Eddie99

I must make my apologies - it was just Baltic & Ligurian. Maybe half or just over of Coral restaurant

@TigerB Yep - you wrote at greater length but it sounds pretty similar. I wonder why they do it? I thought Iona had sufficient space in the MDRs should everyone decide to do “formal”? Anyway, thunder & lightening has abated, the sun is battling the clouds, the sea is a little more lively than yesterday, I think. Loyalty lunch is at 12. Oh my - more food and drink Just checked out the Marabelle gin at the duty free. £42 a bottle (not litre). Phew! Will check out how the OBC holds out as time goes on. It would be a very acceptable momento

Morning We had a terrific thunderstorm as the day began. That’s stopped now but we have light rain forecast. Fingers crossed it’s wrong! So, yesterday afternoon was nice. Plenty of walking round the promenade deck. I would imagine that is really nice in settled good weather, with so many different areas and facilities. We’ve clocked the deck 8 conservatory balcony cabins and decided that there is No Way we would want one of those at normal balcony prices. Priced the same as our very nice sea view cabins? Well, maybe. I think it’s a bit of a cheek charging full whack Last night was Celebration Night, so a chance for folk to put on their glad rags. There was a wide variety in the degree of dressed-up-ness. It doesn’t matter in the least to me and I have the feeling, but no way of proving, that most people are quite relaxed. There’s a full mixture of passengers, from teeny babies through school-age children (a few), to multi-generation families, to couples of all ages. We went to the Chef’s Table, which was an experience. Set in a cordoned off part of Horizon, it felt just like … a cordoned off part of Horizon - with tablecloths. Much bigger than I had envisioned - goodness knows how many people. So, it felt quite crowded and busy and the service was just on the brisk side of rushed (as a contrast to service in Glass House and Beach House, which has been just at the edge of nicely relaxed and verging towards a bit slow) There was certainly no time to even think about the suggested wine pairings and the wine service was pretty poor - though in that environment perhaps we should be content to have it arrive more or less with the starter. No sign of Ollie I don’t want to sound too critical. The food was actually good. For me - lamb bonbon, beef Wellington and trifle. For sir salmon cannelloni (ie mousse inside smoked salmon), sea bass and cheese. I asked for my beef rare and was delighted to receive a piece perfectly cooked to medium, as I’d anticipated. Beautiful bright crisp green vegetables, including beans, of course. Chocolate truffles after. It being very early, we went to the emerald bar, adjacent to Vistas. Comfortable. Cocktails at crazy prices (not in the package!). I tried the Marabelle gin, brewed on board. Nice. I’d say similar to Monkey 47 if anyone is a fan of that Loyalty lunch today but again Caribbean, Baltic & Ligurian in together. So, for my one and only time as Baltic level, I’m not really getting a different experience to what I had before at Caribbean. First world problems, eh? I won’t lose sleep

Nice to get your update Lovely Caribbean blue sky Fancy only just discovering Metropolis! You’ve plenty of time to enjoy it more though

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It is Brief update Sun! The First Officer declared it 14° at noon, and predicted a maximum of 17. I’m not sure we hit that, and there was plenty of wind, but it was good for logging up steps on deck 8, or just sitting in favoured sheltered spots. btw - is it The Law that 1st Officers have to be Scottish? Invariably that seems to be the case (tho’ we had a lady do the 5pm announcement on embarkation day) I forgot to mention that we have a guide dog on board! Met him in the Beach House last night. As you would expect he was a good chap & lay quietly under the table - we didn’t know he was there. Our waitress asked to meet him, so everyone got a sight We had a light lunch at The Glass House. The dancers, or more likely acrobats/gymnasts we’re doing practice on silks/trapeze right beside us. 😳 Pics later, perhaps, if the technology plays nicely. (Being skinflint/careful with the pennies, and sharing one internet package between our 2 iPhones and 2 iPads can get a bit tedious with all the disconnecting _ reconnecting) Right, time to scrub up for the early (6pm) Chef’s Table (Haven’t heard any more about this morning’s casualty. At least it wasn’t a helivac case)

Or have a look at Selbourne Live from 65 nights on Aurora - he’s posting pics of the MDR lunch & dinner menus and I believe MrsGoggins (on Ventura now] said their daily menus are identical?

Black with upside down pineapples, of course! Celebration Night here tonight - it’ll be interesting to see. I’ll take my anti-outrage medication, so should be OK, whatever 🤣

Right - yesterday Well, it was dull, weather wise, with some fog. Calm seas though, so I guess that the most important for Day 2 heading Madeira-wards Our captain is Wesley Dunlop, who I’m sure we’ve sailed with before. He has a nice reassuring captain’s voice when he does his 5 o’clock homily We explored up to Deck 8 but didn’t venture outside. Lunch was a prawn/coconut Thai bowl in the Quays. That place is a revelation - seems so much nicer than the traditional buffet (tho’ I haven’t been there on this cruise, so shouldn’t malign it) Dinner was at The Beach House. Steak on a rock for him, goat curry for me. The steak is a nice idea but they really should address the air circulation/ventilation. The atmosphere was thick with “nearly burning steak” and the poor soul next to us needed to go outside for fresh air as her asthma was aggravated. Just a non-alcoholic cocktail for me, but I finished the day with a Rhubarbellini in the Crow’s Nest. Not a lot of drink for £8 or £9, whatever it is Today - we have sun, and warmth! We took a stroll outside after our coffee in Vistas and will go back out very soon to join the throng circuiting @ 8 A nasty incident as we had our coffee. Someone fell in the corridor just before you enter Vistas from forward. They screamed. Everything worked well. A Vistas staff member was there in seconds and an officer in no time thereafter. A wheelchair & two medical staff took only a minute or two and, as we left, a nurse was arriving bearing injection material. Fortunately, for us, although close, our view was obscured and we didn’t rubberneck. There were sufficient kindly passengers and appropriate staff. I suspect a damaged ankle but that’s only a suspicion. I wish them well So, that’s the news and the drama. Chef’s Table & *black tie* tonight. I think we might meet Ollie Smith, who is advertised as being on board

Thank you for reminding me of that I recall the email, and we did book, but subsequently rearranged Honestly, I’ve booked/cancelled/rescheduled so many cruises over the last 47 months, and this is the first one we’ve actually taken, so I think you are right Fair play to P&O though, because I remember phoning to cancel that one, and bemoaning the fact that I had a local flight & free booze but wasn’t able to take it - so that means they’ve kept the package somewhere on my record (scary thought!) ready to add-on whenever I popped my head over the parapet

Well, you can believe what you like, I’ve told you what happened I don’t have rich friends who would splash out silly money like that. The only possibilities were our children but there’s no reason for them to have done it and they didn’t On the practical side I’m 99.5% certain one would need a booking reference to add a gift, or at least a cabin number? Proper report later …

I hope you get the US immigration sorted out Selbourne - it will be a shame if your wife loses out Another word of thanks for your reports. It’s a little bit of a bind doing them, isn’t it, though still quite fun, as it acts as a personal journal and memory jogger? Enjoy today

It’s the “bells & whistles” package, so any kind of tea or coffee, all soft drinks and juices, water, and 0% alcohol “alcohol” (beer, wine, spirits) are included. I reckon a teetotaller could make good use, though it would be hard/impossible to glug through so much liquid to exhaust the daily allowance

We thought it best to just accept it quietly in case someone looked at it and realised they’d made a terrible mistake! As I said before, you’d think they might publicise their largesse

Yes, of course

I’ve no idea! It’s 4 years since we cruised - maybe they’re delighted to see us back??? Do you think random people are lucky each cruise? If they do it regularly you’d think they might promote it? OTOH, perhaps that would be a disincentive to book prior to boarding (but they could get over that by just giving a refund) The cards definitely had our names & cabin on them, so it was meant for us … Dunno, but am a happy bunny

Thanks all I forgot to say that, apparently, we didn’t set sail till late yesterday because Nicole Scherzinger was giving two performances, then disembarking in Southampton. I don’t know her, at all, but one of our lunch companions was excited. “You remember - she sang at the Coronation”. “No, didn’t see it” “Oh (disbelieving face 🙂)” It feels quite busy today, with 5000 odd people schlepping about, finding watering holes, queuing for Future Cruises, looking in the retail outlets etc. It still seems relatively spacious though, in the bits we’ve seen. We’ve not ventured above deck 8 yet. That’ll be tomorrow We had room service breakfast, which was supposed to be little but was quite big. Not looking for anything else to eat so far, and are booked for The Beach House tonight. I’ll report on that tomorrow. I don’t think we’ll go to any Headliners etc, so I won’t be able to talk about that. Talks today sounded OK. Motown this morning, Art heists this afternoon. Again, we’ll give ‘em a miss That’s all from me today.

Some pucs

Good Morning Finally, we’ve navigated the temperamental, non-intuitive WiFi/Internet access and I am able to write a few lines. Arrival and embarkation Boarding time was 12noon and we were dropped at about a quarter too. Quite a large queue of people already outside. Case drop off is DIY, through various holes in the wall, according to your cabin deck. Of course the taxi dropped us near the entrance and our hole was the furthest from there! It felt a long way dragging the cases down, not so bad on the return. Priority boarding directed us to a different “lane” from the majority and we were up the escalator, booked in, and through security without any delay at all. We crossed the threshold onto Iona at 12.06 and went straight to muster station D to be pinged in. No problem Then directly to the Coral restaurant for Caribbean, Baltic, Ligurian and suite lunch. A buffet. I was disappointed, having been hoping for a served 3 course affair. There were no two-tops left, so we shared a table of 6 with two very nice couples, so it was actually nice to remember how enjoyable the social side of cruising is. I can’t say the food was anything special, and queuing and plate-juggling to get it was definitely not the best. Anyway, the chat was good and kept us at the table beyond the 1.30 ding-dong telling us cabins were ready. Cabin For reasons I can’t remember, we booked a sea view cabin on Deck 4. It’s really nice, though we will no doubt pine for a balcony once we reach the sun. Lots of space - 2 sofas. Plenty of wardrobe space but no drawers. Very nice en suite. Iona - first impressions Huge! Everything looks so different to every other P&O ship we’ve experienced. Bright, airy, spacious. We’ve a lot more exploring to do, so watch this space Cases arrived pretty smartly and we’d unpacked by 3. Started to look at the various bits of paper left on the desk. An envelope addressed to each of us … meh, probably the Limelight booking confirmation/tickets. Opened them up … Lo and behold ”A Special Gift Just for You - The Ultimate Drinks Package” 😳 Whaaaaaat??? Messaged our children asking them if they wanted to pickle our livers to gain their inheritance early? No - they hadn’t done it, nothing to do with them. Had another look at the card. The only other thing, apart from our names & cabin number is P&O UK! So, for whatever reason, we are the blue eyed children and P&O have been very kind to us We had to go to a bar to get the upgrade added to our cruise cards. They had a chart with the prices for purchase 😳. It’s enormous! I don’t think I would ever consider it We’ve already got a decent whack of OBC so will be cruise mini-millionaires 🙂 Went to the Glass House for supper. 3 tapas plates each, followed by a shared cheese plate. And free wine, of course, which explains my rather fuzzy head this morning (it’s improving thank goodness, and has been a timely reminder that I simply can’t drink very much these days. Small glasses, well spaced, with water between, in future) So, that’s a belated Day 1 Hopefully we’re internet-savvy now and I’ll be able to do updates as we go along It’s grey outside, and we’re speeding along. Hurrah - getting a bit closer to the sun

Yay! What great news to hear. I’m so pleased for you both Have a lovely peaceful weekend together. Just relax and enjoy each other’s company, your house & the family. Nice to hear from you Frank. No more dramas now! You’ve hogged the limelight enough 😏 Well, here we are. Cruise day. I took ages to get to sleep but finally made it and didn’t have any nightmares about being left behind or caught in a monster Southampton traffic jam Have a lovely day everyone

It’s probably about 30 years since we “escaped” the “only school holidays” bind - I still remember the sense of freedom. Enjoy yours! Perhaps, sometime in the future, consider upgrading to the no-fly double-crossings 35 nighter MrsGoggins is currently enjoying. Imagine - January eliminated 😳. You’ve plenty of years to consider … or you could go to Future Cruises whilst you’re onboard 🙂

We’re doing a fairly bog-standard Canaries cruise OllySmith is onboard It’s sold out - I think a lot of P&O cruisers want a no-fly winter cruise and, apart from N European 1-weekers at February half-term, this is the only one. Crazy!

… and vice-versa 🙏 You will be blown away by the Caribbean. So laid back. So warm! Fingers crossed for totally hassle-free flights - apart from that there’s nothing at all to fret about Will you report in at some stage?