Arvia dining help (MDR)

[Tomcruise92]

Hi all

I am fairly new to P&O, having only been on Azura.

I have read so many different things about dining on all the ships, it seems there are different rules and operations for each one. With Arvia, I am looking at a cruise for next Easter. How does the MDR work now? Am I able to pre-book a table online beforehand? How long before can I do this? Do you usually have to wait for reservations when arriving at the MDR?

I struggled with the virtual system on Azura as I found my phone just didn't work well with the system.

Any help would be really appreciated 🙂

[Technoman2]

Firstly Tom unless things have changed you can book dining rooms 14 days before and shows in the main theatre 15 days before but get in on that first day as pre bookings for The olive Grove can book quick. The main issue we had was that you could only pre book tables between 5.30pm and 6.30pm other times have to be booked on the app when the dining room opens and in some cases if you are prepared to share a table the wait is short or or you could be waiting 45 mins if you are pro active with your bookings. Again though we also found that people who just turned up at the dining room to wait for a table got seated quickly. 

[9265359]

9 hours ago, Tomcruise92 said:

Am I able to pre-book a table online beforehand?

 

Only if you want to dine early - 5.30 to 6pm.

 

Otherwise it is join the queue and wait, with the wait being dependant on whether you want to dine at a popular time 7.30 to 8.30, or if you dine at an unpopular time such as between 9pm and 9.30pm when they close the doors, when it is unlikely there is any queue at all.

[purplesea]

The, so called, app opens at 6.30 pm for dining. On one occasion when I joined the queue, at that time, we waited for an hour. On some occasions we just walked up and managed to get seated almost straight away on others we were given a pager. 

 

I too found the reception on Azura poor, but it was much better on Arvia.

[Tomcruise92]

Many thanks all - that is really helpful.
 

A tad of a shame you can only book for the first hour, by the sounds of things it may be more orderly if they just have a full booking system to stop people having to wait. Either way I am happy to eat  earlier so will try and get the reservations in before we board.

 

Also, good to hear the my holiday page works better ion Arvia too. 

[Technoman2]

Good idea to book early as you can always cancel the booking if not . We booked the Olive grove for 4 nights but only used it 3 times as the menu only changes once per week. Its also good to know that P&O are not using Maleth airlines anymore after the fiascos last year . Tui flights were fine and they came around 2 or 3 times with complementary drinks which are free of charge that includes alcohol etc like beer cider whisky , gin , rum, brandy and vodka. wine and i think there was prosecco.

[Waju]

I was stressing about Arvia dining arrangements too but on her at the moment and honestly, don’t worry about it.  My phone has remained in the safe for the whole cruise - either speak nicely to the ladies at the restaurant entrance and ask for a table at around 8pm for example and she will make a note attached to your cabin  number - sorted.  Also there are two MDR so if your chosen one is busy just pop upstairs to the other one. Olive Grove and 6th Street Diner are also included and in the same vicinity so it’s always been really easy to get a table whatever time we got there!  All will become clear when you board but it really is a piece cake 😊

[9265359]

4 hours ago, Tomcruise92 said:

it may be more orderly if they just have a full booking system to stop people having to wait.

 

It wouldn't be.

 

The ships are designed so they can turn the tables at least twice, and if you allowed booking at any time the issue would be the number booked for the peak 7.30pm to 8pm slot, so making it difficult to turn the tables and so worse for those who couldn't book, and also worse for those arriving at that busy time as the waiters will be very stretched.

 

The simple solution to waiting is to swap to 'Spanish time' when onboard and just dine at 9pm (although even that is far to early for Madrileños).

[Sussexboy]

We were on Arvia last month. I too was apprehensive about the dining arrangements after reading so many negative comments. Rest assured it was really easy. We used the virtual queue online and never had to wait more than 15 to 20 minutes for a table. We went to the early shows and joined the virtual queue about 10 minutes before the end of the show. Just time to grab a drink in the Glass House (other bars are available) and then you are on way  to dine, sometimes with glass in hand. It was totally painless in our experience. 

[Hollers]

Had no problems on Arvia last month. Booked the 2 Black Tie nights online before we sailed. That was for a table for 6, both at 6.15. Once on board we dined in either of the two MDRs each night. Here we used the My Holiday app and it was excellent. Usually joined the virtual queue about 6.40. and only once did we have a wait longer than 30 minutes. We factored in the wait time so that we could finish getting dressed for dinner/enjoying a drink on our balcony. On most nights we were booking for a table for two...no sharing. Pretty much seamless...but get used to the numbers in the virtual queue going slowly down from, say, 30, then going from e.g. 20 in the queue to a 'ping' and a Your table is ready' message! So virtually every night we walked into the MDR between 6.50 and 7.15. Suited us really well.