BasandSyb

Sounds excruciatingly painful, very frustrating and not to mention expensive if you need to replace more than a few days of clothes. The experiences mentioned have certainly put us off using it. We don't mind wrangling luggage for short movements at this point in our lives. However, we are travelling 4.5 months this year and the misalignment of multiple airline allowances, weight and Seabourn charter flights was doing our heads in. To avoid the problem, we were considering some point to point luggage movement in Europe through a company which guaranteed a two day turnaround but were a bit wobbly with timing and worried that although pre-arranged a hotel concierge might not accept it in our absence. Thankfully Seabourn has re-visited its wording of allowances, corrected what we have been told and clarified baggage limits we can work with - and I made sure to get it in writing. Now we just worry about the airline Gods and what may/may not arrive or be damaged following various airport hopping. Thanks to Shark b8 for the topic and the sharing of experiences. Labonnevie - that Regent world cruise post was interesting... was it just me or did a lot of the food look not very tempting, and some plates almost like mush? Have travelled Regent, but will stick with Seabourn.

Depends if you feel the cold and when your sail date is 😇 January weather on the below link: https://www.accuweather.com/en/ar/ushuaia/6462/january-weather/6462

Yes, The George first with overflow to The Kimpton. We are on the same trip - advice received from Seabourn when we started pushing for info to finalise our travel. Where you land will depend on bookings volume. We found it easier to just lock in elsewhere for another few days.

Thank you for taking the time to do this. We are joining Pursuit in February for what will be the beginning of 4 months away and your packing comments will be very useful. 😵‍💫 Sorry to see Shark B8 is still off line - that must be so disappointing for them both. Hopefully they have managed some activities and are on the improve. If you haven't been to BA before, be wary when on the street and leave all your valuables in the safe (including personal jewellery - earings etc.). Look forward to hearing more of your travels.

Kiwi Afloat, the other option is to contact your local travel agent. We ended up doing Iguazu after a cruise and a few days in BA by purchasing a package with air, transfers and accommodation. Most of the TAs in Aust/NZ have various options and price points available. Took the thinking out and it was a reasonable price to stay at the then Sheraton in a falls view room for 4 nights. A secondary reason for booking a package was the argy bargy between the border countries at that time. Argentina was intermittently not letting visitors to the Brazilian side back over the border. The stay was great. All the local transfer companies worked around the issue by changing cars at the border. There was an airline strike (apparently not uncommon) on the return trip but we were kept in the loop and the local contacts sorted out changes. We took a taxi a few nights into Paraguay for dinner which was fantastic. The whole stay is so memorable, you will love it.

🤗 looking forward to your updates Shark b8. Was starting to get withdrawal symptoms when Markandjie disembarked. We are doing the same run in February on Pursuit. Have done the Drake a few times and experienced “the lake”. I fear the odds may be against us next time. We are keen to hear how the Sth G restrictions play out. Safe and awesome travels. Hope you caught the sail away.

Sfvoyage, I've just had a chance to review the video you posted. Thank you. Very ordinary remuneration. In my book any automatically added gratuity is presumptive and immoral. If it's being used in lieu of an employer paying wages that is even worse. The below is interesting in terms of their upselling and playing on customers: https://www.cruisingascrew.com/what-is-it-like-to-work-for-steiner-on-a-cruise-ship/ So much for a relaxing time at the spa 🙂

Interesting divider of opinions on this one from burying your head in the sand - nothing to see here - I don’t care if my goods come from sweat shops etc - why should I care if someone in my sphere of influence doesn’t earn a decent basic wage for a days work TO choosing not to use the “service”. Where is Seabourn in this if passengers on a so called luxury line are being harangued and harassed for tips and commissions. If it is true it’s a complete embarrassment. Everyone deserves a basic wage. Payment based on tips only perpetuates a black market of tax avoidance and grovelling servitude. I wonder how the free massage for Seabourn loyalty members plays out. Some of us do have a real freedom of choice. If it is correct I will be voting with my feet and spend my money ashore with a complaint to Seabourn HQ about their concessionaire.

Absolutely, we have been weighed on charter flights previously. Haven’t heard how the new Air NZ arrangements have been going. They were in the pipeline for quite some time. Hobar - as per Frantic36s comments, my query was itinerary related. We receive a Seabourn itinerary which hasn’t changed in format for years and I assumed this usually 4-6 page beige and white statement was issued universally. It seems you don’t receive it? Perhaps one generated by your TA instead? That could explain the missing information?

Bas just wants a very large S, C and G so he can find what he wants without glasses! He finds it very frustrating - colour coding doesn’t work. That would require short term memory 😂 Gel rather than soap also cuts the cleaning time and the need for scum removing chemicals which is why cruise companies are large adopters (under the green banner of course). I'm just waiting for fragrance free alternatives and until then have to hump my products across the globe. (Later life allergies from lifetime exposure to crazy synthetic additives)

I’m not understanding why you haven’t been advised of your limits. Ours for both trips is in the line item for the date of travel in the itinerary on original booking and updated since with itinerary changes. Just the flight times are missing.

I understand the ground staff issues with baggage charging as most aren’t airline employees these days familiar with tier allowances etc. Also understand weight/fuel. What I don’t get is a luxury cruise line using charters without organising appropriate baggage allowances for their demographic that link with business class for airlines. We are doing 2 expedition Seabourns Feb and May. One is 34kg the other is 23kg. Annoying and difficult when you are travelling for the period in between and have otherwise much higher flight limits.

Note to cross check for 2024. Seabourn has just confirmed to us our Feb 2024 charter flights are in and out of AEP which makes sense given they are domestic journeys. No timing yet as they haven’t been booked. A transfer to EZE will be available but outbound flights should not be prior to 20:00. Hence we will be staying in town. The airport hotels don’t look that close nor does there seem to be much around them while waiting for a 18:00 next day departure. We’ve done BA twice previously so will probably stay in Recoleta.

Just go for a walk around town - it’s not far from the ship and have a couple of Beagle beers. You won’t have too much time. The shopping isn’t bad if that’s your thing or even window shopping. If you’ve left anything at home from memory there are quite a few outdoor stores - Nth Face etc. We are still wearing butter soft leather shoes bought in Ushuaia - the Argentinians do excellent leather goods.

We have one account checked and the other not so we don’t get two sets.

No. But apparently Mac N Cheese used to qualify as fine dining (tongue firmly in cheek 😇) My husband can cook and we can source a better steak than we ever had in TKG and I can cook a better roast chicken - neither of which we ever seek out at restaurants nor on cruises. I’m sure the new menu will continue to reveal itself - fingers crossed. Lamb remains one of the better offerings on the ship. My husband is a two lamb chops and poached egg guy for breakfast and SB does them perfectly. We also love pork and game. Swordfish is a favourite - glad to see that, we enjoy it for lunch freshly grilled on other lines but rarely available on SB. At the end of the day, we will eat most things but are choosy in what we rate and aren’t swayed by celebrity chefs or hype.

We are the same. We can travel in 2s, 4s up to 12 of us on a particular itinerary - whoever sees something interesting and is available. It’s not necessarily SB of which we are all diamond members. You are correct Mauzac/Nops we have multiple tabs open - what is a better itinerary - date - dept/arrival port - price - inclusions. Where is easier to fly into for Australians and what can we package around it coming and going. Have thought for quite sometime that the SB website is not informative nor intuitive. We search elsewhere first and then compare. Other websites list the particular cruise, you can then try and find it on the SB website or at least provide a date and region to your TA. There are so many cruises I find elsewhere but the search engine on SB won’t bring it up. I need to do a broad regional search then a page trawl… and then find it’s a grand voyage or other ridiculous category and therefore not showing but in a different list. Very frustrating and geared toward pretty pictures than usefulness. Our starting point is usually VTG for a complete list of dates and B2Bs as we do long trips. SB if you are listening a survey of website users might be timely - a sample size of more than 300 - what device they use - how they search - and a focus on age related responses insightful. Can we put those cookies and file history to work with some useful suggestions? Why else are you collecting them? Nops - still waiting to hear which Edinburgh hotel next June! We are doing a further 3 days and don’t want to be in a tour group hotel, will book elsewhere soon as it will be high season and can’t wait any longer.

Agree with Sunprince. The point of an email is to communicate. This one did not show complete trip maps for many of the showcased cruises (on any device). Indicated sold out. The click here for dates and prices did not provide prices, merely an end date. The learn more didn’t drop down the full itinerary. For me that equals a useless email. Why would I then think to call Seabourn or my TA and waste their time further? Or refer to Facebook social pages for further information? If our marketing and comms people put out product like this they would have had to fix it within 24 hrs with apologies, not follow it up with further “offers” today with similar broken links, sold out indicators and little real info.

Every trip we have purchased since our first TKG experience has factored having one fewer dining outlet. We always find something to eat. Can’t please everyone. We would prefer a pan Asian style restaurant choice, but based on the Asian and Indian experiences in the Colonnade we would rather the Solis sample than the other done badly. The only good Indian meal we have had onboard was on special order by a Indian chef asked to prepare it for himself. Similarly the Asian nights are unfortunately “westernised” to cater for all and in doing so miss the mark. Looking forward to some additional choice on our next cruise.

Yes Nops we have been looking too. Perhaps you are right with booking system issues. The website is …politely, rubbish … potentially hand in hand with the booking system. Very puzzling and agree with Mauzac about the proverbial boy who cried wolf - less inclined to click on a email next time for us. I usually use other websites with a better layout and “at a glance” itinerary info anyway rather than the Seabourn site when planning a trip. They are smaller ships and given this the big worry is they are chartered and only had a few spare suites?? Have been caught with a charter previously and never again! There should be more transparency for booking those types of cruises. Good luck in scouting for a trip.

Yesterday as diamond members we received early access invitation advertising for certain regional 2025 sailings. Upon opening each of the regional links within 20 minutes of the email landing, they were all marked as sold out, not even a wait list offer/mention. Makes us question the purpose of the advertising. Trying to drive other sailings which will soon be emailed?

Thanks for posting the sample menu. Looks good. I would normally be concerned given it’s heavily Med and could start leaning to Italian, but I think there’s enough of Yottam O at the moment to keep it interesting and fresh. As already said the absolute proof will be on the table. Fingers crossed. Roll on changes to remove TK from the patio menu. 1 type of burger and hot dog is enough for any lunch menu given it can be made to order. The patio is such a lost opportunity.

It might be different in 2024, but we are doing Pursuit in Feb and were advised by Seabourn that there are 2 x flights down and back (return arr 3pm and 4pm “ish” haven’t got the paperwork with me) an hour apart. AEP (Jorge Newberry) being used in both directions. Our onward flight leaves at 6pm from EZE so will be staying an additional night. AEP suits the extra night. Advised luggage limit is 34kg across max 2 checked cases. I find it quite annoying there is so much different information when you supposedly get it from Seabourn direct. Will re-check ours. We still can’t get confirmed hotel information for June 24 after Seabourn now ends our itinerary in Edinburgh rather than Oslo. It’s not great for planning a longer stay! Seabourn can be very slow.

This comment only relates to Australian wines as we are more than familiar with their pricing 😇. We get the top tier loyalty discount and they are still well over the odds at restaurant prices, then factor in 64c = $1US. Occasionally we may stumble across a bargain but find they quickly run out whether due to other eagle-eyed diners or a realisation the price has been listed incorrectly. 😂

Have just spent a few weeks resort hopping in Thailand and the recent drink trends for cocktails/mocktails has seen some amazing experimenting and results - spices, chilli, cucumber, pepper, pimento, coconut, almond, lime - endless flavours and combos all delicious. We don’t like sweet and won’t have any syrups, soft drinks or diet anything. Every evening there was something new. Look forward to trying the new Seabourn offerings and putting the bar staff through their paces not to use premix (eerrk!)