First Review Of Britannia
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Topic author - Deputy Captain
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First Review Of Britannia
I found this reveiew on another forum but thought it was quite a good comprehensive first review of the new ship which might be useful to share.
http://www.silvertraveladvisor.com/revi ... -britannia
http://www.silvertraveladvisor.com/revi ... -britannia
John
Trainee Pensioner since 2000
Trainee Pensioner since 2000
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- Senior First Officer
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- Third Officer
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
Interesting report, disappointed to read about queue on stairs to the restaurant, this was a problem on Azura and I think also Ventura. Elderly people with walking sticks on the stairs, those more disabled used the lift which opened just in front of restaurant entrance and at head of stairs queue which resulted in a bottleneck and not enough room for people to exit lift. This would not pass any health and safety checks and I am amazed that P & O have not learned this lesson when designing Britannia.
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Topic author - Deputy Captain
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
You make a very good case for using Freedom Dining rather than Club, generally queues on freedom are much shorter, if at all.oldtimer wrote:Interesting report, disappointed to read about queue on stairs to the restaurant, this was a problem on Azura and I think also Ventura. Elderly people with walking sticks on the stairs, those more disabled used the lift which opened just in front of restaurant entrance and at head of stairs queue which resulted in a bottleneck and not enough room for people to exit lift. This would not pass any health and safety checks and I am amazed that P & O have not learned this lesson when designing Britannia.
John
Trainee Pensioner since 2000
Trainee Pensioner since 2000
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
towny I do disagree with you re length of wait on freedom dinning as when we were on oceana to canaries November 2014 p&o booked over 1100 people on freedom and the wait was nearly an hour 2 people really complained strongly and were moved to our table for the rest of the cruise
graham
graham
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
Thanks for providing the link .
Freedom Dining is obviously the way forward, contra to the out dated opinions of some, and I certainly did enjoy reading about the increased number of food opportunities within this ship.
Just need a suitable itinerary and a balcony cabin at a knock down price ... and off we go.
Freedom Dining is obviously the way forward, contra to the out dated opinions of some, and I certainly did enjoy reading about the increased number of food opportunities within this ship.
Just need a suitable itinerary and a balcony cabin at a knock down price ... and off we go.
Keep smiling, it's good for your well being
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- Ex Team Member
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
Have to be honest, we gave never waited more than 30 mins for Freedom, but I guess that is because we are so sociable, we don't care who we sit with...lol
Jenni
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
I can confirm that - Jenni and Steve at very sociableJenniC wrote:Have to be honest, we gave never waited more than 30 mins for Freedom, but I guess that is because we are so sociable, we don't care who we sit with...lol
Janis
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
I rather suspect that although we have booked Freedom dining, we shan't bother with it at all and will just choose the selecting dining venues.
Gill
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
We have just come off Oceana and people were queuing for Freedom Dining at 5.30! Seems ridiculous to me. There was an appeal in Horizon asking people to wait until later to dine. It appears everyone wants to eat at 6.30.
Carole
Carole
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
This is what amuses me, if people want to dine at 6.30pm why do they book freedom .. why not just book club
Jo
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
If everyone wants to dine at 6.30 why don't they just go Club Dining First sitting? Queuing at 6.30 seems to negate the whole point of Freedom dining to me.
Is it me? Am I missing something here?
Is it me? Am I missing something here?
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- Commodore
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
We prefer freedom dining and the flexibility it offers.
Never had a problem with long waits. And if we did have a short wait of say 20 - 30 minutes we would be given a bleeper and off we would go for another drink at the bar. And we can almost guarantee that as soon as we had sat down with our drinks the bleeper would go off. No problem though, just take them with you.
Never had a problem with long waits. And if we did have a short wait of say 20 - 30 minutes we would be given a bleeper and off we would go for another drink at the bar. And we can almost guarantee that as soon as we had sat down with our drinks the bleeper would go off. No problem though, just take them with you.
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
oldbluefox wrote:If everyone wants to dine at 6.30 why don't they just go Club Dining First sitting? Queuing at 6.30 seems to negate the whole point of Freedom dining to me.
Is it me? Am I missing something here?
Agree Foxy.
Speaking for ourselves, 6.30 sitting is too early and 8.30 too late. 7-7.30 works for us.
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- Senior Second Officer
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
mob we have tried freedom dinning ourselves and did not like it much prefer 2nd sitting we have not tried any of the big boats yet as we did try arcadia and found that to big for our enjoyment as we do not have outdated opinions we believe in letting people choose what they want unlike you who thinks you are never wrong and that everybody else must agree with you.
graham
graham
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
Vive la difference!! We've tried first sitting and freedom dining. There are pluses and minuses on both sides but overall we prefer second sitting Club dining, especially if it is accompanied by laughter from Carole and her husband on the next table!!
We are the quiet ones!!
We are the quiet ones!!
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
poole boy wrote:mob we have tried freedom dinning ourselves and did not like it much prefer 2nd sitting we have not tried any of the big boats yet as we did try arcadia and found that to big for our enjoyment as we do not have outdated opinions we believe in letting people choose what they want unlike you who thinks you are never wrong and that everybody else must agree with you.
graham
Hey ho Graham, you old stirrer you ....
I didn't actually have you in mind, twas a feller with a monocle if truth be told.
Keep smiling, it's good for your well being
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- Deputy Captain
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
when all the hype started about Behemoth, sorry Britannia, I did wonder if there would be much more upselling and less included and it would appear I was partially correct, I seem to remember that cakes were free with coffee on Azura and Ventura? and there were less pay for options
Maybe this is the Pando opportunity to raise the bar but at what cost to the traveller?
Maybe this is the Pando opportunity to raise the bar but at what cost to the traveller?
Nihil Obstat
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
As I understand it, the cakes ARE free in Java, providing you buy a drink. Market Cafe is a celebrity chef venue, so food items, which are in a totally different league, are at a cost. Seems reasonable to me.
Gill
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
Hi Gill
So its..'buy one, get one free' or 'Buy one.. or go without'
Regards
Keith
So its..'buy one, get one free' or 'Buy one.. or go without'
Regards
Keith
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- Senior Second Officer
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
Stephen wrote:oldbluefox wrote:If everyone wants to dine at 6.30 why don't they just go Club Dining First sitting? Queuing at 6.30 seems to negate the whole point of Freedom dining to me.
Is it me? Am I missing something here?
Agree Foxy.
Speaking for ourselves, 6.30 sitting is too early and 8.30 too late. 7-7.30 works for us.
This situation regarding people standing in a queue for freedom dining has been reported for some time now. It is clearly people who wanted first sitting and could not get it because of the introduction of freedom dining.
Perhaps they need to move one of the restaurants back to club.
Dai
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Topic author - Deputy Captain
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
Dai, I think P&O will have done their research and double checked the passenger demand for club vs freedom before they decided to switch the second MDR to freedom. But if demand changes then they might put an extra first sitting on and only switch the second one to freedom after 8:30, like Princess have been known to.
John
Trainee Pensioner since 2000
Trainee Pensioner since 2000
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
We've never had a problem with Freedom Dining on any of the P&O ships we've been on, and have rarely had to queue at all.
That said, we usually head to the MDR until around 19:15, and are happy to share. On the odd occasion we want to dine at a table for two, we take a pager if need be, and have a G&T or ten until they have room for us.
One of the reasons we enjoy cruising is that it is so stress free. I'll be damned if I'll let eating or disembarking at our ports of call ruin my holiday if ever we have wait to do either....
That said, we usually head to the MDR until around 19:15, and are happy to share. On the odd occasion we want to dine at a table for two, we take a pager if need be, and have a G&T or ten until they have room for us.
One of the reasons we enjoy cruising is that it is so stress free. I'll be damned if I'll let eating or disembarking at our ports of call ruin my holiday if ever we have wait to do either....
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- Commodore
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
Will post our review on our return. Just to say we are on Club Dining and have had no problem with queues. We turn up at opening time or a couple of minutes after and go pretty much straight in. There were long queues for Freedom on first day but seems to have eased since
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Re: First Review Of Britannia
We've taken pot luck this time with a saver fare, so will have to see what we end up with dining-wise. I don't really mind what we get, as long as it's not first or second sitting ....