ToadOfToadHall

So in a nutshell;

They paid £4,104 as the deposit.

Contractually they owe the full £27,350.

However, if they break/terminate the contract (i.e. cancel their cruise), they have no more to pay but they do not receive their deposit back.

5 minutes ago, Sweetpeajoey said:

Yes, anytime dining would probably be the best idea but Cunard doesn’t offer that in the Britannia restaurant, so late dining it is!

I agree. Given the choice, late sitting is better than the early one I would say.

11 minutes ago, Sweetpeajoey said:

 The annoying thing was that we did the early time for our son but he loved the kids club so much he chose to not eat with us most of the nights and stay in the club so we were stuck eating early!!!

 

We had a similar thing. We went with another couple who had children (we don't) and the same thing happened; they wanted early because of their children and then their kids never ate with us anyway.

The problem is that the early sitting is a bit too early and the late sitting is a bit too late. 

4 minutes ago, Sweetpeajoey said:

Wow, that is late.

 

I'm only joking  - I'm exaggerating for effect !

But I've been to a couple of Spanish cities for work and they do tend to eat a lot later that we would normally do in the UK, especially in restaurants.

How can people compare wages on a cruise ship to wages on land ?

Do crew members have to pay rent, for food, council tax, gas and electric bills, and so on ? 

I would suggest that the majority of people in the UK earning the minimum wage will spend almost all (if not all) of it on the expense of just keeping themselves alive (i.e. paying for a roof over their heads and eating).

1 minute ago, carlmm said:

 

No problem at all. Obviously you know your child best but I have often seen childeen dining with their parents late. For example for Italian and Spanish families 8.30 pm is still a very early time for dinner.

That's true. The Spanish seem to have their evening meal anytime between midnight and 3AM ! 

We've done 2 Baltic cruises (about 6 years ago and 4 years ago). The first time I took maybe £20-£30 of around 7 or 8 different currencies and I ended up bringing all of it back (and I do mean all of it). So the second time we never bothered and were fine.

Pretty much every cafe etc takes cards and most likely contactless as well. However, we did not go to Poland, but I've just read an article that says 9 out of 10 points of sale terminals in Poland are contactless.

As for you reading you can use the Euro in Tallin and Klaipeda - that's rather like saying you have read you can use the pound in London !!

21 hours ago, capegirl said:

As we are leaving on our TA from Southampton and flying back to Heathrow, we are pondering on travel arrangements.  Our thoughts are leaving Surrey, parking our car at a Heathrow parking site, Cruise Connect coach to Southampton and return on our flight and pick the car up.  Anyone experienced problems doing it this way,  or a better idea?

We did something very similar two years ago:

Drove from Oop North to Heathrow T5 and parked at the Meet & Greet (£174 for 18 nights) the day before our cruise.

Taxi (£67 Smiths for Airports) from T5 to the Holiday Inn Herbert Walker Way (not sure of the cost as it was free as I had a load of loyalty points).

Taxi in the morning from the Holiday Inn to the ship (around £5 or so).

Then when we landed back at T5, once we had cleared the shambles of passport control it was 5 minutes to collect the car and we where away.

It all worked very well indeed.

22 hours ago, majortom10 said:

On our last cruise on QE there was no atmosphere around the ship after dinner as majority of bars excluding Queens Room and even though it was busy in there not all were ordering drinks.It will certainly make a difference to me on our roundtrip TA on November and we will be purchasing nowhere near as many drinks as we normally do when we are on a cruise. 

Two years ago on the QV, on a couple of nights we actually found ourselves being the only 4 in the Commodore lounge at around 20:30 or so. We were on early sitting so we then went to the Commodore afterwards and at around 20:30 those that were there then left for second sitting. I can distinctly recall suddenly noticing there  was no one else in the place.

And as you say,  Cunard will not reduce their prices because they are selling say a drink for $10 (or whatever) so they want $10. If that costs you more pounds then that's not their problem.  To be fair, why would they ?

The trouble is, about 2 years ago the pound fell against the dollar and at the same time they whacked up the price of drinks, so hence that time we in the UK got hit twice.

There's a running commentary on the Liverpool Echo's site:

https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/live-queen-mary-leaves-liverpool-16596523

1 hour ago, Stella1250 said:

It really is not pre-existing, because it did not exist before I bought the policy.

True, but it's pre-existing before your holiday.

1 hour ago, Gwendy said:

 Travelled all over the world, each country has their own way of doing things, I try to blend in.

An Aussie blending in ? That must be a first !! 😂 

11 hours ago, Gwendy said:

I like my coffee with my meal.  Once in a French restaurant in Noumea I ordered my meal and coffee and asked for coffee to come straight away.  “Non Non Madame, only after meal”. Oh well when in Rome, or Noumea do as they do.

I suspect you will find it was just the waiter's use of English as opposed to him refusing your request.  This can often seem the case when someone is speaking in a language that is not their first (not that I can speak a word of anything other than English), they can come across as rude or to be refusing your request when it's not the case at all.

For example, two years ago now we were in Madeira. Mrs Toad ordered a sweet Madeira as an aperitif in a restaurant.  The waiter said "Sweet Madame ? Are you sure ? "Yes" she said. "That's absolutely fine, only it's traditional to drink dry before the meal and sweet afterwards. But if you'd like a sweet Madeira then of course I shall be happy to serve it to you".

His English was superb. But if it had not been as good as it was, he may have said something like "Non Non Madame, only after meal". 

Either way he would have simply been expressing his surprise. I'm sure if you had simply said that you know coffee is normally taken after the meal but you would like yours with the meal then he would have happily brought you a coffee.

I find the standard coffee tastes of nothing and is more akin to warm water with brown grit in it.

And I recall once commenting on how bad it was one lunch time in the MDR and someone overheard me and said I was correct and he was going to complain. Which he then did, quite forcefully, and then several new pots arrived at his table as the waiter and the Maitre'D went into customer service overdrive.

10 hours ago, BigMac1953 said:

Slaters is hard to beat. The Glasgow shop was actually listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as having the most gents suits for sale on display, and the prices are great.

 

One of my sons bought his dinner suit/tuxedo there for only £75 and you would never think it was so cheap. I bought my Baumler there.

 

Great for shoes as well. Makes such as Barkers, are less than half the London prices. I wouldn't go anywhere else.

 

Stewart

I love Slaters in Manchester. It's an Aladdin's cave for the gent about town.

56 minutes ago, Solent Richard said:

 

Roughly a £1 per mile. That's very good.

 

The same 'rate' we pay from lee on the Solent.

Because we were sailing from Southampton but flying back to Heathrow, we left the car at the Meet and Great at the airport, then the taxi the day before, so we could then have the car ready to go as soon as we we landed back at Heathrow.

Plus I looked up the train and it was more expensive and then of course you still need a taxi from the station to the hotel as well.

It worked out really well.

36 minutes ago, exlondoner said:

 

Not always. Last year we were further away, but there was a shuttle.

Good point. Last time we were on the QV it did seem like Cunard had turned into Ryan Air in this respect.

Oslo is excellent because the ship parks in the city centre. It's pretty much next to the Opera House. 

20 hours ago, Se1lad said:

The on board prices are a rip off to say the least.  I just did a quick google search and you can get the equivalent of a large sedan for £90 / $115 - That's over 60% less than the Cunard charge!

We used Smiths For Airports going the other way (i.e. Heathrow to Southampton) and it was £67. c.f. £240 that Cunard are charging.

They were very good, I booked them after recommendations on here.

1 hour ago, Camgirl said:

We were not really bothered by St P either. I know a lot of people see it as the highlight of a Baltic cruise but I wish there were occasionally cruises that didn't go there. There are some other fantastic ports in the area that I prefer.

 

On our second visit we stayed onboard for the 2 days apart from an evening trip to the ballet. It was great - the ship was quiet and we found enough to do. I wouldn't worry about staying on the ship at all.

I'd agree with all of what you have said. 

The other thing I noticed was how many people on board were commenting on how very hot it was. I'm sure people had the image of burly Russians walking round in huge overcoats and big fury hats !  

1 hour ago, exlondoner said:

 

I agree. All the tours we have done with Cunard in St. P. have been good, and conducted by guides with good English, unlike in some other places. Least good Hermitage trip, where you have to follow the guides' route to avoid getting lost forever...😀

We went to the Hermitage and I don't know how our guide didn't manage to lose a few !!

Yes, you could image the odd person left behind to endlessly wander the bowels of the museum until the end of their days ! 😁

I'd say from the one with did with Cunard is it actually pretty good. When we have taken other Cunard excursions they have tended to be little more than a glorified bus ride, but the one is St Petersburgh was the best Cunard excursion we have taken.

For the ports, this is from a review I wrote at the time (2012, first trip):

Kristiansand

We were there on a Sunday, and so the town was pretty much closed. It’s a large town, there’s not a lot to see. You can walk to the town centre from the ship in about 10 minutes, it’s very close. We walked over the bridge, across the river and into a more residential area – I don’t think many others walked that far. There is a little train thing that takes you round the town, we saw it but did not go on it. I’d not bother with doing an organised tour as there’s not a lot to see and what there is very close by.

Oslo

Again, you get off the ship and walk into the city centre. It’s maybe 15 minutes, no more. I just walked around, up to the palace, and strolled around the grounds a bit.

Copenhagen

You can walk into the city centre, but it is much more of a walk, maybe 40-50 minutes. Cunard said they were not providing a bus since it was so close. Well, it was okay for us, but I can imagine for older people it was a bit too far. One option is to get on a city tour bus; they wait by the ship. We actually walked right though the centre of the city, and got on one there instead. Then as it went round, we realised we were almost back at the ship, so we got off and did not do the whole tour. But it’s good, you see a fair bit of the city from the top deck.

Stockholm

Due to a bit of illness, we did not get off the ship here. However, plenty of people said the Viking museum was very good indeed ( they have a full size model of a Viking long boat )

Helsinki

I’d rate this about the best place we visited. Cunard provided a shuttle bus, which cost about £5 each or so. It drops you off in the city centre. We then walked past the Parliament building and went round the Museum of Finland, which is small, but very good. It took us around an hour. It’s easy to find as you just walk past the Parliament and you can’t miss it. They give you a personal audio tour device thing, which is very good. We also went to the Natural History Museum, again very good – but it’s not like ours in London, which is, of course, huge. Again, maybe an hour and you have seen it.

St Petersburg

The port is way out of the city centre, so you either have to book a tour with a local operator, or take one of the Cunard ones. We did a Cunard one ( they only one of the ship’s tours we did do ). We did a full day, they take you round to lots of palaces and landmarks first. We were here on a Sunday, so the city is very quiet, the guide said that a lot of people who live in the city go to holiday homes at the weekend.They then took us for lunch in some little restaurant ( included in the price ). The meal was okay, nothing special, some kind of stew ( cat ? ), rice, veg etc. Quite a few people left most of it, other’s cleaned their plates.Then we went to the Hermitage Museum. It’s very big, very crowed and very hot. I think we spent a bit too long in there really. We were flagging, as were others, again, if you are pegging on a bit then I think it was too much.We were glad when we left. Finally, we were taken to a corel recital, which lasted about 50 minutes. Now, it’s not the kind of thing I would normally bother with, but I did leave most impressed by their singing – and there was even a “fat lady” who sang at the end !It was a long day, starts at about 8, back to the ship after 5. About $120 each, but I’d say, looking at what we did, a fair price. The guide was very good, she gave us all a piece of paper that said “Help. I am a tourist, and I am lost, Please ring this number” and said if we did get separated or lost, that whoever we approached and showed the bit of paper to would help, because it’s part of Russian culture to always help some in trouble. Thankfully, no one needed to find out of that was true !

Tallin

I can’t comment on Tallin, as we decided to stay on the ship. However, there was a bus you could hop on to take you to the city centre, and everyone who used it said how could it was, and how nice the city was.

Zeebrugge / Brugge

Again, I can’t comment as we decided to stay on the ship, and, in my case, get sun burnt !You can get a bus again to Blankenburg ( about 3 miles away ), and lots of people did that. From there you can get a train to Brugge, which takes about 30 minutes or so.So, we only booked one Cunard tour as almost all the other places, the ship docks within walking distance of the city centre.

We have done this cruise twice (on consecutive years). The first year we booked a full day Cunard excursion in St Petersburg and it was very good. We'd booked another one for day 2 but after the first day being so full-on, we decided against it. So we stayed on the ship and had it to ourselves. 

On the second year, we never booked anything at all so we stayed on board for 2 days and again had the ship to ourselves. You can do what you like, there's no "normal" thing to do, why does that idea worry you ?

Myself and Mrs Toad used to play a few times when we could not be bothered to get of the ship. They only have normal tennis balls so you will need your own pickle !