groovechick

Thank you for your balanced review. Aurora was the first P&O ship we went on, to the fjords, after a long break away from cruising and I loved her. We are back on her this summer, having since been on Azura and Britannia, which I prefer in that order. Having read some recent reviews, I have been having the odd qualm about whether we would have such a good cruise this time, but I'm reassured, so thank you very much.

If you look under Our Ships on the main menu on the P&O website and click on Aurora there should be a picture of an inside cabin. We stayed in one 5 years ago using it as a 4-berther with our children (then aged nearly 12 and 17) and managed OK. Took a little organisation when all getting ready for a formal night, but we had plenty of storage for all 4 of us and all slept comfortably. Have to say I preferred it to the inside we recently had on Britannia - I find Britannia's cabin décor very drab and dingy and I found I felt quite depressed if I stayed in the cabin for long, although I know others love Britannia's décor. Maybe it's better if you've got natural light from a balcony. I think all inside cabins have a shower only, it's only grades such as Deluxe Balcony and Suite that get baths!

I was able to climb the glacier, I'm not sure if that's allowed now.

No, you're not allowed to climb on the glacier now, the nearest you can get to it is across a corner of the lake. If I remember correctly the glacier tongue was fenced off.

Excellent so how do u book is it on the day or can u do it in advance and is it difficult to get them in?

 

 

I've also used the kid's clubs for my children, although they were much older and also heartily recommend them. Lovely staff, very inclusive, excellent range of activities, etc. You can't book in advance, best thing is to go to the club on embarkation day asap and register them. I've never know it to happen, but P&O do claim the right to cap numbers if there are too many in any one age group - more likely to happen during school holiday cruises, of course - so the sooner you sign them up, the better. It only takes a few minutes. They are also very aware of things like allergies and dealt with this brilliantly for my children's serious food allergy. Hope you have a wonderful time.

It's a fairly gentle drive alongside the lake through the valley bottom, surrounded by the fabulous scenery and then climbs a little to the coach drop-off point. The only hairpin bend I can recall is on the walk up to the glacier, but I don't remember any vertigo-inducing drops away from it.

I do t think P&O would charge if an objection was made on a contractual basis.

I beg to differ Florry. When we had the "booking Select but only getting a Guaranteed cabin" issue on Britannia, I raised the point that their T&Cs said paying the select fare meant you could choose your cabin, and that was their contract with me, the customer, NOT that they would allocate you a cabin of the specified grade wherever they wanted, but they remained unmoved.

I agree with you and Eglesbrech that it is unfair that they keep moving the goalposts/increasing prices after many (the majority of?) customers have booked. That's now 2 things for our cruise this year - the grats and the charge for room service. We've never used room service (wish we had now!) but were thinking that this time, now the "children" are older, we might let them head off and have a quiet night in. Guess not. If we've got to pay extra might as well go the Beach House or Glasshouse.

Is that not the old menu you've linked to, chris11256? There are still quite a few non-chargeable items on there and nothing at the £4.75 quoted for main meals.

Sorry tinsoldier, we posted at the same time!

Catalan Bay is on the other side of the island from the cruise terminal, in fact almost directly across as the crow flies. Don't know about public transport, but there are always lots of taxis right outside the cruise terminal, so you should easily be able to get a ride from there.

To get a bus you would probably have to walk into town first.

Depending on traffic it's maybe a 20 minute journey by car?

How can I find out where my ship will be docked?

You can check out Crew Center http://crew-center.com/cruise-ship-port-schedules-2017

and Cruise Cal http://www.cruisecal.com/portal/ItineraryLookup/tabid/2918/Default.aspx

to see where and when your ship is expected to dock.

Please bear in mind that these times are subject to change depending on factors such as the weather, if your ship encounters mechanical problems, etc., but are a good guide for planning DIY shore excursions, as at least you have an idea of how much time you should leave as a safety margin before being safely back on board prior to sailaway.

In case you're not familiar with the P&O procedure, you can alert P&O to your dietary requirements ahead of the cruise. Speak to your cruise consultant or TA and there's a team at P&O HQ they can inform. However in our experience this does not seem to be communicated well to staff on the ship.

Usual procedure once on board is that you will be brought the next day's MDR lunch and dinner menus during dinner and asked to make your selections. The waiter will then take this off to the kitchen and they will come back and let you know if any of your choices contain your allergen and suggest alternatives from the menu and what they can substitute. Again, in our experience they are not very imaginative. The only time this doesn't happen is the first night on board when you have to take your chances. You will have to speak to the speciality restaurants direct if you want to dine there. The main kitchens have a special allergy chef who deals with all the meals for people with special dietary requirements.

We had a very bad experience on Aurora 5 years ago, cast a bit of a shadow over an otherwise fabulous holiday and a better experience the following year on Azura, partly because I met with the MDR staff and stated my case very firmly and secondly because we had a fab maître d' who went out of his way to make things as normal as possible for our highly allergic children.

It used to be the case that if you wanted to talk to the dining room staff about your allergy you had to queue up with all the people wanting to change dining arrangements. If, as Florry says, they have now set up a separate meeting this is a good move and P&O do seem to be improving their approach.

We looked into the ice cream package on Azura a couple of years ago and decided the saving really wasn't worth it, think it worked out to about 1 "free" ice cream.

Apart from the diners I once saw and heard snapping their fingers at the waiters and calling them "Boy" in the MDR, the other example that springs to mind is an elderly gentleman on a mobility scooter travelling through a fairly crowded thoroughfare in a public area at "speed", effing and blinding at people to get out of his way and lashing out at them with his walking stick.

I have the utmost respect for the elderly and/or the infirm - we all get older and all might need assistance with mobility one day, for whatever reason - but his behaviour really was quite dangerous and unnecessary.

During our Caribbean cruise the only late departure was St Maarten which, IIRC, was about 9pm. All the other were 5-6-ish - we were usually underway or just setting sail when we went to dinner at 6.30.

If you are berthed at the container port, the bus drops you off in a large square with a big water feature in the middle and from there it's a short walk, around 10 minutes gentle stroll, to the funicular.

Whether or not you get ice seems to depend on your steward/cabin/ship. We've asked and never yet got it (three different ships). Last time on Britannia our steward said because of the ship's layout it was too far for them to go.

I believe other posters have asked about robes even if not in a suite and have been told "No". The consensus seems to be they're not very nice anyway.

Yes we are our favourite ship and presume will be very crowded

 

Unfortunately my wife has problems walking so don't tend to do it yourself but were looking at the trip to Hamburg.

Kiel has a HoHo bus which stops at about a dozen places. You also get lovely sea views. Stops at places like the Town Hall and the Shipping Museum. Might be a solution with your wife's mobility problems.

Should be listed by cruise on the dress code page. Also does themes I think.

 

https://ask.pocruises.com/help/PO/life-on-board/dress_code_all.html

 

My calculation is that R713 has 3 Black Tie nights (one of these has a Black and White theme) plus two other themed nights, those being being a 60's/70's night and a Tropical theme night.

 

Regards John

You're right John, we're on this cruise.

I would be surprised if the vibration on Britannia was very noticeable, when we were on her it was so quiet I had to keep checking if we were moving - hopefully you will have no issues [emoji4

 

Our table in the Oriental DR on Britannia was right by a window at the stern and certainly one night (travelling from Aruba to Grand Cayman, I think), when we had choppy seas, there was a very pronounced and quite uncomfortable vibration, so much so that DD, who's normally a good sailor, felt very queasy. It was also quite noisy, which we only realised when we came out of the MDR and the rest of the ship seemed blissfully quiet!

Thank you for this wonderful thread, Selbourne, it's brought back a lot of happy memories. We started cruising a little earlier than you, I think 1992 (would have to dig stuff out of the loft to be sure) on Canberra, followed by Victoria two years later (I'm sure of that because I was pregnant with our daughter).

One thing I also remember that has stopped: around 11 am (I think) the waiters used to walk around the decks serving tubs of ice cream. Also the savoury at the end of dinner mentioned by another poster.

Our one and only experience of using the MDR for breakfast was on Aurora, our first time back with P&O and was not a happy one. We were seated at a table for eight with two other, older couples who were together. They refused to respond to a polite good morning and spent the whole of breakfast alternately glaring at our scrubbed, smartly dressed and well-mannered children and moaning about everything - the staff, the food, the itinerary (one wonders why they booked the cruise?), other passengers, etc. etc. etc. I accept that some people are not good in the mornings, but surely they could manage to say "hello" or "good morning"? The final straw was DH's scrambled eggs and smoked salmon consisting of a single round of French bread, with maybe a dessertspoon of egg on top. I don't think he ever found the salmon! Since then it's been the buffet for us!

We were told we might not find out until a few days before, and most likely it would be 4-6 weeks, in fact we were allocated our cabins several months before sailing, so I think it is totally random as to when you find out.

No, it doesn't contain "bits" IIRC and is only available at breakfast. For lunch it's either tea, coffee or drinks from the bar.

My wife has just had a heart bypass and pacemaker fitted (march 2017)

Can anyone recommend a good travel insurance company.

We have a cruise booked for August and am not sure if to cancel due to her not being fit enough.

What are P&Os policy to medical consitions.

Ian

In the past I have used AllClear, although not the last couple of times because they seem to have gone downhill if ratings are anything to go by. Last time I used InsuranceWith, who were very good regarding investigations my husband was undergoing for a potentially serious condition (thankfully came to nothing) and his sleep apnoea. For our forthcoming cruise I have gone with LV - same cover as InsuranceWith, but significantly cheaper.

You have to state that you have insurance to travel with P&O, it is your responsibility to ensure that it adequately covers any medical conditions you may have and treatment you may subsequently require, including medical evacuation from this ship. You will be charged for any treatment you require, starting at about £50 for a consultation if I recall correctly. I'm not aware of P&O applying any travel restrictions on people who have recently had major operations, but I'm sure this will be in their T&Cs somewhere.

I hope your wife makes a speedy recovery, that you find suitable insurance and are able to enjoy a lovely cruise with your wife.

Thank you for the information regarding the Beach House. I might give it a miss on Aurora but we have a longer cruise booked on Oriana. It would be a break from the usual main dining room style of food.

 

Don't be misled by the term "diner". Yes, the fare is burgers, steaks, chicken, fries, etc., but we thought the ambiance, service and food quality (on Britannia) was a significant cut above the MDR. The candlelit atmosphere was lovely and the service was attentive and friendly. It had a "smart casual" feel. We were disappointed with the Glasshouse on Britannia (in fact we repaired to the buffet for dessert because we were so unimpressed with the food and service), but really enjoyed the Glasshouse on Azura and again thought the quality and preparation of food there was much better in the MDR. You certainly saw the difference in what you were paying extra for.

This has carried on for over 150 years leading to now 80 % of the crew coming from Goa now part of India and the rest from India and other parts of the world.

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It is my understanding that P&O takes far fewer staff from Goa now - this was told to me by a member of staff on our last cruise. He said that with the development of tourism in Goa over the last 20-30 years, working for P&O is no longer as attractive as it once was, particularly in view of the length of time away from home.

On our last two cruises our waiters were from Chennai, Mumbai and somewhere else in India I can't recall, our cabin steward last cruise was Filipino, the steward before that Sri Lankan. Of course these are just a few examples from thousands of crew across the ships.