that as somebody who is both a local bystander and a passenger, so relatively impartial.

I second this, we have never had a problem getting a 2 table on late sitting. We book late and saver or early saver fare. If you are not allocated what you want just see the maitre 'd on the first day. We have always been able to change and we have never been told 'but you booked a saver you have to take what was allocated'.

I think it's important to recognise the difference between a goodwill gesture and a change due to policy.

If you book a saver fare, there is no guarantee that you will be able to switch what you are given, once on board.

People shouldn't be booking these fares with an expectation that they can switch to whatever they like once on board, as they will be incredibly frustrated if it isn't possible for them.

Some restaurant managers may be prepared to make switches where capacity permits, but there is nothing they can do if capacity has been met.

Speciality restaurants have been reduced on the first night of every cruise I have been on. It's a set discount off the cover charge.

Later in the cruise they will sometimes run a 'free bottle of wine' offer, but whenever I have seen this it is only valid if your booking is for before 7pm.