Hiya mate, this has been even more interesting to re-watch, having returned overnight to the UK on Condor at the start of the week.I very much enjoyed all of that, not least your check-in experience there, exactly as i remember it although at first i couldnt find the departure terminal as it was my first time on the island. There are no real signposts or mention of Condor on the seafront and i went all the way up the other end to begin with in search of it and had to walk all the way back again, after calling with the very helpful Tourist Information office in St Peter Port. Thankfully I had alot more time than you seemed to have there! My trip on Condor was to Jersey the first day then from St Helier the night after. Guernsey was lovely I thought, in the 6 hours I had to enjoy it! Still applying the after-sun several days later. A couple of things though, i was moved from the Clipper about a month after my booking and transferred to the Islander (explanation was not given) which seems to have a slightly different layout to what you had on the Clipper? I noticed on the crossing to Jersey that the Islander's Club Class lounge was made up of a selection of soft seating, sofas and semi-circular chairs but no recliners. I noted that because i had a recliner booked for the following night and it was indeed in what they call their Horizon Lounge. It though only has rows of recliners but none of the free coffee and Cheddars etc., i think you got a better deal actually, the Horizon Lounge is not just £10 extra. The seat itself was comfy enough and like you i'm a heavy sleeper and i got more than i expected to. The recline was satisfyingly generous but I thought the footrest wasnt delivering, i noticed no one else had extended theirs. Then while we were waiting to disembark in the morning I found out it was working and didnt get the use of it overnight. My fault entirely that but one thing that wasnt was the fact that their booking site stated that you could charge your phone overnight in that lounge so that was why I upgraded, having got boarding passes etc on my phone for my onward train and flights home, sure enough my phone was almost dead on arrival. This was because the recliners did not have charging sockets at all, when i asked i was told there was a socket on the wall that the tv was plugged into but the problem was there were 2 people who'd paid for the recliners, 2 young girls who were stretched out asleep on sleeping bags on the Lounge floor and had plugged their phones into an adapter so there was no socket available, other than what the staff suggested - a socket in the cafe near the coffee machine which would have meant me either isolating myself from my phone all night leaving it there in a public area or else give up the use of the lounge that id paid alot for to get sleep so i did neither. So that was a black mark to Condor Ferries for sure, ending up having to play Russian Roulette with my phone on the journey home to Ireland keeping the battery alive so i could board a plane later in the day. The other thing was my own fault - I wrongly assumed that Condor Ferries terminal was adjacent to Portsmouth Harbour train station, Im old enough to recall Sealink and British Rail being one and the same and the concept of a boat train whereby a connecting rail service for foot passengers awaits an incoming late boat. In my ignorance I assumed this would apply in Portsmouth, the same thing does still apply in Heysham port by the way, I'm doing the Isle of Man in September by that means. So I had quite a rude awakening in Portsmouth when Condor told me the trains were a 40 minute walk from there. That required a cab to get me to the train that would take me to London and onward plane from Heathrow but not the train i had a seat booked on, it all worked out favourably in the end though. Overall a fabulous mini-trip of which Guernsey was possibly the highlight, I would go again. I thought Liberty Buses were very good with their flat fare pricing structure and online booking set up with the mobile phone. Apologies for the lengthy message, i get carried away talking about travel, i dont have the balls to be a vlogger like you though :D but keep up the good work!
Fantastic reading your experience Phil, and glad you enjoyed our little island so much! Just a shame about the phone situation. I always take a power bank for overnight ferries. Your phone would probably have been fine alone though, theft is so rare in the islands as if you get caught, everyone will know about it! And I've still not been on the islander! Been booked on it twice but moved both times... Really want to make a vlog on it soon! Let me know how your trip to the Isle of Man goes, I might well make it there in August
@@helloantoniotraveladventures why do they move you off the boats so often then? 😁 I didn't really fear losing my phone, no slight on your people by the way, had the lounge shut down all night I probably would have left it out there but they kept it all fully lit up so as that meant the phone would be in full view at a self-service coffee machine I decided against it, not all on board would have been islanders, myself included. My phone bank stopped working a while ago so I had a 2nd phone with me and I had the presence of mind to take a picture of the airline boarding pass onto my 2nd phone and use it in case my phone would be dead. Except that the scanner couldn't read the photographed version so the barrier wouldn't open to let me through to the plane 😄 long story short I made it home, but Condor shouldn't suggest the reclining seats have charging capacity when they don't though. I checked out of my hotel in the morning and had all day in Jersey before attempting the night time crossing so I was really relying on the charging option. But anyways, all makes for a good story and didn't affect too much my enjoyment of everything. I'll remember to tell you surely about IOM, I was a nipper the last time I was there, same as I was in Jersey, hence my reasons for travel. All the best and thanks for your attention. 🙂
Yes you're right, they should advertise properly about the chargers! Glad you made it back. I lost my phone in Belgium last month and had to use the boarding pass from my laptop screen to get on board 😂 was hilarious. Didn't work for the connecting flight at Manchester for aurigny though so had to check in again at the counter to get an old school boarding pass
@@helloantoniotraveladventures one other thing ... About Aurigny who I used to fly from London City (just for the hell of it) to GCI. They were overall excellent and very friendly attentive service on board, however a bit odd pre-boarding with the airport handling agent. Aurigny had sent me a boarding pass by e-mail with my seat 4F on it, however when we were sat waiting to be boarded it was announced that passengers with a boarding pass on a device these did not work and we had to troop up to the desk to have them exchanged for a paper one. All no real issue but I thought it odd. However then I later noticed while still waiting to be called that the paper boarding pass id been issued had seat 20F on it. The groundstaff were all too busy swapping people's passes to ask about so I assumed when they called boarding for seats in rows 1-5 first that I should wait back. So when 'all remaining passengers' were called I showed my pass and enquired then that presumably seat 20F is now what it is and she said 'yes that's right, except it's now seat 2F not 20' and manually altered the printed paper boarding pass with a biro pen! I know these things are usually to do with weight distribution on smaller aircraft but I thought it really strange. Not least when I was finally on board and went to the 2nd row feeling rather VIP-ish as rows 1-5 had been boarded for quite some time of course!, and double-checked with cabin crew who informed me the first physical row of seats on the plane was actually Row 2 and that I was at Row 3 - but I could sit there if I wanted as it was entirely free from passengers either side of the aisle whereas seat 2F had another passenger sat in 2E. All a bit of a head melt early in the day, there was only one of me but I had involvement with four seats on that one flight! 😁 But as I said other than that Aurigny are really good! I was quite impressed, little is definitely best with these things. 🙂
😂 Great story, reminds me of the first time I flew to Alderney on a Dornier and purchased a seat for the princely sum of £1.50 so I could sit up front and see the cockpit, only to be moved! I protested and they let me keep 1A... Doing City with aurigny for the first time next month, looking forward to that
Great video & interesting, thank you. I'm not particularly impressed with Condor though, especially when compared to some of the Scandinavian inter-country ferries which are more like cruise ships! Think I'll fly to the CI
I think the reasons why Alderney isn’t a destination with Condor (these are reasons that I think so you can have your own opinion) 1. Alderney probably doesn’t have a harbour, probably only accessible by plane 2. Even if it has a harbour it probably isn’t big enough for the ferries as it may be a fishing port
@@helloantoniotraveladventuresand plus, it would make the ferries way longer (prob around 5-6 hours) (edit: those hours include fast ferries, probably 16 hours or 17 hours for the slow ones
If you had a cheap way of getting to St Malo, you could’ve done the journey for £30 on Brittany Ferries. They’ve got a promotional day trip offer on until the end of May.
@@helloantoniotraveladventures Shame it’s so expensive. Love the videos mate, would love to see you do a Guernsey football game vlog during your time there. All the best!
@@helloantoniotraveladventures Me too, the port of Southampton would be a great destination & give Condor a run for their money, sadly I cannot see any new operator being interested. I fly & hire a car to avoid using Condor.
@@helloantoniotraveladventuresI honestly used to think Brittany Ferries went to Jersey & Guernsey, only to realise Condor Ferries is the only operator to do so
Hiya mate, this has been even more interesting to re-watch, having returned overnight to the UK on Condor at the start of the week.I very much enjoyed all of that, not least your check-in experience there, exactly as i remember it although at first i couldnt find the departure terminal as it was my first time on the island. There are no real signposts or mention of Condor on the seafront and i went all the way up the other end to begin with in search of it and had to walk all the way back again, after calling with the very helpful Tourist Information office in St Peter Port. Thankfully I had alot more time than you seemed to have there! My trip on Condor was to Jersey the first day then from St Helier the night after. Guernsey was lovely I thought, in the 6 hours I had to enjoy it! Still applying the after-sun several days later.
A couple of things though, i was moved from the Clipper about a month after my booking and transferred to the Islander (explanation was not given) which seems to have a slightly different layout to what you had on the Clipper? I noticed on the crossing to Jersey that the Islander's Club Class lounge was made up of a selection of soft seating, sofas and semi-circular chairs but no recliners. I noted that because i had a recliner booked for the following night and it was indeed in what they call their Horizon Lounge. It though only has rows of recliners but none of the free coffee and Cheddars etc., i think you got a better deal actually, the Horizon Lounge is not just £10 extra. The seat itself was comfy enough and like you i'm a heavy sleeper and i got more than i expected to. The recline was satisfyingly generous but I thought the footrest wasnt delivering, i noticed no one else had extended theirs. Then while we were waiting to disembark in the morning I found out it was working and didnt get the use of it overnight. My fault entirely that but one thing that wasnt was the fact that their booking site stated that you could charge your phone overnight in that lounge so that was why I upgraded, having got boarding passes etc on my phone for my onward train and flights home, sure enough my phone was almost dead on arrival. This was because the recliners did not have charging sockets at all, when i asked i was told there was a socket on the wall that the tv was plugged into but the problem was there were 2 people who'd paid for the recliners, 2 young girls who were stretched out asleep on sleeping bags on the Lounge floor and had plugged their phones into an adapter so there was no socket available, other than what the staff suggested - a socket in the cafe near the coffee machine which would have meant me either isolating myself from my phone all night leaving it there in a public area or else give up the use of the lounge that id paid alot for to get sleep so i did neither. So that was a black mark to Condor Ferries for sure, ending up having to play Russian Roulette with my phone on the journey home to Ireland keeping the battery alive so i could board a plane later in the day.
The other thing was my own fault - I wrongly assumed that Condor Ferries terminal was adjacent to Portsmouth Harbour train station, Im old enough to recall Sealink and British Rail being one and the same and the concept of a boat train whereby a connecting rail service for foot passengers awaits an incoming late boat. In my ignorance I assumed this would apply in Portsmouth, the same thing does still apply in Heysham port by the way, I'm doing the Isle of Man in September by that means. So I had quite a rude awakening in Portsmouth when Condor told me the trains were a 40 minute walk from there. That required a cab to get me to the train that would take me to London and onward plane from Heathrow but not the train i had a seat booked on, it all worked out favourably in the end though. Overall a fabulous mini-trip of which Guernsey was possibly the highlight, I would go again. I thought Liberty Buses were very good with their flat fare pricing structure and online booking set up with the mobile phone. Apologies for the lengthy message, i get carried away talking about travel, i dont have the balls to be a vlogger like you though :D but keep up the good work!
Fantastic reading your experience Phil, and glad you enjoyed our little island so much! Just a shame about the phone situation. I always take a power bank for overnight ferries. Your phone would probably have been fine alone though, theft is so rare in the islands as if you get caught, everyone will know about it!
And I've still not been on the islander! Been booked on it twice but moved both times... Really want to make a vlog on it soon!
Let me know how your trip to the Isle of Man goes, I might well make it there in August
@@helloantoniotraveladventures why do they move you off the boats so often then? 😁 I didn't really fear losing my phone, no slight on your people by the way, had the lounge shut down all night I probably would have left it out there but they kept it all fully lit up so as that meant the phone would be in full view at a self-service coffee machine I decided against it, not all on board would have been islanders, myself included. My phone bank stopped working a while ago so I had a 2nd phone with me and I had the presence of mind to take a picture of the airline boarding pass onto my 2nd phone and use it in case my phone would be dead. Except that the scanner couldn't read the photographed version so the barrier wouldn't open to let me through to the plane 😄 long story short I made it home, but Condor shouldn't suggest the reclining seats have charging capacity when they don't though. I checked out of my hotel in the morning and had all day in Jersey before attempting the night time crossing so I was really relying on the charging option. But anyways, all makes for a good story and didn't affect too much my enjoyment of everything. I'll remember to tell you surely about IOM, I was a nipper the last time I was there, same as I was in Jersey, hence my reasons for travel. All the best and thanks for your attention. 🙂
Yes you're right, they should advertise properly about the chargers! Glad you made it back. I lost my phone in Belgium last month and had to use the boarding pass from my laptop screen to get on board 😂 was hilarious. Didn't work for the connecting flight at Manchester for aurigny though so had to check in again at the counter to get an old school boarding pass
@@helloantoniotraveladventures one other thing ... About Aurigny who I used to fly from London City (just for the hell of it) to GCI. They were overall excellent and very friendly attentive service on board, however a bit odd pre-boarding with the airport handling agent. Aurigny had sent me a boarding pass by e-mail with my seat 4F on it, however when we were sat waiting to be boarded it was announced that passengers with a boarding pass on a device these did not work and we had to troop up to the desk to have them exchanged for a paper one. All no real issue but I thought it odd. However then I later noticed while still waiting to be called that the paper boarding pass id been issued had seat 20F on it. The groundstaff were all too busy swapping people's passes to ask about so I assumed when they called boarding for seats in rows 1-5 first that I should wait back. So when 'all remaining passengers' were called I showed my pass and enquired then that presumably seat 20F is now what it is and she said 'yes that's right, except it's now seat 2F not 20' and manually altered the printed paper boarding pass with a biro pen! I know these things are usually to do with weight distribution on smaller aircraft but I thought it really strange. Not least when I was finally on board and went to the 2nd row feeling rather VIP-ish as rows 1-5 had been boarded for quite some time of course!, and double-checked with cabin crew who informed me the first physical row of seats on the plane was actually Row 2 and that I was at Row 3 - but I could sit there if I wanted as it was entirely free from passengers either side of the aisle whereas seat 2F had another passenger sat in 2E. All a bit of a head melt early in the day, there was only one of me but I had involvement with four seats on that one flight! 😁 But as I said other than that Aurigny are really good! I was quite impressed, little is definitely best with these things. 🙂
😂 Great story, reminds me of the first time I flew to Alderney on a Dornier and purchased a seat for the princely sum of £1.50 so I could sit up front and see the cockpit, only to be moved! I protested and they let me keep 1A...
Doing City with aurigny for the first time next month, looking forward to that
😮 what a cheap journey well done ✅
Cheers, always value for money on this channel!
Great video & interesting, thank you. I'm not particularly impressed with Condor though, especially when compared to some of the Scandinavian inter-country ferries which are more like cruise ships! Think I'll fly to the CI
Don't blame you! I'd say only worth it over flying if you want to save money or take your vehicle
Pretty soon you could be on Condor Islander (ex Straitsman). She was of loyal service over here in New Zealand
I'm booked on her in the new year! Will make a video
You are right, Brittany ferries ships are much bigger. Cabins are priced per cabin so OK if 4 travelling!!
I didn't realise! Can't wait to give the cabin a go
Condor Ferries is owned by Brittany Ferries so you’d think it would be the same quality, but I haven’t experienced BF yet so idk what it’s like
@TDSWar BF ships date from The Bretagne (1980s) to the new eco ships so standards vary a lot..
@helloantoniotraveladventures when are we seeing more of you sir??!! Missing your content
most buses firm are in uk are doing single journey for £2 till end of june,
Great stuff, maybe I'll get to ride some more!
I think the reasons why Alderney isn’t a destination with Condor (these are reasons that I think so you can have your own opinion)
1. Alderney probably doesn’t have a harbour, probably only accessible by plane
2. Even if it has a harbour it probably isn’t big enough for the ferries as it may be a fishing port
Alderney does have a harbour but yes, not big enough and the Alderney race would make a service unreliable
@@helloantoniotraveladventures ok, makes sense as I’ve never been to Alderney
@@helloantoniotraveladventuresand plus, it would make the ferries way longer (prob around 5-6 hours) (edit: those hours include fast ferries, probably 16 hours or 17 hours for the slow ones
Condor used to run a foot passenger-only hydrofoil service between Guernsey and Alderney. I remember going on it in the early 80s.
@andybaker2456 what was it like?
If you had a cheap way of getting to St Malo, you could’ve done the journey for £30 on Brittany Ferries. They’ve got a promotional day trip offer on until the end of May.
I don't have a cheap way of getting to St Malo, though!
@@helloantoniotraveladventures Shame it’s so expensive. Love the videos mate, would love to see you do a Guernsey football game vlog during your time there. All the best!
I will do one just for you the next match I go to!
if you dont check in for the return on a day trip they will debit your card for the difference between the promotional fare and standard one way.
I can't even work out how a day trip would work with these guys. Just stay on board?
The reason the announcement was played in French as in Jersey they speak French (also English but all the signs or most are written in French)
The ferries also go to France
@@helloantoniotraveladventures oh yeah forgot that, I know they go to St Malo I just forgot to say in the comment
Yes and also Cherbourg
@@helloantoniotraveladventures I thought they scrapped the route to Cherbourg when the Condor Rapide left a few years back
Nope, it's back
Is it just me but if I watch this video with my eyes closed you sound just like Mr Bald and Bankrupt
😂 Is it possible to watch a video with your eyes closed!? And you're not the first to say that about Señor Bald...
All night
💯
An awful ship/company, loathed by many islanders.
It's what we've got, unfortunately! Would love to see a bit of competition
@@helloantoniotraveladventures Me too, the port of Southampton would be a great destination & give Condor a run for their money, sadly I cannot see any new operator being interested. I fly & hire a car to avoid using Condor.
Which way around, hire in Guernsey?
@@helloantoniotraveladventuresI honestly used to think Brittany Ferries went to Jersey & Guernsey, only to realise Condor Ferries is the only operator to do so
Same!