High adventure on the high seas – or Portland purgatory? Onboard the first UK cruise

The Man Who Pays His Way: The food aboard Virtuosa was far better than when I was held as a suspected spy in Communist-era Romania

Portland purgatory: the MSC Virtuosa at the southern tip of Dorset (Simon Calder)

Simon Calder, also known as The Man Who Pays His Way, has been writing about travel for The Independent since 1994. In his weekly opinion column, he explores a key travel issue – and what it means for you.

That dark grey smudge on a mid-grey horizon? France. Unsettlingly, this beautiful, cultured nation of 67 million friendly souls keeps moving from port to starboard. The reason: I am aboard the first cruise to leave a UK port in 15 months, but government rules prevent MSC’s Virtuosa from calling at any foreign port. Instead she is sailing circuits off the coast of Normandy between Cherbourg and Le Havre.

While the ship goes around in never-decreasing circles, I am on the top deck doing much the same. Virtuosa is Center Parcs-on-sea, boasting “one of the most intricate and exciting water parks at sea” – a league table of which I was previously unaware.

After looping down and around a selection of plastic tubes, I don a harness and clamber to the “Himalayan Rope Bridge”. My wobble around the high-ropes circuit is enlivened by a cheerful group of hecklers watching from an impromptu Base Camp while making the most of the unlimited free drinks onboard.

There is much to celebrate: the first UK cruise of the year has coincided with the maiden voyage of Virtuosa. She is a gigantic vessel with room for around 5,000 passengers.

Yet Department for Transport rules limit the payload to 1,000. Whether you seek a nautical aqua park or a free bar with no queue, sign up for a voyage before 21 June. After the proposed date for the abolition of Covid restrictions in the UK, passenger numbers are likely to soar – though the ship will not be completely full, due to the need for “isolation cabins” to be kept aside in case there is an outbreak of coronavirus onboard.

MSC Cruises chose to launch loss-leader sailings from Southampton ahead of the competition partly to exploit the pent-up demand for life on the ocean wave, and partly to test new Covid-era procedures that conflict with the fundamentals of mass-market, industrialised cruising.

At the Marketplace Buffet on deck 15, self-service has been replaced by an eager team of masked kitchen staff who, should you ask for porridge, melon and a banana to start your day, hand you an implausible number of plates bearing the components of breakfast.

Now, I have been held briefly under house (or rather hotel) arrest in Bucharest during the Ceausescu era for suspected spying. I can confirm that the food aboard the Virtuosa was far superior to my place of captivity in the Romanian capital (which, disappointingly, also lacked a water park). But otherwise the two experiences shared plenty in common.

Starting with not being let out.

During the 84-hour voyage on Virtuosa, we made landfall once: at Portland at the southern tip of Dorset. One joy of cruises is the ability to step ashore and explore freely. That has been outlawed. Pay £43 and you can leave the ship for a few hours, but only on a supervised coach tour. Repeated testing and for lucky vaccinees, proof of two jabs, is not enough to permit potential mingling with the good people of Dorset.

Having already paid £821 for four nights in a cabin with a disconcertingly long number (11225), I was disinclined to spend more to look at the soggy south of England through the window of a bus.

Were such restrictions to happen at the Swedish capital on a Baltic cruise, you could call it Stockholm syndrome. Here it is Portland purgatory.

Despite the burden of all the new rules and restriction, the captors – sorry, crew – are unremittingly friendly and professional. The vast majority of the passengers I talked to were thrilled by the trip. Only one christened the ship Hideosa because of its shared DNA with a Dubai shopping mall and the departures area of Luton airport.

As with my Iron Curtain incarceration, I was hugely relieved when finally allowed to rejoin real life.

One day soon, variants permitting, I hope to get closer to actual France. As it is, my abiding memory is that dark smudge on the horizon and a joke from the onboard comedian.

What’s the capital of France?

F.