We awoke with just a smidge of a hangover to views of the cruise port and adjoining Cité de la Mer exhibit from our balcony.

Finding cruise port information or things to do in Cherbourg if you’re visiting via cruise online was not particularly easy; either it’s a port not often visited by cruise ships or the people who visit don’t find a lot to write about. We thought this was odd as we’d taken a look at maps of the area and spotted quite a few places in Cherbourg that had attracted our attention: a hill-top fort, a bunker, medieval ruins, and several musuems were all the sorts of places of interest we like to take a look at when we’re visiting a new city and we saw there was a microbrewery there too to satisfy our desire to hunt down local drink. We hadn’t wanted to book an excursion during our cruise stop in Cherbourg mostly because our past record with French ports has been less than amazing and there was always the chance it would be cancelled but there was also the factor that the excursions offered – Bayeux for the tapestry, Normandy beaches, Mont St Michel – all involved fairly considerable travel times. The local attractions would do, we decided.

But we made one crucial mistake with our planning.

We were arriving on a Saturday with intentions to see historical monuments and museums early on, leaving the afternoon for drinking and shopping. We had assumed – because this is how things work at home and France isn’t that far away or that culturally different from us – that the places we wanted to visit would be open. They were not. Cherbourg’s tourist attractions don’t seem to want any tourists on a Saturday morning and, it turns out, if you want to do anything cultural or educational during lunchtimes at any point in the week then you’re out of luck too. What we discovered very late on in our planning (i.e. a few days before we cruised to France) was that the places of interest in Cherbourg we wanted to visit would not open for the first six or seven hours we were in port. Not only that, had we actually arrived on a weekday rather than a Saturday we would have found everything closing up between about 12:30 and 14:00 each day too. This is utterly baffling to us. Had this been the south of Spain where heat plays a part and siestas are common then we might have expected it. This is northern France. Why do these places not have the staff on hand to keep somewhere open throughout the day and during the morning on a Saturday? At the very least, why weren’t steps being taken to take advantage of visiting cruise ships?

This left us with few options. We knew that La Cité de la Mer would be one possibility; maritime exhibits and aquariums are things we like to see but we figured most people not taking a cruise excursion might hit that first so, as it would be right next to where Arcadia docked in Cherbourg, we would leave that to the last thing to see in order to avoid the crush. Our visit there is covered in the next cruise review post. We could have risked going to the microbrewery early and doing shopping before trying to hit something of cultural interest but with anything interesting opening just three hours before we’d need to be back on board and not wanting to go into the city, come back to hit the maritime building, then return to find a museum before turning around again to hit the ship all on the back of hopefully fuzzy heads we rejected that.

Ultimately, we decided that we would walk for a few hours to see if we could find something not necessarily on the maps or just interesting to photograph, get our drinking done, then hit Cité de la Mer early if necessary and just get back on our floating home. We were disappointed that it appeared we wouldn’t really be making the most of our time in Cherbourg but the main thing was we’d be exploring somewhere new anyway.

We left the ship, walked through the old and impressive terminal building, and headed south out of the cruise port area.

Reaching Pont Tournant in around five minutes we crossed over the bridge towards the main part of Cherbourg. This area was very attractive, offering up some lovely views across the harbour with its perfectly still water providing some gorgeous reflections of buildings in the city and boats anchored all around.

On the waterfront side of Cherbourg’s main area of shops and other businesses we spotted a bust of someone not recognisable to us. I always try to take photos of these statues as it provides something of interest to look up later. This turned out to be the Colonel Bricqueville Monument. Armand François Bon Claude, Count of Bricqueville, was a cavalry officer serving in Napoleon’s army who took part in campaigns in Prussia, Poland, Spain, and Russia. The statue was erected in 1845 and originally had two bronze reliefs on it as well but these were melted down by the Germans towards the end of World War II.

We followed the main road along the harbour, Quai Caligny, northwards then westwards past the Catholic Church of Basilique Saint-Trinité where it became first Place Napoléon (easily identifiable from the statue of Napoleon on a horse erected in 1858) and then Rue de l’Abbaye.

We weren’t completely walking on a whim here. Maps had shown that along the appropriately-named Rue de l’Abbaye there appeared to be ruins of an abbey, Abbaye du Voeu (Abbey of the Vow). Information about the place was pretty sparse but we could see it had been an abbey (obviously) as well as military barracks and a hospital, and it had a museum. What we couldn’t find out from the lack of details such as opening times was whether the museum would be accessible but we guessed that at the very least we’d be able to have a look around the ruins themselves. Alas, Cherbourg’s rather lacking appeal to tourism had other plans and the ruins, like everywhere else we were thinking of visiting, were closed until mid-afternoon. We could get reasonably close to its exterior and took a few photos but exploring inside was not to happen.

The walk from Cherbourg harbour to the abbey was about two kilometres and there was no indication that there was anything else of interest in that direction so we turned around and headed back towards the main part of the French city. Our target destination now was Parc Emmanuel Liais, location of a museum we knew would be closed but where we hoped access to the park and gardens would allow us to break up the views of buildings and main roads that had accompanied most of our walk to then.

The park was lovely. Helped by some extremely pleasant weather the greens of the garden popped out vibrantly against the clear blue sky. The spots of sun and shade were welcome as was the tranquility away from the white noise of cars passing in the city. If you’re ever in Cherbourg and there’s nothing else to do then this park is worth ten minutes to wander around and soak up the atmosphere.

Emmanuel Liais was an astronomer and botanist. He went to Brazil in 1858 to witness a solar eclipse but ended up staying on until 1881 doing mostly astronomical research (a Martian crater is named after him and he discovered a comet). Returning to Cherbourg he became mayor and imported numerous plants from Brazil and Asia which became part of the collection he bequeathed to the city on his death.

The museum to Emmanuel Liais was closed, as expected (thanks Cherbourg), but knowing his history we’re sure it would have been interesting to take a look at. The maps we’d seen hadn’t shown that there was another large building in the park and this turned out to be a botanical greenhouse hosting some of the specimens Liais introduced. Incredibly, it transpired that this was actually open at the time we were there. Despite us not seeing another soul inside it as we explored its small but interesting interior it should be noted that this building closes for lunch.

I was particularly taken with the concrete and glass, modernist design elements of the greenhouse, both inside and out.

We decided we would take a little bit of a wander to see if anything popped up to interest us before we’d visit the microbrewery we were looking to sample wares within. Our walk through Cherbourg’s streets took us past a couple of pieces of street art and into a square briefly where a market was taking place. We weren’t there to take back cheese or other goods but it’s possibly something to consider in light of the fact that it did constitute an actual thing to explore in the city on a Saturday.

I did rather like the posters we saw advertising try-outs for Cherbourg’s roller derby team, the Cherboobs.

The microbrewery and bar we were interested in was L’Eldorado. In fact, we were initially very interested in both it and the venue directly opposite it on Rue Tour Carrée called Le Bayou as between them they seemed to serve a large number of interesting-looking ales though only the former establishment brewed their own. As it was, the latter location doesn’t open until 17:00 on a Saturday (I can tell you’re surprised by this) so it was just L’Eldorado that got our business. The brewery makes four ales; a blanche, a blonde, an ambrée, and a brune. We lean towards the darker, maltier ales so one ambrée and one brune later we were sitting in the compact booth seats in the window, watching the world go by, watching one woman spend the best part of ten minutes trying to reverse her car into a parking space twice the size of her vehicle, and enjoying the local alcoholic produce.

In truth, we loved that we had ales freshly made on the site but there was an underlying taste to both of our drinks that we couldn’t put our finger on – almost molasses-like if I had to come up with something – and we decided one would be enough. Having finished our ales, pleased that we’d tried them even if they weren’t exactly to our tastes, we retraced our route around Cherbourg’s harbour and headed towards Cité de la Mer.

Our visit to Cité de la Mer in Cherbourg will be covered in the next post (and we did enjoy that a lot (update: Cité de la Mer)). Cherbourg does have a few areas that would ordinarily interest us – the fortress with the liberation museum, the nearby battery, the abbey ruins, a few other museums and art galleries too – but as a city it’s simply not very friendly towards a casual, daytime visitor from a cruise ship, particularly on a weekend. A cruise cynic might suggest that fits in nicely with the cruise lines’ business model as it promotes the purchase of excursions but it’s a strange stance to take from Cherbourg’s businesses and tourism office. A shame really, and the city can only really be rated as okay as a result and certainly not somewhere we’d be massively bothered about visiting again.

As you approach the main building have any bags on you open for inspection. You’re in a foreign country and the people there will speak their own language before they usually switch to the one you’re familiar with (if they can) and a blank look as you try to replay what you heard in your head hunting down key words you might remember from GCSE French at school will only lead to a repetition of the phrase and gesturing before your wife slaps your arm and says “Let him see inside the camera bag dumbass!”

Inside the main building you’ll discover a lot of exhibits on show without you needing a ticket. These will be submersible craft for the main part that have played key roles in exploration of the undersea kingdom. While these might provide some distraction they weren’t what we were there for. In this area there are also toilets and a café.

Paying for your ticket lets you exit the main building into the enclosed external area where a number of other pieces of maritime history are located and where you can gain access to the Titanic exhibition, the aquarium, and the nuclear submarine. Of these three things it was only the latter two we were interested in during this trip; we’re always fond of aquariums and if we can set foot on a historic vessel then we always will too.

Le Redoutable Nuclear Submarine

The main thing we wanted to see at Cité de la Mer was the submarine museum Le Redoutable. It is the largest and only nearly-complete ballistic missile submarine open to the public and we are always keen to do the firsts, lasts, largests, longests, etc. whenever we travel to places around the world.

An audio guide available in several languages can be picked up as you scan your ticket in at the entrance to the submarine and it provides one of the most informative descriptions of the places you explore as you make your way through the impressive vessel. One thing to note, though, if you’re the sort of person who likes to ignore the audio guide and wander around on your own is that the passageways through Le Redoutable are narrow, often only permitting one person to pass and this, coupled with the guide often telling you to stop and look at certain things, means that you won’t really be able to progress any faster than those with the guides ahead of you on the boat (not ship). You may as well use the guide and you won’t be sorry that you did.

Commissioned in 1971 and decommissioned twenty years later, Le Redoutable was the first of the Redoutable-class submarines constructed for the French Navy. She was fitted with 16 ballistic missile launchers and being in the section where each of the missiles could be independently launched was very impressive. Each missile tube had its own controls, its own computers, and seemingly anachronistic brass tubes to ensure communication could be maintained even in the event of failures there. The audio guide went into some detail about what and how long it took to launch a nuclear missile (something no submarine has ever done), making a mockery of most of the movies or books that might have implied some rogue person might be able to do it on a whim. Did you know that a compressed air bubble is in the tube with the missile so that during launch it expands and keeps the missile completely dry until it ignites its rocket upon leaving the water?

Le Redoutable was a very functional boat for the most part with little room given over to the niceties of life under the water for months on end. The submarine produced its own fresh water and oxygen, could manufacture and replace any part, needed to be able to cope with compression and expansion of the hull of several centimetres when attaching fittings, and had plenty of protection against heat, noise, and, of course, radiation. The reactor section of the submarine had been removed (obviously) but had it been still there and operating it could have powered the entire city of Cherbourg. A walkway allowed you to wander through where the reactor had once been.

My favourite part of Le Redoutable was the very, very 1970s decor of the meeting room area. Looking like something straight from UFO this really appealed to my love of that period’s style.

The audio guide tour of Le Redoutable takes about 35 minutes so you can add on another five or ten to that to cover stepping through doorways, taking photos, etc. Dropping off our guides and stepping away from the submarine we were afforded views of our cruise ship, Arcadia, showing just how close to the attraction ships dock before we made our way to the next point of interest in Cité de la Mer. I can see our balcony in a couple of these photos.

Aquarium

As I’ve already mentioned we are keen on aquariums and you can almost guarantee that if there’s one in a city we’re visiting then there’s a good chance we’ll end up paying to take a look around it. Like everything else in Cité de la Mer the aquarium was on a grand scale, obviously designed to cope with a huge number of visitors at a time. Because of the time that we visited it, perhaps, the place was mostly empty and this suited us perfectly. The aquarium building is set over two levels with a number of marine artifacts and pieces of accompanying information along with some interactive components but it was really the sealife that we’d come to see. There’s something so very soothing about staring into tanks and watching the varied creatures swimming or crawling around.

There weren’t a huge number of tanks but the cleanliness of the glass was superb and the variety of sealife was enough to get a good look around and enjoy what was there. One tank did extend over the two floors of the aquarium building and it was possible to get partially underneath looking up. This produced an unsettling effect in considering just how much weight of water there was poised above you, but unsettling in a good way and one of the highlights of the visit.

Prior to the aquarium in Cité de la Mer the last sealife centre we’d been to had also been in France – La Rochelle Aquarium – and that had been more of what we consider a traditional aquarium. The large tank was impressive but the small number of tanks and apparent waste of space, perhaps simply because we’d timed our visit to an exceptionally lucky quiet period, left us feeling satisfied but not blown away by the exhibit in Cherbourg.

A quick show of our cruise cards as we exited Cité de la Mer allowed us to enter the old cruise terminal and make our way back to the ship.

Conclusion

If you’re visiting Cherbourg then Cité de la Mer is easily the most interesting thing to see with the added bonus of having the most chance of it being actually open. As people who love naval history the price of admission was worth it just to explore Le Redoutable for us. Getting to see numerous other undersea vessels as well as an aquarium and the chance to explore a museum dedicated to the Titanic too should make this a no-brainer decision should you find yourself in the French city.

When we’d booked the cruise aboard Arcadia we’d left it late and so selected a balcony guarantee grade. If you’re not aware then what this means is that rather than choose the room from those apparently available we would be assigned one by the cruise line based on unfilled reservations for travel agents. We would get a balcony at the very least but the location would depend on what was left. It turned out that we had a forward/midship, port-side balcony, not somewhere we would have chosen for ourselves; we always favour starboard side and as far forward as possible. Had we been where we would have picked on the ship then our view from Arcadia would have been mostly out to sea but as it was we got to see another cruise ship at anchor off the island’s capital city, the Cruise & Maritime Voyages cruise ship Magellan, as well as tender boats from our ship.

The sunlight reflecting off Magellan’s white hull made it almost glow against the slightly overcast background of the Channel Island.

But our luck wasn’t limited to just being able to take a look at another cruise ship from our balcony. As I enjoyed the gentle warmth of the morning and the relaxing sight of the water undulating slightly I became aware of occasional flashes of something in the waves. Initially ignoring them as possibly just wave tops breaking I then noticed one of Arcadia’s tender boats seemed to be following the wave movements. With immense joy I suddenly realised there were dolphins and called my wife out from the room to watch.

For the next half hour we were transfixed, observing two distinct groups, perhaps one pod split up or possibly two, with the bulk of the dolphins further out from us and the subject of close monitoring by the ship’s tender boat and another couple of vessels that came in for a look, and a pair or three dolphins that were considerably closer to the ship, occasionally passing by almost right beneath where our balcony overlooked.

While we’d seen whales migrating off Argentina and a single dolphin had jumped alongside our tender boat as we departed the Falkland Islands we’d never seen pods of dolphins before. The combination of being allocated a balcony on the wrong side of the ship (for us) and accidentally not charging the phone overnight came together nicely to grant us a brand new experience. Cruises are already incredibly relaxing ways to travel, offering you plenty of chances to see the natural wonders of the sea and the landscapes you pass as you travel from port to port in luxury but when wildlife makes an appearance too you get a bonus opportunity to feel humbled that’s almost indescribable.

The morning had started very well for us – if you’ve read the previous post then you’ll already know that we had the utter joy of experiencing some unexpected dolphin-watching from our cruise ship balcony – and with the weather appearing to be bright but not too hot (just how we like it) we took the tender boat from Arcadia across to the mainland and started our walk. Our previous visit to St Peter Port had taken us generally south of the city along the cliffs and exploring the castles and other fortifications and museums in that direction. For this trip we headed due north along the shoreline instead. Checking maps we knew that northwards and slightly inland there were some gardens; we didn’t know how interesting they would be nor whether there would be anything else to see there other than greenery and flowers but it was a general target to head towards.

Candie Gardens

The gardens we were heading for were the Candie Gardens.

[The] restored Victorian Candie Gardens offer spectacular views across St Peter Port harbour and our sister islands of Herm, Sark and Jethou, along with a rare example of a late 19th century public flower garden. They are home to the oldest known heated glass-houses in the British Isles, which date back to the late eighteenth century. In the gardens, aside from the beautiful flowers, lawns, and fish ponds, you will find a museum, art gallery, and a cafe housed in a Victorian bandstand.

At the entrance there was a handy map of the gardens’ layout and we decided from this that we would walk the upper garden area first then come back through the lower garden before returning to our somewhat anticlockwise wander around St Peter Port.

Entering the upper garden we were drawn firstly to the statue of Victor Hugo (unveiled in the gardens in 1914) and then to the view over the waters off St Peter Port that showed both our cruise ship Arcadia and the CMV cruise ship Magellan at anchor.

The reason for Victor Hugo’s statue being on the island was that he spent 15 years living there in exile. During his time on Guernsey he wrote Les Miserables, among others.

Passing the bandstand we then noticed that the Guernsey Museum was open (for some reason we hadn’t thought it would be) and it was hosting a Geek Weekend. As somewhat geeky people ourselves we had to take a look and spent an engaging half an hour looking through the rooms that had been set up to show off model railways, amateur radio systems, wargaming, fantasy clothing, and collections of Star Trek spacecraft. We spent quite a while talking to the railway expert even though it’s not something that really interests us normally; there’s something infectious about listening to someone talk about what they love, though. Because there were quite a few families with young children around I put away my camera and didn’t take any photos. I don’t have a cast-iron rule about taking pictures when children are present but generally speaking, and certainly if indoors rather than out in public, I lean towards not triggering someone’s unfounded fear and protective instincts in favour of a quiet life. In addition to the rooms for the geeks we checked out the main museum areas too, some of which was very interesting indeed, especially the parts describing local folklore and the island’s own language.

Back outside we then took a walk through the lower gardens. While the upper gardens were mostly just lawn and borders the lower gardens were an explosion of flowering colours.

Exiting Candie Gardens we started heading southwards as there was nothing apparently of interest north or west from our location. St Peter Port is on a hill so we were some way back from the shore and the main part of the city and quite high up at this point. We took a meandering route that set us towards another garden on the map, the Sunken Garden, but this turned out to not look that exciting as we approached so we made do with a couple of photos and carried on our way.

We found ourselves at the top of the Clifton Steps and decided that this would be a good place to descend towards the centre of St Peter Port in search of something interesting. The steps were pretty steep and I certainly wouldn’t want to walk up them very often but they did provide some occasional lovely views out across the harbour.

Golden Lion Pub

At the bottom of the steps it had been our hastily-made plan by this point to head off in search of Victor Hugo’s house since we’d seen the statue in Candie Gardens and knew it wasn’t far away but it had just turned noon and we found ourselves right by the Golden Lion pub which was just opening. A quick glance at each other and we decided without speaking to pop in for a quick drink before carrying on. This turned out to be a good move on our part as the bar staff were incredibly friendly and knowledgeable about local ales, ciders, and gin, all things we like even when they’re not local but which we will go out of our way to experience when we’re travelling somewhere new. Not only did we get to see and hear about all the local offerings we tried them all too thanks to third-pint sampling paddles. Sitting outside in the sunshine initially our paddles attracted some attention from other visitors to the island and we tried to persuade them to try some drinks inside too but I’m not sure that they did. We used our samples to choose our favourites for a larger drink and have that inside once the heat trap outside the pub became too much and it was here that we realised that Victor Hugo’s house was closed so… we stayed for one more round. And another.

St Peter Port Harbour

Eventually, we decided we’d take a quick look along the St Peter Port harbour area before taking the tender boat back to Arcadia. Whether this was a regular occurrence or not I can’t say but there was a market taking place by the waterfront so we wandered up and down it for a few minutes before spending some of our Guernsey money change on a locally-written-and-illustrated children’s folktales book referencing some of the local creatures of mythology we’d read some details of previously in the Guernsey Museum in Candie Gardens. Just to be clear, the book was a gift for my niece. We then headed to where we would need to pick up the tender, stopping for some photos of the boats in the harbour as there’s something very appealing about boats in calm waters under clear blue skies.

All that then remained was to board the tender and commence the 10-minute ride back to our waiting cruise ship.

At some point I’m sure we’ll visit St Peter Port and the rest of Guernsey on a day other than Sunday and while it’s true that we didn’t get up to an awful lot on this visit we had seen and done plenty on our previous visit to the island’s capital back in May so feel perfectly fine with this. It would be nice to see what other attractions there are in the city during a normal working day and Victor Hugo’s house is still on our list of places to visit plus there are plenty of places on the rest of Guernsey we haven’t even touched on yet.

Embarkation at Southampton was a very familiar affair. Living in Portsmouth allows us to leave packing and driving along to the cruise terminal fairly late, queue for a little while as CPS sort out the parking for the car, then wander in with our hand luggage (as it was just a short trip), grab a card to allow us to queue briefly to get our cruise cards, pass through security, then board. We know what to expect in terms of CPS parking times and rough travel conditions so our timing is pretty much spot on at this point for boarding and entering our cabin precisely when we’re supposed to.

When we booked our cruise on Arcadia we left it fairly late as we were trying to work out how to use up what remained of our holiday allowance in the year. Subsequently, for the first time since our second cruise many years back now we didn’t choose where we would be on the ship (where we wanted wasn’t available), opting instead to pay for a guaranteed balcony and leaving it to chance. The main pros of doing this are that you know you’re going to get a balcony and you’re going to be paying the lowest price. The cons, of course, are that the balcony could be anywhere; fore, aft, mid, high, low. You might be near where the smokers congregate. You might be beneath the running track or pool. For a weekend cruise we took the gamble and it turned out absolutely fine. Our actual grade was a couple above the lowest class of balcony and we were situated just forward of midships on the port side. We prefer the starboard side but as you can read in our dolphin encounter this turned out to be a very fortuitous allocation.

Cabin D72

Our cabin on Arcadia was D72, an EB grade classed as a Deluxe Balcony. A little wider and a little shorter with just a minor layout difference but in all other respects comparable to a mini-suite on a Grand-class Princess ship (such as our Star Princess room in 2016). A curtain separated a seating area from the bed and the bathroom contained a bath and shower rather than simply a shower unit. Storage space was more-or-less identical to any other ship although a small cupboard over the sofa in the seating area was a novel addition. This would be a good cabin to have on any cruise with the only thing to be aware of being the single UK plug socket available by the dressing table. For some reason there were two European sockets also available but for a UK cruiseline this seemed an odd configuration. P&O provide tea and coffee-making facilities in their cabins which we’re still not keen about but each to their own and it’s not as if we’re forced to use it.

The balcony depth was somewhere between a Royal-class balcony (too shallow) and a Grand-class balcony (fabulous) making it just about adequate (i.e. you could turn a chair to face outwards and sit on it, just). The view was perfectly fine and the lifeboats just below, partially obscuring the promenade deck, did not spoil the scenery at all.

Bars On Arcadia

Now, while we’re keen to review cruises and share information about the ships that isn’t our primary reason for getting on them; like most sane people we’re there to enjoy ourselves and relax. On a longer cruise we can do both things because there are sea days and plenty of opportunities for heading off, exploring. With this Arcadia cruise only having two full days aboard and both of those being port stops there was less chance (and less inclination if I’m being honest) to check out every lounge, every bar, every type of entertainment, etc. in detail. Prior to muster, though, we took a quick wander up to the top deck to have a nose at one of the two pools up there. This was the centrally-located Neptune Pool, capable of being covered by the Skydome apparatus and the pool we determined to be the quieter of the two on that deck. Another pool, Aquarius, is at the aft of the ship but its exposed location, large deck area for sunbathing, and loud sound system meant it was absolutely rammed with people when we briefly visited it after our stop in Guernsey. Aquarius appears to be the party pool and Neptune is the more relaxing pool. We’re not party people. The downside to Neptune is that there are limited seats and loungers around and no easy access to the deck above (no steps up from around the pool area) but it would certainly be our preference as a place to swim on a longer cruise on Arcadia.

We had time for one drink before muster drill so walked through the East Bar (not serving drinks until the evening) then forward to the Crow’s Nest.

Muster for us took place in the Ocean Grill speciality restaurant, a place we’d booked a table for that first evening prior to embarking our cruise as we’d chosen a Select Price cruise with P&O and had some on board spending money to play around with. Even though we couldn’t choose our cabin we still opted for the Select Price option in order to make sure that for the following two nights we would be able to dine when we wanted and not when decided by Arcadia’s staff. We’re not fans of fixed dining times. The muster was pretty reasonable as P&O musters go although I’m still going to take the opportunity here to recommend that P&O (and everyone else) adopt the Princess Cruises approach of not needing to take the life jacket with you; it means the stairs aren’t packed afterwards with people returning the safety equipment to their cabins and proper cruise drinking can commence immediately.

Muster done we had a decision to make: the sailaway party by the Aquarius pool or grabbing some drinks at wherever was open. You might remember that we’re not party people so a tour of the three bars in close proximity on F deck was our very easy choice.

First up was the Rising Sun pub. It’s odd to admit but P&O are not our first choice for cruising as, if we’re travelling abroad, we like to get away from things we consider British. A foreign holiday is better if it’s culturally and socially different as much as possible from what we could get at home; it just makes the break better. That’s mostly why we don’t really like seeing kettles in cruise ship cabins. All that said, we do like the pubs they have on P&O cruise ships and the Rising Sun on Arcadia is a really nice example of one. I’d go even further and say that Arcadia’s pub is the best pub on any of the four P&O ships we’ve cruised on.

However, in what has fast become a P&O cruising tradition where we’re concerned, yet again the pub did not have the first beer I tried to order. I know, I know, it’s a first world problem, but cruises aren’t super cheap, the ship had literally docked in Southampton that morning, and there’s just no excuse for not having all the things you’ve seen fit to print up in your bar menus actually on board at the very start of a cruise no matter how short it is. On the plus side it was just this one drink that wasn’t available making our Arcadia experience significantly better than our cruise on Oriana earlier in the year.

From the pub we headed through the gallery, past the atrium, and aft to the Spinnaker Bar. A bell and model ship decorated this otherwise very quiet location.

By the atrium was a long, thin bar area called Intermezzo that we then had a couple of drinks in before heading off to shower and change for our meal. We had some nice views of the Isle of Wight that we were passing by on our starboard side but the most memorable thing about this bar was the manner in which the Martinis we ordered turned up. Call us old-fashioned but we like our Martinis in Martini glasses. The drinks were fine, of course, but for many drinks the drink is an experience that includes the glassware and we felt this did change it somewhat and not positively.

Ocean Grill Speciality Dining

Our first evening on Arcadia saw us try the speciality dining at Marco Pierre White‘s Ocean Grill restaurant. Food on cruise ships is generally very good so the speciality restaurants have to put in a little more effort to warrant parting with your money. Was the Ocean Grill worth the extra? This is a tricky one to say for certain. For us, we weren’t blown away by the food with one exception and on one of the subsequent nights on the short cruise they had a Marco Pierre White menu in the main dining room which included several of the elements we’d paid extra for but for free, putting a bit of a dampener on the experience too. You want to feel you’ve got something you couldn’t have got otherwise and that was only partially true here. The food was all cooked perfectly and tasted fine but it overall just lacked a little something difficult to describe. This isn’t a unique observation of the Ocean Grill on Arcadia as we felt the same about the Epicurean on Azura last year too. We’re possibly just spoilt.

For starters I had the Cured Gressingham Duck Carpaccio and my wife had the Crevette Cocktail

The main course for my wife was the Fillet of Bass while my main course, the Pork Cheek and Pork Belly, was the standout course. Had everything else been as tasty, as good-looking, and felt as special as that one course then we’d have no hesitation in recommending the Ocean Grill dining experience on Arcadia.

Dessert was cheesecake for my wife and chocolate tart for me. The cheesecake felt like another case of style over substance – it looked impressive in its bowl but this ended up making it awkward to eat properly – while the tart seemed to be not far removed from what you’d expect in the main dining room anyway. Both fine, just both unspectacular.

Some chocolates (that were also presented in the main dining room) and a quick visit and a smile for the camera from the head chef rounded off our Ocean Grill evening on Arcadia. We’re glad to have done it and on a longer cruise on the ship we might even do it again as there are plenty of other dishes to try and see if they would impress more but we’d possibly try to arrange it for the same night the similar menu was being offered in the ship at large so as to not feel quite so aggrieved at the extra cost.

One final gripe about our speciality dining night: my cruise card was taken twice, the first being when we bought wine (as expected), the second being… for no reason we could think of. More importantly, it wasn’t returned – something we didn’t realise until later – so I had to get a replacement from reception. This process was very swift, though, so well done P&O there.

We concluded our first night on Arcadia with a couple of drinks in The Globe, listening to the live band then the DJ, and watching some of our fellow passengers get up and dance. I’d like to say this part of the cruise was uneventful but another P&O staple made an appearance here in the form of completely the wrong drink being delivered.

Ports

For this cruise we visited Cherbourg (see: Arcadia, France posts) and St Peter Port (see: Arcadia, Guernsey posts). Disembarkation at both ports was simple and efficient and different in each case. Cherbourg simply involved walking off and into the French city while St Peter Port required taking a tender ashore, a process as simple as taking a ticket and waiting in the very attractive theatre until our number was called before being led to the boat.

We didn’t choose this cruise because of its itinerary in particular (although it was nice to actually dock at the French port we were supposed to, a first on any cruise for us) which was just as well as Cherbourg on a Saturday and St Peter Port on a Sunday aren’t exactly overflowing with activities for casual tourists. The weather was good, though, and we knew mostly what to expect on each day and weren’t disappointed at all.

Main Dining Room

Arcadia’s main dining room is split over two floors, a feature present in quite a few ship designs but a first for us. Its large size and openness made it very attractive indeed – probably the prettiest room we’ve dined in on our cruises – but our experiences on the two nights we ate there were very different affairs. While the final night was without fault the previous evening had been bad enough to lead us to see if there were any speciality options instead (no luck; we’d been handed a leaflet for Sindhu’s, a restaurant we’ve never tried on P&O to date, and phoned to book soon after to be told it was booked up, making us wonder what the purpose of the leaflet had been). That bad experience was the formal night and started with the longest wait to be seated we’ve ever had followed by some shocking service on our table for ten: two people were handed courses before they’d finished the ones before while I entered a now-traditional P&O invisibility period and ended up being offered no bread nor any water (much to the amusement of the people with whom we were seated). I did eventually get a glass of water when everyone had a top-up to get their second glass but this was simply not good enough for a four-course meal. Our waiter couldn’t have been more indifferent to our table if he’d tried. If we hadn’t had similar poor service on previous P&O cruises we’d have made more of a deal of it but we’ve started to accept that they’re just not quite good enough in this area of cruising and it’s one of those things. Food, as mentioned earlier, was very good.

Gameshow

We’re not ones for cruise ship entertainment usually but we did find ourselves in The Globe one of the evenings just as a gameshow based almost exactly on The Chase started. Called The Pursuit, it was well produced and hosted and sated our desire for a bit of trivia that we’d not been able to fulfill to that point. I was particularly pleased with our seating location which produced some great light and shadows for photography during the show.

Prior to the gameshow taking place we’d been in The Globe along with one other couple (not together; they were seated away from us) and we’d had a drink. Finishing our drink we’d looked around to see if we could get another. We counted seven stewards in the lounge (so staff almost outnumbered passengers 2-to-1), all of whom were as far from us as possible and talking to one another. We were in clear view of them and decided to see how long it would be until one of them noticed our empty glasses. After nearly ten minutes of sitting there and looking at one another with raised eyebrows and shakes of the head I then pulled out my phone and started a timer running then left it on the table. That did the trick and we were then served inside a minute. Not good enough by far, P&O.

Miscellaneous

The following photos were taken at various points over our short cruise on Arcadia.

The art gallery and various bits of artwork around the ship were very nice and a lot of it suited our tastes; some of the best we’ve seen at sea.

A prominent feature of Arcadia should be the colourful glassware at the top of the atrium. Something that shouldn’t be so prominent are buckets to catch leaks from air conditioning units. There were an awful lot of these around the ship in lounges and corridors (we saw at least half a dozen) but hopefully this is just a temporary thing until the equipment is fixed properly.

We did finally get to have a drink in the East Bar on one of the nights when we took one look at how packed the Crow’s Nest was and thought better of trying to find a seat. East was practically empty and had some lovely views across the pool at night but there is a doorway to the right side of the bar through which the staff members would periodically walk and every time resulted in a flash of intense white light from the room the other side flooding the otherwise subdued, atmospheric bar. Our recommendation would be to sit to the left of the bar if you can.

We also finally did spend a little time by the Aquarius pool at the ship’s aft on the final morning as it was the only place with seats where we could have breakfast before departure. The buffet offerings on Arcadia were better than we were expecting from our past cruises with P&O so another plus point foodwise there.

Arcadia Cruise Summary

I know there’s a lot of moaning in this review of Arcadia but there’s no point reviewing something if you’re not going to pick out the bad points as well as the good; the world doesn’t need another person claiming everything is fantastic and you’ll never get the cruise lines to improve their offering if they don’t get honest feedback. P&O still have a problem with consistency of service and in our opinion they need to just ramp their speciality dining offerings up a notch, though that’s partly the fault of having such good quality offerings in the main dining room.

We liked Arcadia a lot. We’re still Grand-class fans more than we are Vista-class but the ship design had a lot to recommend it. She’s at the lower end of the size of ship we’d like to take a longer cruise on but we’d have no problem at all taking one on her and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend her if asked.

Our preference when cruising is to book a balcony but on the older, smaller cruise ships balconies are sometimes not there at all and when they are they’re a big premium. Astoria does actually have some balcony cabins and an owners suite that includes one too but the price for a single night was more than we wanted to spend, especially with such a short trip and extremely limited opportunity to make use of the outside space. Through the CMV website, therefore, we picked an Outside Guarantee (OG) so we’d have some natural light through either a small porthole or picture window. Astoria has seventeen grades of cabin with grades 1-5 being inside rooms, 6-15 being outside ones, 16 being the balconies, and 17 being the owners suite. Our OG meant we’d get a grade 6 at the very least. The way guarantees tend to work on cruises is that often some cabins are reserved for sales but then returned to the pool, people in grades lower than those still vacant are then offered upsells to see if they’ll move up for a small amount, and whatever’s left will then be allocated to the guaranteed people. It’s entirely possible that this just didn’t happen for a one-night cruise or that nobody took up the chance to have a Deluxe Junior Suite (grade 15) but whatever the reason, that’s what we ended up being allocated. A bit of a surprise and more details on that below.

Portsmouth port is a fabulous cruise destination as far as we’re concerned because we can walk to it in ten minutes from our house. It has fairly shallow water and doesn’t really have the facilities to handle the larger ships but smaller ones frequently stop there. This would be our first time arriving in our home city on a cruise ship but first we had to get to Poole. For that we booked the coach with CMV for £20 per person. We strolled up with our carry-on bag, had our names checked, got on, and were off on our way about five minutes later than scheduled. Our first impressions of our fellow cruise passengers was that although they were on average older than us it was more than offset by the young-at-heart mentality in effect; we remarked that the coach trip had more of a feel of a school outing than anything else. There were two coaches in total and on the other, before leaving, we saw one woman necking wine from a bottle which raised some laughter on our bus. Several people on our coach had seen fit to bring wine and disposable cups with them so they could start early too. We’ll have to remember to do something similar if we’re ever in the same situation again. The friendly atmosphere continued as light-hearted griping about how long it was taking to reach Poole grew with comments along the lines of we’d be arriving just as the ship was docking at Portsmouth at the rate we were going. All in good humour. The actual trip took about two hours overall, about half an hour longer than expected.

Astoria Embarkation

Embarkation on Astoria was quite different from anything we’ve experienced before on our cruises with Princess and P&O, involving separate steps for cruise cards and accounts arrangements as well as a more personal approach to getting to your room.

At Poole port we walked into the small terminal building to fill in the health form and pick up our boarding pass then hopped on a shuttle bus to the ship. A steep gangplank took us onto the Mediterranean Deck where we then walked up the curving staircase by reception onto Calypso Deck to head forward and queue at the Calypso Lounge where our credit cards could be scanned for onboard purchases. A member of staff then took each cabin’s worth of passengers to their rooms. The steward who showed us to our Deluxe Junior Suite on Navigators Deck had never seen our room before and made all the oohing and aahing noises for us as he showed us around.

Deluxe Junior Suite

The Deluxe Junior Suite (cabin 602) is a unique cabin on Astoria, comprising three decent-sized rooms, one of which backs onto the ship’s bridge. Upon entering the suite you come into a sitting room with a large sofa, a coffee table with a bowl of fruit, and a dressing table with TV on it set up with tea and coffee-making facilities, canapés, and complimentary bottles of wine and water. We knew that all the suites and balcony cabins had these benefits but weren’t expecting them since we’d have the upgrade from our cheap outside view so that was nice to see. There is a single window – a small, picture window – behind the sofa but the view is almost completely obstructed by a lifeboat outside. There wasn’t a great deal of light coming in as a result but it was probably enough for how much the room might realistically be used if you were cruising on the ship. Our steward had unlocked the door with his skeleton key but the room keys were on the table.

This is actually worth noting on its own, depending on what ships you might have cruised with before, as it was new for us. The traditional-looking cruise or boarding card was used for purchases onboard, as you’d expect. However, room keys are separate, fairly large, and mechanical in operation (like elongated punch cards) as opposed to the barcode-read electronic ones you might have experienced on other cruises. It should also be noted that at disembarkation you’re required to leave the room keys in your room, that this is checked by stewards before you leave the ship, any missing keys are called for over the ship’s tannoy by room number, and failure to hand them in costs £15 per key.

Adjacent to the sitting room is the bedroom which is just large enough for two beds in their double configuration with small tables either side. Opposite the bed is a decent-sized wardrobe and dressing table with another TV on it. TV reception on the cruise was generally poor when it was tried but it wasn’t tried very often due to the short duration. Another picture window in the room provides a substantially less obstructed view between two lifeboats.

Importantly, the only plug sockets available were European-style, two round prongs. We’d known this and brought along adapters but it’s interesting that only one of the adapters actually fit, that labelled the Southern European style which appears to be a little thinner than its northern counterpart. Just something to be aware of.

The last of the rooms is the bathroom and because the room is a Deluxe Junior Suite it is very large as these things go, including upgraded toiletries (I believe) and a jacuzzi bath. Being children we were keen to try out the jacuzzi bath so made sure we did before dinner on the cruise but we never could quite get it to work properly with probably the longest burst of bubbles lasting half a dozen seconds. Because of the jet nozzles we found the bath quite an odd shape too so as a luxury gimmick it was mildly fun to have but I wouldn’t let its presence dictate the booking of a room now that we’ve experienced it.

Muster Drill

Our experience of musters on Princess and P&O have been largely the same with Princess differentiating themselves positively more recently by ditching the need to bring life jackets (insert regular pleading with other cruise lines to follow suit here). Astoria’s muster was very different for us although it might be fairly normal for other lines; because we’ve not cruised with a wide variety of lines we can’t say for certain. I can describe the muster we experienced, though. We congregated in the Calypso Lounge once more which had been roughly quartered based on your lifeboat assignment, in turn designated by your cabin location. A reasonably short announcement from the bridge was made and a simple demonstration was performed by the staff about how to wear the jackets. The first big difference was a roll call that then took place. As this was just a drill only a few cabins were chosen from each area but people were required to raise their hands and shout “Here!” Then the second difference was we were all led up the stairs and out onto the promenade deck to line up near our assigned lifeboats. We’ve always ignored the “Bring your life jackets and warm clothing and head coverings” instruction before and the weather was fine enough for us anyway but I would definitely reconsider this depending on how cold or rainy it is should we cruise on Astoria or any of CMV’s ships again.

Ship Exploration And Drinks

Muster out of the way we had time for a quick wander around before getting on with the important business of seeing what the drinks were like. We are creatures of habit.

Astoria has a slight banana-like bend to its shape with the prow and aft curving up slightly from the centre of the ship. This was very noticeable as we walked around the deck looking out at Poole harbour although no pictures show it. In fact, we’d also noticed it in our suite as there was a very definite slope down walking from the sitting room into the bedroom and with the bed facing forward we would end up sleeping with our feet slightly raised above our bodies. To the aft of the ship is a small but deep pool, emptied for this gala cruise but usually filled with unheated water. I imagine there are only select cruises aboard Astoria where that’s very pleasant.

Calypso Deck is where the lounges, games room, casino, shops, and main bar are located, a lot of which was understandably closed up or just unused for this short taster cruise.

At Sirenes Bar we settled down (after tripping up the step to the seat; something we saw repeated by at least a dozen other people on the cruise) to try some of the drinks and listen to some of the piano and violin accompaniment from a couple of the ship’s entertainment staff. We were fairly impressed with the drinks selection but even more so from the level of service. It’s been our assertion until now that service levels on Princess are mostly fabulous while P&O generally has some catching up to do, but CMV’s service was probably the best we’ve had. Stewards were constantly wandering around, looking for empty glasses, gauging how soon people would be finishing their drinks to offer something else, and very friendly indeed (a common trait amongst Astoria’s staff). We tried some weird and wonderful concoctions because that’s what we do when we’re on holiday.

Gala Dinner

This overnight cruise aboard Astoria was a Gala cruise, meaning formal wear, so after looking at a pleasing sunset from our cabin as we left Poole and our disappointing jacuzzi experience my wife and I got into our posh dress and tuxedo respectively and headed down to the bar for a pre-dinner drink, which for me is usually a Vodka Martini if I’m making the effort to look like James Bond but on this occasion was gin-based.

We got talking to a couple who were regular CMV cruisers and who remarked how friendly everyone was and how good the service was – which we agreed with based on our short experience – and who extolled the many virtues of the fleet’s size of vessels such as their recent cruise up the Amazon where their ship could stop at numerous points along the river while a larger ship could only stop at one.

Fixed dining is something we have never done but which we had no real choice about for this cruise. In our cabin there had been a card indicating we were the late seating for dinner and were on table number 6. At the appropriate time we and most of the rest of the bar filed down the stairs to Atlantic Deck and restaurant. We quickly found our table which was a table for four and by the window. As it turned out, the other two people assigned to our table didn’t initially turn up, then turned up late because they were special, then decided they were even more special than that and didn’t want to share so had a table for two set up for them near the middle of the room. We ended up with a table for ourselves and a pleasing view of the water flowing past so that worked out pretty well.

As I’ve said, this was our first experience of fixed dining and our expectation was simply that other than a set time and place to eat it would be identical to any other dining on any other cruise but that wasn’t quite true. When we’ve dined before on Princess and P&O we’ve had no problems with sharing a table with other people; we’re generally approachable even if we don’t go out of our way to instigate chat and we’re perfectly fine with engaging in small talk with strangers for the duration of a meal. If you’re sharing and some of you skip a course then you wait while the others have theirs before you all are served the next course at the same time; that’s pretty standard. What we saw on Astoria was that waiters seemed to have groups of tables to manage and the courses were being delivered not on a per-table basis, but on a per-group-of-tables basis. This may be just how it’s always done for fixed dining everywhere but the result was that we had quite a gap between two of the courses as neither my wife or I wanted salad but because some people on one of the other tables did we had to wait for them to finish first. It’s not a big deal by any means but it was a bit puzzling until we worked out what was happening. Our service, though, was exemplary with water topped up before it was empty (a marked contrast to our recent cruise on Arcadia there) and orders taken and food delivered with a smile. A free glass of champagne was handed out to everyone as it was a gala night and the traditional Baked Alaska Parade took place before dessert was served. Food quality was good but not outstanding but there were certainly no complaints with what we had.

Gala Cruise Evening Entertainment

There was a show on but we don’t really do shows so can’t comment on the quality of the entertainment there so headed instead to the Night Club at the aft of the Promenade Deck via the outside deck in order not to disturb people who were watching a movie in the auditorium.

The night club’s location and large glass windows affording views out to sea (admittedly not much in the way of views because of darkness outside and reflections inside) reminded us a lot of Skywalkers on Grand-class Princess ships so that was great. The club itself was small with an equally small bar but we got there while it was all still empty, grabbed seats by the dance floor, and were served swiftly with drinks. Even when the venue was rammed later in the night service was still impressively quick. We had some impromptu entertainment from one of our fellow passengers who decided that fancy clothes or not she was drunk enough to do forward rolls across the dance floor; that’s a first on any cruise ship for us.

As the place filled up following the end of the show that had been on it rapidly became standing room only and the DJ eventually gave way to one of the entertainment staff performing numerous karaoke hits, mostly aimed at the women present we imagine (think: Robbie Williams). We stayed a while longer then made our way back to our room via the auditorium that we’d bypassed when we approached the club earlier.

Disembarkation

We were due in Portsmouth at 07:00 and that was also the time we had to be out of our cabins which seemed grossly unfairly early. That said, we didn’t really have any problems getting up early enough for that and while it had been our attention to wake at 06:30, grab some breakfast, then return to our room and grab our bag what we ended up doing instead once we saw the approaching dawn through our window as we made our way towards the harbour was grab cameras and head to the promenade deck to take some pictures and video.

The breakfast buffet was absolutely fine with plates being handed to servers who would then plate up what you wanted from the typical offerings. There was a station where fried eggs and omelettes could be made to order too, so that was a nice touch. Following breakfast we then waited in the bar while the ship was cleared to disembark passengers. This took a surprisingly long amount of time especially when you consider this was a cruise that started in Britain, finished in Britain, and never left British waters. There couldn’t have been customs checks so I’m not sure why there was such a delay but disembarkation then took place in strict deck order. Our luck continued as our deck was called first and we were not then long getting off the ship, shuttling across to the terminal, then having an easy 10-minute walk home.

Astoria Cruise Summary

Overall, we liked Astoria a lot.

Obviously, no holiday is ever perfect so there were some things we didn’t like so much. Early disembarkation and wait wasn’t a great way to end the cruise (even if it had meant we got some spectacular views coming into port) and we’ve not become sudden fans of fixed dining either. Unnoticeable during the day but at night we became very aware of just how noisy our cabin was despite being up high and at the front of the ship; we think it was engine noise and vibration travelling through the ship’s hull and it led to a somewhat disturbed night’s sleep so we’re not sure what that would be like on a longer cruise. Astoria’s size was absolutely fine for an overnight cruise and I’m sure she’d be the same for a long weekend, perhaps. However, beyond that there was a feeling that she was just a little bit too small for us. We don’t like the newer, huge ships but we have got used to and like that 2600-3600 capacity size vessel with anything more feeling impersonal and anything markedly smaller feeling like it might start to trigger bouts of stir craziness. We know the size is ideal for other people, though; this is just a personal thing.

On the very positive side the bed was absolutely spot-on for us; exactly as firm as we like it, making it far superior to Princess and their much-vaunted luxury beds there. Also better than Princess was the service from the staff. Absolutely how it should be in every respect there. The general friendliness of everyone we ran into, whether staff or passenger, couldn’t be faulted anywhere and there was a feeling that just being on Astoria with Cruise and Maritime Voyages was what made that so.

CMV do some interesting itineraries and get to a lot of places that the larger, more modern fleets can’t get to making them very appealing indeed. I can easily recommend Astoria if only because she’s a bit of history but also CMV for some very fine, traditional service indeed and we’d have no hesitation cruising with them again with the right ship and cabin for the duration, itinerary, and price.

That was the plan right up until we opened the curtain in our room and saw that not only were we still a little way off the Southsea coastline but the sun hadn’t risen yet and was in the process of painting the eastern horizon with some gorgeous dawn colours against which one of the Solent forts was nicely silhouetted.

Breakfast was postponed and we headed out to the promenade deck of Astoria instead to enjoy nature’s accompaniment to our slow progression into our home port.

The first thing we passed along Portsmouth’s seafront is Southsea’s funfair, Clarence Pier (not much of a pier to be honest), which dates back to 1861 although its present form is a reconstruction following damage from German bombing raids in World War II. The most prominent visible structure in the low light of the early morning was the Solent Wheel which comes and goes with the seasons, it seems, and is considerably smaller than the original design called for.

Before we reached the major icon of the Portsmouth skyline (and another structure considerably smaller than the original design called for (I’m sensing a pattern)), the Spinnaker Tower, we then cruised past Spice Island (as it’s known locally for seedy, historical reasons), easily identified by the fortifications that protected it and the city and closed it off from the rest of Portsmouth, and from where the official name, Portsmouth Point, derives and from the abbreviation of which in ship’s logbooks – “Po’m P.” – is one explanation for the city’s nickname. The Square Tower and Round Tower are fairly easy to spot in the photographs below and the church in silhouette is the Garrison church, another victim of wartime raids in the area.

If you’re ever on a cruise out of Southampton you’ll probably be able to see the highly recognisable landmark of Portsmouth, the 170 metres-high Spinnaker Tower, from quite some distance away, and rounding Spice Island took Astoria right past it. The Spinnaker Tower, as its name implies, is designed to resemble the sail of a ship and is located in the waterfront outlet retail centre of Gunwharf Quays. We’ve been up the tower several times and it and Gunwharf are great and popular places to visit if you ever hit Portsmouth yourself. Listen to me sounding like a regular travel blogger there and recommending places!

The final stretch of water in through Portsmouth Harbour and towards the cruise port took Astoria past the headquarters for the Americas Cup yacht-building team, the Historic Dockyard, and the Royal Navy Dockyard (technically, Her Majesty’s Naval Base, Portsmouth but I don’t know anyone who calls it that).

The historic dockyard houses the famous maritime vessels you’re probably well aware of: HMS Victory, HMS Warrior, and Mary Rose. Again, trying not to sound too much like a cheesy tourist guide to my own city here but really worth a visit if you come down.

Friends of ours were married on HMS Warrior, the first armour-plated, iron-hulled warship. She’s a lovely ship to walk around.

HMS Victory is the world’s oldest naval ship still in commission, is the flagship of the First Sea Lord, and was Lord Nelson’s flagship during the Battle of Trafalgar. The upper masts and much of the rigging has currently been removed for repair hence her squat appearance but it’s still a very worthwhile visit if you get the chance just to see the spot where Nelson was killed on the deck.

The first English and oldest surviving dry dock in the world was built at Portsmouth in 1495 under the orders of the Tudor king Henry VII. These days the naval base, the oldest in the Royal Navy, serves as home to two thirds of its surface fleet. Cruising quietly past in the early hours of the morning we were strangely impressed by the number and variety of ships docked – it’s just something we’ve never really been that aware of living in the city all our lives – and were only slightly disappointed that the aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth was out at sea on trials.

HMS Tyne is a River-class offshore patrol vessel that had a fairly short lifespan before being decommissioned early in 2018 only to be recommissioned a few months later when it was realised that the political implications of this country’s idiotic sprint into economic oblivion thanks to the racists, morons, and racist morons who voted for and are carrying through with Brexit despite all common sense might require some form of dick-waving to protect our microscopic fishing industry. You don’t want an occasional political rant when you’re reading a travel account? There’s always somewhere else dull to read.

HMS Dragon is pretty easy to spot if she’s docked in the Portsmouth Naval Base on account of her distinctive Welsh red dragon prow decorations; she is the only Royal Navy ship so decorated. Dragon is a Type-45 (Daring-class) air-defence destroyer.

One of Dragon’s sister ships is HMS Defender. As this is a travel-related site these days with an emphasis on cruising it’s worth noting that HMS Defender escorted Cunard’s Queen Mary 2 through the Gulf of Oman in 2016. Not a cruise ship or line we’ve experienced yet nor a part of the world we’ve cruised through, either, but we’d quite like to, especially if you can get a warship escort as well.

HMS Westminster is a Type 23 frigate. If you’ve ever seen the James Bond movie Tomorrow Never Dies then you’ll have seen parts of HMS Westminster as she was used to film the interior shots of the vessels HMS Chester, HMS Devonshire, and HMS Bedford.

Another Type 23 frigate docked in Portsmouth Harbour as we cruised past was HMS St Albans. The cruiseferry GNV Atlas – in 2002 operating with P&O Ferries as the Pride of Portsmouth – crashed into HMS St Albans due to gale force winds before it had entered operational service, causing damage to the gun deck and bridge.

Currently awaiting disposal following decommissioning, the final naval ship we spotted on our approach to the port was RFA Gold Rover, a Royal Fleet Auxiliary Rover-class tanker. In its first year of commission, 1974, Gold Rover assisted with evacuation duties during the invasion of Cyprus by Turkish forces.

Some miscellaneous photos of the various warships around the naval dockyard of Portsmouth:

Finally, we approached the port itself, grabbed our bags from our room, left the keys in the room (a CMV thing: you leave the keys in the room on disembarkation otherwise you’re charged for them), had some breakfast in the buffet (fairly standard fare although the ability to have omelettes and fried eggs prepared for you at a station while you waited was quite a nice touch), then waited to be allowed to disembark. That took a surprisingly long time considering this had been an overnight cruise from Poole to Portsmouth (so there couldn’t have been customs to clear you wouldn’t have thought) but eventually we were called deck-by-deck to depart Astoria and our deck was called first. A ten minute walk from the port saw us arriving home.

I’m biased, of course, but Portsmouth is a fantastic port to cruise into because of all the incredible, history-rich sights you pass on the way in. To do so while the sun has just started lighting up the horizon is an incredible experience and one you shouldn’t miss if you ever have the chance.