mondas42

I think for me the bigger issue is that despite P&O knowing these restaurants are closed and will be for the foreseeable future, they still continue to advertise them on the website and the cruise personaliser. This to me smacks as false advertising but I'm no expert.

I accept that times are more challenging than before in the tourist trade, but at least be honest with your customers at the point of booking so they can make an informed decision.

Morning all,

quick question, does anyone know when RCI will release its 2024 Europe schedule?

Thanks

Martin

I’d heard from someone just boarding today that the Epicurian and the Glass House are closed, no reports about the other ones.

9 hours ago, Mrk2868 said:

Hi Mondas, what is the website you were looking at? 

 

Thanks

https://www.covid19-testing.org/travel-testing?gclid=CjwKCAjwhuCKBhADEiwA1HegOTS0WIE9rfzm-xfTb0oG-TFv8V1VgKLscNMdlz_e7cIoQhpc3f4Z7BoCpmoQAvD_BwE
 

1 hour ago, Mrk2868 said:

I've just been re-reading the P&O preparing to sail  rules and I have noticed this sentence "The test must be administered at an accredited or recognised laboratory by a healthcare professional. "   

 

So does this mean that at home pre-departure PCR test can't be used?  Looking online most of the COVID-19 Pre-Departure PCR test kits assume that you take the sample yourself and then send it away to be tested.  Cost say £60-"£90 per test, whilst I suspect a test carried out by healthcare professional will cost a lot more.

I think this is the case. I was looking last night at a website that lists all the accredited places that do the test. Price was similar to the ones you do yourself. But it does mean having to go to the test Center.

We are going to the Caribbean in January 2022, after looking at p&o’ port rules document, a number of the islands we are visiting now require us to be on a p&o organised tour to visit. I’m wondering if because of this p&o will reduce the price as I’ve always found ship arranged tours to be very expensive but in these cases we have literally no choice if we wish to get off the ship (I’m thinking they won’t, but one lives in hope)

13 minutes ago, wowzz said:

Excellent - I'm sure you will have a great time !

Out of interest,  did you go for a balcony? 

Yes, we paid for a obstructed balcony but picked room G420, which looks out onto The Glass House and is isn’t obstructed, despite been labelled as such.

On 9/21/2021 at 10:40 PM, wowzz said:

I totally accept that there must be availability, but as you know, they cancelled all flights to St Lucia, so that leaves a greatly reduced number of seats.

Well we booked it, 14th January 2022, Britannia, flights from Manchester on a TUI charter flight.

1 minute ago, wowzz said:

No Brainer - balcony everytime. Why go all the way to the Carribean and not have a balcony to enjoy ?

Given the reduction in flights,  I'm somewhat surprised that there is any availability at all !

Well there seems to be, or at least they are still taking booking.

Not offended at all, everyone is entitled to their view. Been busy looking up deals on various online TA’s hoping to book 14 nights in January on Britannia in the Caribbean. Just trying to decide on large inside vs obstructed balcony and if it’s worth the grand and a bit more.

1 minute ago, wowzz said:

Given that P&O, like all cruise lines, have only just restarted cruising,  I can't see how you can have read " a load"  of poor reviews. 

You will only have seen Seacation reviews, which obviously have no bearing on a Caribbean cruise.

At this late stage, you might struggle to find a Caribbean cruise anyway, given the iack of flights.

 

https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/pocruises.com

We have cruised with p&o a number of times but we haven’t had a holiday in over 2 years cos of the pandemic. I’m shattered and was thinking of booking a Caribbean cruise in the new year to recharge the batteries. However I’ve just seen a load of very poor reviews for the customer service with p&o recently, not something we have encountered in the past. This has made me wonder if I should book with p&o or wait for things to improve? Any advice?

2 hours ago, mom2tcdx2 said:

 

I got to say with the new Avatar Flight of Passage right, I go over there just for that ride.  I am one of those that waited almost 2 hours to ride it without having a fast pass, only to return and ride with a fast pass.  

Don’t get me wrong, the avatar ride is utterly fantastic, we utterly loved the ride, but it was soooo hot that day and humid that after a few hours we were totally done in and the other problem with the Disney parks is you are only allowed to book three fast passes in advance and then everything else has really long queues. I know you can book more on the day after your three but most are still fully booked. Oh and one other piece of advice, don’t queue for hours for the other avatar ride, it’s not worth a long wait.

5 hours ago, MLP12 said:

Enjoyed reading your review.  We will be on Harmony in 11 days.  I am disappointed that there is no pool in the solarium.  Is the Sport Pool an adults only pool?  I'm hoping that there will be one pool that adults only is enforced.  

Hi, yes it’s supposed to be, but didn’t seem to be enforced.

7 minutes ago, skoolbusdrvr said:

 thank you enjoyed your review could you please tell me when you had lunch at Johnny Rockets if it was included in the unlimited dining package

Hi, yes it was included.

5 minutes ago, TravisP said:

I do not understand why they do not cut off the heat to a couple of the hot tubs in the solarium and use them as little mini adult pools. We were on HOTS this past April. Getting in a hot tub when it is over 90 degrees outside is not my idea of a fun time. 

Totally agree, the solarium was (not surprisingly) like a green house. The so called mister, wasn’t working very well.

13 minutes ago, FlowRyder said:

 

Glad you had a great cruise! What venue did you have the "Key" lunch?" Which activities had priority hours? 

Lunch was in the main dining room on level four, and the activities was the flowrider, zip line I think, climbing wall and ice skating.

Just got back from our first holiday to the USA. Thought Id write short review of the cruise. Feel free to ask me any questions.

About us

Myself (49), Wife (50) and our 18 year old daughter. This was to be our tenth cruise, our fifth with Royal and the others all with P&O. All are other cruises have been either Mediterranean or European.

Pre Cruise

We stayed a week before our cruise in Orlando at the Doubletree Seaworld hotel in order to experience both Universal Studios and two of the Disney Parks. The hotel was great and the room very comfy and we had a good time at Universal and Epcot but we were disappointed with Animal Kingdom.

Embarkation

On the day of our cruise we drove the hour or so’s journey to Port Canaveral from our hotel. We dropped the rental car at the Alamo centre and was told that there may be a little wait for the shuttle to the cruise terminal. However just as we got into the depot a man came and shouted for anyone for Harmony, so we jumped straight onto a shuttle and made our way to the terminal. Check in was a total breeze and within twenty minutes we were on board. We quickly went to deck 8 and found a restaurant that would take our Unlimited dining package bookings and with this soon done we headed of for our Key lunch. Unlike what we were expecting this was in the main dining room I’m guessing due to the number of Key guests. Anyway, it worked well, and lunch was great. After a quick wander around we were allowed in our rooms to unpack. Then the dreaded muster drill, this was fine, but the scrum afterwards was ridiculous, and we very nearly missed sail away as it took so long to get out of Studio B

The Ship

We have never been on an Oasis class ship before, so we were very impressed with scale and finish of the ship. The ship was very well maintained and well laid out. It rarely felt busy except for muster drill and the pool decks on sea days which I described as ‘human soup’. In fact, we never got into the pools as they were always full to the brim with kids. On se days we spent some time in the Solarium but due to the lack of a pool it was just too hot and humid in the afternoons. We found the small sitting areas at the front of the running track and often camped out our afternoons here. We never tried to zipline, slides (see above for pools!) or flow riders, too much like hard work to fight the lines and heat. We loved Central Park and the promenade area. Didn’t visit much of the shops, in my opinion Royal have missed a trick here. The shops are just too expensive with high end goods. I never saw anyone in any of the watch or jewellery shops, maybe some slightly cheaper venues might be a good idea. I know most don’t like to hear it but Royal is a mainstream cruise line catering to normal people and not the uber rich so most don’t have thousands to spend on a Tag watch. Just a thought.

Our Stateroom.

We were in 8606, a Seaview balcony room. This is just before the hump that has the bigger balconies and thus ours was ever so slightly bigger even though we didn’t pay for the bigger balcony. This was great as there were three of us in the room and the extra space was welcome. The room was very clean and had plenty of storage space for the three of us. Sofa was near the balcony and the brilliant room attendant converted this to the bed on the first night and left it like that for the week.

Food

We had paid for the Unlimited dining package and after speaking to a few who hadn’t was glad we did so. Many were saying that food in the main dining room just wasn’t up to standard, but as we never dined there ourselves I cannot comment on how accurate that was. Anyway we dined at the following:-

Jamie’s (First and last night) – We loved Jamie’s the first time, great food and great service. My wife is Gluten free and they (and everyone else) were very accommodating about this. I had the Penne Carbonara and the streak the first time and the pasta was amazing, the sauce was to die for. But I was very disappointed the second time we went as the sauce was watery and tasteless, so I guess it depends on what night you go.

Chops – (second night). Very good food, very good service and happy to help my wife with her gluten free choices.

150 Central Park (Third night). I was expecting good things for this restaurant, but sadly was disappointed. The service was great, but the food was just ok. Nothing special and we all felt underwhelmed. In fact, it was the same standard as what the main dining room used to be ten years ago when we first cruised with Royal.

Wonderland (Fourth night) – Well it was different! as expected this was an experience. Food was interesting and, in some cases, fantastic. Other bits were just a bit odd. We enjoyed the experience, but would we do it again? Not sure. The waiters seemed to spend a very long time explaining the food to you, it just seemed a bit OTT.

Sabor (Fifth night) – Great Mexican food, if rather a lot. They even had a great gluten free choice. Enjoyed it.

Hibatchi – (Sixth night) – Amazing, just amazing. Best meal we had all week. The show by the chefs, the quality of the food, the choice – all top notch. Only down side was it was a little crowded, with my wife perched next to a sink.

We also get lunch on sea days with the package but other than the last day at Johnny Rockets we didn’t take advantage of this as we just couldn’t face three big meals a day. Johnny Rockets were ok, and they were happy to provide a gluten free burger for my wife.

We ate breakfast and most lunches in the Solarium Bistro and this was great, not too busy and a good choice. I only ate one lunch in the Windjammer as I was on my own that day and it was fine. Never ate any pizza or any of the hot dogs so cannot comment on those.

Entertainment

We saw Grease, The Fine Line, 1887 Ice Show and Columbus. Grease was fantastic, just like the film, with my only criticism was the vocals were sometimes a little hard to hear clearly.

The Fine Line! Wow this is amazing, we say it twice it was so good. The divers and dancers are just amazing and its well worth watching. We came away awed by their skill.

1887, again amazing dancers and skaters. The story is a little thin but that’s a minor problem as it’s the skating that’s the main draw and boy do they work at it.

And then there was Columbus!!, we watched it with open mouths and at the end all three of us just couldn’t believe what we had witnessed. The singing and acting was great, the set design was amazing, but the story!? Was the person who wrote it on drugs at the time?? Dancing sharks, dancing hamburgers and magic pickles?? I felt sorry for the cast having to speak the drivel they had been given. Was not impressed!

Overall all though the quality was great and enjoyable.

The ‘Key’

We found this well worth the money, it was great to drop off the bags on the first day, and the Key lunch was nice. Internet was fantastic, and we found it fast enough to stream Netflix etc. Priority seating at the entertainment venues was well worth it and very useful. We were able to get off the ship at all ports using the Key with little trouble. Final day breakfast was nice, and we disembarked using our own line. Didn’t use the priority hours for the flowrider etc.

Ports

First port was Cococay, ‘A Perfect Day at Cococay’, or so they kept telling us. We had booked a beach bungalow and we were looking forward to a relaxing day at South Beach. However, first of all we were told a few days before the cruise that South Beach was closed and that the bungalows had all moved to Chill Beach. A bit closer but much busier. And no one had told the weather that it was supposed to be perfect. The morning stated off with a rain shower, and it was kinda dry for a few hours after that but just around lunch time the wind whipped up and along came the rain. It was not just a shower either, so we gave up on the Perfect Day and decided to cut our losses and go back to dry of the ship. Problem was, so had the other 6000 people and the lines for the ship were long…..very long. Took us over an hour in the pouring rain to get back on board. Obviously not Royals fault, but I did wonder why they were making everyone go through the security scanners when it’s a private island. Everything on the island is what Royal has brought so what did they think we were gonna smuggle on board? But I guess the rules are the rules. So half a day in a damp bungalow and an long line in a rain storm….. not so much the Perfect Day, but no one’s fault other than the weather gods I guess.

Second port was St Thomas, we had booked a day on a catamaran and a visit to Honeymoon cove. Really enjoyed the day, saw sea turtles and tons of fish whilst snorkelling, (My wife saw her breakfast again after getting a bit seasick on the initial trip to the snorkelling place). Nice BBQ lunch at Honeymoon cove. The crew of the catamaran were brilliant. Worth the money!

Last Port was St Marteen. I didn’t do much on this island as my wife and daughter had booked to go horse-riding and I don’t do horses, so I stayed on board and chilled. Wife and daughter enjoyed the horse riding but were concerned that the horses were very underfed in some cases and the safety equipment was not good. They were given cycling helmets instead of riding helmets and most did not fit well and would just come off. One young girl was given a proper riding helmet, but it didn’t have a chin strap and would just slide of her head making it useless if she came of the horse. She mentioned this when she got back to the shore excursions people who said they would feed it back to Miami.

Final Thoughts

We enjoyed our experience on the Harmony, and would love another cruise on an Oasis class ship, maybe in the Med as the nine hour flight is a bit of a killer. Food was great on the dining package and other than a few moans it was a high standard cruise.

Hi

we are booked in a ocean view balcony cabin on HOS on July 21st. I can apparently bid for an upgrade to this room, but when I look at the website for this cruise is says all room other than ocean views are sold out! So how can I bid for an upgrade? Is this just a paper exercise and the bids will be rejected or do they actually have rooms available for people to bid on?

ta

Hi

we are sailing on Harmony next month and it’s our first time on a Oasis class ship, and the first time we have used a drinks package. All three of us have the refreshment package ordered. If I go to a bar for the three of us to order some soft drinks, do I have to hand over all three seapasses and let them charge one drink per card or can they all go on just the one card?

thanks

martin

Just after some advice, we are on Harmony in a months time. I currently have a 3night dining package booked, but for £160 extra I can get the unlimited package. Should I or not? Is it worth the extra? Is the normal dinning room good these days? Been a while since I’ve been with Royal.

ta.

Martin 

Silly prices....was hoping to book a cruise next year for my 50th. Oh well, watch out P&O here we come!!

Hi I’m having a problem with the online check in feature. We are sailing on HOS in July and there are three of us (myself, wife and our 18 year old daughter) in a cabin. I have been able to check myself and my wife in fine but struggling with my daughter. I’ve entered all the data and submit it. Sometimes it just bombs out sometimes it seems to work and she appears alongside the two of us as checked in, but when you log out and login again she has disappeared from the ‘checked in’ section and reappeared in the ‘still needs checking in’ section?? Other question is why do they need to know my daughters marital status but not myself or my wife’s??

help, don’t want to fly all the way to the states only so find a issue with out booking.

martin

EDIT, just spoke to RCI and surprise surprise, they are totally useless. ‘We can’t do anything on the phone, you will have to queue to check her in at the pier’ was the reply! What if there is a problem with the booking and they won’t let her on? I ask. Sorry but we can’t help you.....have a nice day! Click!

On 3/19/2019 at 11:22 AM, suesnake2002 said:

Double checked my cruise planner, there is no such thing as bungalows for rent, only cabanas. Here is the description of what i booked. While one description makes it sound like fresh grilled food, the other one makes it sound like you gotta go to the snack bar. 

We will buy deluxe bev package. So i am curious about the self serve beer for an additional charge 

We are going to Cococay in July on Harmony and we have a beach Bungalow booked.

We’re brits and on Harmony in July, which date are you sailing.