I was awake early this morning to see our sail into Portsmouth, we were then greeted with a torrential downpour as the skies seemed to open just as we were being tied up. Although we booked a time slot to disembark, we had not received any other information so we called Sailor Services to find out the protocol. We were told cases out by 10:00 or you can carry them off yourself. Being as we hadn’t got any luggage tags and our cases weren’t too large, we decided we would walk off with them.
With enough time to have breakfast, we paid our last visit to The Galley to get something to eat before grabbing our things from the cabin and disembarking.
Shuttle buses were on standby to ferry us back to the terminal building where it was just a 5-minute walk to get back to the car. We have really enjoyed our first experience with Virgin Voyages and would certainly consider them should the right itinerary come along with a price that works.
I don’t think we are totally ready to embrace everything on the phone just yet and we did have issues with keeping the phone fully charged while out and about around the ship. We also thought it encouraged people to sit and stare at their phones more than they probably would, with it being particularly noticeable in restaurants. We have rekindled our love for cruising and are now seeking to fill a holiday slot left open by a South Africa cancellation so that maybe not be all for this year. We have had a change of heart regarding Staycation cruises so lookout for some new posts in the not too distant future.
Thanks for the blog. Very informative. We are sailing g on Monday. Can’t wait to get in that hammock! Did you see any of the shows? We have booked 2.
I don’t think everything was available for the first sailing, if it was then we were blissfully unaware. We did see Dual Reality which I can’t recommend highly enough, it’s a great performance.
Enjoy the hammock and enjoy the cruise. 😀
Many thanks for sharing the mist useful information. We are joining the ship on Friday and have found it quite mind boggling, so your blog really helped. Very disappointed with the app so far!
Thanks again
Hi Wans
Glad you both enjoyed the cruise and thanks for allowing me to cross post to Cruisedot as I’m sure they found it as informative as we did.
No problem, I’m sure someone might have found it useful.
You got me so excited with that first picture. I thought you had gotten some specialty octopus. What was that about? Congrats on your first cruise in ages. Hope you get many more and soon!
It’s the Virgin Voyages mascot, I believe he is called Ink
Hi Mike. Thanks for the excellent insight. Our turn coming up. As I’ve never subscribed to the view one can make a valid judgement on a ship/cruise line in 3 days our sole raison d’être was to have a weekend away with friends and enjoy ourselves. It appears from your reports that that is now guaranteed. I will of course create a blog but having utilised RB’s kind enhanced bar tab offer that may have to wait till disembarkation. Thanks again for your reports. I’ve passed them all to our travelling friends.
Thanks Richard, I am sure you will make the best of it and I will eagerly await your opinion of the product and ship.