lprp

It’s been fantastic reading the TA reports each day with the fabulous photos. Thank you. We’re doing the Kimberley in June - 17 nights in a 4 wheel drive vehicle 😬 followed by 11 nights on a Ponant ship, Le Jacques Cartier, which I hope will assist with recovering from the fairly arduous 17 night land trip.🤞 We disembark in Darwin on 1 July, probably just as you start your journey to Australia!

@flossie009 Safe journey home. Loved your reporting. So glad to see you are flying home from Abu Dhabi as Dubai still seems to be having some issues following the recent floods. Quick question if I may? How was your experience in obtaining an Indian visa? I’m in the slightly concerning situation of needing to get a new passport in July (can’t do it before as we’re shortly off on an Australia trip) followed by the visa for India for our Christmas cruise. I’m hoping that both processes will be smooth 🤞

@flossie009 Your itinerary is very similar to the trip we are doing on Voyager this Christmas, it’s fabulous reading about it, thank you. 😁

Good manners cost nothing, sadly though even “nothing” is too much for some people 🤷‍♀️

Thank you for entertaining us again - your humorous reports are always a great start to the day.

The first time we were there back in the 80’s our tour guide warned us not to chew gum (she later added in case we spat it on the ground) 😳 Guess the issues have changed since then……..

Looking forward to your reports @flossie009. How lovely to sail on Navigator with Ray - “Helloooooo”. Hope the trip from Bangkok to Laem Chabang is not too tedious.

I think you could insert pretty much any other airline in front of those 3 words 😏. if there was any other airline flying direct to multiple countries from London I’d change loyalty to them in a heartbeat……

This confirms what my TA has told me. Our return flight from Singapore to London for next January is currently with Qatar Airways via Doha. Now, I really like Qatar, but BA fly direct to LHR as do Singapore. Regent offered Singapore but with another £2.5k each on top of the Business class upgrade for Qatar…… I’m hoping BA and Regent agree terms soon!

Looking forward to travelling vicariously with you. Enjoy!

100% agree. Check out Singita.

We were also on over Christmas and NY. The overall condition of the ship is fine, notwithstanding the drain issue that seems to have been resolved 🤞. There were definitely some things that were not as good as they should be - entertainment was dreadful considering it was a holiday cruise and service in Compass Rose was “Miss” more often than “Hit” for us, Regent acknowledged that this was due to a large number of new (not fully trained) staff. I would expect this to be fully resolved by the time of your cruise.

We were on Mariner Christmas and NY and believe this is definitely what happened. I was told verbally while on the ship and in writing from Regent when we got home. We didn’t have any toilet issues, although a suite a few doors along from us seemed to have several judging by the number of times the “sludge gulper” (doesn’t that conjure up a wonderful image 😬) was deployed. That said, the area outside Reception and Destination Services often had an aroma that was at times gag inducing! The reception staff admitted to being nose blind to it!! We had to move from the Mariner Lounge after dinner one night as the stench was unbearable.

As per post #31 We stayed in the Reykjavik Grand last year and I can’t recommend it based on our stay.

I think it’s more likely that they dropped the ball. We were on Splendor - Reykjavik to Copenhagen last year, in Concierge with the requisite pre-night, along with loads of other passengers.

The booking conditions in the UK are VERY different to the US, for instance: 1) We only get Economy Air as standard - Business Class is only offered for European cruises, utilising short haul flights, for those in Penthouse or above. 2) Deposits are 25% and non-refundable (there are occasional offers that mitigate this). BUT, the consumer protection schemes we have afford us rights that mean we are treated differently.

This might be useful if you do end up booking your own hotel: https://www.headforpoints.com/2024/03/02/review-reykjavik-konsulat-hotel/ We stayed in the Reykjavik Grand last year and I can’t recommend it based on our stay. I liked the look of the Edition (Marriott), but HFP don’t recommend it due to the high price and the fact that it’s surrounded by building works. These were my comments from the blog I did last year:

Thank you @Mike Moore. Best wishes for your future endeavours. Wherever you land they will be lucky to have you.

It’s always been like that - absolutely ridiculous, wonder if anyone ever buys extra hotel nights with Regent 🤔

100% agree, it annoys me beyond belief when passengers just state what they want to the wonderful crew with no hint of a “please”, “thank you” or even a smile. 😡

@mikemoore any update as to when this might be happening? Thanks

I believe the issue only started this January, for new longhaul flights

Has anyone tried to get flights and upgrade prices from Regent for long-haul flights with BA? I’m hearing that BA have pulled their “contract/IT/flexible” fares for ALL cruise lines since January while they renegotiate 🤔 Notwithstanding all their shortcomings, which are manifold, we have Tier status with them that means we book them where it’s appropriate. This POSSIBLY only affects UK based passengers;

I’m hoping that the Mariner Christmas 2023 entertainment team do not migrate to the Voyager Christmas 20 24 cruise 😬🤞 Unfortunately we had very inconsistent service in CR. A complete contrast to Chartreuse where the service was exemplary. The only area we had good service in CR was in Dennis’s section, unfortunately such is his reputation it was not always possible to secure a table there. RSSC confirmed that they were aware of the service shortcomings we experienced.

100% agree @Gilly, we had a not dissimilar experience on Voyager when Explorer was launched. Although I must say the “cruise rotation” on our recent Mariner cruise must have been much higher given some of the “service shortfalls” we experienced 🤔