Live from QV to the Canary Islands.

[exlondoner]

2 minutes ago, Victoria2 said:

Quite rightly bearing in mind not all of us take a phone away with us and not everyone has a phone capable of opening doors or paying for stuff anyway, I can't see open sesame by phone, just yet.

And people quite often seem to lose their phones or they run out of power. I know they lose cards too, but they are comparatively simple to replace.

[Victoria2]

1 minute ago, exlondoner said:

And people quite often seem to lose their phones or they run out of power. I know they lose cards too, but they are comparatively simple to replace.

and don't I know it. Took me ages to stop demagnetising  my cruise card against my iPad. I'm sure on one cruise the Concierge got her daily work out running up and down stairs to the Front Desk for me when she insisted on getting replacement cards for me. 😀

[Winifred 22]

I would hate cards to go. I keep all mine in special purses/ wallets.  I think they are really designed for multiple banks cards. I love flicking back through them and remembering the various cruises. I would be disappointed if they just stopped. I am supposed to be going on a Princess Cruise in 2025 but I am really put off that I won’t get a card for my collection. 

[NE John]

5 hours ago, exlondoner said:

When did anyone last carry a wad of cash around  on a ship? Certainly before my first cruise in the 1990s. All that would mean you have to carry your phone around, assuming you have one with you, much more trouble than just carrying a little card in your pocket.

These days, it’s the guys trying to impress the M’D that carry the wads of cash. The big shots! Reminds me of some of the characters I knew in Brooklyn back in the day. 

[LadyL1]

1 hour ago, Winifred 22 said:

I would hate cards to go. I keep all mine in special purses/ wallets.  I think they are really designed for multiple banks cards. I love flicking back through them and remembering the various cruises. I would be disappointed if they just stopped. I am supposed to be going on a Princess Cruise in 2025 but I am really put off that I won’t get a card for my collection. 

You will  get a medallion on Princess (certainly of this year) as you will show this to bar staff etc, that can be kept for your collection.

We were impressed with the technology on board.

[Winifred 22]

1 hour ago, LadyL1 said:

You will  get a medallion on Princess (certainly of this year) as you will show this to bar staff etc, that can be kept for your collection.

We were impressed with the technology on board.

Yes that’s what I am afraid off. It won’t go with a wallet full of cards and will be too thick presumably? I imagine it’s the size of an air-tag? Petty I know. 

[david,Mississauga]

Modern technology is a wonderful thing until it fails. I well remember how easy it was to board a ship in the 1970s through 90s when we simply presented our ticket package to the desk and the ticket was removed and we boarded. I fully understand the need for credit card swiping and security checks and know we won't go back to that era.  This century we have had some lengthy delays in New York when the check-in computers failed so we had to stand about a half hour each time - or find a seat and lose our spot in the queue.

 

I well remember when cabin keys were just that - keys. We never had to go to the purser's office to say our key no longer works.  I do, however,  appreciate the convenience of the cruise cards which do work most of the time. 

[Froxfield]

We were also on this cruise which was overall a decent experience.  But there were a few first world problems. I would say that QV looked less than pristine in quite a few places!  There were several threadbare seams to be seen in the carpets around the ship, quite a lot of woodwork was scratched/chipped (notably beside the grills lifts on deck 11), areas of deck 6 and 4 experienced plumbing issues and a smell of drains could be found in places around the ship: one day in the Queen's Room! A drydock seems overdue.  We enjoyed the Christmas decorations, which relieved QVs decor, which we always think a little drab compared to her sister QE.

 

Overall, the food in Princess Grill was excellent and served pleasantly.  Although the choice may be more limited than before, we found it more than adequate: we found the fish (sole, halibut and cod) as well as the soups to be the standouts. I can only say that, unfortunately, I was served the toughest piece of USDA prime rib I have ever encountered and a slab of Tournedos that was also so tough it was difficult to cut, let alone chew!! The Tournedos was replaced with a second that was marginally better: but not a lot. Question! Are the steak knives getting a bit blunt?

 

Finally on the list of gripes, we thought that the quartet of singers in the main theatre were quite the weakest we have ever heard at sea: the two young ladies were frankly unpleasant to listen to: loud and flat. The arrangement one evening of "Over the Rainbow" was a particular low spot!

 

By contrast we thought that the two speakers (on 1960s music and technical innovation) were pretty good.  The classical pianist was more than OK: I think the strangeness of his schedule reflected the arrangement of the cruise with all the sea days at the beginning and end of the voyage. The Newfoundland folk duo were good value and certainly packed out the Queen's Room.  I think maybe they could have used the Theatre, in preference to one of the shows!

 

It can't have been that bad, because we have booked again for QA in 2025 in addition to the Alaska trip on QE that we already had in the calendar for next year.  We are looking forward to QA with its increased selection of dining venues and have deliberately booked in Britannia as we intend to use them as much as possible: the grills would be a bit of a waste on that basis! We have learned from Arvia and Iona that we quite like the overall approach of lots of venues: and, at the risk of upsetting some people on here, we quite like Christmas jumpers!!!!

[foodsvcmgr]

Re: the evolution of keys - I recall my first cruise in 1978 aboard “Leonardo da Vinci”

they actually used very ancient looking skeleton keys despite the ship being built in 1960. 
Each key had a tag with the cabin number engraved on it.

And in those innocent days you hung your key in an open box at the end of your corridor when going ashore and picked it up on returning!

[DaisyUK]

Here are our notes/thoughts from this, our first, QV sailing.

 

To be honest, it was a bit of a mixed bag.

 

On the positive side, we found embarkation and debarkation to be efficient and well organised. Every single member of staff and crew whom we encountered were friendly and helpful, and our suite was one of the nicest, if not the nicest, cruise ship suite we have stayed in (Q1, Aft). Another positive surprise was the quality of the excursions. Perhaps we were just lucky, but 3 out of 4 of the guides were really good and made the places we visited come alive. The 4^th was actually pretty good also, but even she couldn’t make the places we visited come alive (for us)!

 

On the negative side, the lack of consistency on the food front was disappointing. When we cruise, the quality of the restaurant/s is very important to us, particularly in the evenings. On this sailing, out of 12 evening meals, 4 were very good, 3 were acceptable and 5 were poor. We decided to try the Steak House in our quest for excellence and even that let us down, in that my husband ordered the Wagyu medium rare and it came well done. It did taste good though, so not a total loss. 

 

We missed many of the shows because we prefer to dine early, so did so immediately the restaurant opened at 6.30 pm which didn’t give enough time on many occasions to get to the theatre for 8pm-ish. The few shows we saw didn’t wow us, so this wasn’t really an issue. We quite enjoyed some of the Insight lectures, but would have liked to see more variety.

 

I know everything can’t be perfect all the time, and we did enjoy the cruise but it didn’t quite live up to our expectations on this occasion.

[Victoria2]

Glad you liked the cabin. I was a bit concerned I'd oversold it!

 

Meals not up to scratch? You shouldn't have to but, send them back as I did twice last May but then we eat off so often I'm usually very happy, apart from when I have to get a magnifying glass out to find my fillet minion! 😃

[DaisyUK]

9 minutes ago, Victoria2 said:

Glad you liked the cabin. I was a bit concerned I'd oversold it!

 

Meals not up to scratch? You shouldn't have to but, send them back as I did twice last May but then we eat off so often I'm usually very happy, apart from when I have to get a magnifying glass out to find my fillet minion! 😃

Believe me, we did make our feelings known!  And, to be fair, the guys in the QG - Ico and co - did everything possible to improve matters. In fact, they are the reason we will most likely return. They could not do enough for us, an absolutely great team. We are a bit weird about sending things back and then having to wait for a replacement. Most times, we will just go without and maybe have a dessert. 

[DaisyUK]

Ref the cabin - you did not oversell it. It was sublime! You did warn me about it during heavy weather and we had a couple of nights of rocking and rolling, but other than that it was great.

[NE John]

52 minutes ago, DaisyUK said:

 

Here are our notes/thoughts from this, our first, QV sailing.

 

To be honest, it was a bit of a mixed bag.

 

On the positive side, we found embarkation and debarkation to be efficient and well organised. Every single member of staff and crew whom we encountered were friendly and helpful, and our suite was one of the nicest, if not the nicest, cruise ship suite we have stayed in (Q1, Aft). Another positive surprise was the quality of the excursions. Perhaps we were just lucky, but 3 out of 4 of the guides were really good and made the places we visited come alive. The 4^th was actually pretty good also, but even she couldn’t make the places we visited come alive (for us)!

 

On the negative side, the lack of consistency on the food front was disappointing. When we cruise, the quality of the restaurant/s is very important to us, particularly in the evenings. On this sailing, out of 12 evening meals, 4 were very good, 3 were acceptable and 5 were poor. We decided to try the Steak House in our quest for excellence and even that let us down, in that my husband ordered the Wagyu medium rare and it came well done. It did taste good though, so not a total loss. 

 

We missed many of the shows because we prefer to dine early, so did so immediately the restaurant opened at 6.30 pm which didn’t give enough time on many occasions to get to the theatre for 8pm-ish. The few shows we saw didn’t wow us, so this wasn’t really an issue. We quite enjoyed some of the Insight lectures, but would have liked to see more variety.

 

I know everything can’t be perfect all the time, and we did enjoy the cruise but it didn’t quite live up to our expectations on this occasion.

I’m sure your expectations were quite high on a Q1. Grills staff will go over backwards to please you so certainly speak up next time. We did on one specific dish!
Remind me, is this the first time you sailed on a Vista also? Have you been on QM2?

Do you have any comparisons from each if you have? 
I enjoy reading your comments. I’m sure we all do. 

[Victoria2]

8 minutes ago, NE John said:

I’m sure your expectations were quite high on a Q1. Grills staff will go over backwards to please you so certainly speak up next time. We did on one specific dish!
Remind me, is this the first time you sailed on a Vista also? Have you been on QM2?

Do you have any comparisons from each if you have? 
I enjoy reading your comments. I’m sure we all do. 

I enjoy reading QG comments too but may I say, expectations should be high but crucially also relevant across all Cunard and if not met, as DaisyUK  experienced with some meals, then I can understand disappointment.

Queen Victoria has an amazing staff and I am SO please to hear they will be one of the reasons a newbie to the ship will probably be back, even if there might/will be a subtle change in staff as QA poaches staff from all existing three ships.

 

[NE John]

53 minutes ago, Victoria2 said:

I enjoy reading QG comments too but may I say, expectations should be high but crucially also relevant across all Cunard and if not met, as DaisyUK  experienced with some meals, then I can understand disappointment.

Queen Victoria has an amazing staff and I am SO please to hear they will be one of the reasons a newbie to the ship will probably be back, even if there might/will be a subtle change in staff as QA poaches staff from all existing three ships.

 

QV is the one ship I have not sailed on yet (is sailing the right word? i.e cabin, stateroom, etc) and would like to do a Norway voyage/cruise/trip/sailing on that steamship/liner/cruise ship/vessel…

[Victoria2]

38 minutes ago, NE John said:

QV is the one ship I have not sailed on yet (is sailing the right word? i.e cabin, stateroom, etc) and would like to do a Norway voyage/cruise/trip/sailing on that steamship/liner/cruise ship/vessel…

Norway is one of our fall back sea trips. Wonderful. I'm sure you will enjoy your foray on our favourite big boat. 😃

[NE John]

7 minutes ago, Victoria2 said:

Norway is one of our fall back sea trips. Wonderful. I'm sure you will enjoy your foray on our favourite big boat. 😃

Alaska next year first and then plan for what’s next. 

[majortom10]

We really enjoyed the cruise even though we had a few issues but Cheryl the Concierge and Reception Manager solved problems superbly. Embarkation was a shambles even though we were slightly earlier than our QG boarding time. Obviously Cunard had started embarkation early and as we entered terminal were calling for Princess Grill and Platinum. Also there were many who totally ignored boarding times but Cunard still allowed them to board. We were successful in bidding for upgrade from PG to QG and ended up in Q5 deck 4 corner aft suite. The first night was awful with noise and vibration and next morning asked at reception for ear plugs which they refused. From then on we had issues with consistent blocked toilet. There were issues throughout the ship with awful smells on occasions. Eventually Cheryl (Concierge) told us to use public toilets which I said was unacceptable. After possibly thinking how bad that was we had a phone call from Reception Manager to be told we were being moved to Q2 on deck 7. Suite was first class on every way. With regards the food we never had a bad meal in any way as all food whether breakfast, lunch or dinner was first class and managed to work through all a la carte choices. The service was also excellent from our 2 waiters out head waiter and attentive service from maitre d. We also dined in the Verandah for our very first Diamond lunch and that was excellent.

 

[exlondoner]

How can you justify refusing earplugs??? Mind you they are one of the things I always bring with me, for obliterating the commentary if I am imprudent enough to be persuaded to go on a tour.

[majortom10]

1 minute ago, exlondoner said:

How can you justify refusing earplugs??? Mind you they are one of the things I always bring with me, for obliterating the commentary if I am imprudent enough to be persuaded to go on a tour.

I didn't refuse them they refused to give me any said they didn't want go down that way. Don't ask me why but that is what they did say.

[majortom10]

One thing I must say is we chatted to a lot of the staff in varying departments around the ship and many are moving to QA for her launch.

[exlondoner]

7 minutes ago, majortom10 said:

I didn't refuse them they refused to give me any said they didn't want go down that way. Don't ask me why but that is what they did say.

Sorry that got hideously tangled. I do apologise. What I meant to say was ‘How can they justify refusing you earplugs.’ So sorry.

[Host Hattie]

Perhaps they didn't have any?

[exlondoner]

1 minute ago, Host Hattie said:

Perhaps they didn't have any?

Probably, but why not just say so? I would have thought they might be one of the things they sell in that useful shop that has things like paracetamol and toothpaste and Pringles, the latter because you are obviously in danger of starving otherwise.