On the maiden voyage the only decent food was at the keel and cow. Some of the others were poor including 6 street dinner which in my opinion was not good. Hopefully things have improved now .
We came iff the arvia just over a week ago... Good review but no sindu ? Sindu was outstanding, the starers we delicious, the main was "alot" but we were overwhelmed with flavours and smells, and the dessert was worth it... Overall an amazing place to eat.
Wish I had tried Sindhu but never got the chance - ran out of time trying all the other restaurants. Glad to hear it was good though. Next time I’ll make sure I book Sindhu too. Thanks for watching
I'm going on Arvia in a few weeks and have heard a lot of horror stories about terrible overcrowding which is making me nervous. But in all your videos the ship looks quite quiet. A few questions: Was it full? Did you make the vids at non-peak times to get better shots, and do you have any tips regarding booking/getting tables?
Hi, I wouldn’t worry too much. Yes the ship was full on this sailing but I didn’t choose special times to film so it was quieter (except in the Horizon buffet which gets pretty hectic at peak times). But there is a way to avoid any real queuing issues and that is to pre-book dinner in the restaurants before the actual cruise (using the same webpage that is used to access your online check-in, luggage tags, book shore excursions etc). You can make online reservations once you’re within two weeks of your sailing date. For the main dining rooms Zenith and Meridian as well as the 6th Street Diner and Olive Grove (which are all the included restaurants) they let you pre-book between 5.30pm and 6.30pm (if you want later dining times then you have to do it onboard and join the virtual queue on the P&O app every night, or you can just go to the restaurant and they’ll give you a buzzer when your table is ready). Speciality restaurants can be pre-booked for whatever time you like but if you pre-book before your cruise then they charge you in advance at a discounted rate (usually 20% off the onboard price). But this could be an issue if you have any cabin credit included in your fare as I believe this won’t be accessible to use until you get onboard (in which case I’d recommend booking speciality restaurants on the app the moment you get onboard as they get fully booked very quickly for the entire cruise - as does the Headliner Theatre and 710 Club so I recommend booking that as soon as you get onboard too). Strangely I found that whilst the speciality restaurants tended to always be fully booked on the cruise they never looked anywhere near full. I suspect that this is due to staffing shortages where they just can’t run those restaurants at full capacity. So when you mentioned that some of the restaurants didn’t look busy in the video it’s probably for two reasons: 1 because I tended to book fairly early dining around 6pm and 2 because they didn’t appear to run at capacity. Obviously everything I’ve mentioned above just applies to dinner but I never really had problems for breakfast or lunch. You can either go to the main dining rooms and physically queue or put yourself in the virtual queue on the P&O app (it was never a long wait, say 15 minutes at the most generally). Of course there’s walk-in places like the Horizon buffet, the Quays (fish and chips, Asian and Carvery - the Carvery also serves breakfast) or Taste 360 in the SkyDome for burgers, hotdogs and pizza from 11am onwards. In case you’re not familiar with it the P&O app onboard works pretty well. When you book a restaurant and your table is ready you get a notification on your smartphone or tablet and then you just have to show up at the restaurant within 15 minutes of getting that notification. Hope this helps and have a great cruise!
Arvia is a brilliant ship we were on it in February and everything was fine. You can book what restaurants you want everyone we tried was excellent. Entertainment every night it was our third cruise love it.
Glad you liked the production. I’d have liked to try both of those restaurants too but time just didn’t allow us to get to every single restaurant onboard for dinner, partly because we felt we needed to eat in the main dining room at least a few times to get an idea of how consistent the quality of food was. Although, in the interests of full disclosure, I always had Green & Co lower on the list as I’m not much of a healthy eater and so me reviewing Green & Co would be about as useful as a vegetarian reviewing a steak house. Seriously though, I do take your point but this was only the first food review video I’ve made, so I always knew there was going to be room for improvement….and I guarantee it will only get better going forward.
Food quality has significantly deteriorated, lots of cost cutting going on, watery soup that I think are dry mixes, custard for desserts is like milky water We had perhaps 5 good meals in zenith on a 14 day cruise Sindhu was very poor & disappointing, bland & not authentic
Just off Arvia food and quantity in restaurants poor. 2 slices cheese with cheese platter. Sauces minimal amount and some food pre cooked before ordering as I was served ravioli about 2 mins after ordering
people dont realise that your not meant to be rushed whilst dining on a cruise, would you rather be rushed or be allowed to lay back and enjoy youre time with family/freinds
So many videos and vlogs simply point the camera at these locations and put a name graphic up....job done, video posted! What you've produced here though Tom is a first rate guide to the various eateries, AND a very detailed review of what you found good, or below par of what you ate and experienced. Excellent. 👍
This was brilliant. We’re going at the end of April next year and this was a superb guide. Can’t wait to try a few of these restaurants now - good job!
Yes it is. It’s called Green & Co and you pay for the menu items you want. I didn’t try this one so can’t comment on the quality but here’s a link to the menu www.pocruises.com/content/dam/po/marketing-assets/excel-class-ships---new/venue/green-co/GCO_MH_Menu.pdf
I don’t remember there being one on Arvia. I recently went on Britannia and I don’t remember there being a soup of the day in Horizon on that cruise either. I could be mistaken but I don’t recall seeing it, so this could indeed be a cutback
Hi, thanks for the video, very helpful as we board in a few days! Just a quick question on the speciality restaurants, I’d like to book the glass house however it doesn’t give me the option to book in advance, just says to enquire once onboard. I’m wondering if you had to book any in this way, was it easy to do and was there availability in your experience? Thanks in advance.
Hi, yes a couple of the restaurants only let you book once onboard eg Glass House, Keel & Cow. These restaurants can be booked on the P&O My Holiday website once onboard (you would literally just put yourself in the virtual queue when you want to eat on your smartphone and it tells you when a table is ready - it’s not usually a long wait - say 10-20 mins). But with the Glass House and Keel & Cow because they are open much of the day and evening it was never difficult to get a table. If you want peak time in the evening (7.30-9pm) then maybe you’ll wait in the virtual queue a bit longer, but other times of day I found you can just show up and get a table straight away without joining the virtual queue - lunch was not usually that busy. The only restaurant that I found got very booked up early was the Epicurean. With that one I booked it before the cruise and I heard people saying onboard that after the first day it was almost fully booked for the whole cruise. Hope this helps. Have a nice cruise
@@CruiseRight thank you, that’s very helpful. When you say about using the website, would I be right in assuming to access this you’d have to have bought the wifi package for this? Just thinking as I wasn’t planning on getting this as it was pretty pricey! We’ve booked on for the Epicurean twice, once for afternoon tea on one of the ‘at sea’ days and once in the evening. Really looking forward to both of those meals. Thanks once again 😊
You don’t have to buy a WiFi package to access the P&O website when onboard- it works for everyone on board. It’s the easiest way to make reservations and put yourself in virtual queues. I didn’t cover it in this video but you’ll also be able to book certain entertainment with it like the theatre - although as I recall you can book some of the theatre nights before the cruise (but not all nights). I’d recommend getting onto the P&O website as quickly as you can when you get onboard (you’ll find a note in your cabin when you arrive about how to access it) and then book as many of the entertainment shows as you might be interested in as if you leave it just a day or two these can become heavily booked up. By entertainment I specifically mean booking any theatre shows you might be interested in (once onboard the website will show you a calendar of the entertainment for every day of the cruise and you can then reserve seats as required). The other entertainment worth mentioning if you like live music is the 710 Club. It’s a very small venue just off the atrium that has a live band that plays for about 45 mins across 3-4 sessions every evening. I though it was excellent - they have a different theme every night like 90s pop, supergroups etc but it’s not just simple covers of songs, they put a major spin on each song so it doesn’t sound anything like what you’d expect - they were a talented band (piano, bass guitar, guitar, and drums). I only mention it because this is one of the toughest things to reserve onboard because it only holds about 80 people per session. So if you’re interested then use the P&O website to view the entertainment calendar and book the 710 Club too for any particular nights you want on the day of boarding the ship (as if you leave it later in the cruise you can usually only find seats in the session after midnight)
@@CruiseRightahh gotcha! Thank you so much, that makes sense! Also great tip on the live music bar, sounds brilliant I will definitely look into that 😊
Glad you found it helpful. I didn’t try Sindhu unfortunately so can’t say much about it other than a couple of other passengers I spoke to had tried it and told me it was good
unfortunately, we have been to Sindhu twice, as well, and both occasions have been underwhelming, starting with the popadom crips from a packet posturing as something different to the frankly odd 'de-contructions' of classics. We call it Sindon't
There’s one option with the Green & Co plant-based food restaurant but it’s a paid option. I didn’t try it though so don’t know how good it might be. Here’s a link to the menu on P&Os website if it helps www.pocruises.com/content/dam/po/marketing-assets/excel-class-ships---new/venue/green-co/GCO_MH_Menu.pdf
I’ve been going on P&O cruises for several years with a bit of a gap since I was here last time. I was massively disappointed with the food on Arvia, really poor compared to how it used to be. The biggest disappointment was the 6th street diner. Terrible food, ended up leaving and going to the buffet. If you’re a vegetarian, you’ll struggle. I hadn’t tried the beach house yet though. So booked tonight. Thanks for the video.
In a very cold and wet northern Ireland and absolutely ready to try all of these in the sunshine
On the maiden voyage the only decent food was at the keel and cow. Some of the others were poor including 6 street dinner which in my opinion was not good. Hopefully things have improved now .
We came iff the arvia just over a week ago... Good review but no sindu ? Sindu was outstanding, the starers we delicious, the main was "alot" but we were overwhelmed with flavours and smells, and the dessert was worth it... Overall an amazing place to eat.
Wish I had tried Sindhu but never got the chance - ran out of time trying all the other restaurants. Glad to hear it was good though. Next time I’ll make sure I book Sindhu too. Thanks for watching
I'm going on Arvia in a few weeks and have heard a lot of horror stories about terrible overcrowding which is making me nervous. But in all your videos the ship looks quite quiet. A few questions: Was it full? Did you make the vids at non-peak times to get better shots, and do you have any tips regarding booking/getting tables?
Hi, I wouldn’t worry too much. Yes the ship was full on this sailing but I didn’t choose special times to film so it was quieter (except in the Horizon buffet which gets pretty hectic at peak times).
But there is a way to avoid any real queuing issues and that is to pre-book dinner in the restaurants before the actual cruise (using the same webpage that is used to access your online check-in, luggage tags, book shore excursions etc). You can make online reservations once you’re within two weeks of your sailing date. For the main dining rooms Zenith and Meridian as well as the 6th Street Diner and Olive Grove (which are all the included restaurants) they let you pre-book between 5.30pm and 6.30pm (if you want later dining times then you have to do it onboard and join the virtual queue on the P&O app every night, or you can just go to the restaurant and they’ll give you a buzzer when your table is ready).
Speciality restaurants can be pre-booked for whatever time you like but if you pre-book before your cruise then they charge you in advance at a discounted rate (usually 20% off the onboard price). But this could be an issue if you have any cabin credit included in your fare as I believe this won’t be accessible to use until you get onboard (in which case I’d recommend booking speciality restaurants on the app the moment you get onboard as they get fully booked very quickly for the entire cruise - as does the Headliner Theatre and 710 Club so I recommend booking that as soon as you get onboard too).
Strangely I found that whilst the speciality restaurants tended to always be fully booked on the cruise they never looked anywhere near full. I suspect that this is due to staffing shortages where they just can’t run those restaurants at full capacity. So when you mentioned that some of the restaurants didn’t look busy in the video it’s probably for two reasons: 1 because I tended to book fairly early dining around 6pm and 2 because they didn’t appear to run at capacity.
Obviously everything I’ve mentioned above just applies to dinner but I never really had problems for breakfast or lunch. You can either go to the main dining rooms and physically queue or put yourself in the virtual queue on the P&O app (it was never a long wait, say 15 minutes at the most generally). Of course there’s walk-in places like the Horizon buffet, the Quays (fish and chips, Asian and Carvery - the Carvery also serves breakfast) or Taste 360 in the SkyDome for burgers, hotdogs and pizza from 11am onwards.
In case you’re not familiar with it the P&O app onboard works pretty well. When you book a restaurant and your table is ready you get a notification on your smartphone or tablet and then you just have to show up at the restaurant within 15 minutes of getting that notification.
Hope this helps and have a great cruise!
Arvia is a brilliant ship we were on it in February and everything was fine. You can book what restaurants you want everyone we tried was excellent. Entertainment every night it was our third cruise love it.
How can you overcrowd a ship it’s never over full. When cabins are sold that is it..
@@CruiseRight Really helpful response! Thanks very much. Subscribed :)
@@dg9015 No, the one after (20th Aug)
Great production, but why bother if you don't review Green & Co or Sindhu?
Glad you liked the production. I’d have liked to try both of those restaurants too but time just didn’t allow us to get to every single restaurant onboard for dinner, partly because we felt we needed to eat in the main dining room at least a few times to get an idea of how consistent the quality of food was. Although, in the interests of full disclosure, I always had Green & Co lower on the list as I’m not much of a healthy eater and so me reviewing Green & Co would be about as useful as a vegetarian reviewing a steak house. Seriously though, I do take your point but this was only the first food review video I’ve made, so I always knew there was going to be room for improvement….and I guarantee it will only get better going forward.
Did you not try Sindhu ? Always been one of my favourites.
I absolutely wanted to try Sindhu but never got round to it. Ran out of time in the end. Next time for sure
Excellent! Very informative. We have booked on the Arvia for September 2025 and this was so helpful-thank you.
Food quality has significantly deteriorated, lots of cost cutting going on, watery soup that I think are dry mixes, custard for desserts is like milky water
We had perhaps 5 good meals in zenith on a 14 day cruise
Sindhu was very poor & disappointing, bland & not authentic
Totally agree that cost cutting is the main factor at play here. I didn’t get to try Sindhu but that’s a shame to hear it was a let down
Just off Arvia food and quantity in restaurants poor. 2 slices cheese with cheese platter. Sauces minimal amount and some food pre cooked before ordering as I was served ravioli about 2 mins after ordering
Yes Sindhu was poor over heard or couldn't help hearing obnoxious guy saying best meal he's ever had. Obviously the sun and sherry had got to him
people dont realise that your not meant to be rushed whilst dining on a cruise, would you rather be rushed or be allowed to lay back and enjoy youre time with family/freinds
So many videos and vlogs simply point the camera at these locations and put a name graphic up....job done, video posted! What you've produced here though Tom is a first rate guide to the various eateries, AND a very detailed review of what you found good, or below par of what you ate and experienced. Excellent. 👍
This is great to hear. Many thanks
What deck is zenith on
Deck 7
P&O speciality dining is the most affordable compared to other cruise lines.
That’s a good point.
This was brilliant. We’re going at the end of April next year and this was a superb guide. Can’t wait to try a few of these restaurants now - good job!
Thanks for the feedback, much appreciated. Have a great cruise
Isn’t Arvia the ship with a vegan restaurant?
Yes it is. It’s called Green & Co and you pay for the menu items you want. I didn’t try this one so can’t comment on the quality but here’s a link to the menu www.pocruises.com/content/dam/po/marketing-assets/excel-class-ships---new/venue/green-co/GCO_MH_Menu.pdf
@@CruiseRight thank you
One of the best videos I’ve seen.
In horizon, is there a soup of the day, or is another cutback?
I don’t remember there being one on Arvia. I recently went on Britannia and I don’t remember there being a soup of the day in Horizon on that cruise either. I could be mistaken but I don’t recall seeing it, so this could indeed be a cutback
Hi, thanks for the video, very helpful as we board in a few days! Just a quick question on the speciality restaurants, I’d like to book the glass house however it doesn’t give me the option to book in advance, just says to enquire once onboard. I’m wondering if you had to book any in this way, was it easy to do and was there availability in your experience? Thanks in advance.
Hi, yes a couple of the restaurants only let you book once onboard eg Glass House, Keel & Cow. These restaurants can be booked on the P&O My Holiday website once onboard (you would literally just put yourself in the virtual queue when you want to eat on your smartphone and it tells you when a table is ready - it’s not usually a long wait - say 10-20 mins). But with the Glass House and Keel & Cow because they are open much of the day and evening it was never difficult to get a table. If you want peak time in the evening (7.30-9pm) then maybe you’ll wait in the virtual queue a bit longer, but other times of day I found you can just show up and get a table straight away without joining the virtual queue - lunch was not usually that busy. The only restaurant that I found got very booked up early was the Epicurean. With that one I booked it before the cruise and I heard people saying onboard that after the first day it was almost fully booked for the whole cruise. Hope this helps. Have a nice cruise
@@CruiseRight thank you, that’s very helpful. When you say about using the website, would I be right in assuming to access this you’d have to have bought the wifi package for this? Just thinking as I wasn’t planning on getting this as it was pretty pricey! We’ve booked on for the Epicurean twice, once for afternoon tea on one of the ‘at sea’ days and once in the evening. Really looking forward to both of those meals. Thanks once again 😊
You don’t have to buy a WiFi package to access the P&O website when onboard- it works for everyone on board. It’s the easiest way to make reservations and put yourself in virtual queues. I didn’t cover it in this video but you’ll also be able to book certain entertainment with it like the theatre - although as I recall you can book some of the theatre nights before the cruise (but not all nights). I’d recommend getting onto the P&O website as quickly as you can when you get onboard (you’ll find a note in your cabin when you arrive about how to access it) and then book as many of the entertainment shows as you might be interested in as if you leave it just a day or two these can become heavily booked up. By entertainment I specifically mean booking any theatre shows you might be interested in (once onboard the website will show you a calendar of the entertainment for every day of the cruise and you can then reserve seats as required). The other entertainment worth mentioning if you like live music is the 710 Club. It’s a very small venue just off the atrium that has a live band that plays for about 45 mins across 3-4 sessions every evening. I though it was excellent - they have a different theme every night like 90s pop, supergroups etc but it’s not just simple covers of songs, they put a major spin on each song so it doesn’t sound anything like what you’d expect - they were a talented band (piano, bass guitar, guitar, and drums). I only mention it because this is one of the toughest things to reserve onboard because it only holds about 80 people per session. So if you’re interested then use the P&O website to view the entertainment calendar and book the 710 Club too for any particular nights you want on the day of boarding the ship (as if you leave it later in the cruise you can usually only find seats in the session after midnight)
@@CruiseRightahh gotcha! Thank you so much, that makes sense! Also great tip on the live music bar, sounds brilliant I will definitely look into that 😊
Excellent review. Full of facts and not too long
Many thanks. Glad you found it useful
Just goes to show plant based is the way to go.
Very good point. Unfortunately I didn’t get to try their plant-based restaurant Green & Co but I’ve never heard a bad word about it
Really helpful. Thanks so much.
Thanks, glad you found it useful.
Many thanks for that, very useful. Did you try Sindhu at all?
Glad you found it helpful. I didn’t try Sindhu unfortunately so can’t say much about it other than a couple of other passengers I spoke to had tried it and told me it was good
I’ve been twice on 2 different boats, it’s been outstanding on both occasions, highly recommend 🥰
unfortunately, we have been to Sindhu twice, as well, and both occasions have been underwhelming, starting with the popadom crips from a packet posturing as something different to the frankly odd 'de-contructions' of classics. We call it Sindon't
Great video - I do think that American Diner is a real asset to these ships - I'd imagine it would be really busy on a typical Brit sailing!
Thanks. Absolutely, the diner was full every evening as I recall
The amount of meat on these menus was horrendous it seemed if you don't eat dead flesh your basically screwed
There’s one option with the Green & Co plant-based food restaurant but it’s a paid option. I didn’t try it though so don’t know how good it might be. Here’s a link to the menu on P&Os website if it helps www.pocruises.com/content/dam/po/marketing-assets/excel-class-ships---new/venue/green-co/GCO_MH_Menu.pdf
@@CruiseRight thanks for the info keep up the videos
I’ve been going on P&O cruises for several years with a bit of a gap since I was here last time. I was massively disappointed with the food on Arvia, really poor compared to how it used to be. The biggest disappointment was the 6th street diner. Terrible food, ended up leaving and going to the buffet. If you’re a vegetarian, you’ll struggle. I hadn’t tried the beach house yet though. So booked tonight. Thanks for the video.
Your experience very much echoes mine. It’s unfortunate with the cutbacks that have happened. Thanks for watching
Excellent and very informative thank you-we will be going on our first P&O cruise next summer (4th in total) and found this very helpful.
Thank you, that’s great to hear. Have a fantastic cruise!