Live from Insignia

The start of Insignia's Around (part of) The World Cruise was heralded by the most tremendous thunderstorm on Sunday afternoon. OH and I had boarded just before noon and were able to go straight to our stateroom. Lunch was being served in the Terrace Cafe and afterwards we headed out to the Botanic Gardens to watch a swing band concert. While the band were getting ready the heavens opened - and stayed open for an hour providing us with simultaneous thunder and lightning. The same was happening back at the harbourfront where Insignia was tied up, and this rather put paid to Dancing Under The Stars on the pool deck.

Having been right in the middle of the Botanic Gardens we returned to the ship wet through. As we squelched and dripped our way back on board we were welcomed by two crew members, one of whom upon noticing that OH's world card wallet was sodden immediately exchanged it for hers saying. "You must have a new one". It's the little touches that make a soggy person feel special.

The ship is in great shape with new furnishings and gorgeous teak decking. The library is even more beautiful with some fabulous fabrics and a good selection of books.

We set sail from Singapore this evening almost three hours late as it was announced at the boat drill that a plane carrying a party from Italy had been delayed (which explained why the assistant cruise director had such trouble pronouncing the names of those missing from the drill - most of them sounded Italian).

The ship is obviously not full, which means all the more ice cream for me. Tomorrow I'll meet up with cc chums at the start of a sea day packed with activities. I don't know how I'm going to fit in needlepoint, portrait composition, line dancing, Mah Jong, exercise classes, a cookery demonstration, wine tasting, martini tasting, and the captain's cocktail party. I'm amused that those last three are all on the same day, hic! And I haven't even mentioned the enrichment lectures, spa seminars and gemstone presentation.

I'm exhausted typing this so off to sleep for me. Night night,

Sella

Excited to follow your adventure! Please, what is an OH?

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Other Half - a British term for husband or wife.

How excited you must be! Have a wonderful voyage!

Thanks for taking the time to post. Have a great trip!!

Sent from my XT1032 using Forums mobile app

Have a great delayed trip.

Just leave a little ice cream for me in July.

Great stuff. I am boarding Singapore-LA. Will you post here, on Rollcall or both? Want to alert my cabinmate. I also love Botanic gardens, any suggestions welcomed .Thanks.

Say hello to MJ and Rich for me. They were on the Nautica with us from Singapore to Beijing when we got off again.

Great stuff. I am boarding Singapore-LA. Will you post here, on Rollcall or both? Want to alert my cabinmate. I also love Botanic gardens, any suggestions welcomed .Thanks.

I'm posting live as I'm on board now! Been posting on roll call for a while.

Are you on a later cruise?

Will save some ice cream :) .

We flew into Singapore on the 20th to have a few days to recover from the jet lag. At the airport I headed straight to the Ground Transport Desk to book the shuttle to our hotel, the Fairmont. Since there was a 25 minute wait I abandoned that idea and we joined the taxi queue. It looked long but was very well organised and we were on our way after only a short wait. The shuttle costs S$9 each and the taxi cost us S$21.35 which we thought was a great deal. Taxi cost can vary though according to the time of day.

We had an evening stroll and an early night. The following day we went to the Marina Bay Gardens. This is a must see IMHO. The Domes are cooled and very pleasant. There is a little shuttle you can take to ride around the gardens which is well worth the S$8 cost.

The Fairmont was very good and well located but on the last day our bill was wrong (we'd prepaid) and they ordered us a taxi to the wrong location. We had said Singapore Cruise Terminal but they told the driver Marina Bay.

The minute we arrived at the correct cruise terminal someone collected our suitcases and directed us into the terminal building. Check in was very easy and after unpacking we went to the Botanic Gardens.

The following day we visited little India which I'll fill you in on later.

Sella

Hope the rest of the voyage goes very well. I was planning to do a 'live from' review before we cancelled due to the fire - nice to see someone else doing it.

My wife and I will be in port where the fire happended tomorrow - don't expect to see anything related to it but it will invoke sad thoughts of what could have been.

Hope the rest of the voyage goes very well. I was planning to do a 'live from' review before we cancelled due to the fire - nice to see someone else doing it.

 

My wife and I will be in port where the fire happended tomorrow - don't expect to see anything related to it but it will invoke sad thoughts of what could have been.

It's been quite an upheaval for the world cruisers but everyone is now happy to be on board and the staff are delighted to see us. Not all of them were redeployed so some have been "on vacation".

On the way to our stateroom on embarkation day we ran into our room steward from last year's cruise on Riviera. Big hugs were exchanged as I was delighted to have him back - he'd been really helpful last year. OH just looked on in a suitably bemused fashion - he's the shy retiring type.

We recognise a few of the crew so I feel like we're proper returners. Mind you the cruise director announced last night that everyone was an Oceania Club member. He may have been exaggerating but I think most people are repeaters.

How full is the ship at the moment?

We flew into Singapore on the 20th to have a few days to recover from the jet lag. At the airport I headed straight to the Ground Transport Desk to book the shuttle to our hotel, the Fairmont. Since there was a 25 minute wait I abandoned that idea and we joined the taxi queue. It looked long but was very well organised and we were on our way after only a short wait. The shuttle costs S$9 each and the taxi cost us S$21.35 which we thought was a great deal. Taxi cost can vary though according to the time of day.

 

We had an evening stroll and an early night. The following day we went to the Marina Bay Gardens. This is a must see IMHO. The Domes are cooled and very pleasant. There is a little shuttle you can take to ride around the gardens which is well worth the S$8 cost.

 

The Fairmont was very good and well located but on the last day our bill was wrong (we'd prepaid) and they ordered us a taxi to the wrong location. We had said Singapore Cruise Terminal but they told the driver Marina Bay.

 

The minute we arrived at the correct cruise terminal someone collected our suitcases and directed us into the terminal building. Check in was very easy and after unpacking we went to the Botanic Gardens.

 

The following day we visited little India which I'll fill you in on later.

 

Sella

Sounds like my kind of Singaporean day - I love those gardens, both Marina Bay - the trees - and the Botanic Gardens. A dear friend of mine had a large hand in designing them and created the Ginger Garden at the BG. Every visitor to S'pore should see them IMO! Hope the rest of your cruise is as nice and that you have a lovely time. Will be looking forward to reading about it and thank you.

I met a couple from Key West ..Jane and hubby on world cruise joining Insignia in Indonesia ...very nice people celebrating a special wedding anniverssary

Jane has long Sandy blonde hair ....and is very knowledgrable re gardening

They were most helpful when I got stung by a big bee ...gave me Benadryl tablets and roll on

If you meet them please give them my regards ....tell them that bite hurt for weeks ...L

OL?.now need the Benadryl roll on before my next cruise

Hope you all have a wonderful time ..we did in French Polynesia on Marina in January ...hope to do it again soon

Michele

How full is the ship at the moment?

There are around 360 passengers on board.

Sea Day Report

I chose to limit my activities to the Artist's loft and Mah Jong today. Kris Smith is the artist on board and today we had two lessons on portrait painting, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. I thoroughly enjoyed both of them. The first concentrated on theory, and for the second Kris drew a portrait of a volunteer from the class. We all drew her too, but from different angles. I was pleased with my drawing as it looked like a woman. Not necessarily the sitter but you can't have everything ..... Rather kindly OH has been trying to spot the sitter based on my drawing truly believing that he might recognise her.

The CC meeting was well attended and Andy Heath came by to say hello.

Mah Jong, taught by retiredbutnottired was such fun. I'm sure we'll get the hang of it eventually and we had a good laugh at our efforts. Our teacher is extremely patient with us :) .

We had a bit of a service fail at dinner in the Grand Dining Room. It took almost an hour for the food to arrive and my consommé was cold. We hadn't noticed the time passing but I sure did notice the cold soup. I sent it back straight away. Otherwise the food has been good.

The evening entertainment was provided by Chris Powley, an excellent vocalist.

I read in a post from Paulchili who is on the Rivieria right now that the Ryan signers/dancers are being phased out and that on our cruise next week there will be only solo entertainers. What is the situation on the Nautica right now??

Tell Andy Orv from Missouri says hi. We enjoyed having him as the CD on our last O cruise. His wife Tammy is also very nice.

I read in a post from Paulchili who is on the Rivieria right now that the Ryan signers/dancers are being phased out and that on our cruise next week there will be only solo entertainers. What is the situation on the Nautica right now??

I heard that because of the length of this cruise they weren't doing the production shows as there are only about 4 different shows which they keep repeating. This is fine if you're on for 8 - 10 days bot not so good on longer trips. Certainly we're having different entertainers brought on every few days. The two we've had so far, a vocalist and a banjo player, are leaving today and I presume two more acts will embark. I think this suits the cabaret style lounge on the Insignia. I prefer this entertainment space on the small ships to the larger theatre style lounges with the fixed seating on the O ships although those are perhaps better suited to production shows. I'll be interested to hear your experience.

Tell Andy Orv from Missouri says hi. We enjoyed having him as the CD on our last O cruise. His wife Tammy is also very nice.

Will do. Tammy and I are getting on very well.

Claudia is the social hostess with the nice line in fascinators (little hats). She was on our last cruise.

The ship is sailing just over half full which makes for lots of space on the Pool Deck - no problem with people hogging loungers on this cruise. We have a choice of tables in the morning outside the Terrace Cafe and there's plenty of space in the Insignia Lounge.

The crew are extremely cheerful but I think when we're ashore they're a bit bored. Several staff members are making a real effort to remember our names which can be difficult when English is not your first language. Sadly, as usual, there are one or two guests barking orders at the staff.

I've heard that some of the officers have their wives and families on board and I believe the toddler I've seen around the ship is the daughter of an officer. She is a charming little thing, as cute as can be. There are some very well behaved older children on board too, which is lovely to see given the average age of a world cruise :) .

I'm finding the elevators a bit of a trial. They're mirrored and I keep catching a glimpse of an older woman wearing my blouse and standing next to my husband. If I'm at home I try only to look in mirrors in a dim light.

At the boat drill the other day, standing by the lifeboats I overheard one chap say "Of course in reality it'll be every man for himself." Should I be worried? I have noticed a distinct lack of chivalry from some passengers though the majority are lovely.

The lack of passengers really shows up in the evenings. After the show Insignia is like the Marie Celeste. We went to "Name that Tune" the other night. I said to OH "I reckon we could win this." Then another couple showed up! Still at worst we were going to come second. I wouldn't say we were bad (it was very hard) but even if you'd added our scores to the other couples' you'd still have been in single figures. Nonetheless, we all walked away with Big O points, which BTW, are now laminated .

This was a tender port and Insignia was anchored quite far out. Only two tenders were being used, and it seemed to take forever to get everyone ashore. We anchored at 0800 and the colour coded ticket system was still in use at gone 1000hrs. The ride took about 25 mins in lumpy seas. Once ashore we took a taxi to Lamai beach. We arranged for the driver to come back later to pick us up and agreed we'd pay when we were back at the ship.

The sea was a bit rough for swimming with quite high waves breaking on the shore but we had free loungers for the price of a drink at a local bar and enjoyed our time away from the ship listening to the seaside sounds. There are a lot of hawkers on the beach but they appear to be licenced and weren't persistent.

We decided to have a beachside Thai massage for 300 baht each. It lasted over an hour and the therapist found knots in my shoulder I didn't know were there. I would say Traditional Thai Massage is not for the faint hearted but I enjoyed it. As we were leaving the massage area our driver appeared earlier than arranged. She was quite happy to wait while we had some lunch. We guessed she wanted to make sure we didn't go back with another driver whereas our concern was that she wouldn't return to pick us up. Having made contact we could all relax. I relaxed enough to enjoy a pre lunch Piña Colada!

Back on board I went to another art class where we drew two apples on a plate. I think I'm more of a portrait person. I encouraged my classmates to eat the apples so we didn't need to draw them again. We're still doing still life. I'm encouraging Andy Heath to be a model for the life drawing class. Sadly, I'm wasting my time as there is no life drawing class scheduled. Perhaps it's just as well.

I have never been on a half-full Oceania ship. Then again, I've never been on a world cruise, especially one that got stopped before it got started! If things get too dull, perhaps you can offer to provide some entertainment. I am finding quite a bit of humor in your reports!

I've never been on a half-full Oceania ship either but then again our first O cruise was a B2B: LA-Costa Rica/Costa Rica-Miami. The first leg was very undersold and we actually got free upgrades. We went from an "A" to a "PH", my Mom went from an "E" to an "A". I think there were about 500 passengers on board.

The next leg, which went through the Canal, was pretty full. (Probably no surprise there.) Bear in mind this was in O's new days -- January 2004.

We've never been on such a relatively empty ship since then ... it did have it's advantages! No lines in the buffet ... They begged us to make specialty restaurant reservations ...

Mura

The ship is sailing just over half full which makes for lots of space on the Pool Deck - no problem with people hogging loungers on this cruise. We have a choice of tables in the morning outside the Terrace Cafe and there's plenty of space in the Insignia Lounge.

 

The crew are extremely cheerful but I think when we're ashore they're a bit bored. Several staff members are making a real effort to remember our names which can be difficult when English is not your first language. Sadly, as usual, there are one or two guests barking orders at the staff.

 

I've heard that some of the officers have their wives and families on board and I believe the toddler I've seen around the ship is the daughter of an officer. She is a charming little thing, as cute as can be. There are some very well behaved older children on board too, which is lovely to see given the average age of a world cruise :) .

 

I'm finding the elevators a bit of a trial. They're mirrored and I keep catching a glimpse of an older woman wearing my blouse and standing next to my husband. If I'm at home I try only to look in mirrors in a dim light.

 

At the boat drill the other day, standing by the lifeboats I overheard one chap say "Of course in reality it'll be every man for himself." Should I be worried? I have noticed a distinct lack of chivalry from some passengers though the majority are lovely.

 

The lack of passengers really shows up in the evenings. After the show Insignia is like the Marie Celeste. We went to "Name that Tune" the other night. I said to OH "I reckon we could win this." Then another couple showed up! Still at worst we were going to come second. I wouldn't say we were bad (it was very hard) but even if you'd added our scores to the other couples' you'd still have been in single figures. Nonetheless, we all walked away with Big O points, which BTW, are now laminated .

I am enjoying your posts. Love your remark regarding the elevator mirrors...have you noticed that after a few drinks she starts looking like a supermodel;)

Have a great trip, I'll be following along.