Not Quite Live From Iona in the Med (G336) - The i-Player Version

[Megabear2]

30 minutes ago, Vampiress88 said:

yes you wouldn’t have thought that you’d ever be questioned. It’s the hidden disabilities that are difficult hence why I sent off for one of those access cards, you have to send all your medical information to them and then they have to agree. It’s something I got as it’s a little annoying being judged all the time but it’s human nature. 
 

im not actually sure other than for embarkation what P&o could even help me with. I don’t mind waiting an hour to board, I just can’t wait stood in a line or not need a bathroom. Think the only other time is if there were long queues to get back onto the ship, with no where to sit that it would be an issue. 

 

but I will find the form and fill it in. Belt and braces 

I understand your frustration, all I wanted was a seat too.  They were extremely helpful, no problem at all.

 

On the other hand, jeepers the problems we've had over a walking sticks ... 🙄

[TigerB]

When I've filled in the form before, about 30% of the time we've later had an email remind us to do it. That doesn't fill you with confidence that it always goes to the right place. I would always save it as a PDF to my phone for when we board.

The new way of doing it appears to be better; I did my wife's this week for all our future cruises, and within a couple of days this appeared on the itinerary pages for each...

 

 

[heatherb1958]

1 hour ago, purplesea said:

Mum is a full time wheelchair user too, if I had had wifi I could have shown them the e-mails that had been received.

Lesson learnt I have downloaded my husband's, for our cruise in January, ready for printing.

 

I have also downloaded my husband's , a walking stick user who requires no assistance in an emergency,  for 3 cruises . I saved them on my phone to Google Drive for off line access, no wifi required .  

[GnT-Cruisers]

Hi TigerB,

 

Thanks so much for your detailed review, it was a great read 🙂

 

My wife and I (both in our 50's) were on the same cruise, so it was fun to read, even if we did have some different experiences.

 

It was a good cruise, certainly relaxing and exactly what we needed. It was however, for us, the most disappointing cruise we have been on from a service level and food perspective. We only have 5 cruises under our belts so we are not exactly seasoned cruisers, but we are definitely very keen cruisers and it is by far our preferred method of holidaying.

 

Let me start off by saying that the onboard entertainment was excellent, and we thoroughly enjoyed everything we went to. Hats off to the dancers, artists, singers, high flyers and comedians 🙂

 

Where we were let down, was by the food. As foodies, were very excited by the idea of having multiple restaurants to go to that were all included in the cruise package, we just had no idea that all of them were going to serve exactly the same menu no matter where you booked. 

 

Service was often slow and we honestly were very let down by the overall quality of what we received. The very worst was the chicken, which, no matter what version was on the menu, was way too overcooked, dry and very nearly inedible. The 5oz sirloin steaks had no marbling at all and even though my wife ordered hers blue and mine was ordered as rare, always arrived well done. I do not know how they did it, but even though the steak was reddish pink in the middle, it was definitely 'well done' and tasteless. The veggies were however nice .... lol

 

The food in Horizon was equally disappointing. Although it offered a wide variety, there seemed to be very little coherence to what was being offered and was just haphazard. There were some exceptions, but for the most part, the food again was generally overcooked. Not once during our entire cruise was the roast pork edible.

 

What we really really missed, was the ability to take brag photos of the 'SPREAD' to share with friends and family and make them jealous. In fact, for the very first time in many many years, we did not take a single photo of the food!

 

The reason I am harping on the food and it's quality is simply because every other cruise we have been on, the impressive selection, variety and quality of the food has been so exceptional, that we really really missed it on this cruise.

 

The couple of times that we did eat at The Beach House and Olive Grove, the food was excellent, so it really seemed as though P&O were trying to FORCE us to spend more money ...

 

Another issue we had was with the drinks. My wife and I are keen 'holiday cocktail drinkers' 🙂 As this was a 14 night cruise, the drinks packages were going to work out too expensive for us to get value out of, so we decided that, on this cruise, we would pay for what we wanted, when we wanted it, and I am sooo very glad that we made that decision. The commonly available cocktails were extremely limited in variety and quite honestly, not to our taste at all. A simple 'sex on the beach' for instance, was nowhere to be had and as much as the barman said he could have made it, he told us that he was not allowed to and had to ONLY make what was on the menu. The drinks were also overpriced, so we had a pretty dry cruise.

 

The last thing which surprised us was the shuttles. I am sure we just missed this fact in the paperwork leading up to the cruise, but having to pay £4 per person per bus ride at every port, came as a big surprise to us. I am absolutely sure that we could have skipped the long queues and gotten private taxis for the same or less than the £8 we were charged to get from the ship into town and then £8 back again. I am pretty sure that we have not had to pay that with other cruise lines, or maybe they just sneaked the costs in where we would not notice it.

 

Not a moan from us, just an observation, was that the photographers were almost completely absent on this cruise. On other cruises, the photographers were ready to snap pics as people boarded and then again right through the cruise and ports and definitely getting good snaps of people in all their finery on the black tie and ballgown nights. This time, if you wanted a pic, you would have to go find them ...

 

Anyway, thats my 2c

 

Looking forward to our next cruise ... just almost certainly not with P&O 🙂

 

[Vampiress88]

Tiger. Any idea if the beach house had the lava block on. 
The sample menu online when I’ve just booked our table is completely different to what we had in April. No mention of the lava block. 

[TigerB]

@Vampiress88, yes they did have the lava steak on, as well as the hanging kebab and other dishes that carry a supplement.

 

I don't know what the IT department are playing at but that sample menu is very old, probably the same one they had on Noah's ark.  There are a number of clues:

The draught lager is Bier Moretti, no pint these days is as cheap as £4.50, the mocktails are now £3.95, the halibut and salmon ceviche cocktail now carries a supplement of £1.50; I can go on...

 

I think you will be safe to assume that you will get your lava steak.👍

[Vampiress88]

15 hours ago, TigerB said:

@Vampiress88, yes they did have the lava steak on, as well as the hanging kebab and other dishes that carry a supplement.

 

I don't know what the IT department are playing at but that sample menu is very old, probably the same one they had on Noah's ark.  There are a number of clues:

The draught lager is Bier Moretti, no pint these days is as cheap as £4.50, the mocktails are now £3.95, the halibut and salmon ceviche cocktail now carries a supplement of £1.50; I can go on...

 

I think you will be safe to assume that you will get your lava steak.👍

gotta have steak there. The fajitas are so small compared to how they used to be. 
 

Can’t remember what the beer draft used to be- not been since April. 
But I’m glad that it’s an old menu. Was panicking cos I’d already paid (couldn’t use the obc) it’s youngests birthday so had to make sure it was booked up. 
also didn’t know that there is a panto on there. 
hoping there are some good Christmas films too 

[TigerB]

On Iona I have a feeling it's always been Bira Moretti and John Smith's at the Crystal bar, the one that serves the Beach House; its has on Arvia anyway .

I don't like Bira Moretti and I begrudge paying five and a half quid for a pint of John Smiths, so I now ask if they can get me a pint of Punk IPA from the Laguna bar.

 

I know now to ask for extra fajitas and dips.

 

Enjoy your cruise.🙂

[TigerB]

I had intended to post a final précis of the cruise, but have been away for a while. I've finally done It, so here it is...

 

THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY....

 

 

CPS

This was the first time we had used them and, having read some mixed reviews, I wasn’t expecting it to be perfect.  Details of our arrival are in post #4; perhaps if we had arrived later it may have been busier, but just about fifteen minutes from joining the queue, to waving goodbye to our luggage and making our way to the terminal, was very good.

The collection after the cruise was just as easy; there was no queue at the office and I could see our car parked close by in the disabled area. After loading, we were on our way within fifteen minutes of leaving the terminal.

A check of the dash-cam the next day revealed our car had remained on the terminal throughout our cruise, just 200 metres from the pick-up location.

We are booked again with CPS for February; if the experience is just as good, we will use them again if on a select fare.

 

 

EMBARKATION & DISEMBARKATION

See post #4 and #20.  Both were spot on!  We could have been even quicker away on the last day if we had used the other airbridge, but there you go.

 

 

CABIN

We knew what to expect with the layout of the cabin having stayed in an identical one on Arvia, confident that it would suit the needs of our lass and her wheelchair; see post #4 for photos and descriptions.  Having previously always wanting to stay in a balcony cabin, thinking that would be the only cabin type that would be suitable for us, this is the third cruise with P&O this year, all on the two biggest ships, where we have had an inside cabin, staying in two of them for the full cruise.

I will say this to wheelchair users: subject to the bed being in a queen configuration, and your chair being no wider than about 64cm, you should get on fine with the partially accessible inside cabins on Iona or Arvia; don’t be put off by an advisor or TA suggesting that it would not be suitable.  You would save money too!

With the exception of the initial problem with the hanging rail and my reappraisal of the suitability of the fridge, as referred to in post #4, the only other quirk of this cabin was the location. We had previously stayed in 15322, the cabin next door, on Arvia and it was really quiet.  This time we spent a little more time in the cabin during the day and, with a service area being one side of it, and the food preparation area of Taste 360 being above and slightly mid-ship of it, there was some occasional noise pollution. During the night though, it was quiet.

 

 

LIFTS

We have previously experienced problems with lift etiquette, but not to the extent that @Selbourne and his good lady did on their August cruise.  On this cruise though we hardly had any problems; I suppose it does help that our cabin was nearest to the forward lifts. There were only two occasions, and those involved the mid-ship lifts, where I had to ‘have words’ with folk (both adults) for being ignorant of the needs of disabled or vulnerable passengers. As has been mentioned by others, it is children that appear to have more awareness of those in more need.  On one occasion the door of the lift farthest from us opened, and a young lad aged about 12yrs ran to it and held the door open for us.  The thing is, he wasn’t even using the lifts; he was walking alone up the stairwell and must have seen the lift doors open and, thinking that we wouldn’t get to it in time, went out of his way to assist us.  An absolute credit to his parents.

 

 

RESTAURANTS AND FOOD

Choosing to eat in Opal on those evenings when we weren’t dining elsewhere was a wise choice.  Apart from one evening where we were sat on a bank of two-seaters, and the first formal night, when our section was full, the service was very good, and we were either sat on a proper two-seater or on a four-seater, for our own use.  That wouldn’t have been the case though if our lass could access more of the restaurant in her chair; an advantage of being a wheelchair user in a smaller restaurant.

The food in the MDRs on this cruise was a bit hit and miss though; more hit than miss, and the second formal evening meal (see post #18) was excellent, but when it was a miss it was massively so.

 

This cruise has done nothing to make the Horizon any more appealing. It is still, in my opinion, a cattle market full of folk who have no concept of proper hygiene and how that may affect others – see post #14.

 

 

STAFF

It has been mentioned by others that staff on Iona appear to look tired and overworked, and service is a bit slower as a result.  Yes, we did notice that some staff appeared to be a little jaded, and in a few locations they were a little thin on the ground but, apart from the experience described in post #12, all interactions we had with staff were absolutely fine.  There were some, our cabin steward included, that went the extra mile to make sure we had a great cruise experience.

Having worked in hospitality previously, albeit many years ago, I can appreciate how hard some work to try and meet the expectations of the customers, and how appreciative they can be of positive feedback.  A simple ‘thank you’ and civility from the customer can go a long way.  Unfortunately, we witnessed two ugly incidents where the treatment of staff by customers fell far below our expectations.  One is described in post #17.  The other happened in the same restaurant a few days earlier.  A man near to us was clearly unhappy with the portion size he was given, but instead of speaking discreetly with his waiter, as I would do, and asking if he could have a little more fish or whatever, he appeared to want the rest of the section to know of his displeasure. He beckoned over the waiter, who was serving another table, and demanded, “TAKE THIS AWAY NOW AND GET ME A NEW ONE; THAT WOULDN’T FEED A SMALL CHILD”.   The embarrassed waiter received no please or thank you, but did all he could to appease this one ‘entitled’ individual.

 

 

MY HOLIDAY APP (NON-APP)

For us, this worked fine, and we didn’t experience any problems with it ....apart from the out of date bar prices, as referred to in post #7, #11, and #12.    Perhaps, booking all our meal times as soon as we could, and not relying on the virtual queue, influenced our positive experience; I was aware that it had crashed a couple of times and overheard folk attending the Opal podium stating they had been ‘kicked out of the virtual queue’.

The My Holiday app (non-app) is far from perfect, and gets a lot of stick on these boards. Whilst in conversation with a Head Waiter, who shall remain nameless, about something else, I turned the conversation on to making reservations through My Holiday.  Their response: “Sir, Madam, in my opinion the app is crap”.  Their advice was, if anyone had problems booking a table, to speak with them or any of their colleagues.