Discussion
ThingsBehindTheSun said:
The issue is the cost, £500 for two nights with all your food, accommodation, drinks and entertainment is a crazy cheap amount of money. This is why we started going on cruises, it was cheaper to fly to Miami and do a weeks cruise around the Caribbean than do a couple of long weekend city breaks in Europe once you add up the flights, accommodation, food, taxis etc.
The P&O cruise I went on over Easter to Rotterdam was the same, it was full of Hen dos, chavs, people on mobility scooters with dole poles etc. The buffet was horrendous and we ended up paying the supplement for the restaurants as it was just so much nicer than sitting on a table of 8 with strangers at night.
They have made the prices low enough so the ships are full, but this attracts a lot of chavs and they have to reduce food and service quality to make any profit.
I suspect they make the real profit on the drinks, hence why P&O have stopped you taking spirits onboard.
It can be a lot less than that.The P&O cruise I went on over Easter to Rotterdam was the same, it was full of Hen dos, chavs, people on mobility scooters with dole poles etc. The buffet was horrendous and we ended up paying the supplement for the restaurants as it was just so much nicer than sitting on a table of 8 with strangers at night.
They have made the prices low enough so the ships are full, but this attracts a lot of chavs and they have to reduce food and service quality to make any profit.
I suspect they make the real profit on the drinks, hence why P&O have stopped you taking spirits onboard.
Two nights for £159 in this deal, full board.
https://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/2-nights-northern...
Seascanner had that cruise the week before for £219 including the premium drinks package.
Those short cruises just have booze cruise written all over them. To be honest, i dont know why the cruise lines do them - they get an awful lot of bad reviews from them which is bound to put people off who are considering a longer cruise.
We found the same thing on a four night short cruise on the Queen Mary 2. The ship was full of groups who seemed to spend the whole time eating and drinking. Half of them didn’t even bother going ashore. Only booked the cruise to get bad in the swing of cruising after a couple of years away….wont be repeating the mistake.
Deep Thought said:
Those short cruises just have booze cruise written all over them. To be honest, i dont know why the cruise lines do them
It's to a large extent to try to get more people into doing cruises.They also fill in short gaps between regular runs for operational purposes.
They can be a bit of a nightmare as crew, I remember a couple of booze cruises I did out of Sydney where I was genuinely slightly worried for my safety on stage.
paulguitar said:
It's to a large extent to try to get more people into doing cruises.
They also fill in short gaps between regular runs for operational purposes.
They can be a bit of a nightmare as crew, I remember a couple of booze cruises I did out of Sydney where I was genuinely slightly worried for my safety on stage.
I'm sure they have stats to back it up in terms of how many people do a short cruise then book a longer one, but the negative reviews from these short booze cruises must surely put other people off who otherwise would have booked.They also fill in short gaps between regular runs for operational purposes.
They can be a bit of a nightmare as crew, I remember a couple of booze cruises I did out of Sydney where I was genuinely slightly worried for my safety on stage.
It's a shame as MSC at the right time and on the right length of cruise is great value for money and the ships are stunning.
Bobtherallyfan said:
The ship was full of groups who seemed to spend the whole time eating and drinking. Half of them didn’t even bother going ashore.
I was in Australia over Christmas and we went on a 2 night Virgin cruise from Melbourne to Burnie in Tasmania. It was essentially a boat load of middle aged people having a floating party, sitting in the hot tubs drinking as people from their group took it in turns to go to the buffet and bring them all food.Not many people got off the boat, they may as well just left the boat moored in Melbourne for the duration and not waste time and fuel sailing the ship.
Despite the articles in the daily mail saying it was full of swingers, I saw no evidence of upside down pineapples.
paulguitar said:
It's to a large extent to try to get more people into doing cruises.
Exactly how we got into it, we had never been on a cruise before but whilst I was living in Australia we did a short cruise from Cairns to Sydney. Since then we have been on numerous cruises as I think they are brilliant. Deep Thought said:
Those short cruises just have booze cruise written all over them. To be honest, i dont know why the cruise lines do them - they get an awful lot of bad reviews from them which is bound to put people off who are considering a longer cruise.
Agreed. Sitting in the taxi on the way home, one of our party of six cruise newbies said "Cruises? Hmm, never again" and everyone agreed. I accept that a short English Channel cruise with the emphasis on value for money is not a fair reflection of all cruises, but for our group, it was a taster. And it didn't taste very nice at all.
Hants PHer said:
Agreed. Sitting in the taxi on the way home, one of our party of six cruise newbies said "Cruises? Hmm, never again" and everyone agreed. I accept that a short English Channel cruise with the emphasis on value for money is not a fair reflection of all cruises, but for our group, it was a taster. And it didn't taste very nice at all.
But surely that's like staying in a Premier Inn in Blackpool on a Saturday night in summer and on the basis of that experience deciding that you don't like Hotels. Or (since this is PH) driving a Lada Niva and declaring that 'cars are rubbish'.You inadvertently chose the worst type of cruise on a cheap cruise-line and it was likely as would have been expected. There are however many far better cruise lines, better ships and different demographics of people to travel with.
Guyr said:
Hants PHer said:
Agreed. Sitting in the taxi on the way home, one of our party of six cruise newbies said "Cruises? Hmm, never again" and everyone agreed. I accept that a short English Channel cruise with the emphasis on value for money is not a fair reflection of all cruises, but for our group, it was a taster. And it didn't taste very nice at all.
But surely that's like staying in a Premier Inn in Blackpool on a Saturday night in summer and on the basis of that experience deciding that you don't like Hotels. Or (since this is PH) driving a Lada Niva and declaring that 'cars are rubbish'.You inadvertently chose the worst type of cruise on a cheap cruise-line and it was likely as would have been expected. There are however many far better cruise lines, better ships and different demographics of people to travel with.
te. dunkind said:
Exactly so. I’m amazed that people book with the various cheap cruise lines, getting on board with groups the size of a small town, paying a pittance and queuing for food and drink. I’m quite sure the majority of these people are there because it’s cheap, mostly monkeys paying peanuts. You get what you pay for and having read the posts on here and places like Cruise Critic it’s no wonder it’s ste.
Yet Silversea doesn't rate well.te. Not a good review this year on Trust Pilot
https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/silverseas.co.uk
Quite a few mixed to poor reviews on Cruise Critic too.
https://www.cruisecritic.co.uk/cruise/silversea/re...
The mainstream lines can be great, but you need to pick the right time of year, cruise duration and itinerary.
Edited by Deep Thought on Friday 10th May 21:23
We are going on our first cruise for about two years later this year. Alaska after a bit of land stuff in Canadian Rockies with a Rocky Mountianeer train journey, few days in Vancouver afterwards.
We've never had a bad cruise in about ten years of cruising and I've previously posted about the many interesting people we've met at dinner.
We've used cruises to get a glimpse of places we might want to see more thoroughly. That leading to us taking land tours in those places.
Places such as Japan, Malysia, South Korea, Thailand, Vietnam. The land tours then including Cambodia and Laos.
However, early on in our cruising I realised short cruises from the UK would not be to our taste.
Read the many cruise forums and blogs and it's easy to find cruises to suits one's tastes.
We've never had a bad cruise in about ten years of cruising and I've previously posted about the many interesting people we've met at dinner.
We've used cruises to get a glimpse of places we might want to see more thoroughly. That leading to us taking land tours in those places.
Places such as Japan, Malysia, South Korea, Thailand, Vietnam. The land tours then including Cambodia and Laos.
However, early on in our cruising I realised short cruises from the UK would not be to our taste.
Read the many cruise forums and blogs and it's easy to find cruises to suits one's tastes.
Deep Thought said:
Yet Silversea doesn't rate well.
Not a good review this year on Trust Pilot
https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/silverseas.co.uk
Quite a few mixed to poor reviews on Cruise Critic too.
https://www.cruisecritic.co.uk/cruise/silversea/re...
The mainstream lines can be great, but you need to pick the right time of year, cruise duration and itinerary.
No queuing though. Very decent food and service and as much champagne as I could drink and for a functioning alcoholic that ain’t bad. Not a good review this year on Trust Pilot
https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/silverseas.co.uk
Quite a few mixed to poor reviews on Cruise Critic too.
https://www.cruisecritic.co.uk/cruise/silversea/re...
The mainstream lines can be great, but you need to pick the right time of year, cruise duration and itinerary.
Edited by Deep Thought on Friday 10th May 21:23
stevemcs said:
We are on a 2 night cruise … hot tubs are full. I don’t intend to get off and will hit the buffet hard
Deep Thought said:
dunkind said:
Exactly so. I’m amazed that people book with the various cheap cruise lines, getting on board with groups the size of a small town, paying a pittance and queuing for food and drink. I’m quite sure the majority of these people are there because it’s cheap, mostly monkeys paying peanuts. You get what you pay for and having read the posts on here and places like Cruise Critic it’s no wonder it’s ste.
Yet Silversea doesn't rate well.te. Not a good review this year on Trust Pilot
https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/silverseas.co.uk
Quite a few mixed to poor reviews on Cruise Critic too.
https://www.cruisecritic.co.uk/cruise/silversea/re...
The mainstream lines can be great, but you need to pick the right time of year, cruise duration and itinerary.
Edited by Deep Thought on Friday 10th May 21:23
Rubbish line, newbie, not in a suite etc.
A little story on our last MSC cruise we were Asked by some Germans enviously who were sharing our table how long it had taken to get our top tier ‘black’ status. I explained it was a blue card not black and our first MSC cruise. It amused us all.
Reading the cruise critic forum provides lots of laughter with regards to what passengers will do to save a dollar a day. Whilst some of my post was a bit tongue in cheek I still don't understand why some people are surprised when they encounter chavy behaviour onboard a ship with 3k/5k people.
surveyor said:
A little story on our last MSC cruise we were Asked by some Germans enviously who were sharing our table how long it had taken to get our top tier ‘black’ status. I explained it was a blue card not black and our first MSC cruise. It amused us all.
By the way why would you share your dining table, unless you were invited or they invited you?Gassing Station | Holidays & Travel | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff