Dolebludger

Actually, somebody who ranks onboard entertainment high on their list of “must haves” on a cruise would be disappointed in lines like O, Regent, Silversea, and such. Actually, the best entertainment I’ve experienced on a cruise was on NCL! But I found every other factor about that line not to my liking.

Well, all I am saying is that if you want a certain cruise itinerary, shop around and do price comparisons for lines you like. And things change over rather small amounts of time, so the results several months ago might not be accurate today.

Cruise line comparison can vary with itinerary. And comparing a Penthouse on Regent to an unspecified suite on X is a bit of a miss. First, on Regent, you don’t need a butler, because room stewards have fewer suites and are tasked with all things that butlers do on X. So the comparison should be with a concierge suite or lower on Regent. And it needs consideration that the MDR on Regent (Compass Rose) is more like a specialty restaurant than a MDR. And on Regent, one is free of crowds on all parts of the ship. I priced a 7 night E. Caribbean on Regent in a concierge suite vs X in a SS, and found Regent less expensive, given the itinerary. And all things considered.

Thanks, Ski Mom! When your TA answers the matter, please post the results right here. What I can read so far doesn’t sound good.

Did Windstar pull the Star Breeze out of French Polynesia?

We are very interested in the outcome of this matter as we are booked Regent Splendor concierge later this month Caribbean and the same for Europe in August. We have the hotel, transfer, and flights set up, at least as of now. But travel has been a mess since the pandemic, and we never know what might happen. We have trusted Regent for decades to do the tight thing. Now, we wonder.

I know some did that. We didn’t. We tipped the “recommended amount” or a little more. No fan of the “American tipping culture” here, but I can’t change it by stiffing those who give me real service. But recent attempts to spread it into basically self service transactions with a tip prompt at checkout are met with “0”.

Actually, I think Virgin’s target market is about 1/4 my age! But I can’t find where Virgin has free drinks or much of anything else “free”. I’m probably missing something. But I would feel like I was on a cruise with my grand kids!

Please keep us posted. According to Picardad’s figures (which are going to be pretty spot on) it’s up to probably $375 USD to get from the airport and book in the hotel. And I’ll bet it will take more than $5 to get from hotel to pier. And Regent’s hotel and transfers includes breakfast, and that will cost extra. And there is the inconvenience to the guest in having to arrange things that Regent was paid to do. From what I can see, Regent is having these problems in small embarkation port cities, like Anchorage, Bridgetown, and Rekyjavik. On our Explorer Alaska cruise last summer, we booked concierge, but learned that Regent’s hotel in Anchorage (Hilton) had some bad reviews. So we took the credit and booked our own. In reading reviews of our cruise on CC after our return, we learned that the hotel was indeed poor, as were the transfers. We found a small boutique hotel and did our own transfers (not in a crowded bus) and all was good. I note that there have been some more minor complaints about Regent’s hotel choices in some larger port areas, but nothing as serious as the problem here.

I must confess that I prefer cruise lines wherein tips (WiFi, drinks, etc.) are included in the fare. It saves me from needing to “do the math”. But I’m capable of doing that, so no problem.

I don’t know the experience of others, but we have found that OBC on Regent is useful only in booking “extra cost” shore excursions. Everything else we might want is included. From our experience from a short stay in Iceland (back in 2017) I don’t think $380 USD will be sufficient to compensate for hotel and transfers. The airport is a very long way from town, and prices in Iceland are very high. Check your actual costs and discuss this with your TA and Regent. As a repeat guest of Regent (many times) I am disappointed in it based on some recent threads, including this one. There was a similar recent thread about Regent being “unable” to provide transfers and hotel in Barbados. There are current threads about Regent’s failure to provide the advertised “unlimited free shore excursions”. I don’t like what is going on with Regent.

There is a problem with the included excursions also. Not only on Regent, but on other lines that offer them. There have been reports of “no excursions available” on Regent and Silversea too. I understand the problem, and it is not being caused by the cruise lines. There are shortages in the hospitality industry world wide. But it does make advertising “unlimited free excursions” a bit wrong, doesn’t it?

The tipping situation over the decades we’ve been cruising sure has changed. Back 30 sr so years ago we cruised Royal a bit. We were furnished tip envelopes for our fixed seating waiters and our room steward. We put money in the envelopes and gave them to those people on the last day. We never knew what happened to the tip money. Was it kept by the staff members tipped, or was it pooled and distributed among all the staff? In the old days, all cruise lines we knew of used the rip envelope system. In more recent times, we have cruised in an auto tipping or a tips included situation, and we just go with the program. We consider auto tip amounts to be part of the fare and pay them. And if we don’t like the fare with those auto tips added in, we don’t book.

Yes, the 150 compensation is an insult UNLESS it is accompanied by the standard credit given when a concierge guest elects to book his/her own hotel and transfers. On our Alaska/Explorer cruise last summer we made this election due to reports of poor service at the selected hotel and transfer provider,— and the credit was more than 150 pp! Reykjavik is not a large city, and most hotels there are on the small side. It is understandable that Regent would be unable to reserve a large block of rooms in a single hotel. But it is not understandable that Regent (being in the travel business) wouldn’t have known this much earlier in the game.

Any idea of what the reasons for the cancelations are? Without knowing, I sounds scary!

If there is a major refit of the Mariner, I hope they will get rid of all the tub/shower combinations. They are not ADA compliant. Insufficient headroom, and not accessible for persons with any leg disorders.

pappy1022, if you look back to Covid era on THIS forum you’ll see posts reporting that many PG guests that were canceled by Ponant had to resort to credit card charge back to recover their payments for a cruise that wasn’t. Of course, the problem with a 125% FCC is that there is no guarantee that the line won’t increase fares to 150% (which it pretty much did). And that’s why all other lines I know of gave the option of a 100% cash refund.

Sounds like the ship is short staffed.

For my next two cruises, we are going with Regent.

Well, it is good that all priority booking categories stay in place. The two times that we were suite guests, we weren’t bothered by the Zenith guests boarding with us. Boarding was no problem, and I hope it stays that way, Zeniths and all. You know what? I suspect that X ships have gotten too big! How does a line offer a premium or lux experience in a 3500 passenger ship? I don’t know, and apparently X doesn’t know either. The way matters have been recently, we’ll never be Zenith. The prices are above those on recognized lux lines for similar suites, but with fewer inclusions. So where are we going to book? You guessed it.

Our flight after Splendor docks at Southampton from LHR to DIA is at 2:50 PM on United business class that we got via a deviation. It is the only direct flight to Denver that exists. I hope all will go well. But I wouldn’t want the return flight to be any earlier.

X must have recently revised this information on their site. Doesn’t look vague now.

Actually, the X website does list the mini fridge as a benefit in ALL suites including SS. But it shows the additional comment “extra charge MAY apply” as to all suites — even RS and above. X seems to be keeping the matter vague, on purpose.

Just a question. Do the Retreat Hosts (or room stewards, or whatever they are called) empty the extra cost contents of the mini fridge and replace with included contents from the Retreat Lounge, upon request?

It’s been five years ago, but we bought a future cruise certificate on the Equinox, and cancelled about six months later, and we were refunded.