Tell me about cruising

[TinkerBabe]

Originally Posted by Omega1

Depending on when you sail, £100ppn in an inside cabin seems a bit high.

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I am a teacher so unfortunately I am tied to school holiday times, hence the £100pppn threshold, however I look forward to retirement in 5 years when we can snap up some bargains! I have spotted some great transatlantic crossings for as little as £50pppn which also included a return flight...we will be all over that when we are not at the mercy of term time!😀

[Omega1]

Originally Posted by TinkerBabe

I am a teacher so unfortunately I am tied to school holiday times, hence the £100pppn threshold, however I look forward to retirement in 5 years when we can snap up some bargains! I have spotted some great transatlantic crossings for as little as £50pppn which also included a return flight...we will be all over that when we are not at the mercy of term time!😀

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I feel your pain. The only thing better than being a teacher is being a retired teacher. Going on a cruise on 1st September is bloomin marvellous!
We’ve done a couple of transatlantics but last year’s via Iceland and Canada was brilliant (£61pppn) not inc flights. Your £50pppn inc flights is excellent.

[Gill H]

Check out my trippie and Peter’s videos of our 2017 Med cruise on the Disney Magic. (Link in my sig.) We had a superb time and would love to do another one. We are 51 so not quite old dears yet - but plenty of younger people on the ship!

[BevS97]

We have just got off a P and O cruise to the Fjords. We are in our 50s (well I am now ) and my dd was 14. We saw families of literally every age from young couples, parents with babies all the way to older people.

We did freedom dining and didn’t have to share a table. We did on the first evening and after that we asked not too and always got our own table.
We enjoyed all the ports, obviously you just get a taste of each place. It’s not a full visit but for some of the small places in the Fjords that’s all you need.
I was paranoid about missing the ship so we were always back on hours before sailaway and we still had plenty of time to see the places.

I’ve posted our trip report on theDibb, or on my blog.

bevs97.wordpress/

I’d pick one of the cruise lines with a younger clientele as they aren’t all the same as far as I can tell.

We had an inside cabin but I would have liked a window for the Fjords.

[Burgmeister]

I've never cruised with CMV but they do offer very attractive fares.

We have done Royal Caribbean 3 times, Norwegian once and Princess once and have enjoyed them all. Each cruise line has its own rules so don't assume that because one line allows something, the others will too.

Of the 3 lines my daughter prefers RC, I prefer Princess and my wife couldn't be coaxed into an answer. Norwegian was very good but it is a more relaxed cruise - no formal nights. As a family we quite like the dress-up nights as it isn't something we do at home so I think that counts against it for us (although, to be fair, we still loved the cruise).

I know you don't like shows so this bity probably isn't relevant but, to us, the quality of the entertainment runs 1st - RC, 2nd -Princess and 3rd - Norwegian.

Drinks prices on all of them are expensive but Princess allows you to bring on as much non-alcoholic drink as you want and also allows 1 bottle of wine per passenger of drinking age. They also allow you to purchase half bottles of spirit for your room (about £13 each). We bought a couple of these and, along with the wine and soft drinks we brought onboard, kept our bar bill to a minimum.

Edit: For Norwegian and Princess we asked for a table for 4 (through our online account before boarding) but on RC that wasn't an option and we were on large tables with people we didn't know. This has mostly worked although we did get an annoying couple of moaners on one of the cruises and we had a sigh of relief each evening they didn't turn up.

[MarkJ]

My apologies to admin if Im not supposed to say - however the forum at Cruise Critic gives loads of information about cruises and everything that goes with it - including trip reports and Q&A

[Cloverlady]

Hi, my input as a fairly new cruiser, feeling much like you are now last year...

We did our first cruise last Easter (2017) cruising the Caribbean out of Miami for a week. not sure what to expect we believed all the stereotypes were true , cruising is for old people, you have to get dressed up to the nines every night, you have to sit and make small talk cheek by jowl with strangers at dinner, not much to do onboard etc etc etc...

We suffice to say we liked it! We are hooked!
None of the above is true!

We have done 2 more cruises since then - a week around the Canaries, a long one from Singapore to Dubai via Indis and Thailand,

And we liked it so much we currently have another FOUR booked!
(just booked another Far East cruise yesterday in fact!)

We've sailed MSC, Marella and Royal Caribbean, soon sailing on Carnival . We plan to try most other cruiselines, particularly P&O, Norwegian, and Princess for comparison.

We always (bar the Canaries cruise) book a balcony, and we get flexible dining on a table for two, we get the drinks package as it includes (usually) nice coffees and fruitjuces as well as yummy cocktails beers wines etc, we don't do the formal nights, it's your choice , there's always somewhere else to eat if you want to be casual. We always meet really nice people, enjoy the quizzes and most of the entertainment

From a newish cruiser, I hope all this helps!

[Bats]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

My apologies to admin if Im not supposed to say - however the forum at Cruise Critic gives loads of information about cruises and everything that goes with it - including trip reports and Q&A

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So does the forum here and it's much friendlier!

Have asked admin to move this over as I can't do it anymore as a CM.

[JudyC]

Thanks for your input everyone. I did hop over to cruise critic as well..
It's only Fred Olsen and Magellan that cruise from Liverpool which is a shame as I don't fancy either now I've read more into it. We are only half an hour drive from Liverpool so one from there would have been ideal.
The P&O cruise from Southampton looks much more to my liking, so I guess it would be worth travelling there instead.

[BevS97]

Thompson go from Newcastle if that’s an easier drive. Quite a few of my friends have cruised with them. It’s a more relaxed experience from what I can tell.

One friend (in her 30s) does Fred Olsen with her mum and she’s says she is the youngest person on board by about 30 years.

We opted to drive to southampton. Next time I might look at flights into Southampton. P & O will also provide a coach if you want.