PurpleMoonlight

Thanks all.

Food for thought! 

It's Ventura, just a short cruise Dec 2023/Jan 2024. I'm treating my employees and their families.

Hi all.

I'm returning to cruising after a break of several years.

My group is 21 people, a mixture of adults and children. We have all confirmed fixed dining at 6.30 pm.

Is there any way to contact P&O shortly before departure to try to obtain one table, or perhaps more likely two next to each other, for dining? Or will I just have to make my first job on board a trip to see the Maitre-d'?

Many thanks.

Nothing is guaranteed as the ship can arrive late to dock.

However, they do offer passengers the ability to register for a disembarkation time. Never tried it so don't know how well it works.

You can also self disembark first thing, usually 7.30 am ish, but you need to take your own luggage with you.

There are two loungers provided and plenty of room for them.

Also a table and two chairs.

There is a video of a corner suite on youtube.

Oops. :D

My thoughts too. From I what I have seen a large number of customers generally ignore all times provided by P&O for anything . There are many posts on this forum from people confirming this.

It's understandable that people will want to schedule arriving early in case of delays in they days travel, however once in there terminal P&O should perhaps make them wait and then stick to their scheduled boarding time.

It is arguably not fair on those with a noon boarding time say, to have to wait while hundreds of people with a 3pm boarding time are processed first.

I agree, he is a lovely chap.

I did a hosted dinner with him on Britannia. Excellent food, the wine he chose for us was scrumptious and he visited each table for each wine to tell us about it.

It was good value for money too I thought.

To be honest, it's about the only good thing I can say about Britannia. :rolleyes:

Maybe they've read the scientific stuff stating that nororvirus is, wait for it, a virus and P&O's hand gel is useless for viruses. And perhaps, like many of us, they use an anti-viral hand gel and didn't want its effect diluted.

 

This is probably part of the problem.

Passenger think the hand gel dished out by P&O is sufficient when it isn't.

Actually I would say do a tour in Gibraltar. I've done two and they were an absolute hoot. The guides were such characters they really made the tour great fun.

Rome you are best to go on a P&O tour I feel. It's a long journey and delays can occur, the ship will wait for you on a P&O tour but not others.

The auto gratuity for the whole cruise is usually applied to your onboard account on the first night. You can have this removed or reduced at any time during the cruise.

Thank you PurpleMoonlight, 8am -5pm gives us plenty of time to get round the local towns on our cruise, dont want to venture to far on our fist cruise and miss the boat :)

I do this too, far more relaxed than having to rush for a tour.

Most ports are walkable, and those that aren't have a bus laid on.

Port is usually 8am -5pm give or take.

I put the dinner suit in the suitcase and it's never been an issue. Depends how tightly packed though I guess.

The machines are free to use.

Best to take your own consumables.

What makes you think it won't be?

Details here

http://www.fathom.org/

What the bejesus is that all about.

:confused:

Do the Americans really fall for all that marketing rubbish.

It's a 'marmite' ship.

You will either love it or hate it. I hated it.

The public areas are very nice to be fair, but the ships plumbing is well dodgy and the cabin creaked, groaned and banged so much I didn't get a single nights decent sleep.

Glad you got there in the end.

These things sometimes come down to the luck of who you speak to at the time.

I did a transfer from Cunard to P&O about 8 months ago, so you should be okay.

It needs to be to an equivalent or greater priced cruise though.

Tipping is explained before you cruise, its in the terms and conditions that you can remove them if you so wish.

Corrected that for you ....

It is not possible to remove tips for dining staff and leave tips on for cabin steward. We tried this on Oriana when we had very good waiters at our dining table but the worst cabin steward we have ever had on a P&O cruise. At reception we were told that you couldnt remove one lot without affecting the other so we left them on auto and made a formal complaint about our cabin steward.

That may have changed recently.

I removed the auto gratuity when on Britannia last month, I didn't pay that much attention to the form I completed to effect this but I recall there was the option to pay a gratuity to specific category of employee via your onboard account. So it may now be possible to tip a steward and not the waiter for example.

I've seen people boarding with guitars, so unless there has been a change in policy I would think it would be okay.

One thing you learn quickly with cruising, is never assume the weather will do what it is supposed to do. :D

I love late departure and overnights in port, it lets you get to see a city at night which is often very different to the day. And I like going out to dinner onshore if possible.

I've not been on a weekender cruise but I gather you may have one or two groups on board, but very unlikely to be loads of them.

Yes almost all people dress according to the dress code for the day.

Tips is very personal, I have done more when it was £3.50 pppd when I thought we had exceptional service, but haven't for the last couple of cruises.

Don't know about the sailaway.

I hope you enjoy the weekender but I fear it's not that representative of a 14 day one. You get no real time to relax and enjoy the tranquillity of the sea.

Yes, they did three on my May cruise. The first was 7pm though.