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Men's Spa Facilities on Cruise ships: Which ones do you think are the best?

GigglewolfOfTheSeas
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alexdw

alexdw

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Posted
On 11/5/2023 at 9:32 AM, Ships and Dip said:


It sure does! Located in the men’s changing room near the spa. There are also 3 showers in there. 

Does this sauna on Reflection have a window or os it an internal one?

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bejwee

bejwee

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Just got back from 9 days on the NCL pearl. Can confirm that in the paid thermal area there are still separate men's and women's wet areas on either side of the ship with a coed area in the middle. Men's side still has an awesome sauna, small but working steam, single person hot tub, and single person cold plunge.  Super disappointed at the crowd in there though, lots of people in suits yammering away that don't have spa etiquette. I sat in the sauna and steam naked on a towel, but there we're only other two folks on ship following suit.  There is a small two to three person steam room attached to the gym in the men's bathroom, that was not super frequented either.  It's a shame because so many people go on Royal Caribbean and the food is so much worse than NCL, although the entertainment is better. 

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bejwee

bejwee

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Posted
20 minutes ago, greg1969 said:

Looking forward to my next cruise on The Sillver dawn leaving Fort Lauderdale 5th January.  I think there is a male only sauna onboard, can anyone clarify this?

I just sailed in Norway on the silver Dawn this past August. I really don't want to rain on your parade and feel bad doing so, but I was not super pleased with the ship and would not sail on silversea again. If I'm going to go on a ship full of old people that focuses on food, Oceania is far, far better. The ship is not run well, you can tell across many arenas.  We had to change rooms because there was a constant sewage smell blowing into our room as did several other people on our hall. I found the dress code to be laborious and did a ton of room service. Heavy marketing on the food makes it sound incredible but execution falls short. 

 

Silver Dawn spa:

- there is a central area where people who are getting treatments or who want to just hang out in the spa will go, with a bunch of chairs shared by men and women, and a couple refreshment stands.

- On either side there is a set of two showers, a wet steam, and a dry sauna behind a smoked glass door.

- For at least a couple days you will have men and women going in the wrong sides because they don't have a sign that actually says men or women, there's just a mural with a painting of a man or a woman on that wall that you are supposed to understand. 

- Privacy in the sauna and steam is decent as far as people out in the main area seeing in,  the whole setup is pretty cramped, but nice.   

There are some super annoying things about the spa as well:

- They stupidly put the spa directly under the piano bar and at 5:00 or 6:00 p.m., the piano bar starts blaring music that you can hear clear as day loudly from the loungers below where you are trying to relax from your massage or whatever. They also have their own spa music playing on speakers so at some point you start hearing two different sets of music playing daily. 

 

- WATER. The one thing you want when you are having a sauna and steam session, is to come out and pound water. They have these little carts with drinks and snacks and the top shelf which is at about waist level has a bunch of chocolates and other edibles you don't want when you are hot and steamed, the second shelf has a bunch of fancy designer TONIC waters...puke... And then finally at ground level about where your ankles would be there are a bunch of glasses and in the very back behind those glasses are bottles of water with screw on caps that everyone shares. They expect you to bend down reach to the back get out a glass unscrew the bottle for your glass re-screw the cap and stick it back on the bottom shelf.... Major pain in the butt and absolutely ridiculous for people that come out hot from a sauna and just want to slam a couple glasses of water. I mentioned how ridiculous this was (politely of course) to the spa manager and she says she knows it doesn't make any sense but it comes down from silver Sea corporate. Generic it's not my fault response basically..

- spa staff that service is the water cart comes out and handles the top of every one of the glass drinking glasses before putting them upside down on the card, with no gloves of course... And then I watch them almost daily come with a glass full of cut limes for the tonic water, which they pull out with their ungloved fingers and put where they are supposed to go, All of course after grabbing the door handle to the spa that every single person grabs. You definitely get the vibe that they are excited COVID is over and they could go back to their old procedures/they learned nothing about germ process.

 

I'll stop there because I don't want to rain any further on your excitement, but perhaps with this review, your expectations will be tempered a bit and maybe you will be happily surprised.. If anything I hope you appreciate the time I took because I know not as many folks sail these smaller lines. Hopefully you also complain about the spa water situation and they will remedy it. 

 

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greg1969

greg1969

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Posted
50 minutes ago, bejwee said:

I just sailed in Norway on the silver Dawn this past August. I really don't want to rain on your parade and feel bad doing so, but I was not super pleased with the ship and would not sail on silversea again. If I'm going to go on a ship full of old people that focuses on food, Oceania is far, far better. The ship is not run well, you can tell across many arenas.  We had to change rooms because there was a constant sewage smell blowing into our room as did several other people on our hall. I found the dress code to be laborious and did a ton of room service. Heavy marketing on the food makes it sound incredible but execution falls short. 

 

Silver Dawn spa:

- there is a central area where people who are getting treatments or who want to just hang out in the spa will go, with a bunch of chairs shared by men and women, and a couple refreshment stands.

- On either side there is a set of two showers, a wet steam, and a dry sauna behind a smoked glass door.

- For at least a couple days you will have men and women going in the wrong sides because they don't have a sign that actually says men or women, there's just a mural with a painting of a man or a woman on that wall that you are supposed to understand. 

- Privacy in the sauna and steam is decent as far as people out in the main area seeing in,  the whole setup is pretty cramped, but nice.   

There are some super annoying things about the spa as well:

- They stupidly put the spa directly under the piano bar and at 5:00 or 6:00 p.m., the piano bar starts blaring music that you can hear clear as day loudly from the loungers below where you are trying to relax from your massage or whatever. They also have their own spa music playing on speakers so at some point you start hearing two different sets of music playing daily. 

 

- WATER. The one thing you want when you are having a sauna and steam session, is to come out and pound water. They have these little carts with drinks and snacks and the top shelf which is at about waist level has a bunch of chocolates and other edibles you don't want when you are hot and steamed, the second shelf has a bunch of fancy designer TONIC waters...puke... And then finally at ground level about where your ankles would be there are a bunch of glasses and in the very back behind those glasses are bottles of water with screw on caps that everyone shares. They expect you to bend down reach to the back get out a glass unscrew the bottle for your glass re-screw the cap and stick it back on the bottom shelf.... Major pain in the butt and absolutely ridiculous for people that come out hot from a sauna and just want to slam a couple glasses of water. I mentioned how ridiculous this was (politely of course) to the spa manager and she says she knows it doesn't make any sense but it comes down from silver Sea corporate. Generic it's not my fault response basically..

- spa staff that service is the water cart comes out and handles the top of every one of the glass drinking glasses before putting them upside down on the card, with no gloves of course... And then I watch them almost daily come with a glass full of cut limes for the tonic water, which they pull out with their ungloved fingers and put where they are supposed to go, All of course after grabbing the door handle to the spa that every single person grabs. You definitely get the vibe that they are excited COVID is over and they could go back to their old procedures/they learned nothing about germ process.

 

I'll stop there because I don't want to rain any further on your excitement, but perhaps with this review, your expectations will be tempered a bit and maybe you will be happily surprised.. If anything I hope you appreciate the time I took because I know not as many folks sail these smaller lines. Hopefully you also complain about the spa water situation and they will remedy it. 

 

 

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greg1969

greg1969

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Posted

Thanks for the reply, we do not have anymore Silversea cruises booked after this one - we were with them in September and we enjoyed it.  Next cruises coming up after this one are Virgin, Oceania, and Cunard.New to both Oceania and Cunard.

Well if there are problems withj females coming into the male area they may get a shock - I never wear swimwear in a single sex sauna - too much time spent in Germany in the wellness places.

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les37b

les37b

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Posted
On 12/22/2023 at 12:57 PM, greg1969 said:

Looking forward to my next cruise on The Sillver dawn leaving Fort Lauderdale 5th January.  I think there is a male only sauna onboard, can anyone clarify this?


From memory, yes there is.

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sauna director

sauna director

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Posted

Okay, so we see lines removing that "awful word" FREE from just about everything in favor of 

"kiddy land" rides and slides. RCL and Princess are in the process of eliminating.free saunas.

Their excuse is that Covid 19 caused such losses that they need every dollar. Oh, by the way, have you followed their stocks? The big guys are back in the black.

Relaxed cruising is being replaced by "thrill" rides.

Those of us who have cruised for years to relax are not amused.

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bejwee

bejwee

Posted
Posted (edited)

Reading through the various posts on this thread I can recall seeing a few of people that went on Disney and had a great time. I think Disney knows their job is to get the kids away from the parents, give the parents peace of mind that they are safe and protected and having fun, and let the parents have a little fun too.

Edited by bejwee
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ShipWalker

ShipWalker

Posted
Posted

It's a new year and I've added Oceania Cruise ships to the database.

 

A friendly reminder to all users to the database...

*******

Best viewed on desktop or laptop. (using a mouse)

 

Steam/Sauna Database

 

As a reminder to all, ANY change you make to the database is auto-saved. There is no temporary change while you are on it. That means if you highlight ships to compare them. It is permanent. If you change the formatting of the data in any way, or for some reason change the order of the ships it stays that way when you exit.

 

The DB then needs to be cleaned up (not that hard to do) but still takes time.

 

Enjoy!

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