The Return of Arcadia

[terrierjohn]

8 minutes ago, arlowood said:

Just for clarification. Do you have to be signed into the ship's WiFi system before you can use the App to book restaurants, theatre slots etc.

When last on board Arcadia I seem to remember that to WiFi was offered in 24hr tranches at a fixed price. At the time it seemed a tad expensive to me bearing in mind that you would be asleep or dining or on an excursion etc for a good chunk of that 24hrs. So effectively you were paying in part for a service that you could not use.

 

In the end I think I just signed up for the occasional 24hr time period when I wanted to check emails or contact family at home via WhatsApp. I know you can book for a full cruise coverage but thaere again it seemed a bit of a rip-off in my opinion.

 

So what it boils down to is this. If you want to book things over the duration of your cruise using the App, you are more or less forced to sign up for the P&O WiFi.

If you don't want to use the App, can you still book dining slots at the MDR and/or the specialty restaurants by telephone or in person.

The on board so called app is free to use, you just sign onto the free ships wi fi. But that's all it allows to access.

Edited August 5, 2022 by terrierjohn

[davecttr]

55 minutes ago, Britboys said:

As I understand it, no, you don't need to purchase wifi access to get into this particular bit of the system.

Yes, you don't need a WiFi package to use the onboard App just a smart device. Actually not a real App but a number of pages on the ships internal network.

Edited August 5, 2022 by davecttr

[Jonahnath]

On 8/3/2022 at 4:49 PM, Megabear2 said:

I might also mention that often the middle lifts are the ones where the problems seem to occur.  We always have a mid forward cabin on Britannia for instance and I can only recall crowding at the front lifts immediately after theatre turnout or on disembarkation day.

 

My husband has several quite severe hidden disabilities (fibromyalgia, ME, myocardial bridging) and on good days walks down the stairs. However it is virtually impossible for him to climb even one flight of stairs without severe pain and yet anyone who sees him in the swimming pool may well think he's extremely able bodied.  Despite all these problems he still gives way to people in wheelchairs as he says but for the grace of God that could be him.

Hey,
I am also facing the condition of fibromyalgia. I know the situation and other disabilities which are related to it. Did your husband take any medication? Muscle weakness is the main problem. I used to take Pregabalin and methylcobalamin tabs every night for muscle tiredness and to get a night of sleep. I have sleep apnea too. Now I recovered my muscle strength by doing some strengthening exercises with the help of a physio. It worked for me. Now I don't have any difficulty climbing steps and doing work. You can also practice doing the exercises. It will change your husband's current condition.

[arlowood]

Just returned from our J216 cruise on Arcadia (7 night Portugal& Spain) and thought I'd chip in with a few observations following the earlier posts regarding the start up cruise on Arcadia.

 

Firstly, we had a great time and enjoyed the visit to 2 ports that we had never visited previously (Oporto and Vigo). Sadly due to adverse weather conditions we did not get to visit Guernsey (swell conditions outside the safety levels for tender operations). This was our 3rd failed attempt to visit Guernsey due to weather/sea conditions so e have resigned ourselves to the fact that it is not meant to be.

 

Our cabin steward was excellent and very quickly learned our morning routine so that the cabin was always serviced when we got back from breakfast. As mentioned elsewhere, there is now no turn-down service in the evening as I believe the cabin stewards have been redeployed to other duties in the evening. (We did meet our steward one evening near our cabin and he was wearing a white jacket rather than the normal blue shirt so he was probably off to his evening shift somewhere else on the ship).

 

There were a few minor issues that showed how things have been pared back since we last sailed with P&) in 2019.

Bulk bottles of shower gel and shampoo fitted to the wall over the bath. No moisturiser or shower cap provided.

The menu in the Meridian Restaurant has been shrunk and the always "available items" (salmon fillet and sirloin steak) are now included with another 3 items as main menu options.

There seemed to be a preponderance of green beans and broccoli as the vegetable accompaniments to most main courses.

No sweet sauces (caramel, butterscotch, chocolate)  available to add to your ice cream.

Restaurant staff appeared to be struggling to cope on occasions probably due to reduced staffing levels.

The "My Holiday" app facility was a bit of a puzzle. We were on Freedom Dining and tried to use the app to join the "virtual queue" for a table. However it stated that the app page had to be kept open to allow you to be notified when a table was available. My issue was that my wifi connection to the app would not work in my cabin and frequently dropped out when moving around the ship. So in order to get the benefit of the virtual queue I realised that, once I had joined the queue, I would have to park myself in a good wifi area and not move from there until I was alerted to come to the restaurant. In my view the idea is a little half-baked at present but may work better with some tweaks.

 

We also spoke to those who had used the app to book sets for the entertainment. Some shows were very popular but they said appeared to be no checks made of those entering the theatre to see whether they had pre-booked or not. So effectively the pre-booking system was a bit of a lottery and you could miss out if those who had not booked got there before you.

 

We had a good time but the various little things that niggled away meant that our enjoyment was eroded by comparison to our earlier experiences on P&O.

 

 

 

[Gettingwarmer]

20 minutes ago, arlowood said:

My issue was that my wifi connection to the app would not work in my cabin and frequently dropped out when moving around the ship. So in order to get the benefit of the virtual queue I realised that, once I had joined the queue, I would have to park myself in a good wifi area and not move from there until I was alerted to come to the restaurant. In my view the idea is a little half-baked at present but may work better with some tweaks.

Thank you for your observations.

Could you advise what deck and area (aft, middle, forward) you cabin was located. 

[silkworms]

59 minutes ago, arlowood said:

Just returned from our J216 cruise on Arcadia (7 night Portugal& Spain) and thought I'd chip in with a few observations following the earlier posts regarding the start up cruise on Arcadia.

 

Firstly, we had a great time and enjoyed the visit to 2 ports that we had never visited previously (Oporto and Vigo). Sadly due to adverse weather conditions we did not get to visit Guernsey (swell conditions outside the safety levels for tender operations). This was our 3rd failed attempt to visit Guernsey due to weather/sea conditions so e have resigned ourselves to the fact that it is not meant to be.

 

Our cabin steward was excellent and very quickly learned our morning routine so that the cabin was always serviced when we got back from breakfast. As mentioned elsewhere, there is now no turn-down service in the evening as I believe the cabin stewards have been redeployed to other duties in the evening. (We did meet our steward one evening near our cabin and he was wearing a white jacket rather than the normal blue shirt so he was probably off to his evening shift somewhere else on the ship).

 

There were a few minor issues that showed how things have been pared back since we last sailed with P&) in 2019.

Bulk bottles of shower gel and shampoo fitted to the wall over the bath. No moisturiser or shower cap provided.

The menu in the Meridian Restaurant has been shrunk and the always "available items" (salmon fillet and sirloin steak) are now included with another 3 items as main menu options.

There seemed to be a preponderance of green beans and broccoli as the vegetable accompaniments to most main courses.

No sweet sauces (caramel, butterscotch, chocolate)  available to add to your ice cream.

Restaurant staff appeared to be struggling to cope on occasions probably due to reduced staffing levels.

The "My Holiday" app facility was a bit of a puzzle. We were on Freedom Dining and tried to use the app to join the "virtual queue" for a table. However it stated that the app page had to be kept open to allow you to be notified when a table was available. My issue was that my wifi connection to the app would not work in my cabin and frequently dropped out when moving around the ship. So in order to get the benefit of the virtual queue I realised that, once I had joined the queue, I would have to park myself in a good wifi area and not move from there until I was alerted to come to the restaurant. In my view the idea is a little half-baked at present but may work better with some tweaks.

 

We also spoke to those who had used the app to book sets for the entertainment. Some shows were very popular but they said appeared to be no checks made of those entering the theatre to see whether they had pre-booked or not. So effectively the pre-booking system was a bit of a lottery and you could miss out if those who had not booked got there before you.

 

We had a good time but the various little things that niggled away meant that our enjoyment was eroded by comparison to our earlier experiences on P&O.

 

 

 

Thank you for the update. We are on Arcadia J219.

Would you please let me if the Ocean Grill is open and/or the

Asian restaurant at the top of the ship? We are on second sitting 

club dining, I believe that is now upstairs whereas previously the 

freedom dining was upstairs.
Any other thoughts you have gratefully received.Thank you.

 

Terri

[arlowood]

4 hours ago, Gettingwarmer said:

Thank you for your observations.

Could you advise what deck and area (aft, middle, forward) you cabin was located. 

Hi there

We were on C deck in the mid forward section (C056) and I was never able to log on to the wifi in the cabin. However I'm sure there are also "dead spots" around the ship as I noticed my connection dropping out when just moving from one area of the ship to another. Could be that if you used any of the lifts the reception is poor or non existent. Did make using the app a bit of a lottery so in the end we just went down to the dining room (Freedom Dining section Deck 2 aft) at around 6.30 and opted to share a table. Never had an issue getting in at that time.

[arlowood]

3 hours ago, silkworms said:

Thank you for the update. We are on Arcadia J219.

Would you please let me if the Ocean Grill is open and/or the

Asian restaurant at the top of the ship? We are on second sitting 

club dining, I believe that is now upstairs whereas previously the 

freedom dining was upstairs.
Any other thoughts you have gratefully received.Thank you.

 

Terri

Ocean Grill was not open during our cruise. I think I heard someone suggest that they were aiming to have it open in October but I don't know if that is fact or rumour.

 

Sindhu was open and we dined there on 2 occasions during our cruise. Enjoyed it immensely the first night but I was less impressed with my Chicken Korma main meal on our second visit. There is a new system in place (well new to us since last eating at Sindhu). Previously we were just charged a fixed supplement per person to eat at the speciality restaurants. Now the set up is more aligned to a normal situation where each individual dish is priced separately and you are charged a total depending on what you select. Our first visit came to £64 for 2 including a bottle of wine which I think compares well with what you would expect at a decent Asian restaurant onshore.

 

One tip I would give is that if you want to eat at Sindhu, do as we did and make your bookings as soon as you get on board either directly by phone or using the  My Holiday app. Within 2 days on our cruise , Sindhu was fully booked with only a waiting list for those hoping for cancellations.

 

Just to confirm your final point, the set dining is now in the Meridian on Deck 3 aft whereas the Freedom Dining is downstairs on Deck 2

Edited September 7, 2022 by arlowood

[wowzz]

3 hours ago, arlowood said:

Ocean Grill was not open during our cruise. I think I heard someone suggest that they were aiming to have it open in October but I don't know if that is fact or rumour.

 

Sindhu was open and we dined there on 2 occasions during our cruise. Enjoyed it immensely the first night but I was less impressed with my Chicken Korma main meal on our second visit. There is a new system in place (well new to us since last eating at Sindhu). Previously we were just charged a fixed supplement per person to eat at the speciality restaurants. Now the set up is more aligned to a normal situation where each individual dish is priced separately and you are charged a total depending on what you select. Our first visit came to £64 for 2 including a bottle of wine which I think compares well with what you would expect at a decent Asian restaurant onshore.

 

One tip I would give is that if you want to eat at Sindhu, do as we did and make your bookings as soon as you get on board either directly by phone or using the  My Holiday app. Within 2 days on our cruise , Sindhu was fully booked with only a waiting list for those hoping for cancellations.

 

Just to confirm your final point, the set dining is now in the Meridian on Deck 3 aft whereas the Freedom Dining is downstairs on Deck 2

We were on Arcadia's first cruise back into service in April. Both speciality restaurants were open during our cruise. We ate in both. Crown was great,  Sindhu was not as good as previously.

Strange that six months later, only the now disappointing Sindhu restaurant is open.

It seems that given the current staffing issues,  P&O have decided that Arcadia will suffer in terms of staff deployment,  hoping that the Arcadia loyalists will  carry on booking regardless.

 

 

[silkworms]

13 hours ago, arlowood said:

Ocean Grill was not open during our cruise. I think I heard someone suggest that they were aiming to have it open in October but I don't know if that is fact or rumour.

 

Sindhu was open and we dined there on 2 occasions during our cruise. Enjoyed it immensely the first night but I was less impressed with my Chicken Korma main meal on our second visit. There is a new system in place (well new to us since last eating at Sindhu). Previously we were just charged a fixed supplement per person to eat at the speciality restaurants. Now the set up is more aligned to a normal situation where each individual dish is priced separately and you are charged a total depending on what you select. Our first visit came to £64 for 2 including a bottle of wine which I think compares well with what you would expect at a decent Asian restaurant onshore.

 

One tip I would give is that if you want to eat at Sindhu, do as we did and make your bookings as soon as you get on board either directly by phone or using the  My Holiday app. Within 2 days on our cruise , Sindhu was fully booked with only a waiting list for those hoping for cancellations.

 

Just to confirm your final point, the set dining is now in the Meridian on Deck 3 aft whereas the Freedom Dining is downstairs on Deck 2

Thank you for your info, most helpful. We are on Greek islands cruise for 19 nights so hoping very much that Ocean Grill is open, it is middle to late October and we really like a change from the MDR.

[Scriv]

Hi - we were on this cruise too and also had a lovely time. 

 

Responding to some of your observations and sharing ours, our cabin steward also only came in the morning and was to be found servicing the suites down the corridor from about 5pm. She said we could find her there if we needed anything. She was very obliging. We actually preferred not having an evening service, as it meant we didn't have to rush to tidy the cabin before we went off to dinner. Two choccies arrived with the morning make-up service and the Horizon was put on the bed every evening.

 

Although we just had shampoo and shower gel in largish containers on the wall in the shower, our daughter asked for conditioner and got it, no problem.

 

Re the app, I managed to use ours this time, but it did depend on where on the ship we were. I liked being able to see my account on the app. Re booking dining, we were Freedom Dining and sometimes used the app, but sometimes went down early and queued up at the desk for a table for four. This worked well too. If we were later, we were given a buzzer and went for a drink in the nearby Spinnaker Bar and took the glass in with us if we were called before finishing.

 

We were really lucky with our table service - we tended to get in the same area of the restaurant each time and had a great waiter. Although we also noticed the fewer choices on the menus, other than on the last day, we had no problem finding dishes to suit us. Must say that I couldn't fault any of our meals - or temperature of the food, in fact we really enjoyed every meal. 

 

We had booked four shows before boarding, but were never asked our cabin number, but there were always plenty of seats available though I had wondered, like you, how they would deal with it if over-subscribed. That never happened to us though. We used to go into the theatre about 8 10 pm for the 8 30pm performance and there were spaces in all our performances, even in the full audience ones.

I did find it frustrating however that the films were shown in the tiny cinema, so we never managed to get in there on the sea days - and were not able to view them in our cabins like you can do on some ships.

 

It was great to be onboard Arcadia again after so long and seeing things coming back to normal bit by bit... 

 

 

[Son of Anarchy]

Pleased to see that Arcadia has made across to Canada.

[Angel57]

30 minutes ago, Son of Anarchy said:

Pleased to see that Arcadia has made across to Canada.

Think she missed her first port of St Johns due to bad weather?

[my marina bay]

We were also on same cruise as Arlo and Scriv. My obs as follows:

 

The App - was hopeless. I could not download on my phone despite having a signal in some areas but not in our cabin. We managed to download on partners phone however after first two nights onboard it stopped working altogether so pretty useless.

 

Shows - we pre booked all shows for 8.30 a week before but no point as no one asked for cabin number and you could stroll in anytime. Always plenty of seats on tiers 1 and 2. Loved the ihoppers and Tom Jones tribute didn't find comedian funny at all.

 

Dining - as we couldn't use app we turned up usually 6.30ish and got a table for four immediately. We only shared twice on a large table and all the talk was about The App many had made complaints at reception.

 

The Food - limited choice nothing special. My fish options were often cool  got the impression they were ready meals brought on board and reheated similar to airline food. The only exception was my Sirloin steak which I wanted medium rare and it was perfect. The vegetables all seem to be reheated from frozen.  Our friend asked for a variation from the menu on two occasions ie no potatoes or veg but they said they couldn't change it and just to leave them. He did get chips in a side bowl when requested along with food he didn't want. Certainly evening dining has gone downhill although I did enjoy the desserts. The best offerings were on the two formal nights. The buffet was similar with the same food every day. I would describe it all as homely but not special.

Service - no issues getting served in any bar. Cabin cleaned every morning, Horizon left outside early evening occasionally on bed with two chocs. Balcony furniture very grubby no deck towels in cabin to put on. We had soap in bathroom and shower.

Officers - notable by their absence. Hardly any announcements apart from 12 noon.

 

Covid rules - this you will find interesting. We travelled by coach with a few solo travellers (not surprising as the cruise was being offered with no solo supplement.) One solo guy in his 60s happened to check-in at the next desk to us. It went a bit like this  'can I see your vaccination certificate' - "don't know what your talking about" - 'your covid vaccination records we need to see them' - "don't have any  didn't know I needed them" - 'have you been vaccinated against covid' - " yes a long time ago" - 'just wait here while I speak to someone'. We left the first check point went to the second and didn't expect to see him again.  However once we'd been to our muster station and  cabin we went for a drink and who's getting served but the same guy. I didn't ask him how he managed to board but it certainly made me wonder how many others they must have waived the rules for!

 

Edited September 12, 2022 by my marina bay

[jh1809]

3 hours ago, my marina bay said:

We were also on same cruise as Arlo and Scriv. My obs as follows:

 

The App - was hopeless. I could not download on my phone despite having a signal in some areas but not in our cabin. We managed to download on partners phone however after first two nights onboard it stopped working altogether so pretty useless.

 

Shows - we pre booked all shows for 8.30 a week before but no point as no one asked for cabin number and you could stroll in anytime. Always plenty of seats on tiers 1 and 2. Loved the ihoppers and Tom Jones tribute didn't find comedian funny at all.

 

Dining - as we couldn't use app we turned up usually 6.30ish and got a table for four immediately. We only shared twice on a large table and all the talk was about The App many had made complaints at reception.

 

The Food - limited choice nothing special. My fish options were often cool  got the impression they were ready meals brought on board and reheated similar to airline food. The only exception was my Sirloin steak which I wanted medium rare and it was perfect. The vegetables all seem to be reheated from frozen.  Our friend asked for a variation from the menu on two occasions ie no potatoes or veg but they said they couldn't change it and just to leave them. He did get chips in a side bowl when requested along with food he didn't want. Certainly evening dining has gone downhill although I did enjoy the desserts. The best offerings were on the two formal nights. The buffet was similar with the same food every day. I would describe it all as homely but not special.

Service - no issues getting served in any bar. Cabin cleaned every morning, Horizon left outside early evening occasionally on bed with two chocs. Balcony furniture very grubby no deck towels in cabin to put on. We had soap in bathroom and shower.

Officers - notable by their absence. Hardly any announcements apart from 12 noon.

 

Covid rules - this you will find interesting. We travelled by coach with a few solo travellers (not surprising as the cruise was being offered with no solo supplement.) One solo guy in his 60s happened to check-in at the next desk to us. It went a bit like this  'can I see your vaccination certificate' - "don't know what your talking about" - 'your covid vaccination records we need to see them' - "don't have any  didn't know I needed them" - 'have you been vaccinated against covid' - " yes a long time ago" - 'just wait here while I speak to someone'. We left the first check point went to the second and didn't expect to see him again.  However once we'd been to our muster station and  cabin we went for a drink and who's getting served but the same guy. I didn't ask him how he managed to board but it certainly made me wonder how many others they must have waived the rules for!

 

Surprise they waived the rules for a cruiser on Arcadia. I always thought it was Britannia waives the rules. Oh no, that was rules the waves.