Embarkation at Southampton was not as slick as usual. We arrived early, about noon, and had to wait nearly two hours before our number was called to register and then a long queue for security which was very thorough, before we boarded the ship. Our luggage arrived at our cabin soon after we did so that was good. We had been on Aurora previously across the Pacific so we were interested to compare Oriana with our first P & O experience early last year.

The Oriana is about 10,000 tons lighter than the Aurora but the layout is similar with a walk around promenade on deck seven always welcome. Some more modern ships do not retain this important, for us, feature. Oriana also has tiered outside decks at the stern so you can walk up from deck seven all the way to the Conservatory Buffet on deck 12 pausing on the way at each deck to look at the view on open decks.

At the scheduled departure time around 6 p.m. the ship was still tied up to the dock and looking over the port side we saw a Dutch diving crew with two large vans working busily at the stern of the ship. Some time after this, the Captain's voice came over the tannoy announcing that there was a problem with the fitting of a new seal on the port side propeller shaft and work would not be complete until midnight at which time he hoped to set sale for Norway. Read more