jh1809

Thanks for the latest entertaining reports, Selbourne. You did well to make it back to your cabin at the end of the evening, given the amount of alcohol you put away. 🙂 Omelettes weren't on the MDR breakfast menu on Arcadia in August either, but as with you they were happy to provide one if requested. It's very strange that such a breakfast staple shouldn't be on the standard menu.

Boggle! The only thing I can think of is that instead of the standard mb they are using mm of mercury as their unit. From school physics lessons over 50 years ago, ISTR that "standard" atmospheric pressure is 760 mm of mercury (so 760 mm equating to about 1012 mb).

If you get the opportunity, perhaps you could ask an officer? Thanks for the excellent reports. I'm surprised at the shortage of guest speakers, as there were two or three on every sea day on my August cruise on Arcadia to Norway and Iceland. Maybe they have more on the adult-only ships than on the "family" ships?

Could it be that the wind direction made them think that allowing people to open the doors on the port side might create a terrific draught inside the ship?

There must be some mistake somewhere. 940 maybe, but 840 isn't really possible.

Not for the first time, I've noticed that my taste in food is very different to Marco Pierre White's, as I prefer quite a lot of the dishes on the right-hand page to his recommended ones. Not a roast in sight, which should make Jean happy!

Thank you for the interesting report. I got so engrossed in reading it that I nearly missed the start of "Pointless", which is high praise. I hope the sea soon calms down.

Thanks, Selbourne, for your interesting posts. I hope you have a great time. It certainly sounds like an excellent start. Were I onboard it would be the roast pork for me. (And the harissa lamb cutlets for lunch.)

In July and August the climate in Oslo is very similar to that in England, so cold weather shouldn't be a major concern (though of course if you are unlucky you could get a wet day).

I do wonder if wi-fi on P&O ships has been so expensive so as to discourage too many people from using it, as they know that with limited capacity the more people using it the slower it will get. So I'm hoping, perhaps over-optimistically that, when Starlink comes in with its greatly increased capacity, they might actually reduce the price.

Not so simple for me. I'm a solo cruiser.

I'm sure the food is good but, being exceptionally unobservant and clueless, I often struggle to find what I want in buffets. And on the last morning I imagine it must get horrendously busy. I much prefer being waited on, even if the meal takes longer.

I've been tempted to disembark, but so far I've been unable to resists the lure of one final breakfast in the MDR. (I don't like buffets.)

Hopefully they can get a direct train or one via Basingstoke, and avoid having to cross London from Waterloo to Euston.

I liked the look of the starters on that menu but wasn't impressed by the mains.

I'm a great fan of the tiffin lunches too. I had a couple on Aurora when I was on her in Nov/Dec last year. I didn't find noise from the coffee drinkers outside to be a problem, IIRC. And as the coffee shop seems to be much less busy during the evenings, it shouldn't be a problem if you have dinner in Sindhu. Actually I prefer its location to the one on Arcadia, where it's right at the top of the ship and you have to use the stairwell where there are three banks of two lifts situated far enough apart that you can't really get from one bank to another in time if a lift arrives there first. (Incidentally, the tiffin on Arcadia is slightly different from on Aurora, as when I was on Arcadia in August they weren't using the little metal pots.)

I've not been to any of your ports, but I've found that when a P&O excursion has "Leisurely" in its title it's usually aimed at those who don't want to (or are unable to) do much walking. So that would probably rule out a guided walking tour as part of it.

I was probably lucky with my table waiter, as my glass always arrived very promptly. And I only like red, so wanting a different wine for the starter and main course wasn't an issue for me. I liked the freedom that buying by the glass gave me to try lots of different wines over the course of the cruise. It also helped me to be good and not have more than one glass with my meal. 🙂

Agreed, or if you have an Android laptop or phone you can download a Kindle app for it (and if you also have a Kindle device you can sync with it, so that any content on one you can read on the other).

A couple of things from my Arcadia cruise in August which should be equally applicable to Aurora. I noticed that it's no more expensive to buy wine by the glass than by the bottle. The cost for a 175ml glass is always very close to a quarter of the cost of a 750ml bottle of the same wine, and similarly for a 250ml glass it's very close to a third of the cost of a bottle. So whether they will keep a bottle for you to use over several nights isn't a major issue apart from convenience. I think for those of us who are primarily meat eaters, the main reason for the reduction in choice is the increased number of fish and vegetarian/vegan options nowadays. I suppose that reflects the increased number of vegetarians, vegans and pescitarians these days, though I suspect that's less the case in the age bracket that Aurora and Arcadia tend to attract. P&O probably lack the flexibility to balance those ships' menus differently from those for the rest of the fleet, though.

We were able to dock at Isafjördur on Arcadia in the summer. (and on the much missed Adonia back in about 2016, but of course she was a lot smaller.)

Still a feature post-Covid - at least it has been on the Aurora and Arcadia cruises I've taken. Not that I've taken part, having discovered at school art classes as a 12 year-old that I'm the world's worst painter.

I should. It's quite reasonably priced, and when you've spent thousands of pounds on a cruise why begrudge another £100 or so over he course of the cruise. And think of all the money you'll be saving on your heating bill back home! (Being a helpless male, even at home I pay someone to do my ironing - though not my laundry - fpor me.)

I went on a river cruise on the Nile in about 2018, and I can't recall that I needed a visa. But my memory is rubbish these days, and maybe the process was just so painless that I've forgotten all about it.

About £6 a day is pretty good. Rather different from P&O's pricing! (Though hopefully with the increased capacity provided by Starlink, they will feel able to substantially reduce it. They may have been keeping the cost high to try to reduce the number of people using wi-fi to what the existing system could cope with without becoming impossibly slow.)