Wine kept?

[jeanlyon]

Hi, not sailed on Fred for a while, but do they still keep your wine for the following evening if you don't finish it?

[Eglesbrech]

Jean we usually finish the bottle but have seen tables around us having them saved for the next day.

[Eglesbrech]

Ps if you haven’t been on recently I can highly recommend the speciality restaurants. They are well priced if booked before sailing and excellent food if you like Asian / Indian foods.

 

The martini events are also fun as are the wine tasting events.

 

They also do a really nice elegant afternoon tea.

[jeanlyon]

Thanks a lot Eglesbrech.  Don't do martinis, but will definitely try the speciality restuarants.  Love Asian and Indian.   Long time since we sailed on Fred, but looking forward to Bolette.  Got a couple of nice private excursions booked, one in Madeira and one in Punta Delgada.  No need to pay until you get there either.

[Eglesbrech]

25 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

Thanks a lot Eglesbrech.  Don't do martinis, but will definitely try the speciality restuarants.  Love Asian and Indian.   Long time since we sailed on Fred, but looking forward to Bolette.  Got a couple of nice private excursions booked, one in Madeira and one in Punta Delgada.  No need to pay until you get there either.

If you book before you get onboard then it’s £10 pp. £15 if booked onboard.

 

The food is excellent and at that price really great value.

 

What do you have booked in Punta Delgado if you don’t mind me asking? 

Edited January 10 by Eglesbrech
Ask about trip

[jeanlyon]

37 minutes ago, Eglesbrech said:

If you book before you get onboard then it’s £10 pp. £15 if booked onboard.

 

The food is excellent and at that price really great value.

 

What do you have booked in Punta Delgado if you don’t mind me asking? 

Doing the Blue and GreenCrater Lakes in Punta Del in a car with local guide.  Doing a fred excursion in Praia da Vittoria and another private one in Madeira.

 

Have booked Tastes on your recommendation.

Edited January 10 by jeanlyon

[Eglesbrech]

46 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

Doing the Blue and GreenCrater Lakes in Punta Del in a car with local guide.  Doing a fred excursion in Praia da Vittoria and another private one in Madeira.

 

Have booked Tastes on your recommendation.

I’ll have a look at those tours, thanks.
 

The menu changes every week in the speciality restaurants so the choices change but there is always something tasty. The beef bao buns are a must if they are on your menu as a starter. 
 

Vasco is also nice. You get all the starters on the menu served family style then select a main.

 

The Chillian house Chardonnay is good on Fred IMO (but strangely not the French one, for my palette anyway).

 

We like Bollette, very spacious ship, good staff ratio and lovely public areas.

[jeanlyon]

Yes my friend, who unfortunately died last year, did a British Isles cruise on her and liked her very much.  Sounds good for the house Chardonnay.

Edited January 10 by jeanlyon

[jeanlyon]

Eglesbrech, are you on this cruise.  Our trip in Praia is Amazing Tours.  Madeira is Madeira Airport transfers.

[Eglesbrech]

12 hours ago, jeanlyon said:

Eglesbrech, are you on this cruise.  Our trip in Praia is Amazing Tours.  Madeira is Madeira Airport transfers.

No I don’t think it’s the same cruise as we don’t go to Madeira but we are going to the Azures later so I’ll look at Amazing Tours. Thanks.

 

If it had been it would have been nice to meet you after all these years. I remember you as far back as the old P&O site before CC.

[July morning]

We've used "Taste" on Bolletto & Borealis and it's been lovely with good service and the price booking before you is excellent 🙂

[jeanlyon]

4 hours ago, Eglesbrech said:

No I don’t think it’s the same cruise as we don’t go to Madeira but we are going to the Azures later so I’ll look at Amazing Tours. Thanks.

 

If it had been it would have been nice to meet you after all these years. I remember you as far back as the old P&O site before CC.

It really would be nice.  One day!  So when are you going to the Azores?

 

Must say, I rather like Fred's way of doing things compared to P&O.  I have booked Tastes, although the confirmation didn't mention the price.  But I see it in the description.  I didn't like the look of the Indian menu, but it's only an example.

Edited January 11 by jeanlyon

[Eglesbrech]

9 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

It really would be nice.  One day!  So when are you going to the Azores?

 

Must say, I rather like Fred's way of doing things compared to P&O.  I have booked Tastes, although the confirmation didn't mention the price.  But I see it in the description.  I didn't like the look of the Indian menu, but it's only an example.

August. We are going for the meteor showers but will also go to three of the islands.

 

Yes I like the way they do bookings and as they dont charge you until you are onboard you get your discount (if you have any) as well so a £10 meal is on £9.

 

We have done the wine tastings and they are a bit on the pricy side but very well done. We did a beer tasting while in Germany and that was interesting too.

 

The elegant afternoon tea is good too, held up in the Observatory on your ship and they have live music to accompany it (that said the afternoon tea in the buffet is just as nice food wise but less of an occasion).

 

We liked the fact that if you are late back from a port you can have lunch served to you in the magradome. The menu is not large but enough to choose from and an alternative to the buffet.

 

If you like cooking the demonstrations are really good and you get to try what they are preparing and get the recipe. I use their pickle recipe on a regular basis.

 

When are you sailing?

[jeanlyon]

April 4th - got £200 pp OBC as well.  I have forgotten about my discount as well.  That's cheap!!  Even the excursion we are doing is cheaper than P&O   We rarely do ship excursions, but this one looked good and reasonable.  I don't get discount on excursions,, as only Silver level.

Edited January 11 by jeanlyon

[Eglesbrech]

14 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

April 4th - got £200 pp OBC as well.  I have forgotten about my discount as well.  That's cheap!!  Even the excursion we are doing is cheaper than P&O   We rarely do ship excursions, but this one looked good and reasonable.  I don't get discount on excursions,, as only Silver level.

We opted for the drinks package as lots of sea days and I like the fact you get 50% off which makes decent bottles of wine really cheap. 

[tring]

31 minutes ago, Eglesbrech said:

 

 

Yes I like the way they do bookings and as they dont charge you until you are onboard you get your discount (if you have any) as well so a £10 meal is only £9.

 

 

The loyalty discount only applies to certain things and we did not get it for the £10 Colours and Tastes charges, nor for the £16 wash and fold laundry service, though both of those were well priced, so no complaints.

 

22 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

April 4th - got £200 pp OBC as well.  I have forgotten about my discount as well.  That's cheap!!  Even the excursion we are doing is cheaper than P&O   We rarely do ship excursions, but this one looked good and reasonable.  So I guess if I had waited until I got on board, I would have got discount off that?  But then it might not be available.

 

We did not have any obc as chose the half price drinks option, though I am not sure if you get a discount whilst using obc.

 

We did do very well drinking glasses of cava in Colours and Tastes, which is included in the package, whilst bottles are not.  They kept the bottle in.a cooler and we finished it off each time we drank that there, a glass at a time.  We were not keen on the other included wines, so usually  kept to mixer drinks before meals in the MDR or buffet, along with the occasional wine.

 

Edited January 11 by tring

[Eglesbrech]

9 minutes ago, tring said:

he loyalty discount only applies to certain things and we did not get it for the £10 Colours and Tastes charges

I thought we had but I may well be wrong. Our final bill was certainly very reasonable. 

[Eglesbrech]

14 minutes ago, tring said:

We did do very well drinking glasses of cava in Colours and Tastes, which is included in the package, whilst bottles are not.  They kept the bottle in.a cooler and we finished it off each time we drank that there, a glass at a time.  We were not keen on the other included wines, so usually  kept to mixer drinks before meals in the MDR or buffet, along with the occasional wine.

The Chilean Chardonnay was the only house white I liked and the Shiraz was passable for red. We did enjoy the cava as well, it was perfectly decent.

 

The drinks package was fine for the odd lemonade or beer through the day or glass of house wine. As I said to Jean we got most value from the 50% discount off full bottles of wine.
 

Tried the house spirits and they were not quite to my taste. My sister liked the Irish cream which she said she prefers to Baileys as it was less sweet.

[jeanlyon]

We will pay as we go for drinks.   I don't even see a drinks package, only champagne and wine packages?

 

I found the package another way by typing it into Google.  There is no way we would use £50 per day.  We have one large glass of wine each before dinner and a bottle of wine which we don't always finish.

Edited January 11 by jeanlyon

[Leither]

18 hours ago, jeanlyon said:

Eglesbrech, are you on this cruise.  Our trip in Praia is Amazing Tours.  Madeira is Madeira Airport transfers.

We did the cruise last year to the Azores, Canaries & Madeira. Unfortunately the first stop, Terceira, was cancelled due to storms. On São Miguel we'd booked a private tour through https://www.brumasecenarios.com/en/ in Ponta Delgada. It was 50 years since we'd been to the island and knew exactly what we wanted to see/do and what we didn't. Our guide/driver Gabriel was really first class and delivered everything we wanted. Highly recommended.

 

Regards.

[jeanlyon]

16 minutes ago, Leither said:

We did the cruise last year to the Azores, Canaries & Madeira. Unfortunately the first stop, Terceira, was cancelled due to storms. On São Miguel we'd booked a private tour through https://www.brumasecenarios.com/en/ in Ponta Delgada. It was 50 years since we'd been to the island and knew exactly what we wanted to see/do and what we didn't. Our guide/driver Gabriel was really first class and delivered everything we wanted. Highly recommended.

 

Regards.

I keep getting confused about the names of the islands.  Sao Miguel is Ponta Delgada.  Praia da Vittoria is terceira.

[Eglesbrech]

58 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

We will pay as we go for drinks.   I don't even see a drinks package, only champagne and wine packages?

 

I found the package another way by typing it into Google.  There is no way we would use £50 per day.  We have one large glass of wine each before dinner and a bottle of wine which we don't always finish.

Ours was “free” with the booking.

[jeanlyon]

Yes, we got the £200 each OBC, so quite happy with that.  I have asked them to send me a couple of different menus from Vasco, because the example one didn't excite.

[Leither]

32 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

I keep getting confused about the names of the islands.  Sao Miguel is Ponta Delgada.  Praia da Vittoria is terceira.

São Miguel and Terceira are the names of the islands, the other two names are the principal towns respectively.

[jeanlyon]

9 minutes ago, Leither said:

São Miguel and Terceira are the names of the islands, the other two names are the principal towns respectively.

Yes I know, but when booking a private tour, I kept forgetting which was which!!