Brad1185

9 hours ago, TableGirl said:

@Gray Area - Who has the best burger at sea?   I love a Dive - In burger on HAL and the lunch time burger at the Pinnacle but I thought it was awful on Regent, Oceania, Royal Caribbean and Norwegian.

I will get a burger usually once a year and last Viking cruise got a burger at the grill and I must say one of the best burgers I have ever had. I did not try them on our last Oceania cruise. 
overall we prefer Viking over Oceania. 

Looks like someone went crazy with all the supplemental charges on the menu.  My opinion charge one price for what ever is on the menu. 

2 hours ago, DCCruiser57 said:

Viking and Oceania are way below SS.

 

I hope that’s the case. After reading comments here it sounds like Carnival is way above SS. 

That’s great you let the line know of the issues. 
 

SS seems to really be faltering right now. 
 

hopefully some of the execs will do their jobs and follow through with the right department heads in the ship and make some changes. 

I appreciate your review. Your comments are becoming the norm. I hope SS can react and make the appropriate changes otherwise they will be turning off a lot of their passengers.  
 

the SS executive staff should go on Viking and Oceania and see how these 2 cruise lines are providing a quality product for their passengers.

It’s becoming apparent that RCI bean counters are taking away the quality that people expect on SS and if this continues will hurt SS financially in the future. 

Just now, canderson said:

Moving back to the topic - Dawn ...  it's only 1/2 that price.  Wonder how the turn-out has been on Nova at 2x the price?

On the Nova it’s $160 each for La Dame and $80 each for Kaiseki.  We don’t drink and there is no option for no wine.  Seems a bit much for an all inclusive line.  You would think on our 14 night cruise with a passenger capacity of 700 something passengers there would be a way to at least book once without these charges. 

$480 for 2 meals for 2 people in the 2 extra charge restaurants on the Nova is a bit much when SS over uses the words all inclusive on their advertising and website. 

The buffet sounds like an appealing option after seeing the restaurant menus. The restaurant menus seem very repetitive and have some strange offerings. Hopefully when we go in October seeing and experiencing the menus in real life will be different than seeing a few menus online.  

That’s pretty bad if SS can’t give you a couple chocolates each evening. 

Forgot to add they seem to have no shortage of foie gras and beef tartar. Seems like it’s on every menu. 

Great review. Wish the would ditch the jackets. Agree the internet needs a boost. On Viking we get speeds in the 60’s. 
 

‘We’re giving SS a try in October but I’m thinking like you said SS is probably not that much better than O with a considerable price difference. 
 

You would think SS would really deliver that wow factor but it sounds like though it’s not bad SS lacks the little extra that apparently is not there. 
 

To get some positivity back went and watched some SS video reviews by Rich and Helen.  They make SS look really good. 

Disturbing reports here that seem to echo what a lot of others are saying about extreme decline in service and quality of food.  So it’s more than one disgruntled person giving a bad review. 
 

looking back on our recent O cruise the waiters and crew really had their act together and have to say service was outstanding along with the meals and menu offerings. 
 

Hard to believe SS is struggling so much. 
 

I think if you try Viking or Oceania you will not look back. We made the move from Celebrity a few years ago as we could not take all the cutbacks and extra charges.  To us Viking and Oceania offer the missing quality and things that we like and are important to us that Celebrity no longer offers. 

On 12/7/2023 at 2:48 PM, Familygoboston said:

In case anyone from RCI and SS is watching- I want to weigh jn that your up and coming customers, the ones like us who might be your customers for the next 20-30 years, don’t want formal anything!
 

I’ve booked an expedition cruise on SS in Antarctica only after my TA PROMISED me there are no dress expectations on this cruise. If we discover there is, we are out on future SS expedition cruises and if they continue this on their other cruises, we won’t be booking them, even if we have a fabulous experience in Antarctica. So it might work for current clients for as long as they are still able to travel, but I’d imagine they’ll need to make a change to attract new/younger passengers.  I will be  watching with interest! 

So well said. Completely agree. I hate dressing up. So really hoping there are more changes to continue to relax the dress code on the Nova before Oct 1st.  I would be really happy to be able to ditch the jacket. 

3 hours ago, canderson said:

For the techies out there, I'm posting a few notes of my experience on Silver Dawn over the past days.

 

First, the controller for the TV is truly minimalist - not even a mute button!  These Samsung televisions aren't just in 'hotel mode', they have no external buttons at all, therefore lacking a 'source' button. 

 

That said, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that our monitors would automatically respond to a live signal on the unused HDMI port.  You'll want a 'straight' cable, not one with a right angle connector as is true in some situations with wall mounted screens, since the connector panel in the rear runs cables parallel to the screen.  Plug the HDMI into a live source, the monitor detects it, and voila, you're in business. 

 

 

Moving on to connectivity:

 

I had a couple of choices for VPN service, and we've all heard about the issues that some have had with these, depending upon the protocols available and what's being blocked by the ship's IT dept.  To my additional surprise, I have Nord working on my notebook using the "Open VPN (UDP)" option, and I'm using a Denver server (choose whatever is needed for your purposes) to connect.  To manually select, you'll want to turn the "Auto-Connect /  Choose a VPN server and protocol automatically" = off, then set the "VPN Protocol" to "OpenVPN (UDP)". 

 

Mind you, with the VPN running, you will NOT be able to use the MyCruise.com shipboard site on your notebook.  For that, you'll need to turn the VPN off.  If you don't, you will get some weird support page in Dutch - that's your clue.  You may need to restart your browser after shutting off the VPN to access that site.  However, there's nothing there that doesn't show up on the TV if you need that information.

 

I had zero success using either Nord or Tunnelbear VPN apps on my Android phone.  Wasn't able to find a protocol setting in either of those that would get me past the ship's server.

 

 

Great info for both the hdmi and Nord vpn for our upcoming cruise. Thanks for sharing the info. 

44 days sounds wonderful.  14 days is my wife’s max at one time. 

Seems like a lot of repeated menus. Lots of raw meet and fish. 
 

I am sure we will be happy with the offerings but comparing the menus and food pictures to our Oceania Vista cruise a month ago SS seems like a let down and disappointing.  The cheese course one meal looked really bad.  
 

the menus seem small, repetitive and a little disjointed. 
 

seems you had your share of meh meals

per your posts. 
 

seema you have been on the cruise for a month or longer?

We did one Viking cruise post pandemic

 and did an Oceanian cruise mid October. 
 

I must say both the Viking and Oceania cruises had some amazing menus and all most everything was excellent. Hoping SS steps up and delivers the same. 
 

thanks for the menus and food pictures. 

I am enjoying your pictures and posts. Like seeing the menus and food items. 
 

I must say the menus look very weird with strange items listed. The presentation also seems off and the cheese plate you showed looked bad.  The repetitive menus is also off putting. 
 

Our first SS cruise is this coming October. 
 

The closest comparison I have is past Viking Ocean cruises and one Oceania cruise.  Both of their dining options, menus and food offerings seem miles above SS from what I am seeing here. 

Some of the pictures at the top of page 14 did not load. All I can see is a ?

The charred cauliflower dish sounded really good. 

That’s good to know about the ability to order from room service in a restaurant (did Not know) and forgot about the everyday menu. I Really enjoyed your posts and pictures.  Doing Japan Oct 1 on the Nova. 

19 minutes ago, drron29 said:

Yes but there are plenty of different items and with the different restaurants you would have to be very fussy not to find something you enjoyed.

I am happy they have tartare, carpaccio. foie gras and raw fish on the menu as we both enjoy those Immensely. Atlantide has a daily menu which changes daily. Indochine has changes every 3 - 4 days.

Plus There is the everyday menu at Atlantide which should satisfy most passengers.

 

Then there is the room service menu which is reasonably extensive and you can order from that when in a restaurant. We have done that for a change particularly dessert when we will order the room service Creme bruleee for dessert in Atlantide. You can find that under restaurants on your TV though they will provide a copy in a restaurant if you ask. A gentleman did it just a few hours ago in Kaiseki for lunch. Not sure why you go to a Japanese restaurant and order pasta though.

Their menus seem to have a lot of tartare, foie gras, duck, veal, raw fish, all things we don’t eat and many repeated menu items.