P&O Ventura Cabin Grade Changes

[delteach]

Hello we are looking at booking a Caribbean cruise on the Ventura for Jan 2014 , after reasearching cabins , ports of call, facilities, and duration , Ventura , ticks the boxes, P&O appear to be the only cruise line that offer a 14/15 night cruise which is our preffered duration, however through our searches on many occasions it has been mentioned that cabin grades are going to change as of 2013 sailings Balconies becoming outside outside becoming inside , and now this weekend 1/7/2012 prices have increased by approx £200 per person against the brochure price , so in question does anybody have any information what the cabin changes are all about (we are looking at a Balcony ) and why the price hike, and as this is our first cruise for a while when would be a recoomended time to book to ensure a Balcony cabin ,and a good price , at the moment it is in excess of £4000 for 2 in a balcony, as you can appreciate this is a rather large amount, hence the questions and early planning, its for our 10th wedding anniversary and 50th birthdays so want it to be memorable for the right reasons , Many thanks for reading

[BrianI]

You cannot change a balcony cabin to an outside or an outside to an inside.

What P&O have done is change some of the grades of each type of cabin.

For ech type of cabin, inside, outside or balcony there are different grades. The different grades are purely on location. The ones near the front are the cheapest and the ones mid ships are the dearest, although the cabins are exactly the same.

It is always difficult to know when to book . The early booking offers have now finished so now is not a good time. If you are flexible on dates, it maybe best to wait until around six to eight weeks before departure when the last minute deals will come out. However you do run the risk of the shipp being fully booked but based on the offers around this year it does not seem to happen often.

Brian

[kevinyork]

I understand yor confusion as on some sites a weird description has been appearing showing a change of description from for example a balcony cabin to an outside. Very strange and certainly that is never going to happen.

 

January is pretty popular for a carribean cruise and when the poor weather and dark nights start to roll in people often think about booking to get some sun in January.

 

I would wait till those recent price hikes you mention level off but probably not wait beyond the end of August if you definately want to secure a specific cruise. Also, dont be fooled by price changes. Sometimes the price may go up but they may be offering more on board credit which could offset or more than offset the increase.

 

Also, if you can look towards late Jan then Azura joins Ventura in the Carribean which should ensure prices are competitive and Azura is virtually identical to Ventura so may offer an alternative for you. To give you an idea, in autumn last year, carribean cruises for two weeks with P&O where going for around £1500 pp for departure in Jan and I see no reason why they should cost more in 2013.