bradpole

I agree!

I would agree with that statement regarding food! Crystal's main dining room was wonderful, we found food there to be slightly better than what we've received on Oceania. The area where Oceania shines in comparison to Crystal is in casual options. Crystal in our opinion did not do "casual" very well. The options at their pool grill compared to Waves grill on Oceania were a joke. Also we found the buffet lacking the variety and quality of Oceania. We went once to afternoon tea on Crystal, on Oceania we attend almost daily!

Directly opposite from the future cruise desk. or pre renovation where the seemingly always unused piano used to be. 😄

We have not! That sounds wonderful!

The day prior to Bar Harbor starting at 6. The line started in the theater and snaked through the casino. When we saw that we decided we’d stay onboard and enjoy the empty ship!

Very affordable, $20 plus $10 a gig for the plan I choose. Coverage has been excellent in St. John and Halifax.

I completely agree! We are currently onboard a mega ship and literally the only food that has been miles better than Oceania is their Indian Food in the buffet, it is appropriately spiced! I understand Oceania’s problem, make their food authentic and spicy to please the few and the majority won’t eat it!

Hello, I’m onboard this cruise and have been following along to the OP’s adventures and thought I’d toss in my 2 cents. I purchased an esim subscription for Google-Fi on my iPhone and had coverage most of yesterday as we sailed fairly close to Nova Scotia. It wasn’t 5g, but to my surprise it was usable most of the day.

Hi everyone! Currently onboard Adventure docked on Portland, Maine. We stopped up in the Viking Crown to read and noticed there are contractors onboard beginning the installation of the Starlink internet! I have no information on timing when the service will be turned on, but I’m guessing it will be soon! Attached is a photo of the cables being run and the mounting plates being installed on top of the Viking Crown.

I remember it being included, then the $5 fee but all the Crown and Anchor coupon books (remember those?) had a coupon for one free meal!

In theory, if there was an app it would query a server onboard the ship [intranet] rather than use the glacial internet and connect ashore. This is my biggest gripe about the guest satisfaction survey, I wish it would reference a server onboard rather than try to connect to land at the same time many are trying to check in online, etc... further slowing down the internet. I've been reading all the comments about "to app" or "not to app" and I thought I'd toss in my 2 cents.... We've cruised both Viking Oceans and Crystal. Both of those lines had incredibly useful apps to use while onboard. Neither required internet, they referenced the ships intranet and a server onboard. Although the apps did work, and offered a ton of good information, guess what I referred to during the day? The printed schedule. We would also go down to view the posted menu outside the restaurants to see what was for dinner. Just tradition for us. For me, it was just habit and easier to glance at the printed schedule rather than use the app. Next month we are scheduled to sail on Royal Caribbean and they are now pretty app focused, I'm curious what my opinion will be if the printed daily Compass (daily schedule) isn't easily available and we're forced to use the app. Funny side story, to me at least... a number of years ago we were on another cruise line, a completely different demographic from the typical Oceania guest and this cruise line pretty much reads the daily schedule out multiple times a day. It was/is obnoxious. However during that cruise on a sea day someone casually asked me, "do you know if we're stopping somewhere today?" I overheard someone asking the staff at the entrance to the buffet how much breakfast was. The moral of the story is if people get on a ship not knowing what sea days are, or that the buffet is included in their fare, no, they don't read the daily newsletter so it is semi needed for the cruise director to verbally tell everyone about what is going on. I do wish the cruise director's run downs were a little more condensed but I don't mind them so much anymore.

I completely agree! Oceania's tagline is "the finest cuisine at sea", not "the finest entertainment" or "the finest onboard daily activities". This past July we were onboard one of the incredibly short 7 night Bermuda sailings out of NYC. There were many first time Oceania guests onboard and you cold tell some had done absolutely no research what so ever on what Oceania is or is not. We overheard someone complaining there was no kids club for their daughter (a quick look at the deck plans before hand could have solved that). One morning at breakfast we could overhear the table next to us complain to, "...Celebrity does X, I can't believe Oceania doesn't offer x". (I don't remember what it was, but would not have been a surprise had they done any sort of research what so ever). We cruise Oceania to relax, enjoy the wonderful food, and catch up on the books we don't have an opportunity to read while at home. The only other thing we enjoy doing onboard is participating in the daily "BIG O POINTS" activities; Baggo, put put, and shuffleboard. Generally there are 2 in the morning, and 2 in the afternoon. It took me several years of convincing to get my DH to sail on Oceania. He was afraid he'd miss the big production shows and live bands offered on the mainstream lines. On day two of his first Oceania sailing, "Do we have any more these booked?" Does he miss the entertainment options? A little, but the trade off is the better food, small ships, and wonderful staff!

I've run into the situation where somehow the fare I was booked under wasn't eligible, and when that has occurred rather than replying to let you know that's the case they just don't reply. In both of those instances I've never found out what made those fares ineligible compared to others.

We just returned yesterday from Insignia's second Bermuda sailing of the year and I scanned some of the "Currents" for you. There are a couple of sea days as well as a port day there for you. Overall I think they give a pretty good representation of what is offered onboard. One thing that was different this cruise from our prior cruises is there was no pre-dinner live piano music in Martini's. I'm not sure if this is something new or just a recent temporary change. I agree! Oceania isn't for everyone, but we really enjoy the product they offer, and have several future cruises booked to allow us to continue to enjoy it! 7.12.22 Insignia Bermuda.pdf

For the OP, I happened across this video this morning. At the 10:34 mark you can see an example of the tea cart. The part when he shows the bottom of the cart (enclosed in plexiglass) that was filmed at the end of last year on Marina, the top was filmed pre-covid onboard Insignia. It looks the same today but is enclosed in plexiglass.

We were the cruise before yours. I can't speak to the teas on offer, I'm like your wife, I am a coffee person. Most days I'd bring a coffee from Barista's to sip on while nibbling on the snacks.

I just thought I'd offer my own 2 cents.... Overall afternoon tea is still a lovely affair, in fact I'm looking forward to enjoying it on our next sailing! Is the selection as massive as it once was, with the tables setup in the back of Horizons for you to server yourself? No. This is not a change from covid, our last "Before Covid" cruise on Insignia in the fall of '19 the tables weren't there. Is the selection of high quality and presented lovely on the cart wheeled between tables (under a plexiglass dome now)? Yes! Afternoon tea is still a lovely affair, and of all the cruise lines we've travelled on Oceania does it the best in our humble opinion. We were onboard Riviera in December, and that particular cruise was nearly booked to capacity and never noticed any decline in service levels around the ship or at afternoon tea.

In theory the online survey is a good idea, in practice it is frustrating. There just isn’t enough bandwidth the last day for everyone to fill it out and submit it successfully. Personally I wish the survey referenced a server onboard rather than relying on the limited satellite bandwidth….or just allow us to do it when we get home. As for the mid cruise comment cards, they do read them. I noted something silly in their, and they followed up with me!

When I read the title of the thread my first thought was, "what nightlife?" 😀 The only other thing I'll add is on occasion there will also be some sort of live entertainment in Horizons at 10:30, but that is not the norm.