Megabear2

I'm delighted you aren't considering cancelling based on others experiences. I get very nervous of mentioning my experience since at the time I received comments that upset me greatly and was accused of making people cancel, it was a horrendous personal experience made worse. I hope you have a great New Year cruise.

I can confirm my deck 9 aft small balcony was horrendous and the noise unfortunately on occasion did not end until 1.00am. I was not alone with the complaint, witnessing very many people complaining vociferously including a family who went in their pyjamas complete with their children to stand in reception at 12.45am. They were lucky as a cabin was found for them the next morning. My battle continued for four days and at one point I was going to leave the ship at the second port when my promised move did not materialise. Eventually on the fourth day I was moved at 11.00pm to an inside cabin 9n deck 4 forward which was thankfully quiet. During in my many meetings with managers and staff I was told there are over 100 cabins onboard Arvia which have noise issues ranging from niggling to totally unacceptable. Certainly I could not live with the noise but obviously that is a personal thing. I will add my complaint on return was dealt with exceptionally well by P&O but I do think that was most likely to the fact the voyage in question had numerous problems (not all noise related but disorganisation with shuttles etc) that were not handled at all well onboard. What I would say is if you are someone who is out and about late you lost likely would be in a different situation to myself. I am particularly noise sensitive and spend a fair amount of time in my cabin and on the balcony and also retire relatively early. Sandancer regarding your September cruise could you perhaps consider moving your cabin rather than cancelling? You may find you are fine with the location as you stated you had no issues previously. It may not be wise to cancel based on others experiences and also I found it very upsetting to deal with people suggesting my experience was causing them to do that. I do however believe people should be aware there may be potential noise issues but we are all different and have different tolerances.

It was a genuine question. I'm a fairly new arrival to P&O compared with many on here, only since 2009. All my cruises prior to that were on Cunard so I've always taken the wine list as the norm so to speak. I had thought that prior to the "modern" P&O perhaps they too had wine lists like the one posted. We sail on Celebrity next week and they claim in their blurb 300 wines although I've not seen the list as we aren't that into wine and on this occasion have the benefit of a free drinks package so will be drinking by the glass. It will be interesting.

The question probably should be when did P&O offer, if ever, a 50 page wine list? I notice the Indian wines still on the Cunard list including one I had the pleasure of trying in the Glass House on Britannia in 2021. Unfortunately come 2022 and the much reduced offerings even there it was sadly no longer available. Even if I do not want to pay for it personally I welcome the vast choice.

My mum's cousin worked for Telfers in their factory in Bow. I recall my dad asking her what her job entailed and her replying she had to stuff the meat in a big hole at the rear!

Good morning. Thank you all for the help on the Warners breaks. I have now booked my friends in for a 4 day break in June for something described as an "Explore Break". From all your kind help I'm sure they will love it. Very busy day yesterday organising the last Christmas present and then a quick dash up to Essex for my niece's first birthday. How time rushes on, seems impossible it's a year since we were sitting at Gatwick flying out to join Britannia when she decided to come into the world. All the excitement of boarding and rushing to activate our Internet to learn if she was here yet to be greeted by her first photograph, and there she was yesterday literally running around with her slightly older cousin. We learned yesterday we have another niece or nephew on the way as well, arriving in July. We had three weddings in close succession in 2022 and now have two little ones here already from those couples with a third arrival expected. Amongst all the sadness and turmoil it is so lovely to hear such good news and gives hope for us all. We are having our "staff" Christmas lunch today. Every year we take our cleaner, gardner and helpful odd job man and their respective families for a lunch at our local pub, always a really festive do. Last year our local had closed down as the owners had gone into administration, however it reopened in the summer and is apparently thriving. It will be interesting to revisit. Tomorrow will be the frantic packing ready to head to Gatwick on Wednesday for the flight to Florida, I'm totally unorganised this time round but thankfully we don't need too much posh stuff as the worst will be stuff to dress to impress one evening. Looking forward to the two days in FLL before we board as we catch up with my friends. Ellie got 6 votes from us too ...

Help please, all you Warner officianados! Looking at the Somerset Cricket St Thomas hotel as a Christmas present for my two very dear friends who are aged 74 and 76. The lady has unfortunately been very poorly this year with a mystery illness the hospital are unable to track down. I picked it as somewhere relatively easy to get to by train from here - direct train to Crewkerne apparently. I believe it's a short taxi from there but does anyone have any idea? Also the packages seem to offer b&b, entertainment etc. As they will most likely just wander the grounds is it possible to buy other snacks, lunch etc on site? I have a choice of 4 day breaks, one of them seems to include a day out to Lyme Regis if I'm reading it right, if so does anyone know do Warners provide the transport? I can see 2 headline acts mentioned which is great, what happens on the other nights, ie is there entertainment or anything? Basically if anyone can offer information I'd be much obliged. I hope it will be something they can look forward to later in the year. They are pretty easy to please, not ones for posh just something nice, do you think it might suit? Thank you all.

With the introduction of Starlink on cruise ships and very positive reviews of the performance in cabins, I'd hope that the cruise lines would introduce rules that prevent passengers making long Facetime, Zoom or whatever calls at least in public indoor areas. The old excuse of bad connection whilst at sea would appear to be no more - even on QM2 mid Atlantic reports are of fast and efficient connection. ICF, the relevance of this in particular is because of the actual structure of the ship on top of the obvious one of no nearby land to bounce signals off. That used to mean more or less blackout on those voyages. There would now be no need to not use your cabin so I cannot see any way that valuable public space needs to be handed over on the off chance a few if us need to call or make some business zooms etc. Normal telephone conversations while at sea are generally restricted by the cost of onboard telephone costs. If someone wishes to make these calls generally they do so from the open decks whilst in port purely to ensure they are not connected to the onboard phone system.

That sounds lovely. I wonder if it's to do with the Geminid meteor showers last night. This from our local BBC website showing my neighbour yesterday.

Lightbulb moment - perhaps P&O could employ some of these new style WFH cruisers to alleviate the staff shortages in Southampton. Cheap accommodation, food ... it sounds quite appealing, I might even apply.

Is anyone else experiencing an incredible sunset today? Just been driving back from collecting the OH's new dinner suit in Southampton and witnessed incredible red skies most of the way home. Best bit was seeing the Queen Mary 2 bathed in some sort of ethereal glow and actually appearing to radiate, presumably because of her new paint job. Unfortunately because of being alone and driving I couldn't take any pictures but the sky colours were astonishing.

My OH and I do not send cards, however the cat does! The first Christmas after he arrived we made some personalised cards made to let our family and friends know he'd arrived, not realising it would start a trend. Year two we were going away at Christmas so thought we'd go electronic. Sudden outraged protests on my husband's social media as apparently no one cared about us but what about the DFC - the cat's full name is RAF based and DFC is "Distinguished Feline Companion"! Last minute Vistaprint order, lesson learnt and gulp 80 cards every year. Here's this year's offering, sorry about the glare.

We know a few people who've taken the option of these working abroad on remote "nomad" visas, two of them chose Barbados, one Antigua, one Germany and the other Spain. The visa varies between 1 year and 3 years depending on which country. Apart from having to meet minimum income requirements to prove self sufficiency and medical cover it was relatively easy although the German one was quite lengthy. I'd guess this might be more popular with a lot of the types we are discussing.

So are we ....😉

That's fine for your line of business, not so everyone's. We have to have live zoom and teams meetings with up to 20 people including the FCA, bad enough on a laptop, but would be horrendous on a tablet and impossible on a phone.

Bless them. Unfortunately we are banned from dog and cat adoption as "unsuitable" due to our address. Thirteen years ago, almost to the day, after losing three of our four cats at 19, 21 and 23 with one left aged 26, we tried very many times with different organisations and would have taken a new friend in a heartbeat. All refused. Someone smiled on us though, a very special visitor was sent (i swear by my furry girls) and appeared on Christmas Eve in our car port unchipped, unloved and in temperatures of-8, and here he is, our own very specially sent adoptee! He sends a very big hello and a Merry Christmas as he's due to go to his "hotel" any day soon and is busy overseeing his servants preparing his bag! After all isn't that what humans are for?

No, been a fan since I was 5. My uncle used to take me to a match in London every Saturday from the age of 4. The day he took me to Stamford Bridge on my 5th birthday i fell in love with Peter Bonetti and Jimmy Greaves. We were relegated but I refused to go to any other ground if Chelsea were at home. I'm completely the person Suggs describes in his Chelsea anthem Blue Day - every other Saturday was spent at the Bridge until the advent of the Premier League. To this day I get a huge thrill when we leave West Brompton and I catch my first glimpse of Stamford Bridge, I'm a very sad individual!

The best. The amount of times you'd walk in and find Stevie Winwood and his mates having an impromptu jam session were my favourites with added bonus of some very inebriated Chelsea footballers. I used to love the Parrots Perch on Friday nights when your new togs used to have to be on display, and shopping in The Garage, especially for crazy hats! Surprisingly so many of these places still exist and we do drop in when we go to football but the new crowds are very tame compared to us.

Yes at 16 I shared a flat in Chelsea two roads down from Stamford Bridge so I do know about sharing. However safety regulations and council rules wouldn't allow that now - we were 10 who rotated in and out rapt weekends when work colleagues joined us for the football and nights out in the King's Road. Happy days but we certainly wouldn't have been able to work under those conditions!

P&O's own. I noticed them lunchtime when I did a quick check on my own cruise which was showing sold out but they have now put an upgrade bid from £0 to £1,357pp on a suite into my planner. Crazy pricing as you say. At least the 7 night Arvia one has dropped in price, at one point starting price was £3,500 for an outside!

I've been in an Arvia inside cabin ... no way can I see 4 young working people making that work! Maybe a suite but absolutely not on any P&O, or for that matter any mainstream line unless at suite level.

J320? A42 and A38 balconies along with guarantee outsides currently available.

In fairness Arvia's 14 night Barbados Christmas cruises are also sold out, together with Britannia's and most of Azura's. Most of the other Christmas cruises have room - even your Arcadia cruise currently has a couple of insides and balconies. This is a good year for Christmas cruises selling, not just on P&O as a great many actually over the Christmas period on other lines have also been sold out for months.

And hence the push for the younger cruisers. Interestingly worldwide there is a new desire to offer long world cruises and there must be a call for them. The answer probably lies with the entrepreneur age who work very hard and then retire exceptionally early. However that may be a problem for the mainstream like P&O as the quality of the offering will need to be very high to attract these guys.

@CarlaMarie's wording is also that used by Cunard, this from a 2017 post by a contributor on that forum (my bold): "Important Reminder - Yellow Fever Vaccination** We hope you are looking forward to joining us on board. We would just like to take a final opportunity to remind you that a yellow fever vaccination is required for this cruise. Failure to provide a valid International Vaccination Certificate may result in you being denied boarding or being asked to leave the ship before the relevant port of call. The vaccination must be given 10 days before entering a yellow fever area in order for it to be effective and valid. If yellow fever vaccination is contraindicated for medical reasons an exemption can be issued by your Medical Practitioner and this must be brought with you to the ship. Local Port Health Officials will then decide if a vaccination waiver can be issued. The exemption should be either detailed in a headed letter or recorded in the International Certificate of Vaccination. It should be signed by the clinician and include the practice stamp. We look forward to welcoming you on board."