Megabear2

Well here's a tale of woe! Just spoke to P&O re the Aurora June cruise calling at lots of nice Italian ports - the website offered me an outside cabin for £2980 but kept reverting to 0 guests in 1 cabin. Ahh says the nice man, you can't book that one yet only the single cabins, it may change when they go on general sale. Is this normal, the single balcony he offered me was £4,004 with £70 obc which seems an awful lot - I have a single outside on a QE fly cruise in September this year for £2501 so £4,000+ seems ridiculous.

They do have the excursions, they just might not have the berth. However if they don't allow bookings for excursions lots of people would moan about that too. We can't have it all ways. On my cruise the Soller train is sold out which basically means a whole carriage. The train operators will surely be checking with the port whether the sales to P&O are viable. In fact nearly 50% of the excursions are full and I'm pretty sure the operators of them will not be at all happy with their government if and when they have to repay P&O and their guests at very late notice.

Which costs a small fortune on the ship's service. I always switch my voicemail off before sailing just in case someone calls when I have it on, once got caught and ended up with a £15 bill for someone telling me my car was due an MOT and service!

Are Arcadia's single cabins gold plated? Just priced the April Med one and been quoted a starting price of £2949 inside and £5179 balcony. Single occupancy double inside is from £1729 saver or £2079 select while deluxe balcony is from £3079 saver £3699 select. This echoes Cunard when I booked for January 2025, all single cabins nearly £2,500 dearer than single occupancy of double.

It's what Americans want, the UK audience gets short shrift when it comes to the new ships. MSC even offer inside Yacht Club cabins and these sell well. For American cruisers status is everything, hence the obsession with loyalty programmes. On Celebrity if you don't take the second room service and turndown they add extra points to your loyalty!

Ahh - the joys of being one of Mr Rishi's inactives.

I've found Kotor, thanks. However I clicked on an Arvia Med cruise and got a lovely map of the Fjords! I'm looking at the Arcadia April/May too, but very scared of all the talk about she's a cold ship. I'm like a bear with a sore head if I'm cold!

More to the point I just searched the P&O site for cruises calling there in 2025 and apparently there aren't any!

Order, order ... silence onboard! You're up before the beak

Agree, I really dislike the place nowadays.

On Britannia our steward kindly made a note when he introduced himself to deliver extra towels every afternoon at 4.00pm as he changed shift. He delivered our ice at the same time, if we were out he'd drop the towels on the bed and put the ice in the fridge. We were very happy with the arrangement and didn't miss turndown at all.

If it's on Britannia the Deck 15 deluxe balconies at the front are shaded and also suffer noise (big time) if you are on a cruise where night time activities may take place outside. Been caught out once in the Caribbean and never again. Of course if it's a cruise where nothing much on deck is likely to happen in the evening then noise shouldn't be an issue for you there.

On the days with big clashes Celebrity have been moving Edge to Ibiza as a substitute but she of course is under 3,500 passengers. Will have to wait and see

+1

Currently one of the top destinations in Europe, stunning place. Would really like more ports like this instead of the old repeats. Montenegro is one of the hot to places for young people these days, with Budva being in the top 5 places most visited by under 30's.

Run!!!!!!

May the Duck be with you ...

Did you not complain?

So that's why you need umbrellas on your rear balcony on Iona and Arvia!

Whilst it seems obvious assumedly the port has to cancel first. Unfortunately we have to wait and much as I hate to say it the Balerics are not exactly keen on UK visitors at the moment no matter how they arrive so we could well be bottom of the queue for getting notice. I believe Moley said alternative plans will be in hand behind the scenes.

Is this the 14 May departure due Palma 19th - that's the one I'm on. Port schedule actually shows Seaview, Edge and Arvia in port that day so assumedly we won6 be going.

All of them apart from P&O are presumably classed as boutique or specialty cruise lines though and presumably with higher fares? Researching the subject last year when my friend picked our Celebrity cruise it seemed very much that all the leading mass market cruise lines bar Cunard were moving away from turndown. As I say Princess and Celebrity offered a choice but most now appear to have removed the option.

I have Palma on my Arvia May trip and nothing has happened with that. My August Britannia has had things swapped around and timing changed. I am mainly disgruntled that P&O can't seem to update the itineraries on the websites to reflect where tyecships are actually going. If you go to book you seem to get an errata before finally clicking in to buy the product but that's little consolation if you're in the planning stage, make a decision based on your research and then at the end of it all learn it's not quite what you thought.

I have been researching Iona Norway cruises in the past few days and have noted that on the P&O website they are showing Iona calling at Geiranger on all departures between 27th May 2023 and 2nd September 2023. As I understood it Iona will not be calling there due to a problem with docking so assumedly these cruises are showing incorrect information and a change will be imminent or have I got this completely wrong and the passengers have been notified en bloc earlier on? I can't help but be a bit worried about all this websitecsloppiness on ports changing, some blurb is still waxing lyrical about St Petetsburg! Regarding Palma I have noted that Celebrity Edge has now updated a number of her cruises from calls there to now being Ibiza, but these seem to have been done very quickly as a block. Is there any news yet on Arvia calls - I have notification on the August Britannia one as mentioned above by others.

In fairness the big players have all been tinkering with the turndown service for a while. On Celebrity and Princess last year while it was available you had to opt in rather than opt out, this by way of the Medallion app on Princess and by card or the app on Celebrity. In December 2022 there was a change on Quantum of the Seas in a move many thought was the trial run on RC. Guests recently sailing on Quantum of the Seas have noticed a “Housekeeping Services Update” listed in the daily cruise newsletter on embarkation day, however, that dramatically reduces that service. The notice reads: “In an effort to be more sustainable and to align with global hospitality trends, we will be adjusting our stateroom services to 1 time per day.” I now note NCL have become the latest to change the service. https://www.travelandleisure.com/norwegian-cruise-line-decrease-turndown-service-7091895 Reading further into the NCL changes and update in Crew Centre indicated both crew and passengers were unhappy with the NCL approach but complainants were apparently told all cruise lines intend going to once a day servicing! Unless sailing on a boutique line or high end cabin or suite it looks as turndown will be a thing of the past across the board.