My Cruise Experiences & Holidays

Our Car Tour Of France

For our summer holiday this year, instead of a cruise we decided to go to do a car tour of France and visit some areas we had not been to before including the Dordogne region. The idea was a relaxing holiday and to taste sample some good French cuisine. We booked through Brittany Ferries and went across to Santander from Plymouth and then travelled up the west coast to Roscoff and back to Plymouth. Here is a diary of our somewhat eventful two weeks. I have also added comments on Tripadvisor in relation to the 5 hotels we stayed in on route.

30th June 2013 Ivybridge Devon To Ainhoa France

Left our home in Ivybridge, Devon (which is about a 20 minute drive to the Plymouth Brittany Ferry port, at 2.00 pm for Brittany Ferry for sailing to Santander), 10 minutes down the road realised I had forgotten my eye shadow brush which no woman could be without so had to turn around and go back home. Steve (hubby) as you can imagine was less than pleased, even though we were in plenty of time. This was not a good start to the holiday, but this was only the start of our eventful 2 week holiday. Got to the port about 2.40 p.m ( ferry leaves at 4.00 pm see what I mean!). Then told on arrival that ferry was 30 minutes late arriving due to the powerboat racing in plymouth sound, so again having to go back home was not a problem. Finally got on board The Pont Aven and found our Commodore cabin which was fine, except that the balcony hadn’t been cleaned properly as there was still the remains of the previous persons’ croissant crumbs on the table, so had to find a cleaner. [Read more…] about Our Car Tour Of France

Black Sea P & O Cruise On Arcadia September 2012 My 20 Day Diary

I have just returned from a much needed holiday on board the P & O Ship Arcadia to the Black Sea.  I thought that it might be of interest,  not only for me to look back on, but also for other cruisers, or potential cruisers to  keep a day to day diary of each day of the 20 day holiday.  Naturally I have kept each day fairly short and have not gone into too much detail, but hope it gives a little insight into what being on board a cruise ship is like.

This is the 7th cruise that Steve and I have been on.   Now I love cruising, as I do not like flying but Steve is not that keen for a number of reasons, the main one being that once you have reached a port, you have a very short time to see it and then it is back on board and off again.  This actually suits me fine, as long as we have had a little taster of that particular Country, bought the fridge magnet then off to the next.

A cruise is as relaxing as you want to make it, or it could be full to the brim with on on board activities, although many of them are not our cup of tea.  There are also guest speakers who come on board, and if it is on a subject that you are interested in, then they are well worth attending.

We went on the Arcadia a mid size ship in the P & O fleet.  We have been on her before, but she is not our favourite – Aurora is by far.  Anyway, I will give you a little bit of detail about the main parts of the ship,  so when I refer to them you will know what I am talking about. [Read more…] about Black Sea P & O Cruise On Arcadia September 2012 My 20 Day Diary

Cruises to Date

As said in my previous post, our first cruise was around the Western Meditteranean on the Aurora in 2003, but we have had several cruises since then which have included the Baltic Cities, which again was a super cruise and the places we visited were stunning. [Read more…] about Cruises to Date