groovechick

I started doing it, but stopped halfway through because the questions were so loaded towards the "unbundling" that Florrie has mentioned in previous posts that I couldn't answer, as neither proposed answer corresponded to what I, or my family, would want out of a holiday.

It seemed crystal clear that P&O were looking for justification for potentially turning many currently inclusive services into fee-paying add-ons.

Why would they do this? They haven't said that the 1 litre per person can't be taken on board in hold luggage, so many people will legitimately take their 1 litre on board that way to save carrying it. Others will carry their 1 litre on as hand luggage. My point is that some people will do both and there is absolutely no way that P&O will know!

Selbourne, I apologise if someone has already replied in this vein, I haven't read through all the pages, but I seem to recall that on our first cruise with RCI, which has a "no bringing alcohol on board" policy, they stated that luggage would be scanned and if a passenger was found to have brought on drink they would have to open their suitcase for the offending item to be removed, which would then be confiscated until the end of the cruise. It would be laborious, but if people have brought alcohol on board in hold luggage, P&O could then ask to check their hand luggage to ensure they aren't flouting the rules. Presumably they could go back through the hand luggage scans (again time consuming). If they enforce the policy strictly at the start, people might be deterred in the long run, then requiring less effort on P&O's part.

AFAIK he hasn't been a captain with P&O, at least not in the last 5 years we've sailed with them. The name kind of rings bells, think he might have been a deputy captain on one of our cruises about 4-5 years ago, so maybe he's been promoted to the captaincy with Princess?

Our options are:

*LF Outside P deck £2,718

*LC Outside P deck £2,798

*LE Outside E deck £2,798

*LB Outside E deck £2,898

We were upgraded from an inside on Azura's Riviera deck (so quite high up) to an outside on P deck and loved it. The cabin was just off the Atrium, but very quiet. There was occasionally the sound of music being played in the Atrium for evening dances but this finished between 11 and 12 pm. It was very convenient for disembarking in port because we were either on, or one deck above the gangway deck, a couple of decks up to the main dining and entertainment venues and lifts straight up to the Lido deck. The sound of waves against the hull was noticeable a couple of times when we had choppy seas. The only time it was really noisy was when docking in Southampton, with the noise of luggage being offloaded, equipment in use, etc. from about 5 am. Still we had to be out of the room by 8, so it wasn't the end of the world.

In the far-off days when we were DINKIES, we were trying to decide what to do for our next summer holiday. For some unknown reason I'd always fancied cruising, so I said to DH that if we could try cruising that year, he could pick the holiday the next year. Our first cruise was on Canberra in the early 90s, an almost identical itinerary to the one we did this summer, down to the Canaries. It was in late October (over DH's birthday) and despite not brilliant weather and probably being the youngest people on board by a good margin, we had a wonderful time and DH was totally hooked.

A couple of years later we were in the same situation (debating main holiday) and a leaflet dropped through the letterbox from a local TA advertising a significant reduction on a cruise to the Eastern Med. As we'd both wanted to go places on the itinerary we booked immediately and had a fab 2 weeks on Sea Princess visiting Jordan, Egypt, Israel, Turkey and Greek Islands. Despite missed ports and other incidents that made it a very eventful cruise we loved it. We then had a 17-year gap before cruising again, one with RCI and 4 with P&O and cruise once every couple of years.

Britannia was the only time in a total of 4 P&O cruises that we've been disappointed with MDR food, or food anywhere else on board for that matter. Chatting to other passengers on that cruise, they felt the same, especially about the Christmas dinner. Now Aurora this summer was a completely different story - the overall standard was very good and some meals were outstanding. It's clear from this forum that standards do vary from ship to ship and cruise to cruise, we've been happy 3 out of 4 times and I'm just delighted I'm not shopping/cooking/washing up!

Sadly we found the Christmas dinner on our 2015 Britannia cruise to be disappointing. It was cold, it was scant (one roast potato, one 1-inch cube of pumpkin, 2 rock-hard sprouts) and the dark turkey meat was wrapped up in a massive kind of flaky pastry pasty, which I think had been baked and reheated because the pastry was soggy and tough.

Generally we were underwhelmed with MDR food on Britannia considering it was the flagship in her maiden year, had a much better experience on Aurora this summer.

Does anybody know how to find out more specific port arrival and departure times relating to a specific cruise?

The most accurate, if rather laborious way, is to look at the websites for your individual ports, although depending how far in advance you are looking the information may not be there months in advance. I should think with Jan. 18 you would be OK, though.

This website also gives info. as used by ship's crews: http://crew-center.com/bridgetown-barbados-cruise-ship-schedule-2017

Unfortunately 2018 dates are not up yet.

Cruise.cal gives the following times: http://www.cruisecal.com/portal/ItineraryPrint/tabid/2919/Default.aspx?sailID=CarnUK/B802

They're not there for all the ports, but quite a few are.

We found these to be pretty accurate on our Caribbean cruise 2 years ago. As it also shows which other ships will be in port, it's a good way to gauge what demand there will be for taxis/water buses and how busy the port area will be.

You should be able to use the Cruise.cal times as a starting point for booking your excursions. The reputable operators tend to check ship port times anyway and work their excursions around them so you are back in port in plenty of time.

Hope this helps and happy excursion hunting!

As far as I understand if you are set dinning you are already booked it is only for freedom diners.

Even on fixed dining your dining times will change - they make it slightly earlier so the crew get to have some time off at Christmas too.

If it's wine you want, we tend to take wine boxes. Greater volume, less weight, less risk of breakage and fit better into the cabin fridge.

Mind you when ordering them online you have to give a reason why you want them - would have thought it was obvious but there you are.

A long time ago I was prescribed seasickness tablets for cramp, so maybe they can be used to treat other things, hence the question.

Strange though, as travel agents are still selling holidays to Turkey (I think).

Indeed they are, my sister-in-law's just come back from Antalya, where I think they have suffered terrorist attacks in the recent past.

Just wondering.

Are we likely to have a Chocolate Buffet and an Ice Carving Demonstrastion on our sea days during our cruise? (5 sea days)

Also, can you ask for a table for four when taking afternoon tea in the restaurant or are you seated at a larger table ?

I've never known P&O to do ice carving demonstrations. Only time I've seen one was on RCI. P&O do have a chocolate buffet, usually on a sea day towards the end of the cruise, but the one on our cruise this year was very poor and they seem to a) be scaling them back considerably and b) hardly advertising them at all. I'm not a chocoholic, but my son is and he was very disappointed with the offering this year compared to one on Azura 4 years previously.

Hello Everyone

1) on black and white night, do most ladies wear a dress that is a mixture of black and white or is it acceptable to wear a long white dress or a long black dress?

Most ladies wear a black dress with a white stole/shrug/corsage, or vice versa. Doesn't have to be long. Some ladies also wear smart white trousers with black sparkly top, or vice versa. Quite a few black and white patterned maxi dresses on our last cruise, accessorised with sparkly sandals, bags and jewellery.

I'm lucky in that I found a ballerina length chiffon dress with a white wrap top and black skirt - very forgiving style - but I've had it a few years now so will probably be on the lookout for a replacement.

We crossed the North Sea in a force 8 on Aurora and felt very little movement at all. My husband and I are good sailors, daughter isn't but apart from being a little apprehensive she was fine. There was the odd little lurch from the ship, but nothing major. The captain on our cruise said she was a wonderful ship for rough seas.

On Britannia, OTOH, daughter felt really ill in a force 5/6 swell and had to leave dinner early and go to bed.

It gets more confusing as some Select fares are offered on a cabin guarantee basis. The is despite the fact that Select fares are supposed to offer you a choice of cabin. Some people on here have suggested this is done as cabins in that grade start to sell out. My understand is that if you accept a guarantee cabin you can be upgraded without any consultation or control by you. The fact it is a Saver or Select fare will make no difference. The fact you have asked for no upgrade I would guess will make no difference.

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In our case there was no suggestion that we might be more likely to get an upgrade. With my cynical hat on I feel this is a ploy by P&O to sell more of the more expensive cabins/cabins with obstructed views etc. that might be the last to sell, as they hope people will jump up a grade to secure a cabin in a preferred position. My understanding is the same as yours Stephen - you are guaranteed a cabin of your chosen grade or higher, but you have no control over its location, so as Chris P. Bacon says, effectively you are not getting what is touted as a Select 'perk' and you might as well not bother ticking the "No upgrade" box. A definite case of P&O having its cake and eating it IMHO!

Thanks everyone for the replies. I did mean wine purchased through a package. I didn't know you were able to take your own drinks aboard, anyone know how much you can take? Someone posted on another site that lots of people disappear back to their cabins after dinner and have a drink there so I guess that's what they were referring to.

P&O don't specify how much you can take. Their information used to say "a reasonable amount". In the latest brochure and on the website they have qualified this, to say "a small, reasonable amount". They don't say what they class as "small". Apparently a fair few people have been abusing this option. For our cruise this summer we took on board 2 wine boxes - one for our cabin and one for our children. We tended to have a drink whilst getting ready for dinner, but still ordered wine with dinner on some evenings and had a couple of drinks from the bar during the day and at night. We've never gone back to our cabin to drink. I know other people take a bottle of spirits and maybe some mixers.

We have booked the Xmas and new year cruise on Ventura this year, the form says 4 Black tie nights, can anyone tell me is this likely to be xmas day or New Year’s Eve, also can anyone let me know any other things I need to know?.

Many thanks in advance

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Christmas Day and NYE are both formal, but it's not compulsory to wear a red dress Christmas Day, I'm sure not many ladies on our Christmas cruise did. NYE also coincided with our last night on board which, being formal, was a bit of a pain because of having to pack and put suitcases out, although we were given the option of staying smart casual. We compromised by dressing up for dinner, packing away our finery and changing into casual to see the New Year in up on deck.

Slightly off topic, but was very surprised to hear yesterday that the hand luggage allowance for my son's winter swim training camp is 10 kg, and that's with a budget Spanish airline (Vueling). Mind you, he's going to need it, what with fins, pullbuoy, snorkel, two sets of hand paddles...

Some pax go way over the top with luggage, I have seen them on a 14 day cruises with half a dozen cases per couple, God only knows what they have in them.:p

Some people just can't/don't know how to pack - my mum for one! My dad said it was being in the Army that taught him to pack and travel light. I bless him and the fact he taught me his packing methods every time I pack for the family holidays.

We had a cabin steward on Ventura 2 years ago who we had had twice before and we chatted to him one day when he was little upset and he showed us a list that he had been given that showed which cabins on the previous cruise had removed the tips and the score that they had given him on the questionnaire. He said he was not bothered about the tips being stopped so much as he was bothered by less than excellent scores because the scores determine how much bonus ( his word ) he would get. He told us that the bonus is the share of the tips that have been received on that cruise and that if they have less than a certain percentage of excellent scores they get nothing even if all of their cabins have paid the full amount. He told us that they do not know who has changed the tips until after the passengers have left.

We always leave the auto tip on because it is easier than trying to tip individually as we like freedom dining. We usually give a little extra to the cabin steward.

I just wish P&O would include tips in the cruise price.

We were told exactly the same by our steward on our first P&O cruise back in 2012. I'm fairly sure he said it was a new system that had just been introduced by P&O then and that if all of his cabins didn't give him an excellent score he wouldn't get a bonus and if a certain number didn't score him as "excellent", he wouldn't get anything at all. We had no problem scoring him excellent - he was lovely - but thought at the time what a pernicious system it was. I believe I've mentioned this on (a) tipping thread(s) before and was shouted down - pleased Josy1953 has seen hard evidence of this. For the record, we pay auto-gratuities (even though we have an issue with P&O putting them up after we've budgeted for a holiday at a certain price) and tip extra to our steward/waiters/wine waiter as merited.

The worst possible time to find accommodation at short notice, a Saturday and the weekend is a public holiday at least in Scotland, the schools are off for the week - is it the same in the South?

No Eglesbrech, it's not a public holiday weekend here and the schools aren't off either. I suspect it may be Scottish half term as the Scottish schools go back after the summer holidays in mid-August compared to first week of September in England. My son's school isn't on half term until week after next.

We love the P&O black and white nights (though sadly we shall not cruise with P&O anymore) and I always wear a white tux, black shirt and white bow tie. As everyone else has said it is usually the last of the four formal nights.

 

Peter

We must have been exceptions to the rule, then. On both of our last two cruises, 14 nights and 10 respectively, it wasn't the last formal night.

The problem with the websites that are supposed to give you port times is that a) not all ships are listed - the Aurora isn't on the first site and b) the second site usually only reflects what the cruise line itinerary says ie: early morning to evening or similar. Best sticking with the actual port websites

If you look under Itineraries it gives the full itinerary for each ship for 2017, with times in and out of port. Of course these are always slightly subject to change (mechanical problems, adverse weather) but at least provides a guide for arranging DIY shore excursions. Certainly this was spot on for our mid-August cruise, but I see it doesn't have Aurora doing the Northern Lights in November. As you say, actual port websites are the best guide but the information is not available on some until relatively short notice, i.e. Lisbon, which doesn't help if you're trying to book ahead. Why on Earth P&O doesn't just provide port times, with the caveat that they are subject to change, is beyond me.

I've found the following sites give a good indication. They were pretty reliable for our cruise this August and another 2 years ago.

http://crew-center.com/cruise-ship-port-schedules-2017

https://www.cruisetimetables.com/cruisesonaurora-nov2017.html