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Aurora Refit

Selbourne

By Selbourne,
in P&O Cruises ( UK )

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Selbourne "Live from...." Rare

Selbourne

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Aurora is now back in Southampton following the refit and leaves on her first ‘Adult Only’ cruise (to the Canaries) today. If anyone going on this cruise is able to post early feedback on the refit then I’m sure we would all be grateful, especially if they were familiar with the ‘old’ Aurora and can comment specifically on the changes.

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BrianI

BrianI

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On Aurora now. New carpets in cabin and corridors. New TV. New toilet. New cabins not ready yet but will be open for viewing when they are. Not sailing till 8pm. Just missed end of broadcast so don’t know why.

Brian

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galeforce9

galeforce9

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1 hour ago, BrianI said:

On Aurora now. New carpets in cabin and corridors. New TV. New toilet. New cabins not ready yet but will be open for viewing when they are. Not sailing till 8pm. Just missed end of broadcast so don’t know why.

Brian

Thanks for the update.  Would be great if you could share pics as next poster has said. 

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AndyMichelle

AndyMichelle

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2 minutes ago, BrianI said:

Not sailing till 11pm now. Apparently an engineer from Germany came to do some work and he has not finished. 

Brian

Oh well Brian, it will have to be a little extra tipple in Andersons.

Have a fantastic time,

Andy

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Selbourne "Live from...." Rare

Selbourne

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27 minutes ago, BrianI said:

Not sailing till 11pm now. Apparently an engineer from Germany came to do some work and he has not finished. 

Brian

 

Enjoy the cruise when you eventually get going Brian! I know that a few of us are very interested to hear about the new TV’s. Are they much bigger, is the picture quality better (I could never read the scrolling text on the Sky News channel as the picture was so poor) and are there any on demand features? I appreciate that the TV’s won’t be your priority, but if you have time to kill and have already established any of this then we’d be grateful to hear about them!

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Selbourne "Live from...." Rare

Selbourne

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1 hour ago, terrierjohn said:

Facebook reports say that the new TVs are widesreen and wall mounted in the balcony cabins, there is a picture, it does not look like the 32" in Britannia but certainly much better than those midget ones on Ventura.

 

Thanks John. I don't use Facebook so can't access it. Sounds encouraging, although the wall mounting aspect concerns me slightly. Much as we love Aurora, the sound insulation between cabins is very poor. If people in adjacent cabins talk at full volume, we can often hear their conversation! For reasons best know to P&O, the default volume that the TV's are set to come on at are often deafeningly loud and the time taken before you can turn it down to something sensible is long enough to wake your neighbours (as we found on one cruise when a neighbour turned on their TV at 6am every morning). I just hope that the wall mounting won't transmit this noise even more.

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Selbourne "Live from...." Rare

Selbourne

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Thanks for posting that John. A vast improvement from the previous TV's - assuming that the picture quality has improved as well. At least double the size, I would say. The carpets are new but everything else looks as before. Not a problem, as the cabins were OK (aside from the TV's). My wife does have an issue with the vile coloured bathrooms though and was hoping for white. As my kids would say 'First World problems'!

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terrierjohn

terrierjohn

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47 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

Thanks for posting that John. A vast improvement from the previous TV's - assuming that the picture quality has improved as well. At least double the size, I would say. The carpets are new but everything else looks as before. Not a problem, as the cabins were OK (aside from the TV's). My wife does have an issue with the vile coloured bathrooms though and was hoping for white. As my kids would say 'First World problems'!

I will reserve judgement on the TVs until I have checked whether I can read the rolling banner on the  Soccer Saturday show on Sky Sports News, without having to get up close.

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Legal Stylist

Legal Stylist

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Hi Brian!

 

I hope you are having a wonderful time on Aurora. I can't wait until we are onboard in 4 weeks.

 

If you see this and have a minute, who is the captain on Aurora? I'm hoping he can take a joke given the ridiculous wedding vow roast of one another my husband and I have planned for our renewal.  Thanks!

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AndyMichelle

AndyMichelle

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9 hours ago, Legal Stylist said:

Hi Brian!

 

I hope you are having a wonderful time on Aurora. I can't wait until we are onboard in 4 weeks.

 

If you see this and have a minute, who is the captain on Aurora? I'm hoping he can take a joke given the ridiculous wedding vow roast of one another my husband and I have planned for our renewal.  Thanks!

I believe Neil Turnbull is currently 'El Capitan' as he likes to call himself on Aurora....

Andy

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Selbourne "Live from...." Rare

Selbourne

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1 hour ago, AndyMichelle said:

I believe Neil Turnbull is currently 'El Capitan' as he likes to call himself on Aurora....

Andy

 

We were on Aurora on the last but one cruise and the Captain was David Pembridge, but this may well have changed following the refit. 

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AndyMichelle

AndyMichelle

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9 minutes ago, Selbourne said:

 

We were on Aurora on the last but one cruise and the Captain was David Pembridge, but this may well have changed following the refit. 

According to some posts on face poke, Neil Turnbull is on Aurora post refit. 

He was also there before Christmas, I didn't take to him but others seemed to like him.

Andy

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jh1809

jh1809

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12 hours ago, AndyMichelle said:

According to some posts on face poke, Neil Turnbull is on Aurora post refit. 

He was also there before Christmas, I didn't take to him but others seemed to like him.

Andy

I'm one who likes him. As he makes a lot of jokes, I don't think Legal Stylist need have any concerns about his sense of humour.

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BrianI

BrianI

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Confirm that Neil Turnbul is the captain. Interesting that on the way down to check out some changes made to the engines we had to do a 3 hour full speed run and Aurora reached 27 knots. This was followed by a crash stop which involved putting the engines to full astern from 25 knots. There was a bit of vibration but the ship stopped in 6 lengths.

Brian

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Brayman

Brayman

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45 minutes ago, BrianI said:

Confirm that Neil Turnbul is the captain. Interesting that on the way down to check out some changes made to the engines we had to do a 3 hour full speed run and Aurora reached 27 knots. This was followed by a crash stop which involved putting the engines to full astern from 25 knots. There was a bit of vibration but the ship stopped in 6 lengths.

Brian

6 lengths! That's good going, as is 27 knots. Quite an exhilarating trip by the sounds of it!

 

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Selbourne "Live from...." Rare

Selbourne

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49 minutes ago, BrianI said:

Confirm that Neil Turnbul is the captain. Interesting that on the way down to check out some changes made to the engines we had to do a 3 hour full speed run and Aurora reached 27 knots. This was followed by a crash stop which involved putting the engines to full astern from 25 knots. There was a bit of vibration but the ship stopped in 6 lengths.

Brian

 

Blimey. They must have dropped the anchors to have stopped that quickly! I thought it took miles! Have you spotted any changes, other than the new cabins, carpets and new TV's?

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Britboys

Britboys

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As well as having what many experience as a good of sense of humour, from personal experience I can also say that he is a very kind and compassionate man.  One of P&O's best as far as I am concerned.

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