Selbourne

Thank you - that would be really appreciated. I’m just keen to understand if it’s worthwhile and how much the accompanying wine flight is (assuming that there is one). Have a great cruise.

I agree with everyone that, unless it was a sort of treasure hunt organised by the on board kids club team, it falls firmly under the ‘tasteless tat’ category and is frankly littering which I shouldn’t think impresses the ships crew, but can somebody please tell me why somebody would do this? I am struggling to understand what the point of it would be.

That’s our view as well. We don’t drink a huge amount and many of the drinks we do like are excluded. If there weren’t all the daft restrictions I might be tempted to give it a go once, but my wife drinks very little now so the rule about both having to buy it would be a show stopper.

Please can you get them to sort it out PDQ! We are now on Britannia in July, as well as Iona in August and Ventura in October. We intend to be using Epicurean regularly on all three ships, given the reports about the MDRs, and Epicurean on Britannia has hitherto been our favourite restaurant at sea.

MSCs USP seems to be their cheap drinks packages. P&O are still miles off in that regard, as their drinks package is overpriced and with far too many restrictions for those who want decent quality drinks. I agree about the cruise prices though. I’ve just nabbed a Britannia cruise for a few months time. It was below my new self imposed ‘P&O price cap’ of £100 per person per night for a balcony cabin and that was for a Select booking. Best of all we got our first choice accessible balcony cabin. Interestingly, when I enquired about the cruise a month or so ago there was no availability for accessible cabins. Yesterday we had a choice of two. The difference seems to be that balance due date has just passed. I suspect that some folk who booked with a tiny deposit may have cancelled, probably due to the cost of living challenges at present?

I believe that it’s just on Fjords cruises, as the chef is Norwegian. Shame they don’t do the Crepes Suzette at the table as that was quite an experience. I shall keep in mind the tip about the cheese 👍

Supply and demand. P&O are offering cruises at extremely low prices, especially on Arvia and Iona, in order to fill the ships. The profit will come from on board spend.

I’ve never heard of him! What in particular was disappointing about Epicurean on Iona?

When we are on Iona in August we intend to use Epicurean at least twice. As it’s a Norwegian cruise, on one night they have a tasting menu created by the chef Kjartan Skjelde. Has anyone tried this and what did you think? It’s a bit confusing as the menu is described as a Vegetarian tasting menu, but it isn’t! Also, there are paired wines listed with each course. Can you buy these as a wine flight to accompany the meal and, if so, can you recall the cost? Menu below (if the link works) https://my.pocruises.com/content/dam/po/my-cruise/dining/venues/menus/Menu_App_Epicurean_Iona taster menu.pdf

So were they actively intercepting wheelchair users and allowing them to bypass the queue? Great if they do, as I was concerned about my wife needing the loo if we were stuck in a long queue.

Sounds great.

We would love to do river cruises. The constantly changing scenery and the fact that there are no sea days would be perfect for us! Sadly, they cannot accommodate wheelchair users. I have heard others say that the entertainment isn’t great and, of course, dining and bar options are very limited. However, I guess that’s no different to a boutique hotel versus a resort, which is essentially the difference between a river cruise boat and a cruise ship.

As others have said, unless the policy has changed you can only take a scooter if you are in an accessible cabin. Frankly, I hope that they do relax this policy. My wife is a full time wheelchair user and is unable to even stand unaided, let alone take a few steps. As a result we are unable to cruise if the accessible cabins are booked. We have spoken to scooter users who have felt most uncomfortable occupying an accessible cabin in the knowledge that by doing so, through no choice of their own, they may be depriving someone with a far greater degree of disability from cruising.

My wife is also in the ‘eat to live’ category, whilst I am most definitely the other way around. The fact that I am twice her size if of course purely coincidental and entirely down to other factors, such as genetics 😉

In your situation I would do exactly the same. Like some others, although we were cruising around 3 times a year prior to Covid, we didn’t really miss it at all during the shutdown. Staycation cruises didn’t remotely appeal, as we cruise for the ports not sea days, and we couldn’t be doing with all the on board restrictions. Also, like you and others, we were noticing the drop off in quality with P&O pre Covid. I grow rather tired of the constant jibes from a couple of posters that those of us who haven’t cruised since Covid shouldn’t comment on this, as if we have no experience. This is of course nonsense, as the changes were happening in the years leading up to Covid and, from all the reviews I have read since, the cutbacks have worsened, not improved. We have put our money where our mouth is and have booked our first Cunard cruise and we are pre registered with Saga and are keen to try them. What we have decided, however, is that we will still use P&O as ‘filler’ holidays, as long as the price reflects the revised quality of the experience. In a similar manner, we use Premier Inn quite happily for short breaks and are happy to do so, but if it was a special holiday we would use somewhere more luxurious. Having used suites with P&O on the bigger ships and balcony cabins on the more expensive cruises (mostly on Aurora), we have now set a notional cap of £200 per night per couple for a balcony cabin with P&O, as we feel that the lower quality experience will still represent good value at those prices. This price cap also reflects the fact that we will be using speciality restaurants more than we would have done previously. Our Iona cruise in August is more expensive, but was booked some years ago. Our October Ventura cruise was well below our cap and in fact I booked a Britannia cruise yesterday that was also below our price cap. Hopefully, with 3 ‘post Covid’ P&O cruises on 3 different ships this year we will have a very clear idea as to whether or not we have made the right decision.

Quite. Every time I see the massive queues and delays at Dover, Eurotunnel or airports I am relieved that the only time that we go abroad now is on a cruise ship! I find embarkation and disembarkation to be a faff, and also tender ports (which we try to avoid now) but, beyond that it’s a very relaxing holiday and, as you say, particularly accommodating for those with health or mobility issues.

Formal nights used to be around twice a week, but that was before all the cutbacks. I might be wrong, but I believe that there is only one a week on Iona.

We try to use the MDRs on formal nights, particularly if it’s the Marco Pierre White or Chaines des Rottiseurs menus. Do they they have things like cheese soufflé, beef Wellington and lobster Thermidor in the buffet on Arvia? Also, have the desserts improved? Never a P&O strength from our experience. The buffets seem to have dozens of different looking small patisserie items that look nice but are all tasteless. The hot deserts can be better, but I find the churned up trays in the buffet to be somewhat off putting in comparison to a nicely plated desert served to the table in the MDR.

Your enthusiasm is infectious (even more so than our kids were at Christmas when they were young) and the crusade that you seem be on to constantly tell everyone why they should cruise in exactly the way that you do is very amusing 😉 For balance, here’s an alternative view. I hate the buffet and will only use it as a last resort when I’m feeling peckish and just want to grab something. If it’s cold food, I will often take it back to our cabin to eat. Why? Like many people (not just those of us who are full time carers), I am up and down like the proverbial blue ar**d fly at home, doing jobs around the house and garden, including preparing meals. When I dine on holiday, I want to be shown to a nice table in a decent restaurant and just sit and relax, chatting to my wife, whilst someone else does all the running around. The buffet is the complete opposite of that. Although I am British I detest queues and avoid them at all costs. I get fed up shuffling along in a food queue whilst people examine every potato to decide which they want. Some folk think you are queue jumping if you skip half of it and just go directly to the tray that you want. Sadly, some of my fellow guests have very poor hygiene standards when it comes to food handling. As a male of a certain age, I tend not to pass up the opportunity of a loo visit when en-route to a meal! I have lost count of the number of people who don’t wash their hands in the loo and then proceed directly into the buffet, again skipping any hand sanitisation regime. These people are then handling serving tongs etc. Others, when serving themselves, will spill some on their fingers, lick it off and then pick up the next set of tongs. To me, that is the equivalent of spitting on the tongs 🤮 I don’t believe that it is purely coincidental that we almost never use the buffet and in all our cruises have never succumbed to Norovirus. We prefer the ambiance, layout and seating arrangement of restaurants, rather than the cafeteria style layout and ambiance of the buffet, the seating arrangement of which means that you are often up close and personal to others. The buffet is a hustle and bustle place with people constantly coming and going and walking up and down to get food etc. Not conducive to a relaxing dining experience IMHO. If the priority is just to get something to eat and then quickly move on, then the buffet is ideal. However, that’s not how we cruise. Unlike you, we don’t rate a lot of the cruise ship style ‘entertainment’. It’s not a reason that we cruise and we avoid most of it. On the other hand, dining is a highlight and something that we take our time over and enjoy. We dine out a few times a week at home. We tend to use nice pubs and restaurants, not cafeterias. When on holiday we want as good as we enjoy at home, or better. We don’t get that from the buffet. I’m glad that you enjoy an entirely different type of cruise experience to us, because it would be a real problem if we all wanted to do exactly the same things at the same times. That’s why cruise ships cater to all tastes. However, I’m afraid that your persistent efforts to tell me and others why we should all do as you do are futile in my case 😉

It’s odd how reviews of the same speciality restaurants can vary so much by ship. Some restaurants that get consistently good reviews on Iona can receive less positive reviews on Arvia and vice-versa. Based on your feedback (admittedly on Arvia) and others, I intend to try breakfast in Keel & Cow and possibly The Quays, as long as they aren’t too busy. Unfortunately we are only on Iona for a week, so we won’t have time to do everything. Hence why the balanced reviews have been so helpful in narrowing down our priority choices. Like you, I have always marvelled at how cruise ships can cater for such vast numbers and yet still churn out meals that are generally pretty good and hot. I read many reviews about MDR meals being luke warm, but can honestly say that we’ve never had that problem. In the couple of years prior to Covid we started noticing a decline in the quality and size of MDR meals, lunchtimes being particularly bad. I would agree that many meals could still be described as ‘adequate’, but adequate is what I cook at home! When I am on a cruise ship, the meals are a highlight for me (I enjoy my food and it’s even more enjoyable when you don’t have to cook it and clean it all away afterwards). As a result, I want good quality restaurant standard meals every time. The unfortunate thing is that to get that with P&O now it sounds as though you have to pay extra and use the specialty restaurants. We’ve always used them, but have also enjoyed the MDRs. It won’t be a problem on our 7 night cruise, but we will want to be using the MDR a lot more on Ventura in the autumn, as that’s a 14 night cruise and there are less alternative options on her.

I was extremely interested to read your review majortom10, as I know that you have had similar concerns to me about P&Os direction of travel. I also know that you prefer Cunard, which we are trying for the first time next year. Your positive comments also helped to reassure me about our forthcoming Iona cruise. The areas where you made constructive criticism are entirely consistent with quite a few other reviews that I have now read and, as a result, we have revised our plans for our Iona cruise. We usually use the MDR quite a bit but will probably restrict it to breakfast and the one formal night (we don’t like the idea of Chefs Table). Lunches and other dinners will now most likely be in the speciality restaurants. One of those was likely to be the Beach House but, again, based on the feedback of yourself and others, we may give that a miss now.

I very much enjoyed reading your review Dai, and it has reassured me about some of my concerns about our forthcoming August cruise on Iona. In fact, I believe that I was the first to respond with a ‘trophy’ thanking you for it! It’s great that you have always found everything about P&O to be perfect. As I say, I don’t take issue with anything that you have said, because that was your experience. It’s just that I personally like reviews that give due credit to all the positives, whilst also acknowledging the areas where improvements can be made, as there are always some. We have enjoyed all our cruises, but none has been 100% perfect in all respects, nor do we expect them to be. I have often found the critical observations of others to be invaluable in helping plan our cruises in order to avoid experiencing the same problems or challenges, and I know from feedback that by doing the same we have also helped others.

I feel exactly the same way. I take reviews that are 100% positive with the same huge pinch of salt that I do those that are 100% negative. That’s not to say that I don’t believe the persons experiences to be true, but nothing beats a good balanced review.

With excursions you can only book for those in your cabin. However, as long as both couples book the same excursion times you can travel together. Just make sure that on the day you arrive together for the excursions and that way you will be on the same coach. With speciality dining, as far as I know, you can book for more than the number in your cabin, so one person can make the booking for four, so that you are seated on one table.

It’s a bit of a myth that you have to have cruise specific insurance cover in order to cover things like emergency evacuations from a ship. We are insured with Aviva and they consider a cruise to be a normal holiday and we are covered for on board medical treatment, emergency evacuations, repatriation etc. Specific cruise insurance tends to add things like missed port compensation, which we don’t have, but with the eye watering premiums that some people mention they have paid we would need multiple missed ports on every cruise to recoup the additional premium!