daydreamer62

My experience is that we are booked on a cruise in June around Spain and I was waitlisted for one excursion which cleared after about 4 weeks. I think that many who eventually cancel their cruise book excursions before they have made the final decision on actually going and when they cancel their excursion place is reopened ( the new penalities might disuade people from doing this in future .. hopefully)

I researched this for our upcoming cruise too. What my research told me was trains seem to go hourly and take about 35 minutes but the station is 1.5km from the village centre which is a 20 minute walk . I decided that wasn't ideal use of time for us so I decided it would be better use of time to book a tour . Based on the NZ$ terrible exchange rate currently it was much cheaper to book a ship excursion than a private one. We also could have rented a car for the day, but we recently spent a month in France driving and my husband wants a driving free holiday this time, especially where vineyards may be involved

No it isn't user friendly at all. I agree . I also wish there were more reviews of excursions but they seem few and far between

To get the simply more price you need to book the minimum number required for your cruise. You can see this on the book shore excursions page at the top of the section on the gold bar . My 15 day cruise has a minimum of 7 required. If I book 6 or fewer then I pay the tour price. 7 or more I pay the simply more price. Unlimited only applies to bookings before the simply more packages were introduced so if you just booked this will not apply to you and you can ignore it

Too true and I want to thank you for your efforts in posting and producing your documents . As a (in 6 months) first time Oceania customer, I could be severely put off by the majority of comments here on Cruise Critic. However I know I am a (mostly) 'see the positive 'type of person and it's clear that many on this forum are not! I truely believe the more you look got the positive in whatever aspect of life, the less negative is noticed. In a way it's a bit like having realistic expectations just as you do but also having eyes open to the positive around you. I see most of the complaints are about food and the size of the bathrooms in the R ships. I cook for a job. I know good food and not so good food, and I have eaten at many restaurants where I pay good money for food I could have cooked in a superior fashion.. But the good in that is that I didn't have to cook it.. I am with friends. I don't have to clean up ... so I enjoy it regardless. As for the size of the showers, well in only in then for 5 minutes a day. How bad can it be!! See the positive. I will though take on board your advice and do more to call out the positive and bring notice to others from now on. I'm sure it works!

Yes I did see that thanks but from doing a search unfortunately it looks like one a Sunday mornings it seems to be the slow route taking 1 hour 38 minutes so I figured uber to Victoria station might be quicker but I think with 4 of us it may be not much more expensive to Uber the whole way but we can make that decision at the time

I have booked a central London hotel now. The Mad Hatter in Southwark. I did the maths and it will still cost considerably more as it's double the price of the Gatwick one but the location will be very convenient for that day in London especially for the one in our party of 4 who hasn't been to London before , and I can still get to Hampton court easily should I wish to. The Gatwick express train though seemed to only take 30 minutes though from Gatwick to Victoria station so I don't think we would have spent 6 hours travelling each way...

Emirates to Dubai. And I've been looking at hotels around Victoria station or London bridge but the difference in price for the 2 nights is a minimum of £300 and many are sold out already.. Over 7 months in advance. Apparently due to a Taylor Swift concert.. crazy

The cost differences are quite significant as it appears that weekend central London hotels definitely have a price spike . I'm not sure the inconvenience of doing one night in London and one out at the airport, or getting to the airport for our flight at 10am before 7am from central London, assuming we need 3 hours too check in, is a better option than the time lost getting to and from the airport on those 2 days . Im always open to alternative solutions though.

I posted this earlier but it ended up in the wrong forum so I'll repost here where I meant it to be We are disembarking in Southampton on June 21 and flying out from Gatwick North terminal on June 23 in the early am I thought it best to stay both nights at Gatwick and train into London or elsewhere for sightseeing. Which hotel would be best located for our early am flight but also for convenient transit from Southampton and to London . Alternatively if anyone has a better idea for those 2 nights in very open to suggestions. I was hoping to get to Hampton Court palace if possible (been to the UK several times but never been there)

Not sure how this ended up in this forum as I'm sure I posted it in the ports forum but thanks very much for your response. The premier inn sounds like a good choice . Is it easy to get the train from the North terminal or would we be better placed in the south terminal area for transportation? I've only flown into and out of Manchester and Heathrow on the past so Gatwick is new to me

We are disembarking in Southampton on June 21 and flying out from Gatwick North terminal on June 23 in the early am I thought it best to stay both nights at Gatwick and train into London or elsewhere for sightseeing. Which hotel would be best located for our early am flight but also for convenient transit from Southampton and to London . Alternatively if anyone has a better idea for those 2 nights in very open to suggestions. I was hoping to get to Hampton Court palace if possible (been to the UK several times but never been there)

This was definitely the case for me. One quite inexpensive excursion in Seville that I had no intention of booking originally, meant I saved a few hundred dollars on the ones I did want to take

It applies to all of them . For my 15 day cruise the minimum was 7 . I wasn't going to take that many excursions. 3 each that were my first choices would have used up our $1000 ($1670NZ) credit and we would have had to pay about $US80 each on top of that. But with the discount applied to all of them the extra 4 excursions cost less than $US300 total each ,and that was way way less than booking private excursions in those ports so it seemed like a good idea.

I just booked the minimum 7 excursions required for the SM discount and the prices were reduced accordingly.

This already happens . In NZ we pay more than those in the US and gratuities are included in our fare

We are booked in the same cabin on a cruise next year. How did you find it.? I was a little worried about noise drum whatever is in front and above it .

That will also spread out the payments a bit more too!

It seems like the website isn't optimal. We booked with the simply more package and were told it would be $US 30 to upgrade to the prestige drinks package. Originally I saw that option to book online but that's now gone and strangely it's offering the package we already have included as an option to purchase and the full prestige package at the full price as if we don't have a package included. Very confusing for a newbie to Oceania. I'm assuming their software developers are well behind their marketing people and haven't implemented the necessary changes for the new systems . I'll just do everything through the Oceania rep .. glad I decided to use her and not book online!!

Frustrating to say the least!

Well that's frustrating! Do you know if you need to pay immediately on booking if you go over the credit amount

This made me laugh. This is EXACTLY my travel history and after our last independent road trip in France for a month with friends who had already caused me stress on a previous trip, it was NEVER EVER AGAIN!!! .This time we were definitely going to travel in our own and we booked this upcoming cruise.. But another couple from our friend group found out and booked the same cruise because they 'wanted to travel with us.' .. As they have never travelled to Europe nor ever cruised I think there is likely to be a lot of hand holding(already experiencing this..) but I'm trying to encourage them to at least book their own excursions (I'm more an independent explorer) so we can get some space from each other.. fingers crossed!!!

I have another question. It's highly unlikely that we will book the minimum 7 excursions on our cruise to get the SM discounted price, but the friends who are joining us on our cruise are complete newbies to European travel let alone cruising so they may want to do more. In order to get the discounted price so they need to book them all at once?

Believe me many many ports were missed in both countries and the Pacific islands during our summer and so many ships had to try and negotiate hull cleaning demands. It was all over our news at the time. I'm sorry you missed some of your ports, it must be disappointing especially if it's a once in a lifetime trip , and I'm sorry for the thousands of others who had vacation plans disrupted (I feel more sorry for those who suffered a loss their livelihoods when the cruise ships couldn't dock.. especially after the last few years ...and even more sorry for the many many who lost their homes and businesses and their loved ones who were washed away in the floods .