Impressions of First Time Oceania cruiser (on Nautica)

[KathyL2537]

This forum and the roll calls were really helpful, so in the spirit of giving back, thought I would post our impressions after our first Oceania cruise.  We started cruising on Carnival and RC, have also been on Princess, Celebrity (last time was in the Retreat), Azamara, an expedition cruise on Stella Australis, a long ago cruise up the Nile, another around the Greek islands (not lines anyone would recognize) and most recently an expedition cruise to Antarctica on Seabourn. In total roughly 20 or so cruises. We have friends who loved Oceania and we liked the South Pacific itinerary so thought we’d give it a shot. 
 

Given the competition at this price point, we were underwhelmed by Oceania. The ship was the same as Azamara so we were expecting roughly a similar experience,  There were definitely some things we liked but overall the food and service was very erratic, some nights we had to continually turn wine and water refills away, others we sat and waited. Even getting coffee and water in the cafe at breakfast was very slow, I often went up to the counter or the machine myself which they didn’t like but after waiting 10 minutes with no one acknowledging me I thought it was justified.
 

 Some of the menu items were excellent, but others were substandard. I’ve never had to argue with a waiter to order something (“I wouldn’t recommend that ma’am, it’s not good, try one of these instead”.)  Neither appealed to me, but he kept saying no and I had to keep pushing to order what I wanted, which when I finally got it, was excellent. This was in the Polo Grill on the same night they brought me the wrong order. Toscana was much better, both food and service. 
 

We were also disappointed that the dinner menus between the cafe and the dining room were much the same. On other lines there’s been much more variety between these venues so you had more options. I know others have noted that you cannot serve yourself in the cafe, and I know there are pros and cons to that but it definitely slows down service and results in confusion (where’s the line?) . We definitely missed some of the specialty meals/experiences that we’ve had on Azamara: a fabulous breakfast buffet in the Main dining room on sea days, other occasional ethnic buffets plus of course their White Nights and Azamazing evenings, there was nothing even close to that on Oceania.  Additionally the limited hours were disappointing, we often like to stop at whatever the coffee shop is on board to get an herbal tea in the evening but Baristas closed at 6. 
 

For this cruise we tendered into most ports. We had booked a mix of ship excursions-which we never do but this time wanted to use up the SM chore excursion credit- and independent excursions. Their process at least initially was awful. We went down one day before 8, which is when they opened, to get our independent tender tickets for our tour which was starting at 830. Once they opened, they announced that the Jeeps for the ships tours were not yet ready, however they then disembarked those passengers right away. Then they moved the tendering location due to wind and water conditions so the next tender didn’t go out til almost 9. Really? Luckily enough people complained that after that they started disembarking tenders of independent tour passengers first, so we did appreciate that they listened to feedback. 
 

internet speed, if the internet was even accessible, was slow. At one point I went up to the Oceania@sea for help and he kept telling me it was my device, until I went back and showed him more error messages, where he finally admitted there was a problem. We had great internet on Seabourn in Antarctica which I would consider even more remote. 
 

And as others have said, cabin and bathroom were tiny but workable. Late in the cruise  I had started loading items in the suitcase (including the bottle of champagne) but they were loose when I pushed it back  under the bed, opened, to finish up later.  I was surprised when I came back to find it had been pulled out, zipped shut and was upright by the bed. I’ve never had that happen on another cruise line, luckily the champagne was not damaged. 

So that’s the negatives. There were a number of positive things as well. We really appreciated the advice from this forum to bring your own liquor, we brought several half sized bottles and just made our own happy hour cocktails after the long shore excursion days. Have not been able to do this on other lines but really enjoyed having our drink while we were cleaning up after the long hot sticky days.
 

We had three free bags of laundry which we used and it came back on schedule and just fine.

 

Excellent library and gym (I hear on Azamara they are turning the libraries into bars, which saddens me as I love that space). This is the only line I’ve been on where they’ve offered a meditation class, which was terrific. It’s also the only time I remember seeing the staff tactfully remind a guest to change out of shorts before he could go into the MDR for dinner. Loved Baristas for that all important morning latte.

 

 And above all, the staff was really all very nice and other than the some of the meal services, really efficient. We had room service breakfast several times before early excursions and they were prompt. The first day after they had opened our access to our rooms, none of the keys worked. I had to go down and get it reset twice, as did many others. The  poor customer service person at the desk was clearly frazzled dealing with this, but was super helpful, polite and apologetic. Our cabin staff was superb. At the end of a cruise I like to make a donation to the crew welfare fund to benefit everyone that you don’t see, but sadly apparently Oceania doesn’t offer this. 
 

Bottom line, it was a good cruise and depending on price point and itinerary we might go on Oceania again but it wouldn’t be our first choice. They definitely need to up their game if they want to compete with Seabourn and Azamara (there is another thread in the forum comparing Oceania specifically to Seabourn and now having done both I would agree with just about everything that author said). 

[clo]

25 minutes ago, KathyL2537 said:

This forum and the roll calls were really helpful, so in the spirit of giving back, thought I would post our impressions after our first Oceania cruise.  We started cruising on Carnival and RC, have also been on Princess, Celebrity (last time was in the Retreat), Azamara, an expedition cruise on Stella Australis, a long ago cruise up the Nile, another around the Greek islands (not lines anyone would recognize) and most recently an expedition cruise to Antarctica on Seabourn. In total roughly 20 or so cruises. We have friends who loved Oceania and we liked the South Pacific itinerary so thought we’d give it a shot. 
 

Given the competition at this price point, we were underwhelmed by Oceania. The ship was the same as Azamara so we were expecting roughly a similar experience,  There were definitely some things we liked but overall the food and service was very erratic, some nights we had to continually turn wine and water refills away, others we sat and waited. Even getting coffee and water in the cafe at breakfast was very slow, I often went up to the counter or the machine myself which they didn’t like but after waiting 10 minutes with no one acknowledging me I thought it was justified.
 

 Some of the menu items were excellent, but others were substandard. I’ve never had to argue with a waiter to order something (“I wouldn’t recommend that ma’am, it’s not good, try one of these instead”.)  Neither appealed to me, but he kept saying no and I had to keep pushing to order what I wanted, which when I finally got it, was excellent. This was in the Polo Grill on the same night they brought me the wrong order. Toscana was much better, both food and service. 
 

We were also disappointed that the dinner menus between the cafe and the dining room were much the same. On other lines there’s been much more variety between these venues so you had more options. I know others have noted that you cannot serve yourself in the cafe, and I know there are pros and cons to that but it definitely slows down service and results in confusion (where’s the line?) . We definitely missed some of the specialty meals/experiences that we’ve had on Azamara: a fabulous breakfast buffet in the Main dining room on sea days, other occasional ethnic buffets plus of course their White Nights and Azamazing evenings, there was nothing even close to that on Oceania.  Additionally the limited hours were disappointing, we often like to stop at whatever the coffee shop is on board to get an herbal tea in the evening but Baristas closed at 6. 
 

For this cruise we tendered into most ports. We had booked a mix of ship excursions-which we never do but this time wanted to use up the SM chore excursion credit- and independent excursions. Their process at least initially was awful. We went down one day before 8, which is when they opened, to get our independent tender tickets for our tour which was starting at 830. Once they opened, they announced that the Jeeps for the ships tours were not yet ready, however they then disembarked those passengers right away. Then they moved the tendering location due to wind and water conditions so the next tender didn’t go out til almost 9. Really? Luckily enough people complained that after that they started disembarking tenders of independent tour passengers first, so we did appreciate that they listened to feedback. 
 

internet speed, if the internet was even accessible, was slow. At one point I went up to the Oceania@sea for help and he kept telling me it was my device, until I went back and showed him more error messages, where he finally admitted there was a problem. We had great internet on Seabourn in Antarctica which I would consider even more remote. 
 

And as others have said, cabin and bathroom were tiny but workable. Late in the cruise  I had started loading items in the suitcase (including the bottle of champagne) but they were loose when I pushed it back  under the bed, opened, to finish up later.  I was surprised when I came back to find it had been pulled out, zipped shut and was upright by the bed. I’ve never had that happen on another cruise line, luckily the champagne was not damaged. 

So that’s the negatives. There were a number of positive things as well. We really appreciated the advice from this forum to bring your own liquor, we brought several half sized bottles and just made our own happy hour cocktails after the long shore excursion days. Have not been able to do this on other lines but really enjoyed having our drink while we were cleaning up after the long hot sticky days.
 

We had three free bags of laundry which we used and it came back on schedule and just fine.

 

Excellent library and gym (I hear on Azamara they are turning the libraries into bars, which saddens me as I love that space). This is the only line I’ve been on where they’ve offered a meditation class, which was terrific. It’s also the only time I remember seeing the staff tactfully remind a guest to change out of shorts before he could go into the MDR for dinner. Loved Baristas for that all important morning latte.

 

 And above all, the staff was really all very nice and other than the some of the meal services, really efficient. We had room service breakfast several times before early excursions and they were prompt. The first day after they had opened our access to our rooms, none of the keys worked. I had to go down and get it reset twice, as did many others. The  poor customer service person at the desk was clearly frazzled dealing with this, but was super helpful, polite and apologetic. Our cabin staff was superb. At the end of a cruise I like to make a donation to the crew welfare fund to benefit everyone that you don’t see, but sadly apparently Oceania doesn’t offer this. 
 

Bottom line, it was a good cruise and depending on price point and itinerary we might go on Oceania again but it wouldn’t be our first choice. They definitely need to up their game if they want to compete with Seabourn and Azamara (there is another thread in the forum comparing Oceania specifically to Seabourn and now having done both I would agree with just about everything that author said). 

I'll be honest with you. When someone writes an all glowing with praise review, I just blow it off.

 

[ak1004]

13 hours ago, KathyL2537 said:

 

Bottom line, it was a good cruise and depending on price point and itinerary we might go on Oceania again but it wouldn’t be our first choice. They definitely need to up their game if they want to compete with Seabourn and Azamara (there is another thread in the forum comparing Oceania specifically to Seabourn and now having done both I would agree with just about everything that author said). 

 

Thank you for the review.

 

I don't think O competes directly with SB, probably more with Azamara, Viking and Windstar. SB is also more inclusive and more expensive, so you might expect to get a slightly better experience.

 

We sailed on Azamara once and enjoyed it very much. We found service comparable with O, food slightly better on O, but we like the newer ships on O better. Much better cabins, more dining choices etc. I would recommend trying one of the newer ships.

[bradpole]

13 hours ago, KathyL2537 said:

White Nights and Azamazing evenings, there was nothing even close to that on Oceania

Thankfully there aren’t!  
 

Thank you for your review.  Besides not having a white night or something like that, we enjoy the fact that the grand dining room and the terrace cafe offer basically the same menu.  Those of us who enjoy a nice casual meal can still have a good meal without having to go to grand dining room.  
 

Oceania isn’t for everyone, that’s why there are so many different lines, but for now we enjoy the product the offer…especially the smaller R ships.  

[Vineyard View]

Seabourn is not always more expensive than Oceania. I am comparing the two on some itineraries for next year. 
 

With Viking’s included excursion in each port, post Covid, they are more expensive than Oceania and Azamara, even Seabourn, by a significant amount if you do not do ship excursions. 
 

Thank you for your review. It was well balanced and I appreciated your feedback. I believe we would want to stay away from the smaller ships on either Oceania or Azamara unless we bumped up to entry level suites for cabin sizes. Once you do that, the pricing is up there with luxury lines, so we would stay with Oceania’s larger ships. 

Edited March 3 by Vineyard View

[ak1004]

5 minutes ago, Vineyard View said:

Seabourn is not always more expensive than Oceania. I am comparing the two on some itineraries for next year. 

 

Yes, we discussed it, it really depends on the itinerary and the category you book. In some cases Oceania is not more expensive than Celebrity, depending mostly on the ship. But overall, SB is more expensive on average, otherwise I don't think many people would book O.

 

Viking prices don't make sense to me at all. In many cases they are more expensive than SS (and SS includes excursions as well).

[Vineyard View]

4 minutes ago, ak1004 said:

 

Yes, we discussed it, it really depends on the itinerary and the category you book. In some cases Oceania is not more expensive than Celebrity, depending mostly on the ship. But overall, SB is more expensive on average, otherwise I don't think many people would book O.

 

Viking prices don't make sense to me at all. In many cases they are more expensive than SS (and SS includes excursions as well).

Maybe, but maybe not. I expected SB to be a lot more expensive than O, so originally I did not consider them. Maybe that is part of the reason.  Maybe part is because of ship size. SB is 450-650 pax (excluding expedition ships). I can only say that when it comes to Europe balcony cabins, the two lines are often quite competitive. Europe is where I am looking for 2025. Maybe that is not the case for other regions in our world. 

[HaveDogWillTravel]

15 hours ago, KathyL2537 said:

Given the competition at this price point, we were underwhelmed by Oceania

We sailed Oceania for the first time in March of 2023 on an O class.  That statement summarizes our take away. We have 2 more bookings that we made while on board (before SM) so we will give Oceania 2 more tries at it. 
I just got done booking our ships excursions for a port intensive 10 Barcelona to Rome sailing.  There were only 2 that were of any interest to us. The excursion portion of SM is definitely not worth it to us. The included SM alcoholic beverages are not worth to us either. We have 1 (on occasion 2) drinks a day and they are not ones that are offered in that package nor do we want them during meals. 
 

Like you we had a mix of experiences from really? That’s never happened before to simply excellent.  Enough good to get us booking again for now. But at their price point our future sailings will have to be more of the excellent and less of the Really?  
 

In my opinion Windstar is a competitor to Oceania. We sailed them last year as well for the first time. WS made a 99.9% excellent impression.  We have 3 more WS booked. One is also this October taking us Rome back to Barcelona.  It will be interesting to see if WS continues to impress at the same level. 
 

 

[IWantToLiveOverTheSea]

We cruised in the South Pacific on Oceania (Marina, one of the larger ships) some years ago.  I remember lots of tendering and slow internet on sea days when we were way out in the middle of the Pacific.  I guess those things haven't changed.  But cruises after that were better.  I think to a fairly big extent, the whole cruising experience can be better or worse depending upon where in the world you find yourself.  

[PhD-iva]

I think the room stewards pull out suitcases that are stowed under the bed to facilitate guests’ packing. Many guests are older/elderly and this is helpful to them. I didn’t want you to think there was anything untoward about the room steward moving your suitcase.

Best wishes!

[EJL2023]

7 minutes ago, PhD-iva said:

I think the room stewards pull out suitcases that are stowed under the bed to facilitate guests’ packing. Many guests are older/elderly and this is helpful to them. I didn’t want you to think there was anything untoward about the room steward moving your suitcase.

Best wishes!

Yes they did the same on our recent cruise. Again as noted, doing as something helpful for packing. 

[ak1004]

2 hours ago, Vineyard View said:

Maybe, but maybe not. I expected SB to be a lot more expensive than O, so originally I did not consider them. Maybe that is part of the reason.  Maybe part is because of ship size. SB is 450-650 pax (excluding expedition ships). I can only say that when it comes to Europe balcony cabins, the two lines are often quite competitive. Europe is where I am looking for 2025. Maybe that is not the case for other regions in our world. 

 

We look mostly at Europe too, and yes, we expected SB to be much more expensive too.

 

That said, I just looked at Vista prices and compared to Ovation and Encore. Vista entry level veranda is in $450-500 USD a day range. Some slightly less, some slightly more, but most fall into that range. SB does have few sailings under $500 USD, but most are still around $500-600. So on average, SB is still more expensive, but I agree that the gap is much smaller that I expected.

 

Of course it's not exactly apples to apples - SB is more inclusive (although the excursion credit on O offsetting the drinks cost more or less) and the cabins are larger. So finding SB sailing around $500 or less would be very attractive if the itinerary is good.

[Vineyard View]

2 minutes ago, ak1004 said:

 

Of course it's not exactly apples to apples - SB is more inclusive (although the excursion credit on O offsetting the drinks cost more or less) and the cabins are larger. So finding SB sailing around $500 or less would be very attractive if the itinerary is good.

Agree with you!  When I added in the gratuities on Oceania, and the upgraded drink package (I realize that package is optional), it narrows down that range. It does allow me to look at both lines and make a decision with more options of itineraries.

[ronrick1943]

Well we haven't cruised Oceania for a while, we switched over to Regent for awhile - then took Silversea for a few cruises.  We just booked the Riviera, so I guess you could say we are coming back to Oceania.  To be truthful nSilversea was high cost and not so good.  We prefer the bigger name suites and after nRegent and Silversea, Oceania beats them hands down.  On the 9 "O" cruises we only have had one bad experience and it wasn't that bad.

[MEFIowa]

3 hours ago, ak1004 said:

We look mostly at Europe too, and yes, we expected SB to be much more expensive too. That said, I just looked at Vista prices and compared to Ovation and Encore. Vista entry level veranda is in $450-500 USD a day range. Some slightly less, some slightly more, but most fall into that range....

Thank God for sales. Riviera 10/30-11/19/2023 Trieste to Athens (10 nights) and Athens to Barcelona (10 nights) off the ESS from early in 2023 was just $175 PP PN in a B3 and just $190 PP PN in an A3. I can't imagine sailing on O without a sale price.

[AMHuntFerry]

@KathyL2537 When comparing future O cruises to others, you might want to look at O's larger ships, if only because Barista is open until 10 pm 😉 (OK, there are other benefits too). I am fine with Regatta in Alaska, but I am soooo happy that Riviera is taking over that route in 2025.

[Vineyard View]

3 hours ago, AMHuntFerry said:

@KathyL2537 When comparing future O cruises to others, you might want to look at O's larger ships, if only because Barista is open until 10 pm 😉 (OK, there are other benefits too). I am fine with Regatta in Alaska, but I am soooo happy that Riviera is taking over that route in 2025.

I was hoping she would stay as Marina is the only option other than small. Vista is staying North of the Mediterranean. Bitmi get what you are saying if you cruise Alaska every year. 

[ak1004]

36 minutes ago, Vineyard View said:

I was hoping she would stay as Marina is the only option other than small. Vista is staying North of the Mediterranean. Bitmi get what you are saying if you cruise Alaska every year. 

 

We are booked on Vista Rome to Istanbul in Nov.2025, so they do Western Med. But yes, I wish Riviera stayed there too.

[Vineyard View]

Makes sense. I was looking at Apr/May and Vista would no longer be in the  Northern landscape in November. 

[JYDCruise]

22 hours ago, bradpole said:

Thankfully there aren’t! 

I guess I don't understand this at all. "Thankfully there aren't" some special events? Don't like the Azamazing Evening? Don't go. Don't like the White Night? Don't go. Seems pretty simple to me. Unless you're trying to argue that the money spent on these is taken away from things you prefer, how could having these events that others enjoy diminish your experience in the slightest?

[ak1004]

2 minutes ago, JYDCruise said:

I guess I don't understand this at all. "Thankfully there aren't" some special events? Don't like the Azamazing Evening? Don't go. Don't like the White Night? Don't go. Seems pretty simple to me. Unless you're trying to argue that the money spent on these is taken away from things you prefer, how could having these events that others enjoy diminish your experience in the slightest?

 

Azamazing Evening and White Night were among the highlights of our Azamara cruise. O could attract a lot of new customers by doing something similar, also lowering the average age from 70-80.

[ORV]

What night is Toga night and the Baked Alaska server parade? 

[azbirdmom]

On 3/2/2024 at 6:34 PM, KathyL2537 said:

Given the competition at this price point, we were underwhelmed by Oceania. The ship was the same as Azamara so we were expecting roughly a similar experience,  There were definitely some things we liked but overall the food and service was very erratic, some nights we had to continually turn wine and water refills away, others we sat and waited. Even getting coffee and water in the cafe at breakfast was very slow, I often went up to the counter or the machine myself which they didn’t like but after waiting 10 minutes with no one acknowledging me I thought it was justified.
 

 Some of the menu items were excellent, but others were substandard. I’ve never had to argue with a waiter to order something (“I wouldn’t recommend that ma’am, it’s not good, try one of these instead”.)  Neither appealed to me, but he kept saying no and I had to keep pushing to order what I wanted, which when I finally got it, was excellent. This was in the Polo Grill on the same night they brought me the wrong order. Toscana was much better, both food and service. 

 

This kind of sums up our experiences on the Nautica February 19th sailing.  I really thought that the service and food would be significantly superior to what we've experienced on mainstream Princess but it wasn't.  Loved the itinerary but like you we were underwhelmed by O.

[osandomir]

56 minutes ago, azbirdmom said:

 

This kind of sums up our experiences on the Nautica February 19th sailing.  I really thought that the service and food would be significantly superior to what we've experienced on mainstream Princess but it wasn't.  Loved the itinerary but like you we were underwhelmed by O.

Some people can’t see the difference between Oceania and Princess, HAL, Celebrity, etc… Then paying more for Oceania doesn’t make sense when they can sail and enjoy their cruise on the other lines for less.

 

We also started cruising on the big ships long time ago. Since we booked our first Oceania cruise in 2012 we had no desire to go back to those cruise lines again.

Edited March 6 by osandomir

[KathyL2537]

35 minutes ago, osandomir said:

Some people can’t see the difference between Oceania and Princess, HAL, Celebrity, etc… Then paying more for Oceania doesn’t make sense when they can sail and enjoy their cruise on the other lines for less.

 

We also started cruising on the big ships long time ago. Since we booked our first Oceania cruise in 2012 we had no desire to go back to those cruise lines again.