Spirit review

My wife & I were on the Silver Spirit from Venice to Istanbul (July 10–20). We have also sailed Silver Cloud (2010), Regent SS Mariner (2011), Paul Gauguin (2012) and Crystal Serenity (2013).

Overall:

We boarded the Spirit with very high expectations. In short, the Spirit exceeded our expectations in all aspects. We had a truly wonderful cruise and hope to sail the Spirit again or the new Muse. We were told there were 555 guests on board; the max allowed. It never felt crowded. Many times it seemed we had areas to ourselves.

Service:

The service was wonderful. Many employees stood out by providing excellent service and remembered our names from the moment we boarded. Even though this cruise had a port stop every day, we spend a lot of time relaxing on the ship because we visited most ports on our own schedule for a short period in the afternoon.

Dining:

We only dined at La Terraza, the Pool Grill and the Restaurant. We did room service a few times as well. All of our meals were great and service was great. La Terraza was our favorite only because we loved dining outside at the back of the ship.

Suite:

We loved the suite. We were on deck 6 near the front of the ship. The suite was narrow, but it did not cause any problems for us. We love the larger sitting area and the walk-in closet. We spent a lot of time on the veranda as well. The shower and bath were both great and both were used a lot. We also liked having the two TVs and enjoyed the movie selections (we only completed one movie since we watched small portions at a time). Our butler and room attendant did a great job and all of our requests for the in-room bar and other amenities were met. We so enjoy that all suites have a butler on SilverSea. The bed was comfortable and the A/C worked fine considering how hot it was outside during this cruise.

Public areas:

- We used the fitness center every day and had it all to ourselves most days because we would get there later in the day (11 am or so)

- We loved the lobby Bar and it was rarely even close to busy.

- We hit the casino 5 times and it was always fun and busy, but not too busy.

- We ended most nights in the Panorama Lounge and always had fun. It got much livelier most nights than I expected, in a good & fun way.

- The pool deck was fun, but did get a little busy on a few days. There were many more kids on this cruise than we had hoped and by late afternoon most days they seemed to be at the pool, but it was never a problem.

Please post any follow up questions and I am happy to answer what I can.

Thanks imcpa for giving your impressions in a detailed, systematic way! It is so refreshing to hear compliments and kudos for SS staff and for accommodation and venues! Your review was a pleasure to read! :)

I want to add a few other random comments to my review above...

1. We booked before the excursions & wifi were "thrown" in. We didn't do any excursions, so I don't know if we could have done any for free. The butler did give us a sheet that reflected which ones were free, but he may have been unaware they didn't apply to us. Or could we have done them for free anyway???

2. We did get 2 free hours per day of wifi. Actually, we were just given 1200 minutes each to use, which was easier to track. The wifi was spotty at best, but luckily we didn't use it much anyway after all.

3. We were very disappointed we couldn't watch the Wimbledon final anywhere on board. Luckily, we were able to find a sports bar at the port showing it so we could watch the great Federer win that awesome second set tie break. We boarded after the tie break due to the rain delay and I would just prefer to forget about the rest of the match.

4. The Spirit did not look "front heavy" in person like I expected it too. It was much better looking in person. The pics don't do it justice.

Thank you for a very well written Spirit review ImCpa. Enjoyed your Crystal Serenty (2013) thread on the Crystal Board as well--your posts are delightful to read (then/now).

Absolutely, please consider sailing on the Muse. We have a growing group of Muse Maiden Silversea cruisers intending to book the Maiden Voyage (Spring 2017). Hopefully, after April 15 (tax deadline in US to file your income tax returns) so (if your biz can spare u for a week or two) y'all can consider booking the Muse Maiden voyage...pls see the Muse Maiden roll call link below:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2229958

We were on the same cruise imcpa our suite was on deck 8 , I agree with all your comments .My only disappointment were the parents that let their 2 children run around the Restaurant ,If they had bumped into a waiter with a tray I know who would of got the blame not the kids.

We are hoping to cruise through the Panama canal next year

We did the Panama canal from la to ft Lauderdale last March.

great cruise, great crew!

let me know if you have questions about it.

All of this is good to hear. We board in Sept. can't wait!

Spinnaker2 any information about your cruise would be welcome

Great review and all good to know. I wonder if the same crew will be in place Sept. 18...