Cruises, Cruise Deals & Cruise Holidays

My concern would not be the original problem but with the failure of the crew to deal with your complaint. My friends who own Skokas tell me that the company is very good at handling complaints. It sounds to me like Trabant service. We also faced indiffernce when we had a problem earlier thii year.

Its always the case you pay for a Skoda and expect a Rolls Royce!

Watertight doors are closed when entering or leaving port, during restricted visability, restricted navigational space or in an emergency or during drills - this is mandated by law. It is also law that anyone who is "cut off" from the normal route by a WT door MUST be shown the alternative escape route before departure and it should be clearly marked. Very very few ships sailing nowadays have WT doors in passenger areas but I would write to Fred Olsen as if they did not show you the alternative route they 1. broke the law and 2. potentially threatened your safety.

It's hard to imagine the closure of water-tight doors could ruin your cruise. Inconvenient yes, but surely not significant in the overall experience.

My husband and I were on this cruise and also on deck three.We didn't have any noise problems and no problems with the watertight doors (although we were midship).This was the first time we had cruised with Fred Olsen and we thoroughly enjoyed it.We thought the food was excellent and I mostly had two puddings each evening as I couldn't make up my mind!They didn't seem to mind how many courses you had or if you wanted two if you were hungry.Although the food was pretty continuous throughout the day anyway. We found the staff friendly particularly our cabin attendant. The shows in the Neptune Lounge were fantastic and so professional.We thought the comedian was very funny for most of his act. The Magician we didn't really rate at all. A nice guy but a boring and predictable act. The only gripe we had was with the tender service to Guernsey for which we waited two hours for, leaving us not much time before we had to leave to come back. All in all we had a spacious cabin which was excellent value, great food, marvellous entertainment, friendly staff - and we had good weather too! We would definitely go on a Fred cruise again.

I find it difficult to believe that Pells is describing the same boat as that on which we have just spent two fantastic weeks. Surely, there must be some downside to booking a cabin on Deck 3, otherwise there would be no point in people paying considerably and progressively more for the higher deck cabins. As with most things, you get what you pay for. Deck 3 is partly a passenger deck and partly a service/crew deck and therefore one has to expect some noise from staff carrying out essential services during the night, such as luggage handling on the last night. It is a little unfair to condem Fred Olsen in general terms for this although the experience with the watertight doors does seem rather bizarre.