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Cunard Liquor Policy



 
 
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  #1  
Old May 13th, 2004, 11:45 PM
Now Voyager
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Default Cunard Liquor Policy

I've been reading numerous threads about different cruise line liquor
policies. Can anyone tell me what the policy of Cunard is? We're
leaving on the Caronia for a 14 night Baltics cruise from Southampton
mid-June. I've looked at the prelim documents we received, the
brochure and their web site and don't see anything about liquor. Can
you bring it aboard, purchase liquor on board for consumption in your
stateroom or order it from room service in bottles, not just by the
glass?

Thanks,
Doug
  #2  
Old May 15th, 2004, 01:12 PM
Andrew Pullen
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Default Cunard Liquor Policy (includes Caronia mini-review)

I have recently returned from a four night mini-cruise on Caronia.

I took rum on board in my suitcase and coke in hand luggage (there's a
fridge in the cabin to keep it cool). There didn't seem to be any problem
with this.
I brought more rum back on board from our first port of call (Guernsey). I
wouldn't have minded if they had taken it off me till the end of the cruise
(I was buying it to take home), but nobody seemed to mind me bringing it
aboard, so I kept that in my cabin as well.

On the last day my wife bought some alcohol from the duty free shop on
board. I think that the scheme is usually that you order it, and they
deliver it to your cabin on the last evening, but given it was the last day,
we were allowed to take it with us. The duty free price for a litre of rum
was about 6.50 GBP - BUT if you bought it for in-cabin consumption the price
was more like 35.00 GBP.

On a more general point, I must say I was pleasantly surprised by the
service, the ship and the entertainment aboard Caronia (generally somewhat
better than our also-excellent cruise on QE2). It is a small (and old) ship
by today's standards (only about 24,500 GRT) but is well maintained and has
some lovely public rooms - and a restaurant & ballroom big enough to
accommodate everybody at once.

It's a pity my wife & I have only just discovered her - because she leaves
service with Cunard in November, so we probably won't get the chance to sail
on her again. She does re-appear (with a number of structural improvements)
as part of the Saga (over 50s) group next February - but I'm not yet old
enough to be allowed to sail on her ( - or is that )

We had an outside cabin on "upper deck" - which was reasonably large, with a
good bathroom. Being on upper deck was very convenient for the restaurant
and pursers desk. It also meant we had a higher than average ceiling (given
it was on a deck with public rooms). I had a friend on board who had taken
two cruises in cabins on A deck (two decks below us). His first cabin had
been quite acceptable, but his second one was more amidships and suffered
from engine noise. Personally I would recommend Main deck or higher (the
suites look good if you can afford them).

The vast majority of the passengers on board were British (like us) with
what seemed to me to be a few French, a few Germans and a few Americans (and
practically no children).
We were only on a short cruise but the entertainment was very good (perhaps
they had tried to pack in more than 4 days of usual entertainment on a
longer cruise). On one hectic day I think my planned evening activities
consisted of
1) classical concert in the Garden Lounge
2) dinner in the restaurant
3) ballroom dancing in the Ballroom
4) Song & dance show from the excellent on-board troupe in the Ballroom
5) more dancing
6) Comedian in the Ballroom
7) Pianist in the Picadilly Club (although it was unfortunately too
small to fit in all the people who wanted to attend, so I had to miss it)
8) Disco in the Picadilly Club

Good points of our cruise included:

A restaurant big enough for everybody - so you can go for dinner at any
time between 7pm & 9pm (although it makes sense to go at a similar time to
your table companions if you don't want to be eating different courses at
different times).

Excellent dining room service - although being at the captain's table
probably helped with this )

The Tivoli restaurant has excellent food and service (It's an intimate
Italian restaurant for alternative dining - book up early during your
cruise; there's no extra charge, but I believe you are only allowed to book
once per cruise).

Garden Lounge - a beautiful, relaxing room with 270 degree views

The Ballroom - with a reasonable dance floor & comfortable seating. This
room gets used for most entertainment (dancing, shows, lectures, etc). Sight
lines are not as good as in a proper theatre, but they're better than in the
Queen's Room on the QE2.

A good standard of entertainment in the evenings (not up to big-ship
Royal Caribbean standards, but much better than I had expected)

Ballroom dancing with gentleman hosts

A proper cinema with a good selection of films, shown several times a
day. The films on the TV were pretty good too (and a VCR was provided in
case you wanted to borrow anything special from the video library).

A pleasant library - open (I think) 24 hours per day, with an honesty
system

A well equipped computer room, with internet access, word processing and
games (although I didn't try it, so I don't know about the speed or cost of
internet access).

A reasonably well equipped gym (for a ship of its size)

A pleasant outdoor deck area at the stern

Hassle-free embarkation & disembarkation at Southampton


The less-good things we-

The Picadilly Club was too small when hosting the jazz band or the "Name
that Tune" quiz.

The Lido (buffet breakfast & lunch) was very small (although you could
take your meal outside if the weather was good, or into the back of the
ballroom if it wasn't). However, this probably helped to encourage more
people to go into the restaurant for breakfast & lunch - which was a good
thing, given that Cunard have the unusual system of keeping the same table
for all three meals, rather than having open seating for breakfast & lunch.
If the majority of people had eaten at the buffet, it would have left their
table companions with no-one to talk to.

Afternoon tea was very popular, but not very well laid out - which meant
that it turned into a bit of a crush at times.

Even though our cabin was quite spacious, there was only one chair and
no settee. The beds had a hard wooden border and were uncomfortable to sit
on.

The beds could be pushed together, but couldn't be made into a double
bed (due to the wooden surrounds). There are a limited number of cabins
which do offer a king size bed, but other than those cabins, I think the
cabin lays out better with twin beds.

Oh well, I ought to stop now. This just started out as a quick reply about
alcohol policy, but I seem to have rambled on for a while.

Andrew Pullen

SS Nevasa, Easter 1973
SS Uganda, Easter 1978
(old) Oriana, Aug 1979
Century, Easter 1996
Sun Princess, Easter 1996
Mistral, Aug 2001
QE2, Christmas 2001
Nile cruise, Feb 2002
Millennium, Aug 2002
Maasdam, Feb 2003
Radisson Seven Seas Voyager, Mar 2003
Braemar, May 2003
Century, July 2003
Explorer of the Seas, Aug 2003
Oriana, Oct 2003
Golden Princess, Feb 2004
Caronia, Apr 2004


"Now Voyager" wrote in message
...
I've been reading numerous threads about different cruise line liquor
policies. Can anyone tell me what the policy of Cunard is? We're
leaving on the Caronia for a 14 night Baltics cruise from Southampton
mid-June. I've looked at the prelim documents we received, the
brochure and their web site and don't see anything about liquor. Can
you bring it aboard, purchase liquor on board for consumption in your
stateroom or order it from room service in bottles, not just by the
glass?

Thanks,
Doug



 




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