vtgumby

We were on Regatta from Tahiti to LA in January and they had a lovely woman, June, teaching jewelry making. We completed three separate pieces (each within an hour) on three separate days and they were beautiful shells, not low cost beads, etc. Quite striking pieces. It took place in the Terrace Café and she had approximately 70 people in each of her two sessions so if you are on a longer cruise with lots of sea days they will likely have something similar.

My thinking also, lots of never ever excursion folks are going to be doing them now because it’s included. If I’d booked a simply more cruise I definitely would vs leaving it unused on the Oceania table. Simply more is going to benefit tour operators because O is going to have to provide more excursions for the increased volume of people (eventually the entire ship) taking them albeit the pick and choose of which one, two, or three are your ‘free’ ones. It’s going to be interesting to watch the logistics of this but it looks like a boon to tour providers which is money into the local economy so yay!

Hi Jane and Ed, We are and we are going to have a great time, this itinerary on Marina around fabulous South America is wonderful and then to have Antarctica and Falklands is the cherry on top…accompanied by great food, what’s not to love?!! See you in six!

As does Azamara, we enjoyed them RT from Buenos Aires in January and we did make Port Stanley but we’ve heard of many folks missing the Falklands repeatedly, one couple missed out three times. Our trip was so incredible that we booked an expedition cruise with Hurtigruten in February 2024 from Santiago but prior to that we will be jumping on the Marina from Rio to Santiago via the Falklands and Antarctica. The entire area is just incredible (birds! whales! penguins!) and we can’t wait to go back so if you can only afford the drive by it’s still an incredible experience, you won’t be disappointed. This time we need to get on the ice, however, and looking forward to these two incredible trips.

Yes, we wear masks on the airplane and in the airports and on any public transportation whether it be trains, buses, Uber, etc. We don’t do excursions but again, any crowd and we wore a mask including standing in the crowded lines to get off on the tenders. No to Covid. We’ve had all the vaccines and boosters. I love hearing people declare this is over but it’s not and forget Covid, I am happy to not come home with the URI that was so prevalent on many cruises. We also bring a mask with us to the theater and the minute we hear someone coughing that phlegmy cough we relocate ourselves. We also ate mostly at the Terrace so we could be eating outside. it works for us. What surprised me was the lack of washy washy going on at the entrance of eating venues, very little which was slightly disturbing but happy they still have the staff serving at the Buffet so I’m good.

Buy your cabin steward or favorite waiters something nice, a necklace or cologne or shirt or or or. Plenty of possibilities to make some days and touch these hard working staff with your meh OBC. I’ve done it and it’s nice, I always have a plan for that OBC!

Love Windstar but never had an open porthole, feels like a recipe for wet disaster but I too wish they did open. Seems I missed the good ole days. Alas.

Never knew about this ITA Matrix, GREAT information, thanks!

This is a big reason why we cruise, to get the taste of a city and then, yes, we do go back for an extended time so thanks for the reminder. Now I’m smiling at some of those tastes that led to a much fuller meal. That and our love for lots of sea days! 😉

WINNER, someone who actually answered the posters question, good job jlowe! 😉 Plus I learned something, who knew?!

OR you choose to cruise a different cruiseline. You are right about corporate not caring, that is UNTIL enough people jump ship, but Cliff didn’t say that, he merely stated what many of us are saying which is we will not just be O only cruisers but will look into other lines to find the value we seek. It isn’t to cruise or not but rather more judicial choosing of our cruises. I shall still look at O along with beloved W and AZ and when the value is there we’re booking but there IS a price point for some of us, O may be challenging ours.

Windstar is lovely and our top line, highly recommend.

Let’s stop this silliness. YOU do you and number crunch and decide your value of your cruise. Others of us HAVE crunched the numbers and don’t like the added ‘value’ or cost for unused amenities. It really is simple math and yet you refuse to understand so let’s just end this although it is fun for other CC readers to watch these stupid exchanges, I’ve enjoyed following a few in the past. You will enjoy your $45 per day increase, I will not and therefore not ‘upgrade’ to SM on the two booked and in the future will see if O offers me the value I seek. This has become too personal for you so don’t fret, O isn’t going bankrupt (I hope as a stockholder) and you’re going to enjoy your added perks. I’m personally hoping for the cruise only fare to come back, time will tell. Until then, happy with my two earlier booked cruises and we’ll see about the future. Now go crunch someone else’s numbers or volunteer at a food pantry, you’re getting way too crazed about other peoples cruises! 😉

Agree 100%, it really doesn’t matter if it was a sale or not, the price you paid pre SM is the price paid, period. Just like prices now reflect the SM and Olife doesn’t matter, it simply comes down to the numbers and for many we’re happy with pre SM but if it works for others then great. Options are abound, no one is tethered to ANY cruise provider and I’m glad to have a few others until I win Powerball and then private yacht! 😉

Windstar We did a 28 day Tahiti to LA on O in April, fabulous. We then did a TP with Windstar a month later so did direct to direct comparisons. O gets it for food and entertainment while W nails cabins, 288 sf on their motor yachts and the extra room is lovely along with large bathrooms and rainfall showers, the opposite of O. Normal cabin too, not suite. W also gets it for the whole ‘family’ thing, they know your names within a day (kinda freaky) and officers go out of their way to say hi, nothing we’ve cared about but absolutely notice when we’re on W ships. Both have quality linens and pool blankets, both offer good wines although we felt O’s sommeliers pushed wine tastings a bit and both have wonderful people, genuine smiles and mood, not like they’re being forced. They both offer nice options, free on one and a charge on the other (WiFi and laundry) so that should be factored in as necessary. We aren’t one line cruisers and find O and W to be on par, ship excursions aren’t our thing so zero thoughts but why having them wrapped into the fare isn’t a deal for us…if we were ship excursion people I’d probably be giddy with delight over SM. I like they both allow you to bring alcohol on, nice perk. We survived Covid pricing, we’ll survive SM and who knows, if the price makes sense we may be there too but still happy for the two we have already booked and hoping an aforementioned cruise only option does reappear. Time will tell. Meanwhile, happy cruising to us all!

Our portholes didn’t open, do they even? Inquiring minds…

Not quite, I booked four days ago with the only ‘cruise only’ option available so $800 Olife OBC and SM price is now 2200 more. It really doesn’t matter about the price per day for us, it was the total cruise cost and 2k more would’ve prevented our booking. That’s all. A simple 2k more makes it not desirable, no per day crunch of numbers needed to feel good about stuff we don’t want. Bottom line, we’re good for our two booked and we’ll see what happens, lots of nice ships in the sea.

The ‘real’ increase is 2k (actually 2200) more than we did pay and would have spent. Easy peasy and it doesn’t require number crunching to make it into a good deal for stuff we don’t want. I know that’s how you did it for your cruises, making it a deal for yourself (and congrats) but that doesn’t work for us. Sorry that’s difficult for you to understand but even if it were a 50 day cruise it wouldn’t matter, we have a price point and the SM prices exceeded it. That’s my point. Happy Canada Day by the way.

I booked four days ago, price went up 2k as of today for unwanted excursions or meal booze and we did get Olife of $800 for the cabin when we booked. It isn’t a per day comparison for us, its a whole trip cost of 2k more for the same thing (although not really because we have $800 Olife to spend vs ‘excursion’ credit) and we wouldn’t have booked it because there ARE other cruiselines we love and value and not named Viking. We will continue to love Oceania, maybe from afar after our two, time will tell. Until then, happy for this weeks earlier booking!

Celebrations and high-fiving are going on in my house because we wisely booked cruise only for two of our likely last Oceania cruises, one just a few days ago. Woof on the pricing, ours both soared upwards by over $1000 pp with unwanted additions so we’re thrilled for these two and I guess we’ll watch to see what happens but right now they have priced themselves out of our market.

I decided to go ahead and book cruise only a few days ago and the cruise has gone up $1000 per person with the simply more option so we would be paying $2000 extra for excursions we do not want and booze which we DO want but no way would we be drinking $2000 worth unless Friends of Bill are looking for two new members! Simply no more with O if this is the new pricing structure but thrilled with the two we have booked and happy there are other ships in the sea to choose!

Thanks to everyone for posting on this subject, I had no clue they would be booked out so rapidly for our mid January cruise on Marina that we booked today but we luckily just snagged one spot so thanks for the info, it helped us!

Windstar is fabulous. We’re new to O and loved them after our 28 day Tahiti to LA, booked a 34 day onboard but Windstar beats them on customer service. They know your names with a day or two and while they all pound that whole ‘family’ drum way too much it felt like a nice family every time we’ve been on W. Cabins are bigger than many we’ve had and the ocean view cabins have huge windows and the French balconies are fine, not as good as a real one for sure but nice to get the constant breeze. W and Az and O are our main three and we like them all but W is probably the best for us, all depending on itinerary and prices. However O wins hands down with the food, W is really good but bless O and the nightly sushi! 👍 Nice to say goodbye to the big ships!

We were offered an upgrade to the owners suite in the front for a mere 2k on our TP and declined it because their balcony, while large, was completely enclosed and dark and ugly. I know that sounds like a ridiculous reason to reject but we just didn’t like the dark ambience of the balcony and while the room itself was huge it just wasn’t worth it and so we stayed in our French balcony cabin and loved it. However, those owner suites in the back had nice balconies and looked pretty sweet!

We were on a beautifully empty 15 day transpacific with Windstar (88 people) that we just got off and they had a couple of owner suites that they were offering up for 2000 total. Deal! You would think we would leap onto that but we took a brief tour and thought it to be just meh (and I’m pretty sure it would be the only time we would be in an owners suite) but we just couldn’t take the bite of that apple and stayed in our lovely French balcony room. Bigger yes (much!) but it just lacked any ambience and why spend the 2k just for the space? Zero regrets. To have spent $2500 for a mere balcony on quarter full Oceania is a waste for us, we love Oceania but find it pricey and it has to make sense. Undoubtedly I’ll kick myself for my only cheap leap into a Windstar owners suite but we truly loved our cabin and found another cruise to put that 2k into, go figure BUT Windstar offered up a deal, Oceania did not in my estimation. I remember our infrequent suite moments and they say you can never go back but it turns out you can, rather easily too! 😉 Having said that we have a lovely suite experience coming this November during a TA so all is not lost, whew!