Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Book a 14- or 16- day transatlantic Virgin Voyages cruise from 280,000 Virgin Points

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Got two weeks free at the end of this month or in December? Excellent, because Virgin Voyages is running a generous redemption offer.

You can book a 14 night full board Virgin Voyages cruise from Barcelona to Miami for just 280,000 Virgin Points for two people.

Alternative, book a 16 night full board Virgin Voyages cruise from Rome to Miami for just 320,000 Virgin Points for two people.

If you don’t have 280,000 Virgin Points in your account, you can buy the extra here. You should still come out ahead. There is a 70% bonus running at the moment too.

Virgin Voyages

What’s included with your cruise?

The cruises are full board. All your meals, soft drinks, fitness classes, entertainment etc are included – even tips.

The following are not included:

  • alcoholic drinks, although package deals are usually offered before departure allowing you to prepay for drinks credit at a discount if you wish
  • flights and transfers – you’ll need one-way flights to Rome or Barcelona and one-way flights back from Miami
  • someone to look after your children back home – these are adults only trips

A lot of HfP readers have jumped on these redemptions in the past. The feedback in our forum has been fantastic – from young and old, from those who wanted a bit of a party to those who simply wanted a quiet break after a tricky couple of years. There is a Virgin Voyages master thread in our forum for your Q&A.

If you are short of Virgin Points, options include:

  • transferring Tesco Clubcard points (should happen overnight)
  • transferring American Express Membership Rewards points (should be instant)
  • transferring Heathrow Rewards points (not clear about timeframe)

What is the itinerary?

The first departure, on Resilient Lady, is on 27th October and looks like this:

  • Day 1 – Barcelona. Departs at 5:00pm.
  • Day 2 – Sailing
  • Day 3 – Casablanca. Arrives at 9:30am, departs at 10:00pm.
  • Day 4 – Sailing
  • Day 5 – Las Palmas, Gran Canaria. Arrives at 9:00am, departs at 8:00pm.
  • Day 6 – Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Tenerife. Arrives at 8:00am, departs at 5:00pm.
  • Day 7 – Sailing
  • Day 8 – Sailing
  • Day 9 – Sailing
  • Day 10 – Sailing
  • Day 11 – Sailing
  • Day 12 – Sailing
  • Day 13 – Sailing
  • Day 14 – Sailing
  • Day 15 – Miami. Arrives 6:30am.

You will get a Central Sea Terrace or The Sea Terrace cabin, depending on availability.

Full details are on the Virgin Red website here or in the app.

Virgin Voyages

The second departure is on Scarlet Lady, departing on 28th November. It goes like this:

  • Day 1 – Civitavecchia (Rome). Departs at 6:00pm.
  • Day 2 – Sailing
  • Day 3 – Barcelona. Arrives at 8:00am, departs at 10:00pm.
  • Day 4 – Sailing
  • Day 5 – Malaga. Arrives at 8:00am, departs at 6:00pm.
  • Day 6 – Sailing
  • Day 7 – Funchal, Madeira. Arrives at 9:00am, departs at 5:00pm.
  • Day 8 – Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Tenerife. Arrives at 11:00am, departs at 10:00pm.
  • Day 9 – Sailing
  • Day 10 – Sailing
  • Day 11 – Sailing
  • Day 12 – Sailing
  • Day 13 – Sailing
  • Day 14 – Sailing
  • Day 15 – Sailing
  • Day 16 – Sailing
  • Day 17 – Miami. Arrives 6:30am.

You will get a Central Sea Terrace or The Sea Terrace cabin, depending on availability.

Full details are on the Virgin Red website here or in the app.

Cruises from Miami are bookable too

Virgin Red has also added a batch of Caribbean cruises departing from Miami. I won’t run through those but you can find details in the Virgin Red app.

Prices start from 140,000 Virgin Points per cabin and include a $100 bar tab.

How to book

If you want to find out more about Virgin Voyages, here is our report from an afternoon on ‘Scarlet Lady’, the first ship in the fleet.

If you want to top up your balance by buying Virgin Points, the link is here.

You can book via the Virgin Red app or online. Once you have redeemed you are sent a code, and you use that code to book on the Virgin Voyages website.

Read the instructions carefully before booking – you need to check there is still a relevant cabin available for cash before ordering your booking code, and once it arrives you should book ASAP before the availability disappears.

You should be offered the chance to upgrade your cabin for cash nearer the time of departure if you want something larger than a Sea Terrace.

PS. If you are not a regular Head for Points visitor, why not sign up for our FREE weekly or daily newsletters? They are full of the latest Avios, airline, hotel and credit card points news and will help you travel better. To join our 65,000 free subscribers, click the button below or visit this page of the site to find out more. Thank you.

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards (April 2025)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Virgin Points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses.

You can choose from two official Virgin Atlantic credit cards (apply here, the Reward+ card has a bonus of 18,000 Virgin Points and the free card has a bonus of 3,000 Virgin Points):

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

18,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard

3,000 bonus points, no fee and 1 point for every £1 you spend Read our full review

You can also earn Virgin Points from various American Express cards – and these have sign-up bonuses too.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for a year and comes with 20,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 20,000 Virgin Points.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 30,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express comes with 50,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 50,000 Virgin Points.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

The Platinum Card from American Express

80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

Small business owners should consider the two American Express Business cards. Points convert at 1:1 into Virgin Points.

American Express Business Platinum

50,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

20,000 points sign-up bonus and FREE for a year Read our full review

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Virgin Points. 

Category

Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club

Comments (32)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • jamestg86 says:
    13 Oct13 October 11:43

    This isn’t a good deal at all, and Virgin have been pushing this for months – this went live with all of the other points cruises back in May. It’s also extremely overpriced.

    T/A’s are a cheap way to cruise as they are rarely full – hence I do them all the time as I’m broke. The one way flight back situation works particularly well for using up miles too, although it is preferable coming the other way in spring and avoiding a day hanging around an airport in the States and a night flight and jet lag.

    I’ve now done 4 T/As and all 4 were rough, the calmest being a force 8 consistently and on NCL we hit hurricane force 12 one day and were very delayed and missed every port. Very jealous of the comments where people had calm ones. I don’t get sea sick but it took over a week on dry land for my balance to resume last time. But paying £599 for a balcony, all inclusive with NCL you can’t really grumble. Not quite up to the RCI/VV standards but certainly worth it with the difference in cost.

    Finally, 14-16 nights is way to long on a Virgin ship. You would be going insane after a week, you bar bill would be extortionate and you’d be sick of the same menus – I’ve done 3 with them now on each ship and whilst it is amazing for a week, it starts to get very repetitive.

    In short, I’d avoid…

    • Andy says:
      13 Oct13 October 14:55

      Do you?!

    • TimM says:
      13 Oct13 October 19:24

      Jamestg86, all very sensible stuff.

      I have done a few trans-Atlantics and many other re-positioning cruises. What I don’t like about NCL and Virgin is their lack of formality. Being forced into black tie almost every night makes the World look prettier – well certainly your fellow diners – and certainly adds to the theatre of it.

      The QE2 used to sail at 30+ knots so even if there was no wind at all, you would feel your brass monkeys getting out of the boiling jacuzzis on the stern. The staff would help you dry off and quickly tuck you in under a Cunard blanket before bringing afternoon tea. Those days are sadly gone.

      Now, a cruise entails being a prisoner to be sold at constantly. The style, skills and pleasure have all gone. The staff have never known how things once were.

      I will pass on Virgin, buy a yacht and employ a retired steward who knows how things should be.

    • Mb says:
      14 Oct14 October 15:22

      Just did 12 day one, they changed up the menus testing specials in the all restaurants, added extra classes I’d not tried before, I actually got more time to meet new people and had more fun because was less fleeting, over multiple nights. was surprised I liked it so much. Wasn’t such a booze cruise as say a 4 day Amsterdam or Miami one so had more chilled vibe. I also would call drink prices expensive plenty of options like sip and save, bottomless brunch and classes we did had pretty much unlimited drinks and bar tab promos. It worked out much cheaper for us than a drink pages on other lines. Really don’t understand the “extremely overpriced” it’s still over 1p per point, just because it’s now popular they don’t need Todo the 3p per point flash sails currently.

  • Track says:
    13 Oct13 October 12:06

    If Virgin get people to spend 320,000 points, good for them. That is quite a shed of liability.

    Given the earlier story that people spend up to 1mil points on flights, seems people subscribe to cards/accumulate but not good at keeping track of cost/value. Again, a win for Virgin and caution us. I don’t think we’ll see 80,000 cruises again.

  • Ralph says:
    13 Oct13 October 13:21

    Doing Rome to Miami in November for around 3k and agree using miles for flight back and a 241 that was going abegging are to the value prop.
    But disagree 16 nights is too long and each to their own. Just because it doesn’t suit you isn’t a reason to not recommend it to others, particularly given the quality and still, great value. However, the Virgin Red points offer is not such great value not of you are points rich, and want to use them this way, why not?

  • Voldemort says:
    13 Oct13 October 17:50

    HfP – any chance of investigating QR’s new policy of not allowing people to add FFPs to existing bookings made via QR?

    • babyg says:
      13 Oct13 October 20:10

      Agreed, whilst it’s possible, it’s very hard and I’ve only been successful via the telephone. Quite the faff and many calls needed.

  • BJ says:
    13 Oct13 October 20:50

    Looking at the design of modern cruise ships like these it seemst amazing to me that they are stable in winter Atlantic seas.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

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