sewgood

Really enjoying your tour recap. A fantastic port Lisbon with the ship being docked right in town. We wish we had brought more then two tarts when we were there.

The photos of the crew facilities are great.

I googled Ronda and saw the pictures of it and the bridge and all I can say is wow! Another one for the bucket list.

Wonderful news for you and your mother. No long to go before the first one. As for the second now you don't have to work out who is cooking Christmas dinner. 😁 Have a great time on both your cruises. It is always a great feeling to book a cruise. 😊

I enjoyed reading your comments and was interested in getting an American passengers view of P&O. We have only encountered one couple from the USA on a P&O cruise in August on a Queensland cruise a number of years ago. I remember them saying they found it a little difficult to book but they wanted something at that time of year and there wasn't much to choose from but they were enjoying the cruise.

Thanks for the reply, I'm glad to hear the horses and donkeys have mostly been retired as it was sad to see them working so hard in the conditions. Some of them were trotting fairly fast.

Aus Traveller, are the horses and carts still used in Petra? There were plenty of them in 2019 and only a few golf carts but we were told they were trying to end the era of the donkeys and horses and no " new" horses would be allowed to start working there. But authorities were turning a blind eye to "old" horses not looking the same as they did yesterday.

I must have had the same person you had deal with the original application. I did get get a shock when my application was denied but all sorted out now. Thanks for letting us know how you solved it. Hopefully I won't have any trouble next time.

Coming back into Australia in June we still had the paper copy handed out by staff. I have yet to come across the digital version.

I have a solution for those who book through a Princess Vacation Planner. I emailed my PVP yesterday and she applied the SOBC this morning, it was not a problem. Unlike trying to go through Princess Australia. Since I brought my shares in 2019 it will be a long time before I sell them so I may as well try to get as much OBC as I can in the mean time. 😁

I think she did a good job with P&O when considering the budget that would not be as large as Princess per passenger. I've had two cruises on them since the restart and I have been happy with them. Even surprised at the quality of the production show when compared to pre-covid times. All the best to her and I hope she returns to the industry when she is able.

The Coral was built for the old locks, there are now the new locks which are wider. When booking canal cruises some go through the old and some go through the new locks.

There's movement!

I would say you are right as well as they don't have so many ships going through at the moment that they really don't have the same time pressure they usually do.

Having a look at the weather right now in the Gatun Locks. 26- 27 degrees with a gentle breeze from the south. It's overcast as can be seen from the pictures but no rain expected until after 10am and it's now 8:45am.

I finally realised that as the Coral very slowly advanced a bit.

Wow the Coral looks so small compared to the cargo ship in the other lock/lane.

Thanks to both of you for keeping us updated. I just saw 200 ships waiting to go through the canal on the SBS news and was hoping the Coral being a passenger and not cargo ship it wouldn't be delayed. Sounds like everything is going to plan and there will be no delays. 😊 What a sight to be seen all those ships just floating around filling in time, I would have loved to have seen it and taken a few photos.

I agree strongly. 😊 I would like a more salad and vegetables to choose from.

Even Princess have added a couple of items on the dinner menu for an up charge.

We sailed on Explorer in June 22 and had sailed on the sisters a lot under Princess, so can compare the Princess vs P&O experience. We have again sailed on P&O (Adventure) this June. We find the food to be less varied on P&O in that they only change the menu in the restaurants every three days but then you have three restaurants to choose from, all with different menus. On the cruises I have been on there were only two menus for each restaurant. But in saying that, the food was enjoyable. The coffee from Charlie's bar was great. As for the smells in the hallways I didn't notice any on the floor I was on but I have been on the Dawn Princess towards the back of the ship and there was a definite sewage smell in the hall and also found this on the Explorer of the seas on the rear left hand side of the promenade deck. On the Explorer I found the lifts to be painfully slow but not on the Adventure. We did have soap in our bathroom but it was a liquid soap in a pump container on the wall, one near the sink and one in the shower. What we didn't have compared to Princess was hand creme and a face washer. There was a box of cheap tissues in the room. The production shows in the theatre have improved a lot since pre-covid and I enjoyed them. The guest entertainers were fine but that can vary from cruise to cruise. There are also not as many cruise directors staff as on Princess but I didn't feel a lack of them. There were sufficient activities during the day if that is what you like. The ship does have a different feel to Princess and this is due to the different passenger mix, it has more families and younger passengers but there are plenty of older folk as well just not as many as Princess. The standard of dress at night time is more casual than Princess so you need not bring as many fancy clothes as other lines but quite a few people did get dressed up each night and they weren't out of place. We would happily cruise on P&O again but would only do it during non school holiday time and we wouldn't do a cruise over 12-14 days on them as I would probably get tired of the menu choices and we wouldn't do a cruise under 5 days on them either (probably too much drinking on one that short) I wouldn't pay as much per day as Princess or RC, but as a cheap, fun winter cruise with a more relaxed feel they work for us.

Thanks for the information, I will have to watch those screens now.😊

Very interesting. Did they advertise that in the Patter or did you have to speak to the on board cruise planner to find out about the offer?

Too funny I learn something new everyday. Here I thought it was only native to Australia.