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Having spent 99 nights on her in January its fair to say that in that amount of time you tend to notice things you probably wouldn't on a normal length cruise, there is no doubt she has lacked serious investment in certain areas (seating in the rising sun were way past their useful life ,in fairness we did not frequent that venue often) the public toilets' were a constant issue ( not working or blocked) carpets in some areas were ready for replacing and paintwork again in certain areas needed refurbishment , one major problem was leaking ceilings in the belvedere with towels often laid out on the floor, the upper decks had water under them and the mock flooring did bubble up when it rained , and our balcony was in a poor state with severely worn fixtures. All this should not detract from the fact that she is an older ship and has been mentioned is due a refit ,quite what will be done during this work is an unknown factor but mention on our cruise was that most of the work was to be mechanical not cosmetic. This was our fourth time on Arcadia and we did enjoy our cruise but it has to be said that upgrading needs to be done for her to compete with other lines who appear to have bigger budgets to keep their older vessels in good repair. We are on Aurora next which appears to have aged better than Arcadia. Hope you have a wonderful cruise and enjoy all Arcadia has to offer😀

Good to hear, no pun intended🤣🤣🤣🤣

Tbh that has now become the norm , more so on crowded city tours , and have to say very welcome

Thank you ,really looking forward to trying Fred after listening to so many other cruisers opinions of them ,which were nearly all positive. We have sailed with various other lines ,both big and small .old and new, have no problem with older ships as they do have character ,as long as they are maintained to a decent standard. Totally agree about the North/South issue, there must be quite a large untapped market to be captured with the right destinations other than Northern Europe and Great Britain .

We too have booked our first fred cruise out of Newcastle after years of procrastinating, our dealings with them up to now have been a pleasure and the reviews of the ship ( Balmoral) are mostly positive , we always approach a new line with an open mind and it will be interesting how we feel after it , also greatly looking forward to the two hour journey to Newcastle as opposed to the long drag to Southampton😃

If your into sunbeds then Aurora and Arcadia well suit you fine as there is plenty of deck space to find a suitable spot which is not hemmed in on the other ships

Roatan is a lovely port of call .we were blessed to be the only ship in on the day we called and one of the abiding memories was of at least half the crew having the most fantastic time for a few hours and was a pleasure to be on the same stretch of beach as them , they were polite and made sure they did not interrupt or disturb any of the guests, however quite a few passengers saw what a good time they were having and joined in with them !!! There is a chair lift from near the dock which takes you to the beach area and cost $2 ( may have gone up now) but in all honesty the walk was really nice through well kept gardens , the only downside when we called was the departure time of 4pm ,even though our next port was less than half a days sail ,most people agreed we could have stayed for at least another couple of hours without it making any difference.

Thanks ,we will be applying for the extended cover shortly for our January 2025 65 night cruise as we have been informed if we renew before the expiry date of our world extension we will receive the same charges as last year , hopeful this is information will be correct

We applied for our missed ports when we arrived home and were paid out within two weeks with the full amount for the seven missed ports , well impressed with the NW policy which we only started using two years ago, wished we had known about it years ago as our other policy did not cover missed ports ( we found this out after trying to make a claim) we then paid for the cruise cover and tried to claim when we missed ports on a later cruise , only to be told we could only claim if we had a shore excursion booked!!. So pleased with the policy we now have and very easy to add on for things like the world and longer cruises 👍

We do feel its an area that really lets P and O down , same with e mails ( no reply after ten weeks now) as our bookings are with a TA we usually leave it up to them , in context we have had to contact Fred twice in the last three months and the call was answered within two minutes and our query dealt with immediately, as this will be our first time with them it bodes well for our upcoming cruise

Indeed on the longer cruises they SOMETIMES give vouchers for in cabin consumption at a greatly reduced price , however the problem is that the most popular brands get sold out quickly and are seldom restocked , if you drink gin it does not appear to be an issue, if you don't its tough luck

There are only two port presenters left and they are only on the world cruise and the 65 night cruises ( or 75 night ) ,Speaking to one of them it would appear that its only a matter of time before they too are gone, regarding the condition of Aurora I agree that things will need to be updated if the high prices are to be justified , although it is our favourite both it and Arcadia need some serious money spending on them to bring them up to a standard that warrants the high prices ( personal opinion )

well after years of procrastinating we have booked for the Balmoral later this year and as we like to try other lines we will go with an open mind, the sailing from Newcastle was the thing that tipped it for us

I’m afraid to say it’s a massive issue across the whole fleet , something really needs to be enforced with relation to personal hygiene in eating areas. As for leaving restrooms, what can you say? 😟😟

Mine were ordered and paid for three months in advance , unfortunately neither shoreside or on board would accept responsibility

It may not be important ,but there is no doubt when the crew have a good captain in charge IE, a peoples person , the whole ship is a happier place , we have noticed this with both sides of the coin

Of no help with the contacting customer service ,but I can say I had a similar experience on our recent cruise and the on board reception informed me that shoreside had not relayed the correct information to the ship ,the result been that the surprise birthday package for my wife was in our cabin as we arrived in January, instead of March , it took a few visits to sort out the situation but by then the surprise was spoilt. Best of luck and hope your complaint is dealt with when you eventually find a way to speak to somebody

I can see both sides to this issue , however in relation to choice , a very popular whisky ran out within three weeks of our world cruise and was never replenished , despite various port stops where it could have been , and if you don’t drink gin (I don’t ) the onboard offers were very restrictive, the only other whiskey offered was top end malts which I don’t particularly like . I took onboard one bottle of my preferred whiskey and bought another whilst on board before it ran out , however with just the one drink on the balcony pre dinner it soon ran out , and I was unable to purchase any from any bars for the remainder of the cruise. If this new policy is implemented it is to be hoped the onboard stocks are sufficient to satisfy demand

Had an inside cabin three times on Ventura on lido deck (it was our preferred location and cabin) and we had no problems with noise or anything else 😃

Indeed it will , not for the better I suspect

This is exactly what was happening on Arcadia, staff were stationed at the hand wash facility but so many passengers argued or ignored them or said ,"were just passing through, or I've just washed my hands" that staff didn't enforce it, with the exception of one staff member who would not let anyone pass until they washed their hands , the grief she got was incredible but she stuck to her guns, unfortunately she was only there a few times and passengers went around the other side to avoid her. Only when the captain announced that it was his orders to wash hands and his orders to make staff take note of cabin numbers etc of those who refused to comply did you see 100% compliance , personally my thoughts have always been that this action from the start could have helped matters . The obvious conclusion is that a captain should not have to resort to these measures and that some peoples dirty habits have a major impact on other passengers and crew☹️

Glad to hear all now appears to be calming down, I do feel a lot of sympathy for the staff as they do all they can to stop the spread of infections, however if a minority of passengers are incapable of basic hygiene ( and from what I witnessed they are) they are fighting a losing battle, towards the end of our cruise fellow passengers were bringing to task those that would not comply, it did make trying to get drinks in the buffet a long winded affair

I have the utmost sympathy for your enforced delay , however it is not just Aurora , we got off Arcadia after 99 nights and its fair to say that infections were plentiful ( of all descriptions)and increased in the last three weeks of the cruise , it says something when the Captain announced that anyone not adhering to basic hygiene requests would be put off the ship, and indeed they were, we never used the lifts and never once touched any grab or handrails during the whole voyage ,even when the ship was rolling all over, and still succumbed in the last few days and got off the ship with infections of varying descriptions which we are still suffering with. Honestly I do not know what the answer to this problem is but feel that earlier ,and strictly enforced standard hygiene practices perhaps would have minimized the spread , it must be stated that as passengers were flying into the ship and embarking at numerous ports this will not have helped ( passengers next door to us were isolating with sickness etc within an hour of embarking) I do wish you a speedy embarkation and hopefully a healthy cruise😃

Having just returned from the full world cruise I can confirm that the problems began after Singapore and increased dramatically after embarking passengers in Capetown , Captain Sharples did a good job in trying to contain it but some people will just not do as they are asked and some did indeed get removed for not following the requests of the captain , rightly so imho. Unbelievable how rude and obstructive some people are to staff when asked to follow basic hygiene requests, it is also fair to mention that if enforcement had been made from the start it would have restricted some of the problems. Some passengers embarking in Capetown were isolating in their cabins within an hour of boarding so no doubt they brought issues on board with them. Unable to confirm but mention was made of a couple put off in Tenerife because they stated they were allergic to water 😒

Nice pictures ,thanks, hope things calm down for you all, just a little surprised to see green beans though as its out of character for P and O 🤣🤣🤣🤣