Britannia Review
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We were so looking forward to this cruise as there had been so much hype on how fantastic this ship was. Sadly there was very little WOW factor overall. Britannia is a lovely ship with regard to the decor - but lacking on so many points.
Embarkation was horrendous. We arrived at 2.30pm and didn't board until 5.00pm due to an issue with the air bridge. We were not advised of this when we arrived and there were thousands of people in the lounge waiting to embark. The staff were bad in not advising us of the problem and there were no refreshments or provided and it was difficult to find a seat. There was no real welcome on board either. Dire.
The food was hit & miss - we ate in the Meridian each evening. On one occasion the food was so atrocious we had to complain all the way to the Food & Beverage Officer who really didn't care. Her arrogance was unbelievable - she evidently thought it was acceptable to serve slimy decaying lettuce in a Caesar salad and one small slice of beef and broccoli that had gone yellow as it was well past it's sell by date. We heard that if you paid to eat in the select dining restaurants you fared better. However, we paid a lot of money for our holiday and expected the main restaurants to be of standard.
Cabin Review
Small - We booked a balcony cabin with a sofa bed for our daughter. Once the sofa bed was down you couldn't use the dressing table or fridge & if you wanted to go out on the balcony you had to climb over the sofa bed. The open wardrobe was messy and not enough hangers for the three of us. There were so many shoes on the floor it resembled a mosque. Some shelves for shoes would have helped. The bathroom was OK but if you had a weight issue you would struggle. Our toilet took many presses to flush (counted 31 presses). We complained and who knows if it ever was attended to there was no feedback - it was marginally better - perhaps 10-15 presses of the flush. The bed & pillows were comfortable. However, we could hear our neighbour's tv whenever it was on. We had issues with an internal staff door in the corridor being continually being slammed throughout the day & night. This caused a rift with our neighbours as they accused us (aggressively) of continually slamming our door. It wasn't us and fortunately we were able to prove this & getting an officer to put a slow closer on the internal door sorted the problem but left a nasty feeling in our mouths.