Windsurf versus Oceania Regatta

[Delta Queen]

Any one out there who has cruised bith ships? We are considering the Regatta this time for a transatlantic cruise & were wondering how it compared to Windsurf, recognizing that there are twice as many passengers on Regatta.

[schmidlapp]

can't speak for oceana, but we have heard good things about them. we're back on windstar (windsurf) january 15th and have 2 additional weeks booked with them in late april/may. we've been on a good number of lines and windstar just seems to fit our likes. plusses are very good to excellent food, no crowds, the most friendly staff of any line, really neat out of the way ports. NO i don't work for windstar, just our opinion. don't get me wrong, many other lines have a good product, just some of them are overrated for their price point. for example we did seadream 2 years ago, we paid slightly more than double what we are paying for our barbados run coming up. seadreams food was not as good as windstar,

yes it was all inclusive but theres no way we drank up the difference in price. service at times might have been a bit better but all in all just not up to their high ratings. we did radisson in tahiti, and i'd go back on that ship anytime. this is one that lived up to its ratings and expectations.

i guess the point i'm trying to make is windstar is a great product that

lives up to its ratings and expectations, we've enjoyed them in the past and expect to in the future. (the sails are kind of cool too, even though they don't do much to propel the ship!)

[JoanneCam]

Hi,

Just returned from my first Oceania cruise after doing 6 or so on the Windstar line (all the ships, including the late Windsong) and one on Seadream. I agree entirely with the assessment noted above: Seadream was great but significantly more expensive, and I challenge the average person to make up the difference in price by consuming the necessary amount of the included alcohol. It just can't be done if you want to remember anything about the trip! The Oceania Regatta is a beautiful ship, but to my mind, the level of service and the cuisine, although very good, is not up to the Windstar standards. I also prefer the smaller size ship for meeting fellow passengers, who, in my experience on the Windstar are by and large several decades younger on average. My primary reason for writing this post is, however, to warn reagrding a Transatlantic crossing on the Oceania ships. So much of your experience would be, of course, up to the chance of the weather, but on a Miami to Miami cruise last week, half the ship was seasick (including me) for the first 2 days due to wind and waves (it was also sunny and fair). The ship apparently has little of her mass in the water, and the 11 decks above, for the length of the ship, serves as a sail to rock the boat quite a bit. In fact, according to staff, although the last transatlantic was flat calm, the one before was so rough, the cabins on one side of the ship were flooded with several inches of sea water as the waves broke up over deck 8. I have never been seasick on Windstar. Although I am sure I'll do other Oceania cruises (they have great itineraries and very fair prices), I would not consider doing a crossing unless I had a great deal of experience in rough conditions on the water and knew I would not be seasick. Joanne