themanwithahat
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Posts posted by themanwithahat
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If I understand correctly, voyages such as this should have no expectation of actually reaching the port specified in the itinerary due to well-documented weather conditions. I accept that.
What I'm having a problem understanding is why Cunard didn't have a Plan B in place. There could have been on board activities prepared in advance. You wrote "Entertainment ; they did the best they could" Did they really?
Well, I suppose it could have always improved a bit. But the Days which became sea days were pretty much comparable to normal sea days.
I think though you do have a point when you write that if there is a significant risk, which there was in this case, more could be done in advance. I also agree with those who question the general plausibility of the Cruise itself.
Most of the complaints about what actually (supposedly) happened are nonsense, though.
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Perhaps it comes down to the PR skills of the Captain? I feel sorry for the Purser's Desk clerks as they have no power whatsoever. It's a shame that some passengers (although the Telegraph made out that it was the Bounty revisited) took it upon themselves to abuse the ordinary crew - its a bit like swearing and carrying on at checkout operators about the prices set by supermarkets!
It was fairly obvious what was happening I thought. Some people just like to complain, and will find anything to complain about. Having half a brain, I presumed there was fairly heavy communication between the crew and Cunard central, and the Captain decided not to make update announcements every five minutes.
Interestingly, the point was made about people paying 400 GBP for their holiday - what a bargain for 4 days! Maybe that's part of the problem, the riff raft invaded the ship and brought their classlessness with them.
I'm one of the GBP400 newbies (actually slightly less than that). I agree it's a bargain. If there was a lot of riff-raff there wasn't much sign of it - not much drunken behaviour or rowdy behaviour. If anything it was rather quiet.
What really annoys me is the comical exaggeration. There was no mutiny. There was a strong smell of diesel - it was there for a couple of hours, tops - we had outside cabins on Deck 1 so walked pass the 'smell point' on a regular basis both crossing between them and accessing Deck 2.
Everyone was not complaining. The compo chasers and whingers seem to think everyone was, but I only met two or three people who were really unhappy (and one of those it was about the cruise generally *not* Amsterdam being cancelled - the stuff about no Captain's party may have some credibility ? As its my first Cunard cruise I have no other Cunard cruise to compare it to). I thought the food declined in standard slightly, which may be down to non-reprovisioning of course.
Most people I spoke to understood at some level what some of the posters here who know about these things have written. Obviously the ongoing Amsterdam/other port issue was a popular topic of conversation (with staff as well).
One of the complaints in the Mail comments is actually us - we were sat down during the quiz. There was a family behind us similarly sat. None of us complained - we got there late for a popular quiz activity and there were a reasonable number of seats for the space it was in.
I note, as an aside, that apparently some flights into Schipol were cancelled as well.
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You are quite right. Cunard did not handle this well. Communication and explanation about why no alternative port was suitable would have helped. Despite the man in the hat's rude accusation of lies, I wrote about what I experienced and unless he was following me into the lifts, dining tables and ladies' toilets, he can't possibly claim that his experience was the only truth. Likewise, he cannot know why people left early.
You can't either - and the statement that "no effort was made" is not a "rude accusation of lies" - it's a lie and a very obvious one to anyone on the cruise.
You make the assumption that everyone feels like you. I met virtually *no one* who felt like you seem to think was common. Even those involved in the supposed 'mutiny' were not that upset.
Your attitude to the onboard Christmas Fair is typical. Yes, it was not brilliant. Tell me, if you tried to do a "Christmas Fair" replacement on board, what would you have done ? Or do you think they shouldn't have bothered trying to do a Christmas Fair (in which case you'd whine about them not trying)
Martin Bell's lectures were a delight - what a pity that the daily programme showed that on day three he was repeating the lecture from the day before (he wasn't). Some of us missed it, thinking we'd already heard it.
So, if this is correct, then the claim that no effort was made is not true, is it ? The effort was 'made' to get Mr Bell to use what he called his 'back up lecture' and also his poetry reading sessions at 5:00pm
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What is 'dishonest' about Cunard's behaviour ? Putting that in their T&Cs (I believe the same thing is in everyone else's) is hardly a surprise.
Even before I'd been on a Cruise I'd been on enough cross channel ferries to know there is no guarantee of them running. North Sea in December, yeah, sure, it's going to be a millpond.
Cunard couldn't get into Amsterdam - others have explained why, which tallies with what my daughter (studying Travel and Tourism) says. There appears to be no real alternative (what smaller ships do is largely irrelevant). I do not see what else they could do other than sail and hope the weather would improve. It sometimes does. Even if they had known at sailaway that the chances of getting into Amsterdam was close to zero it is incredibly naive to believe that they or anyone else would just go "oh, well, you don't have to go if you don't want".
Complaints seem to fall into two categories ; generic "this is not right" and complaints which are best misleading and at worst dishonest. Neither show much of a grasp of reality.
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While I am sure that Cunard will have complied with their contractural obligations I hope you will agree with the thrust of my argument, that the risk of being stuck on the boat for the entire period and not disembarking is not mentioned anywhere in the advertising. Furthermore, when it is clear to the operator that a safe docking is impossible the passengers should be made aware?
It's obvious isn't it ? It does say that there is no guarantee of any port - the first cruise I ever went on - haven't been that many - had precisely this at St Peter Port.
What exactly do you expect Cunard to do ? Why do I suspect the answer to this is "give me the money back".
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There is nothing in the 'contract' entitling you to visit any port, let alone any specific port.
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Just to emphasise: No passengers wanted the Captain to put the ship in jeopardy. The root cause of the problems encountered was the lack of communications. Saturday evening we learned the visit to Amsterdam was in peril. Not until late Sunday morning did we get another announcement that the wind had beaten us, and then it was Monday afternoon before the captain announced that we would be returning to Southampton early. No attempt to communicate in between times - just the map in the cabin to update us.
Some of us had the brains to look at the live map when we woke up early on the morning we were supposed to be in Amsterdam to find ourselves still at sea. The 'trail' made it obvious what was happened. Looking out of the window worked as well.
The 'return to Soton' was that late because they were trying to keep open the option of going elsewhere. It must be said for accuracy's sake that the messages coming out at this point were that it was unlikely the QE would be going anywhere other than Soton.
Also, no effort to say sorry/ sound contrite. Just a bland statement of fact.
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Not actually true, so not a statement of fact.
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The company knew in advance about the weather. Sailing enthusiasts among the guests said even they had known about this weather front for over a week. We took 36 hours to get to Holland at a snail's pace and 12 hours to be back level with Southampton. We passed ports in Holland, Belgium, France, The Channel Islands and the UK. The weather in the English Channel wasn't nearly as bad. No port, not even Southampton, was deemed possible to dock, until it suited Cunard to dock early for repairs.
The Boat arrived in Amsterdam on time, pretty much (about 4am) . One sea day was always part of the itinerary. It was supposed to go that slowly. And it didn't "take 12 hours to be back level with Southampton".
It docked slightly early - during the Beatles first "second" performance, about 8:45 PM. Hardly enough time to make any sort of significant repair. I know this because the 'Beatles' were joking about it.
Moreover, if the weather was known about, why wasn't there a contingency plan for entertainment? The afternoon of the second day (when we were supposed to arrive in Amsterdam) had nothing to offer most passengers - 2 lots of televised football, bingo or a quiz. The rest of the so-called entertainment involved hard-sell shopping promotions - Tag Heuer watches and the Cunard spa packages.[/Quote]
There is some truth in that. Though it was always like that, of course (and is on other cruises) as the second day is and always was a sea day.
It was the third day that was completely rewritten by about 10AM. I can post both versions of the onboard magazine if you like. This was the day when the crew expected the vast majority of the staff to be off the boat in Amsterdam, and as such there was nothing much happening. The spa staff said this quite openly and it is obvious anyway.
We were supposed to arrive in Amsterdam early on the morning of Day 3 (e.g. Day 1 leave Soton, Day 2 Sea Day, Day 3 Amsterdam)
Most people I spoke to weren't angry about missing Amsterdam if it was unsafe to proceed. The extremely quick decision that no other port was suitable and that we were going to spend 4 days just circling the English Channel was what infuriated most guests.
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You have no idea whether that is true or not.
The final announcement was made quite late, following three or four 'updates' even though it was fairly obvious building up to it that it was a likely outcome.
It didn't "infuriate most guests". I met one or two who were infuriated, and enough who could see for themselves what the weather was like and that there were problems thoughout the North Sea. People I met were mostly disappointed but nothing more. The family on our table wanted to visit their favourite Chinese Restaurant (in Amsterdam) so they were sad to miss out on that, a little, but they weren't *cross* about it, they were just philosophical about it.
Perhaps I meet nicer people than you.
It's somewhat different to miss a port when it's the last day of the cruise, but not many people would pay out for a trip to nowhere at all, particularly when no effort was made to lay on anything for the trapped guests to do.
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This is simply a lie. When it became clear that Day 3 was not going to be on a largely empty ship the timetable was expanded significantly, this was done (i.e. printed and available) by 10 at the latest (and probably earlier) and staff were distributing the rewritten daily paper in various areas of the ship and explaining what was happening and why.
Some things were moved. Martin Bell's lecture on his time in Politics was moved to Day 3 (when the boat would have been largely empty) and he gave another lecture (and a poetry reading) on Day 4, for example. I know additional things were put on , we attended them. Daily things like (say) the Bridge classes were reinstated.
People were just sitting around staring into space, because there was next to no entertainment laid on.
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This is also a lie. The level of entertainment was pretty much the same as the original sea day. If this was insufficient, that may be a general Cunard problem.
The atmosphere on board was awful: everywhere people were angry and complaining.
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This is also a lie. One of the Entertainment staff told me someone got in her face - literally, a distance of a few inches. I spoke to one person who was unhappy, and heard of another (a stag do who missed out on the Red Light District, I gather). There were not hordes of miserable people on the ship.
The supposed 'mutiny' was a few people - probably less than 80 or so - in the reception immediately after the announcement of no alternative port. It is nonsense.
This is an exaggeration for money (like the Diesel, which we know about because the worst smell point (actually outside the theatre on L1) was about 10 yards from our cabin. We smelt it once and we went past that spot endlessly (because it was between our two cabins)
Cunard's reception staff couldn't have been more cavalier or disdainful.
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When I spoke to them they were perfectly reasonable and pleasant.
I wanted to register a complaint about the lack of entertainment. After being called over to one of the receptionists, she cut me short while she tidied up something in her drawer. I waited until she'd finished, began again, but then her colleague had a little joke to involve her in, so I had to wait until she'd had her laugh. That's pretty typical of the attitude that the guests experienced.
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To quote Alan Shearer, have you ever thought it might be you ?
As if to rub it in, Cunard put on a 'Christmas Market' of a few stalls of stuff from their shops - with mulled wine, if you were prepared to pay for it. The other stall had waiters rolling napkins into shapes. I wouldn't have been surprised to see one rolled into a 2-finger salute.
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Yes, this is correct.
They were trying to do something (you claim above no effort was made, I seem to recall). Given that short of ordering a fleet of helicopters to drop things onto the ship, this is the best one could reasonably expect. They were trying to get a "Christmas Market" feel. I would agree it was not terrific, and it was stuff on sale in the shops, but what else have they got ? Do they magically make Dutch stallholders appear ? somehow ?
People were queueing to get off the ship 12 hours before the end of the cruise. I've never seen anything like it.
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That's because it got in early enough for them to do so. We arrived just before 9.00. Those who wanted to leave could leave, some did, some didn't.
If I lived in Winchester rather than South Norfolk I probably would have as well.
I'm a Gold Member cruiser with Cunard, but I no longer trust this company with my money or precious holiday time. This is from someone who has experienced the disappointment of missed ports before - this was of a different order. Some people are saying 'get over it', but really, you had to be there to experience the feeling that we, and our money, were being taken for a ride in every sense of the phrase.
I'm not thinking "get over it" so much as "get a grasp on reality".
*and* "get over it".
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There were not all 2.000 unhappy passengers, probably some 200 barristers only.
Pretty much, probably not even that. Sad rather than unhappy. There is an old saying that 10% of anything is rubbish ; this applies here.
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This?
Hard to believe, this bit is: "They stormed the reception desk and clapped and chanted, ‘We want the captain’ demanding to know what was going on."
Got off it this morning. It's absolute c**p basically. There were a lot of people wanting to know what was going on, well maybe 100 or so. No aggro. Most people we spoke to were disappointed but pragmatic about it. We saw it as a double edged sword ; we did want to see the markets (there *are* Xmas markets in Amsterdam, though it isn't Bruges or Koln) but then we got more time on the boat.
Other fantasies ; there was a diesel spill, briefly, yesterday, near the theatre (or it smelt like that) but it was dealt with rapidly (it wasn't far from our cabins)
Entertainment ; they did the best they could. Martin Bell did an extra lecture and poetry reading. The Ents.Manager who is a serious amateur astronomer gave a lecture on the Solar System. The various bands/musicians did overtime I reckon. Usual quizzes and things were added. Spa reopened. They can't magically make other lecturers appear on the ship. Most of these people (and other staff) missed out on down time.
The boat didn't 'go round in circles' - it went pretty much all the way to Amsterdam, then back to Cherbourg area, then to Soton. There was the odd 'wiggle' but it was a slow cruise anyway.
Basically on the Amsterdam day they planned to shut everything down during the day more or less because they thought most people would be off the boat ; by about 10:00 (I think) there was a revised entertainment for the day more appropriate to a sea day.
Basically ; the whiners here and in the Mail are not representative ; they are probably after money. Mrs Hat. spent a fair chunk of the return trip home reading out and commenting on some of the abject nonsense in the comments.
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I've been on three P&O cruises and am about to try Cunard.
One thing that I haven't been too impressed with on P&O is the sort of lecture/education/skills sort of thing. There have been few of them that aren't flogging something (e.g. a lecture on (say) massage which is selling Spa massages really).
One I did attend was a chap talking about UFOs. I thought it would be a few geeky blokes like me but it was absolutely packed out, standing only, all ages, and both genders. I asked a lady next to me if she'd been to his previous lecture on the cruise (about the Apollo missions) and she said that had been the same.
It's not that we got bored, far from it, but I'd quite like more of this sort of thing - is Cunard better in this respect ?
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Thanks everyone !
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We are on our first Cunard cruise this Friday - a short break to Amsterdam :)
I was unsure about informal dress. I have got the impression that it is slightly more formal than the P&O cruises we have been on.
My son is 17 and 6'2 - he actually dresses quite smartly normally - checked shirt and trousers - as he doesn't like t-shirts and jeans much. Would the dining room be okay with this sort of attire or should he wear his jacket ? Does he need to wear a tie ?
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Thank you all very much - we have 1016 and 1019 so its nice to hear that about 1012. I will pass it on
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Hi. We have our first Cunard cruise coming up (short break to Amsterdam) and we've been allocated cabins right at the bottom of the passenger decks (Deck 1. all prefixed 1.nnn) which looks to be about half way up the ship.
Mrs Hat is a bit worried about this. Can anyone tell me what they are like ? Are there any advantages or disadvantages ? I have heard it is more stable lower down.
All advice welcomed !
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Am. I better off just going smart casual or should I stick with the suits?
Whatever you like. You won't look out of place, IME anyway most people in there are reasonably smart.
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Absolutely. Be a glass half full person.
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Hello
2. In Bruges we fancy going on a paid excusion but wanted to check where the coach drops you off in Bruges ... is it the BargePlein?
I think so from memory (this was "Bruges on your own"). Certainly down there somewhere. We were walked (as a group) into the centre and a meeting place was arranged, then we were walked back. We loved Bruges.
It wasn't a difficult or long walk - maybe 15 minutes
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I have my next cruise picked out and want to book it onboard as soon as it opens. :D Thanks
It's pretty much open all day I think !
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The atmosphere we experienced was good all round - from the stewards (not just our own), the waiters, bar staff, entertainment staff, library, reception, the officers and crew, and even some of the engineering staff who were helping out on the tenders.
Maybe we just got lucky? Or maybe just easily pleased? Or maybe some of the reviews just don't accurately reflect reality? Maybe on the day it's as much down to the personality of the passengers as it is the personality of the ship ....
Maybe. Can't recall a grumpy member of staff - some are friendlier and livelier than others, but that's just human nature.
I don't know if the food has got worse, haven't been cruising for long, but it seems to me to be pretty good for what you pay for it.
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But I will admit, we did give our cabin steward an additional tip at the end of the cruise, over and above the automatic daily amount on our account
How much do people think is a sort of reasonable "additional tip". I've seen quite a lot of discussion about this but not many numbers. Is any additional tip welcome, or would a certain level be viewed as insulting.
As a young lad, I once left a one centime tip in a French cafe/restaurant (or the lowest amount, not sure) because the food was so awful.
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1. We are sailing on Oceana in December and have just received our cruise info booklet in the post. We had booked room A503 but have noticed on the back of the luggage labels that is says we are in room b409. Have we been upgraded without being told?
2. When do we find out what time to get to the cruise terminal/embark?
1. Yes. Unless there is a specific reason you want A503 I'd enjoy it.
2. Quite late. They don't seem to mind when you arrive too much, I don't think it is strictly mandatory, it is to stop everyone arriving at the same time.
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Young couple on our first cruise (4nts Bruges/Guernsey Ventura) had an inside cabin for which they told us they'd paid £199 each.
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It's nice to hear that P&O are refurbishing Oriana.
I agree to a certain extent about pricing, but a cruise isn't a loaf of bread. The prices for a cruise vary wildly depending on when and what type of fare you book, but essentially once on board the holiday is the same.
You would think that those who have paid a bargain fair would be the most satisfied, but from the recent Azura reviews it's the other way around.
Strange ....
We paid about £600 odd for a balcony. 6 days to Bilbao and back up. That's £100 per person each day. Looking at what we got it's an absolute bargain.
If we'd been paying Regent/Seabourn sort of money, then we probably wouldn't have been too impressed, maybe.
People have to be realistic. We once booked a late booked early Easter break to a hotel in Cyprus, AI, on the rec. of our (excellent) TA. We took the line that it was so cheap (about £400 each) that if the food was awful we could eat out every night, just sleep there, and still be ahead on points. It actually was pretty good in the end all round. If we'd have spent £800 / head on it we'd have felt hard done by.
And some people just like complaining.
QE Cruise to nowhere
in Cunard Line
Posted
Well, I actually was on board, I saw the 'mutiny', I smelt the 'diesel', I talked to quite a few passengers, and I partook in the additional activities which supposedly weren't bothered with etc etc etc.
Am I completely happy with it, no, I'm not. Do I remotely recognise even slightly the descriptions by some posters and the Daily Wail, no, I do not.
Most of the passengers had a sort of 'meh' approach to the $75 OBC. It's the price of a couple of bottles of restaurant wine (not one as one Mail commenter said !). Some people, IMO, are on the compo march though.