SarahHben

I’m feeling quite emotional watching the news today. I have been unwell with the lurgy so am in a room on my own with only the tv for company. Got to hope I am clear by Sunday or my family will be going to Disneyland Paris without me, not great timing 🙄

We pay a set amount every month until they decide it needs to go up or down so I suppose it’s calculated on expected use. My husband looked to see what the set tariffs were like but EDF seem to have stopped offering them for now.

We were paying £140 a month, that went up to £220 a couple of months ago, soon to be £390, I dread to think what it will be if there’s more increases in the new year 🥴

We’ve just heard our monthly gas/electric bill is going up to £390 from October 😳

Have a great time, I’m very jealous of those of you off on cruises, I’ve got to wait until next August.

Enjoy your cruise @zap99 where are you sailing off to? I’ll be watching the Solent ships webcam later

I will do ☺️

I'm watching your ship sailing down from Southampton while I'm cooking dinner, have a great time ☺️

Thank you. Yes it's during the school holidays that we're going as our daughter works term time and I look after our 2yr old Grandson. I can't decide whether to book the retreat for the whole fortnight or just pay for certain days.

Does anyone who has been on Ventura recently know how much the daily charge for the Retreat was? Thanks

Thank you, I think I might call them for clarification.

Hello I have just been looking at our cruise personaliser for next year and noticed that The Retreat is available to book. It will only let me select my name or my husband's, not both and it mentions sharing the experience. Do you think this means that it's pay for one of you and the other person gets the use of it free?

Morning. After all this talk of air fryers I rooted around in the back of my kitchen gadget cupboard and dug out an air fryer that I bought 3 or 4 years ago but didn’t use very much. It’s only a basic Tower one, bought from The Range. I’ve just ‘cooked’ a pizza in the air fryer, 3 minutes warm up, 4 minutes cook, instead of oven’s 15 minutes warm up for just 1 small item & 10 minutes cook. It was lovely and fluffy, will definitely be getting to grips with using it properly.

I’ve just looked it up and the P&O arranged ferry was £59 per person in May this year. I would expect that it will cost more in 2023 though.

Oh no, sorry to read that Sue! I hope you get news soon and that all is well.

Have a great time.

Yes, that's right. When we were onboard in May, Iona cruised just past the Seven Sisters then turned round. You can't see Geiranger from that point as it's round a corner.

I think you might find that more P&O excursions are added nearer the time. When we went in May there was a good choice. We opted to get the ferry excursion to Geiranger and it was our favourite day of the cruise. There was also a trip to Mount Dalsnibba & I think one to the top or side of the seven sisters waterfall, plus others that I can’t remember

The gaps might not be in all the panels around the ship but certainly in quite a few places there is a gap by the hand rail. I’ve taken a screen shot from someone’s video to try to explain what I mean. I’ll also add a link to the video, they get to the front of deck 19 around 7:45 mins in.

Thank you. I think we’ll have to go with low expectations of the condition of the ship & the busyness. It’s just me and my husband going so we may well pay for a cruise long pass to the Retreat. We also booked a C deck balcony cabin as the balconies are bigger so we can sit there if it’s too busy on deck. We really wanted to do a 2 week cruise somewhere warm (hopefully) and Ventura cost-wise & dates-wise was our best option. If it were just me I’m sure I’d be happy on any ship as long as I can sit outside armed with my kindle and my camera and not have to cook or iron! 😊 but as I persuaded my husband to cruise I feel responsible for if he likes it too.

Depending on which camera and lens you have you may find you can get a photo through the gaps in the panels. I know I did on my phone and I’m fairly sure I managed to do the same with my DSLR lens in certain places.

Do you mind me asking what kind of things made it feel like a step down? Was it the newness, cabin decor etc? We cruised for the first time this May, went on Iona and loved it. We have now booked 2 weeks to the Canaries on Ventura next summer. We are also tied to going in the school holidays so we realise it’s likely to be very busy. So I’m just interested to know how you found it.

Happy belated Anniversary to @grapau27 & Pauline and @Dermotsgirl& her hubby. Eldest daughter and I went to Ashford Outlet shopping centre yesterday, I was very restrained, I didn't buy a handbag but did manage to get myself some Skechers trainers for our trip to Disneyland Paris next month and a couple of fold up Radley shoppers (they don't count as handbags) It's 19 days until we go to Disney but this cruising lark has spoiled me and I'm feeling more excited about our 2nd cruise next August (347 days away)

So sorry to read your sad news.

I don’t always post but really enjoy reading this thread. As with any online forum it is sometimes difficult to tell the intended tone of what is written but it’s possible to skip past posts/posters that maybe make you bristle. Anyway, we’ve been busy with our little 2 year old Grandson, we took him to Leeds Castle yesterday. He’s a friendly little lad and often runs (waddles) up to people to say hello, his current chat up line is ‘hello, how are you, I play play dough’ most people react well but yesterday he went up to a rotund man and before we could grab him he patted the man on his belly as he said hello. Man wasn’t impressed & just glared & we were very embarrassed. 😳