This cruise really started for us in October last year when we attended a Dinner Dance organised by The Crows Nest, an on-line Cruise Forum I use. I was fortunate enough to win first prize in the Raffle, which was a choice of 2-night P&O cruises in 2009, kindly donated by Cruisekings and arranged by Les, one of the staff there. As we had already travelled on some of the ships and don't fancy Ventura, we opted for Oceana, as she would not be our first choice ship.

Fast-forward almost a year and we set off on the Friday afternoon to stay overnight in the Holiday Inn overlooking Southampton Water. We had cruised aboard Oriana in June and enjoyed the company of Kathy & Mike (amongst others) on our table. Kathy & Mike are local to Southampton so we were pleased to be able to arrange to have dinner with them on the Friday night. We went to La Regatta on Town Quay for a very pleasant Tapas meal. The food & wine were good, service okay and prices reasonable.

After a hearty breakfast on Saturday morning, we re-grouped the packing and left for Dock Gate 4 about 1110. I wondered if we would be some of the first to arrive that early but there were at least 100 - 200 people already there I would estimate. We got the car parked and strolled to the Ocean Terminal, popped the one large case through the 'hole in the wall' and then up the escalator to departures and were given 'E' check-in cards. We then relaxed with some refreshments from the 'cafe', some complimentary magazines and that day's copy of Horizon - what a great idea to give it out before actually boarding! I wondered why, when they spent millions on the new terminal, the cafe has been built like a 1950's Rail Station 'hole in the wall'. Surely you can do better than that Carnival/ABP? Read more