Day two

Hello again, day two of my blog.

The life of a Cruise Director is very varied; no two days are the same. At times it can be stressful, challenging and demanding, but never dull and always highly satisfying. We are all here onboard to make sure our passengers have the best holiday ever. Myself and the entire entertainment department along with every other member of the ships company are here to make that happen. As Cruise Director I oversee all the entertainment onboard from the daytime activities to our evening entertainment be it a Caribbean Deck Party or a West End Style Production Show.

A lot of my job takes place behind the scenes. On any day on board I can be answering internal ships or shore side emails, attending meetings, dealing with passenger observations, running activities, compiling reports, doing appraisals, working on the planning of future cruises, hosting chat shows, attending drills, introducing production shows, cabarets or classical concerts, the list really is endless!!

I returned to Oriana after leave on 30th September and joiners to any of our ships go through three safety training inductions. It does not make any difference that I have been with the company many years, every member of the ships company attends the induction programme on joining and quite right too, at P&O Cruises safety is our number one priority. We also have Crew Drills once a week, so on this 21 night cruise I will have done the Southampton Passenger GES Drill, 2 crew drills and 3 New Joiners Inductions.

Today we are on day two of our five day crossing of the mighty Atlantic Ocean, it’s just about perfect, Force 3 to 4 with part cloud, a lovely day at sea. The decks have many passengers either sunbathing, or sat out under some shade and it’s just a great atmosphere out there. You could in fact take photographs for a P&O Cruises brochure today, passengers are sitting reading, having a cocktail or pint, listening to some music or just chilling out looking out to sea, a day like today is what cruising is all about. Oriana has eight decks you can sunbathe on; it’s my sort of ship! All three of our swimming pools are doing a roaring trade!

One of the special events happening onboard today is The ‘O’ Factor, this is taking place between 10.00am and Noon in our three deck mid ship atrium. All the different departments throughout the ship are represented and it’s a great chance for our passengers to meet and talk to a great many ‘front of house’ staff and also ‘behind the scenes’ personnel, as the deck department will be represented as will the technical team.


The boss!! The Cruise Directors at P&O Cruises report to the Executive Purser and on Oriana at the moment it is Kathy Jones. Kathy was born in Trinidad but lives in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, Vancouver, in British Columbia, Canada. Like myself she has been with the company many years and worked her way up through all the Hotel Officer ranks to Executive Purser. We have worked together on many ships in our numerous ranks throughout the years.


Martha is one of our passengers Kathy and I met at the Reception Desk when we were having our photograph taken for the blog, Martha’s ambition is to work on a P&O Cruise ship as a member of the Youth Department.

Tomorrow, I will be telling you all about a couple of the team who are ‘tying the knot’ on their next leave!

Bye for now, I will be back tomorrow from the Mid Atlantic!

Nigel