Illuminated Isles - Voyager Feb 13-23 Caribbean

[HonTri]

Thank you for the great photos. We don't board the Voyager until Oct. this year our first on her.

[Got2Cruise]

Love this balanced blog. We were seriously considering this sailing but chose a land based island vacation instead. Did the pool chair issue ever improve? That’s a deal breaker for us. 

[macbest]

1 hour ago, Got2Cruise said:

Did the pool chair issue ever improve? That’s a deal breaker for us. 

Not really, if anything it got worse. Today is a sea day. The first of two before we return to Miami. It has been bad the entire trip. 

 

We went up at 7:30a s morning and every last lounge chair in the shade was taken with only 10 people sitting in them. It’s terrible. Very upsetting. 

 

Alas at lunch some ray of hope. Some security person was about to remove someone’s items when the lady rushed over. She was lounging on another lounger in the sun! So taking two up herself! 

 

Just then the man lying next to where this woman was going to be - and clearly unrelated - started yelling at the security woman. And I mean nasty. I was ready to jump in to defend her as he was being beyond inappropriate. This chair hog person wasn’t there for well over an hour in the latest period and I think not there much at all today other than when she placed herself likely before 7:30a. They ended up calling down a senior officer as both the woman who was being told to leave and the man who just yelled at the security woman weren’t budging. 

 

THe security lady walked away to compose herself. I got her name. And walked up to her and thanked her for what she was doing. It is out of control. Why would anyone want that job? A towel staff person or a cocktail waiter certainly wouldn’t want it. They need a new system. Maybe some type of plastic card that they put on the lounger that is empty with a time on it. They come back in 30 min (or heck even make it 45) and if still unoccupied then they remove their stuff. Like they do when they stripe your tires in a timed street parking. Of course I’m sure the chair hogs would just figure a way around that also. 

 

Sorry to rant about this otherwise fantastic cruise. Since the ship is at capacity you really feel things like this and it is disappointing. Best solution? Be sure to get a balcony big enough to hold your own lounge chair. 

[Travelcat2]

This seems to be a repetitive issue on Caribbean and Mediterranean cruises.  Regent does have a table and a sign for crew members to put belongings of passengers that are chair hogging.  They need to put this out every cruise.  Most importantly, it needs to be enforced.  Sorry that you had to go through this.

[Got2Cruise]

Sorry to hear about the chair hog situation. Puts a negative light on the entire vacation. I’d do the same and stay on my balcony and order room service but hubby likes to chat with folks at the pool. 

[forgap]

The entitlement of some people never ceases to amaze me.   The rules are clearly stated in Passages.  Hogging chairs is rude but kicking up dust with the poor soul tasked with enforcement is beyond inappropriate.  Can Regent give passengers time out?  If you behave like a toddler, you get treated like a toddler.  

[golfgirls]

Yikes, hoping we will not have too many chair issues next week but I expect we will as it looks like a full house. 

 

Job number one when we get to our room will be to request a second chaise for our balcony.  We did this last time and didn’t receive it but this time we will insist!  

[Hambagahle]

Macbest - looking at the photos from P7 (which are very good and make my mouth water - thank you!) that steak was medium rare IMO.  I eat what we call "saignant" or rare steak and it was way over-cooked for me.  I would have sent it back!!  To each his own...

 

Totally agree about which ship to be on - we were in St Martin, on the Navigator.  Three other "behemoths" docked there as well.  Cruise Director went on shore for lunch and the waiter asked if she was from a ship.  Yes, she said.  Which, he asked.  She pointed out the Navigator.  "Oh! the baby ship" was the reply!!!   I would take that baby ship any day.

 

Continue to have a lovely time.  and please send more photos!!  they are great.

Gerry

[cwn]

Just now, Hambagahle said:

……..

Totally agree about which ship to be on - we were in St Martin, on the Navigator.  Three other "behemoths" docked there as well.  Cruise Director went on shore for lunch and the waiter asked if she was from a ship.  Yes, she said.  Which, he asked.  She pointed out the Navigator.  "Oh! the baby ship" was the reply!!!   I would take that baby ship any day.

…….

 

I love your comment.....last year on the Navigator WC we were the "baby ship" in several ports also. I wouldn't travel any other way! 

[macbest]

Couple of great meals since I last posted. 

 

Three nights before the end, and a wonderful chicken egg roll showed up as an appetizer in CR. Nice and hot, crunchy and yet soft. Delicious. Served with a hot and spicy sauce. Nice start. 

I haven’t said anything about the intermezzo. Each day a new sorbet is available and all have been excellent. Different than what i have had off the ship. Today’s was a cucumber and mint which had just the right level of palette cleansing you would want. 

Turkey night! With all the trimmings I asked for just white meat and that is what you got. Wife doesn’t care much for this meal so she had the seared ribeye steak that CR does so amazingly well. 

Each night they also have a new dessert soufflé. Who does that? Most cruise ships you are lucky to get even one soufflé the entire cruise! This one was pistachio and oh so yummy. 

Another great meal in CR!

——————————

The captains farewell night (which is typically two nights before the end of the cruise) is usually my favorite night for my number one dish - beef Wellington. This one did not disappoint. Nice mushroom duxelle and perfectly cooked (medium rare) and pastry that was crispy and a great Syrah wine sauce (always ask for extra sauce - it’s the law)!  

For the entire cruise there has been no carrot cake which is my wife’s favorite dessert. So I asked our Butler a day prior to ask if the kitchen would make one and without raisins which she also doesn’t care for. I didn’t tell my wife I had done this. Imagine my wife’s surprise when two pieces came to our table. She saw Roxanne bring them from the kitchen. She said, “oh my goodness I just saw carrot cake. That wasn’t on the menu!”  When it came to our table she was flabbergasted. I loved it. “Surprise!”  A fitting end to a fabulous dinner. And a happy wife. 

Edited February 22, 2019 by macbest

[macbest]

We have been enjoying the heck out of our Butler, Roshan. Never knew what I would use one before when we first got one on a late upgrade a couple of years ago On the Voyager Hong Kong to Beijing. Now we have it down. 

 

• We have had had a few small issues with our room that were addressed nicely by letting the butler know. The  opulent that gets our room tomorrow will have it all dialed in!
• We have him come to our room at 5:15p each day with a new canapé and to fix us a drink. For me a Hendricks and tonic which he makes in the room along with a fresh cucumber slice he brings daily. And a glass of Wente Chardonnay wine for my wife. That is a real treat!
• He has escorted my wife to dinner with the classic look from others, “Who is she?”  
• He arranged each night a great table for us in whatever restaurant we were going to in addition to finding a couple of waiters we would be pleased with.
• He arranged the special carrot cake mentioned above,
• He made sure we had copies of the menus for the next nights dinner each night so we could plan accordingly.
• He got us into Prime 7 when they were full.
• He found a filled out disembarkation form in our room that I kept failing to turn in and turned it in for us.
• He also spoke to the appropriate head waiter or similar when we first got on for staff that were not friendly. They all have turned it around and just needed a little “nudging”. Well he took care of it. 

It is this type of anticipation that I just love. So big call out to Roshan, our Butler. Going to be hard to go back to the “real world” starting tomorrow. 

Edited February 22, 2019 by macbest

[WesW]

Thanks for sharing such terrific Butler service Wayne/Macbest and for taking us along our your Caribbean voyage.

[golfgirls]

Hoping that when we meet our butler  this afternoon, it will be Roshan!

 

[jimbri]

Photos are great!

[macbest]

Trip summary

This was a fantastic cruise vacation! We both thoroughly enjoyed the ship and the excursions were wonderful as I detailed earlier. The food was spectacular (the highlight? The escargot in CR continues to be unbelievable) and the service even better. Service in Compass Rose really stood out for us this trip. It’s elegant but not stuffy. Best way to describe it. We continue to love the “left side” - always available items in CR. They really picked some high end items and ,made them available anytime or for mix and matching with those items that change daily. And the new pool grill concept at dinner worked really well for us when we got back late from an excursion and didn’t feel like changing. That burger in the evening is awesome. 

 

I will also mention there was only one or two teenagers on the ship. I didn’t see anyone younger. I guess that could be good or bad. For us it was good. Most of the guests on board seemed really friendly and outgoing. We met some very nice people on the two “paid” Regent choice excursions. Keep these in mind when you pick excursions. These were the highlights for us. 

 

The weather was ok to good. We had some rain but we got through it. February is a great month to enjoy the Caribbean with its more moderate climates and still warm ocean water for swimming. 

 

Things I continue to like about Regent and this cruise 

• Reidel stemware for wine glasses. Very nice. 
• There are at least three different sparkling waters on board. If you don’t mention which one you want they give you the generic. Perrier (no sodium) and Pellegrino are also available. Ice and lemon are always available just by asking. 
• Towels in public bathrooms. And the little paper towels to lay over the door handle when you leave. I continue to like this. Oh and the public restrooms are generally really nice compared to other cruise lines. On Voyager they were a little small. But this didn’t  pose any difficulties. 
• How so many staff members call you by name. I love that personal service. 
• We had an awesome, super quiet room, 866, Penthouse B. It was located close to the aft elevators which on the Voyager is a short elevator ride to all of the restaurants. That isn’t the case for example on the Explorer.  There was no noise in our room throughout. No squeaks or rattles, no hallway noise, no tender drop or rising noise. It was super quiet. And of course no pool side chair noise since we were well below deck 11. We were also about 30 yards from the laundry but even then it as on the other side of ship so no laundry noise (more typically from the people there and not the machines). Perfect location for no vibration, no sounds of tenders being lowered or raised, etc. Highly recommended location. 
• Comfy balcony chairs
• Penthouse suites had nice amenities included. Stain remover, purse holder for table, spray disinfectant for hands, eye glass cleaner etc. 
• I will note, however, that the carpet was stained in the penthouse suite and the door lock took 3-6 times of inserting key card to open (someone came and “fixed” it but it didn’t change). The Penthouses are in need of a cosmetic facelift. 

 

 

Things I didn’t like

There were really only three areas I would like to see addressed. 

• Chair hogs. Ridiculous. And no staff would dare move the chair hog stuff after 30 min. I spoke to the poolside help and they wouldn’t want to get written up by doing their job when the hog complains. We observed way too much of this on this cruise. However we did find a surprise for a great place to hang outside on a lounge chair. You will have to PM me on this one. 
• When sailing, the cigarette smoke on the starboard side of the pool deck (deck 11) floats all down to those on loungers on that side. Gimme a break! So 50% of the pool deck when sailing is unusable if you don’t smoke or don’t like smoke. On explorer they put them in a separate “room” by the pool. This badly needs to be considered for a retrofit. And surprised to see that there is a smoking section on deck 5 aft, port side. If you are near that end in an aft suite be aware that smoke will likely travel up. So starboard by the pool and port side aft on deck 5. 
• US, 110v plugs by both beds (like on Explorer) vs the European plugs would be more up to date. If you need power on both sides of bed best to bring your own European converter for both sides. 
• The house Chardonnay was Sebastiani. The still free upgrade was Wente Morning Fog. This is a $6.99 chardonnay. The included wines used to be better. And there were no good Pinot Noir included choices unless you went to the premium list. And that only had two California Pinot Noirs (I know they can’t carry everything but there were numerous other varietals). 

I can’t recommend highly enough Regent - again. We booked on board (actually through the new program that let’s you enjoy all the benefits of booking onboard but by doing it anytime 30 days before your cruise. This way you didn’t have to wait for the cruise consultant to find time to meet with you. A great addition). Next up will be Iceland and Greenland on Explorer (our favorite ship), July 2020. Seems like forever away.....

[WesW]

Excellent and balanced Summary Wayne.  We will see you on board the Explorer, pls do sign up for the meet & mingle.  Ida and I and Mr. Rumor (Ginny & Rich) are booked on this Copenhagen to Reykjavik voyage.

 

https://www.cruisecritic.com/rollcall/cruiselinel2.cfm?cruiselineid=29

[Hambagahle]

I have really enjoyed your posts and especially your photos.  Thank you SO much!!

[vegasdriven]

macbest..thank you for taking us along, and for all the great photos. I think I know the area you are talking about for the good lounge spot, but would love to find out more.

Unfortunately, I don't believe there is the option to PM on CC!