CaraLark

Great question - I was only searching for this information yesterday!!

Does anyone know if it is possible to walk from the cruise terminal at Barcelona? I understand it’s a longish walk into the centre, but interested nonetheless ! 😉

Muster scan, then locate cabin!

Drop coats, bags, and have a wander. I like to have the chance to orientate myself and pick out some way markers for when I invariably get lost!

return to cabin, change into swimwear and find a hot tub to plonk ourselves into and wallow away the rest of the afternoon!

helps to temper the jumping excitement that I’m finally on board and about to have a cracking cruise! Our other holidays tend to be city breaks where we walk miles, so a cruise allows us both to have some relaxing days in between busy port days. 
got to wait till September for our next cruise though *impatient* 

4 minutes ago, jwlane said:

This menu is misleading - it does not show the offerings that change daily. That said, your husband needs to contact the dining room as soon as you board and inform them that he is vegetarian. My vegan wife is usually very happy with the offerings they will put together. 

Thank you for responding, that’s reassuring! 

19 hours ago, TrueCruiseaholic said:

Not yet cruised with Celebrity, but due to in July. I’m a little concerned if this is an evening menu as to what my vegetarian husband could choose - is it just the ‘chop chop salad’ as a starter. No main?

where is a choice for him? 
 

I have to say I’m quite disappointed with this change. We have our first cruise with Celebrity, having been persuaded by family who’ve cruised and loved the line. We don’t use room service every day, but I need to take medication with food, so if hubby wants a lay in (not unreasonable on a sea day, or holiday) I can still keep to medication regime without breakfasting alone.  Whilst I don’t think cruise lines changing their offering can be stopped, surely honouring what is offered at the time of booking should be maintained. It’s poor customer service, and I’m now feeling far less enthused about my upcoming cruise. 

 We are new to Celebrity and going on our first cruise on Silhouette later this year.

Husband is a vegetarian, I’m struggling to find reliable menus for the speciality restaurants to see if any are worth booking for us.

I emailed Celebrity but they were not helpful - telling me there is a separate 14 day vegetarian menu for the main dining room, that is only available onboard, but did not answer my question about Blu or the speciality restaurants. 
Can any of you seasoned travellers either point me in the right direction, or offer any advice?

Thank you.

I did try to search the boards, but only found this thread, which as we are not in a Royal Suite doesn’t give me all the info.

https://boards.cruisecritic.co.uk/topic/2841596-vegetarian-options-on-silhouette/#comment-62919625

Resurrecting this older thread as the same thing has happened to me, only the extra charge is £567.

Will be contacting them immediately to resolve this!

2 hours ago, Bazrat said:

Hi thanks for the picture it puts it into context and did you have a good cruise hopefully you left me some beer onboard

Plenty of beer left for you, slightly less rosé though! 
 

23 minutes ago, Bazrat said:

Just out of interest if they allowed all the passengers off early what about transport home, unless you have a car the rest would spend the night wandering up and down the quayside.

The maintenance as far as I gather was for something that needed to be done so the follow on cruises would not be disrupted, as for the mention of compensation interesting really your onboard a beautiful ship and in my opinion eating good food and being entertained yes they paid for six nights and there getting six nights

It is essential maintence - to do with the pressure in the life rafts!

given the height of the crane and the forecast winds tomorrow, I think it was easier today!

It has been a truly glorious sail up to Liverpool and back. We have been very fortunate with the weather. With spectacular sunsets. Although it was a treat to return in the daylight around the IOW, I would have preferred another day at sea.

Mostly it has been a great voyage, though some service in the MDR has been lacking - particularly when my vegetarian cruising companion was presented with an incorrect meal, and when we stated this, it was suggested they eat it (fish!). 😳

Many thanks for your reply. I don't eat fish, although my husband does, so that could be okay. I just resent paying the cover charge for no choice and us both eating the same food. I get that we don't have to eat at the specialty restaurants. I've heard good things about the Glass House, and the Beach House seems to offer a good selection.

Thanks for the suggestion of speaking to the restuarant manager - I will make a point of doing that. Thank you.

Hi, hoping some seasoned cruiser can help. We are due to sail on our second cruise this September. On our first cruise, we were both meat eaters. We are now both vegetarian. I rang P&O to update them and I understand there is a separate vegetarian menu each day for the MDR. What about the specialty restaurants? This cruise is to celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary, and we had originally planned to treat ourselves. I’ve looked at the sample menus but can only see one vegetarian option - is that the case? Can anyone advise?

Thanks!

Thanks for the replies. We hadn't booked a saver deal, but had the money available to pay for the cruise - had not long moved house and with 'new house' spending wanted to ensure we didn't forget about paying for the cruise, so paid it early - interest rates are fairly awful anyway!

Son has cruised before (same ship, same cabin type) and really really enjoyed it - however he has since become an 'adult' and no longer needs to listen to us... and anything we do is 'totally lame'. He's been dithering for months about coming on the cruise. Rang P&O who were ace and we can remove him and just lose the £50 deposit, which I can cope with. He's got two weeks to decide, or I'll decide for him!

We were going to book independently - but found it sold out. So have paid the hefty p&o price. Howerever it is for our wedding anniversary,and we’re on holiday, so trying not to mind too much

Evening. Hoping seasoned travellers might be able to give me some advice. We booked a cruise for later this year, and have paid in full.

Our son no longer wants to come (who’d want a free holiday anyway... :rolleyes:)

Will it be possible to remove him from the booking - are we likely to get any monies back? He’s the third occupant in a superior deluxe balcony.

Thanks - be good to have some info before I ring tomorrow.

I ignored the time on my last cruise, as I needed to book rail travel and the advance fares were significantly cheaper to book. That said - I wasn't expecting to board earlier and very happy to wait in the terminal building until our allotted time. Rather enjoyed the people watching actually.;p

We have two cruises booked later this year (A824/N833), haven't been advised yet about any changes to the on-board service charge. It was £5.50 pppn on our last (and first) cruise. I suspect I may alter the amount down based on our experience of service on our last cruise. We left an additional envelope for our cabin steward, as she was wonderful, and I suspect we will do the same again on our next two cruises.

I think its probably time for P&O to include the charge in the cost of the cruise, rather than as an extra.

I agree with this sentiment. People seem to think that it is fine when the company remove something that they don't use. Will they be so happy when they take away something that they do use and like?

 

And to an extent the real issue is (allegedly) removing something else that was part of the brochure offering and included in the price when everyone booked. If I booked Brittania today then according to the current marketing information I still get MDR afternoon tea.

 

When I booked my cruises earlier this brochure offered complimentary items of room service.

 

Based on P&O obvious willingness to simply remove items included in the package when holidays went on sale I do really wonder what they will remove next.

I have to say I totally agree. I've two cruises booked for 2018, one to celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary, and a family holiday. I booked because of the multiple options cruising gives us, all included. We did enjoy room service on our first cruise as we were travelling through the sea lock leaving Amsterdam and I wanted to watch it from the balcony. We also enjoyed afternoon tea instead of lunch.

I'm concerned that elements advertised as part of our cruise are no longer on offer, and wonder what else might be removed before we cruise next year.

On my first cruise with P&O (first ever too) we had a boarding time of 3pm. This didn't come through to us until after I'd booked our rail travel down, which I'd booked for much earlier in the day, as hubby was excited to be there 'as soon as possible'. We arrived at Mayflower just after 1pm. We fully expected to wait until 3pm to board, and took advantage of a seat where I could people watch (guilty as charged) and the free magazines on offer. Very surprised to be called through at 1:40ish and were on board, and in our cabin by 2pm.

Very thrilled to be on-board early, but, I would have been prepared (and happy) to wait until 3pm. I do understand that first day of the holiday means we all want to be on board as early as possible - and very interesting to read this is do-able from other lines, but my holiday starts from the moment I wake up, and I count traveling down as all part of the fun. I do, however, fully understand how people would become frustrated to be kept waiting in excess of their boarding time - that's no fun, and would hope that any company would endeavour to help smooth this over with good customer service.

Anyway - very much looking forward to our next two cruises, but starting to suffer cruise envy, as they are not until September 2018.... how long to wait....

We did the four-day cruise visiting Amsterdam and Zeebrugge. Amsterdam was an 8-5:30 day, and Zeebrugge was 8-4 day - both good amounts of hours. Thoroughly enjoyed the ports, but like Selbourne found service levels a little lacklustre - and believe this might be a feature of mini cruises.

As promised, here is the link to my review for this cruise...

 

http://www.cruisecritic.co.uk/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=567521&et_cid=2861228&et_rid=134107201&et_referrer=Boards

Oh lord! I'd forgotten the canapés!! Not sure what you had, but we were served soggy pastry with a (guessed) savoury filling - might have been cheese, but totally tasteless, with a smattering of a green herb!

We also attended the Lowry talk - which we enjoyed.

We enjoyed that sail away from Amsterdam, and traveling through the sea lock, though we missed the Special boat entertainment on the first night. We did look out for it, as it was mentioned at the safety drill, but we were starboard. Thanks for your review, it was interesting to read as this was our first ever cruise, and I am saddened that we didn't have a better experience, that said, we have all fallen in love with cruising.

We were on Ventura last week for a four night mini cruise. I suspect there are different standards between mini and longer cruises. However we got to know our cabin steward and she was lovely and was fab to us. However that was almost the exception. Staff seemed bored and not very engaging. We ate mostly in the freedom dining room - and were fortunate to sit in mostly the same area on most occasions. The wait staff there were lovely, however in a different section the service was abysmal. We often ate as a couple - the teen preferred the buffet, and were often only given one menu to share! Having to ask for another, and water, and bread.

We ate in the buffet a few times, and thought the food offered was poor. This was in regards to presentation - serving implements were dirty, but also the food was tepid to warm, and bland. This was such a masked contrast to the freedom dining restaurants and really let the ship down

In general I'd say the service was lacklustre. For example, one morning we wanted an early start, so ordered breakfast to the room - clearly marking the order for three people, but only got two sets of cutlery. Just a lack of attention to detail. On the gala dinner night - which we didn't want to do, we opted for afternoon tea. For a table of 7, we were offered dry sandwiches, two shortbread biscuits, two millionaire shortbreads and two mini profiteroles to be shared amongst us. We had to ask for scones and crumpets. We were poured tea, but had no milk on the table, when we asked for some it was taken from a table next to us! The non-gala option that night was curry in the buffet. It wasn't very appetising.

I hope you have a better experience. I have to say I'm considering my options as we are booked on another cruise with P&O next year and I'm considering taking the hit of losing the deposit, as I was so disappointed.

We have done many cruises with Pando and have always found the food very good. However, we have just returned from a 28 day Carribean cruise on Ventura and have to say the food was poor and service slow. We have other issues, but am taking them up direct with Pando. We are not the type to moan about everything, but we were really surprised about the food. The cruise was not up to the standard we have had in the past with Pando.

It's interesting that you say this as we have just come off the cruise after yours. We thought the food was really poor and service lacklustre. Your comment suggests this is not the usual levels on P&O. Perhaps the crew are at the end of their stint on board?

Generally in the region of £3.25/£3.50 for a single, plus tonic. Tonic ranges from a can of Britvic £1, Schweppes £1.50 to Fevertree £1.75

Liking the suggestion for a big meal at lunch and then afternoon tea, followed by room service!

The teen is a strapping 17 year old, he struggles with being sociable (above and beyond the usual teen tendency to grunt), mainly because he is very slow at processing information and can take a long time to form sentences etc. I suspect, as it's just a short 4 night cruise we will go with the brilliant suggestion of taking afternoon tea and then order some room service - or find one of the non-formal venues.

I'm hoping that by giving him a chance to try out a short cruise, with no major 'asks' of him that he will be able to relax and enjoy it - and therefore we can relax and enjoy it, and perhaps take a longer holiday and join in the Black tie fun.

Thanks again for all the help, and suggestions.