P&O Cruises, Ventura, Northern Europe

I’ve taken quite a few cruises over the years, most recently with Celebrity and Regent Seven Seas. This, however, was my first experience of P & O and probably the last! This cruise was advertised as a ‘Party Cruise’ but unfortunately there was very little party atmosphere apparent. The welcome aboard was non-existent. No welcome glass of champagne, no smiling staff to guide or escort you to your stateroom and no live music playing discreetly in the background. Numerous members of the crew just stood around and pointed to where the lifts were situated as we tried to find our bearings. The design of the central lift area is most bizarre! There are several lifts available but they are SO far apart from each other, that you need to be prepared to make a dash for it, if the one that arrives, is not adjacent to where you happen to be standing! We booked a suite and although it was nicely decorated it was rather cramped in comparison to those of other cruise lines. I note that P&O, unlike other cruise lines, do not publish the size of their staterooms on their website, so it isn’t easy to make comparisons with those of other cruise lines. Also, the ‘luxury’ bathrobes were 100% polyester rather than the usual cotton which I thought was a bit cheap! We dined in ‘East’ on the first evening, which is billed as the Asian/Pacific-rim restaurant. This attracts an additional £25 per person dining supplement which is not cheap. Although we made a reservation as soon as we boarded, we were very surprised to find that the earliest available table wasn’t until 9pm but we put this down to its popularity. We were therefore totally bemused when we arrived at 9 pm prompt, to find the restaurant almost empty! There was no-one at the desk to welcome us so we had to stand around until another member of the crew who appeared to be ‘passing through’ went to find someone to attend to us! I have to say the food was very good, but the service, however, was appalling! We thought we’d ‘push the boat out’ so to speak and ordered a bottle of Champagne. It took 30 minutes and FOUR attempts before the correct one arrived. We’d pre-booked a shore excursion to Ghent departing at 8.30 am on the Saturday morning and assembled in the ship’s theatre as duly instructed. There was a 1 hour delay in disembarkation (which I’d like to believe was not the fault of P and O.) After 20 minutes, the lady in charge of dispatching the passengers on their respective tours (who was dressed in a scuffy fleece top– looking TOTALLY unprofessional), apologised for the delay but then added that as we were fortunate enough to be on a beautiful ship, the delay didn’t really matter! The shore excursion was very good. We arrived back on board mid-afternoon and thought we’d try some tapas in The Ramblas tapas bar. It wasn’t very busy but trying to get the attention of one of the staff to serve us proved to be nearly impossible! The food, however, was very tasty. You select 3 dishes from the menu for only £2.50. However, there are only handful of dishes to choose from which we felt was too restrictive. We dined in Marco Pierre White’s ‘The White Room’ on the second night which was a very enjoyable experience. The food was delicious but simple and I’m not sure it deserved the £30 per person additional supplement. Indeed, there were no tablecloths or fancy table settings in either of the restaurants that could justify the amount of supplement charged. Also, we were very amused by the size of the cloth napkins provided in the café where breakfast is taken. They were absolutely minute, less than the size of a handkerchief! I’m disappointed to say that there was very little about this particular cruise that made it ‘special’ for us. P and O are expensive and I think there are other premium lines that are more deserving of your £.