Free 2 night cruise break Newcastle - Stavanger (Norway)

pondie1

i enjoyed my cruise in february,we had a fairly mild crossing,wouldnt have gone if it hadnt been free so gave me a chance to see norway(a little part of it)we took salad meals from asda,mini snack pastries,biscuits,travel kettle with us helped one meal,we actually prebooked the breakfasts,really enjoyed it won the quiz a free cruise which we couldnt use as it had to be used within next month,if i wasnt goin on holiday in july i would have booked this again myself

vfm

Thankyou for this information, just got one of these booked for August, the dates now seem to be August and September.

I live less than an hour from Newcastle and went on one of these a few years ago (paid for) and had a lovely time. I wouldn't class it as a cruise in the true sense, however, in my opinion it was a nice short break and the scenery travelling up the Norwegin coast was beautiful. The prices on board are quite high but you can overcome this by taking your own food and drink. Fortunately when we last went the weather was lovely and we sat out on deck with our own food and drink admiring the scenery.

I wouldn't advise anyone who would incur a lot of costs getting to Newcastle to go on this, however if Newcastle is close in my opinion it is a good short break.

Thanks again.

Bubbles101

Can you post a link to a the free august and septembers ones? I can't seem to find it on the website. I live near the port too and would love to go:D

~*Plushroom*~

The first link says it couldn't find what I was looking for, how odd!

System

There were only 500 places and they have all been taken so the offer is now closed

sovarn

Well i managed to book tickets for the 10th of june and will report back to you guys on the experience.

pinginal

sovarn wrote: »

Well i managed to book tickets for the 10th of june and will report back to you guys on the experience.

Please do!! I'm booked to go on the 17th June.

xmlkid

Hi all,

Did the trip and got back yesterday thought I'd post my thoughts.

The DFDS side of things was very smooth - got the boarding card that doubled up as a room key. Left my baggage in the room the entire trip, only taking it out when leaving the boat back at North Shields. If you were leaving the boat in Stavanger to stay, you had to vacate the room two hours early but there was a left luggage facility.

The boat itself was pleasant enough - food was available in several places, I took my own but £8 for a breakfast probably isn't bad value (a McMeal in Stavanger was £7!!). There's a decent coffee bar that had a plasma tv showing Sky News all the time, typically £2 for a smallish coffee, again, not unreasonable. They also did soup and sandwiches (soup 45NOK, around £3.80).

There was a small duty free shop which I didn't bother with and also a two screen cinema, showing three movies in each screen, enough to pass some time.

The main bar was much like a social club, but I didn't spend much time there. They also had a piano bar adjacent.

There's seats on the rear of the boat and the top deck, which if the weather is nice, there's a bar open in each area. A nice touch.

The North Sea was like a millpond there and back so I can't comment on the seasickness tales mentioned elsewhere.

My only complaint would be the cabin. It really could have done with at least a new carpet (and I suspect beds - don't want to think too hard about it). There was a definite smell of bodily fluids in there (vomit? urine? not pleasant anyhow). The carpet outside the cabin had a couple of very dodgy green stains on it. I was on deck 2, right down the bottom of the ship, near the sauana and pools.

Overall, I can't complain. Staff were nice, trip fun but the room not great. If you've booked it, go you've nothing to lose and Stavanger is a nice place to see if only for a couple of hours!

I'll post some pictures soon and link to them from here.

Lee

chunkeebum

I also went on the free cruise. I arrived back yesterday. I have to say this was a pretty good cruise considering it was free. I read on HUKD that the prices were a complete rip off and it was £8 for a pint. For this reason I stocked up on food, I literally packed enough to feed a family of five for a week.

Upon boarding the ship we were quite surprised to find that it was actually really nice. Other people had said it was basically a hovel. It was clean and nice, lots of things to do, nice cafe, 2 resteraunts, a sauna, a pool, a gym, a cinema a piano bar, a club with live entertainment and a disco.

We were also on deck 2. When we entered our room we were quite dissapointed at first, it was actually like a coffin with 1 bed and a foldout settee bed on the floor and 2 bunk beds above these. The bathroom was also tiny, but we were only staying for 2 nights. On top of this I also noticed that these rooms typically cost about £74 on the same cruise when not on offer. So for free they were pretty good. It was clean but in need of a makeover. This didn't bother us as we were barely there and when the light was off we couldn't see the shabbiness! My only real complaint about the room was the air conditioning, it was none existent and it was very hot on the boat.

The live entertainment in the club at night was pretty bad but entertaining, there was also a very bad but funny dance troupe called "Magic and Dance" who did just that - but badly! Very funny though.

The next day was even better. The sun shone all day and the sea was very calm we even saw dolphins! :T According to regular voyagers we were lucky as the North Sea is never that warm or calm! So that was a plus. On the way back was very cold and foggy. I think if you have good weather it is a nice trip but quite boring if it was cold all the time.

That day we also had our meals which we had purchased in the 7 seas buffet resteraunt. The food was lovely, but be warned there is alot of fish. Crab, lobster, caviar, salmon, mackeral herring. I did not personally like alot of the food as I hate fish, the rest was nice though, not a chip in sight! The puddings were devine. We actually only booked 1 meal each on our return journey but a mistake was made somewhere and when we recieved our meal vouchers we had 2 each so we paid for 2 and got 4! :beer:

So all in all a pretty good value short break. My and my BF spent around £80 between us. This included our meals on board, the food we bought before hand, travel insurance, purchases in the onboard shop and drinks in the bars.

I would definitly do one of these cruises again even if they weren't free because I really enjoyed myself and they cost about the same as it would for a two night break in the UK but you get to see another country!

mobilecat

We have booked for August. We have booked the breakfasts on oth days and the evening meal before we dock in norway. We will take lots of food and drink with is and if needs be park ages away and get the bus to the port to save on parking (but I will check this out anyway). We will get there with plenty of time - £65. Ok for a few days away from child.