New York to Montreal 21st September Mariner

Hope to post regularly as not much has been heard from Mariner recently.

Stayed at Sofitel T5 Heathrow Monday night, excellent hotel. Tuesday, walked into terminal from hotel...a dream, no queues at BA checking, no queues at security, flight on time.

Arrived in New York, very humid and warm. Received by agent showing Oceania board! We were the only passengers so had a private SUV to Le Parker Meridien....eventually. NY was gridlocked mainly due to Heads of State at UN. Roads were regularly being closed off for the convoys of security etc accompanying the 'important ones'. Our driver was extremely frustrated with it all. We saw several of these and wondered who they could be...

The hotel was ok, the room needed refreshing but for one night in a city centre we could manage.

Checked In with Regent, there are 300 pax staying here. Luggage ready for 8:00am and our bus leaves at 12:30. More shopping time for the wife!

Just a note..on a previous post I asked for a good Italian restaurant near the hotel and was told about one across from the57th street entrance ..Antonios pizza ..very good so thanks to the replier sorry I have lost your name.

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Eagerly await your posts Swansong. Our best cruise ever was the Montreal to Miami trip, similar to your cruise. Such a glorious trip you have to look forward to.

Enjoy, and keep us posted on your journey. Have a wonderful cruise. Jean.

Hope you have an enjoyable cruise :)

Hope your cruise is as excellent as the one we are just ending as we sail into Stockholm on Voyager tonight. Regent at its best - we are so sad that it is coming to a close, but you can take over where we leave off!

Gill, Glad it was great! Now come to the USA

Looking forward to hearing about your cruise, we'll be on that ship later.

We left the hotel on time and had about 45 minutes waiting to check in at the port. Otherwise our suite is fine, the gin is ordered and the unpacking done. Lorraine is our CD who we have sailed with many times before. We sail at 19:00 and will pass the Statue of Liberty at about 19:30. The ship is full as would be expected out of New York.

Sailing out of New York in the dark with all the lights was an emotional experience even for a Brit, especially as the US national anthem was played as we passed the Statue of Liberty.

Service was a bit slow in CR but the staff were great. We were remembered by a couple of crew especially one who comes from our home in Nottingham.

Jean thank you for your good wishes, it was on your suggestion some months ago when I posted about this cruise that we booked it.

Newport tomorrow, looking forward to a new experience.

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Your NY arrival coincided with the UN meeting. The driver should have known the re-routing.

Wishing you an enjoyable cruise and will be following your updates.

Swansong, we just left Mariner September 3rd in San Fransisco. It was a teary farewell as it was an excellent cruise for us. Service and staff top notch and we felt totally spoiled from start to Finnish. I am sure you will be feeling the same when you have to leave in Montreal. Have a wonderful time . Jean.

Lorraine is our CD who we have sailed with many times before.

We are boarding Mariner on 21 Oct; if you get a chance please check if Lorraine will still be on board, plus who will be the Captain and other senior staff?

Thanks

Hi, Swansong:

Thanks for sharing your trip with us. We have good friends who are on this cruise with you. If you run into Fred & Millie (from La Quinta, CA), tell them the Clifford's are watching...HA!

Actually, we have also booked this trip for 2017, so really appreciate your insights.

Have a wonderful cruise.

An excellent day today on a Vanderbilt mansions tour. The bus was only half full. The tour of the mansions was with an audio headphone set up that was excellent especially as we never seem to be near to a guide on tours to hear properly. Very impressive houses and worth the visit if that's your thing.

The weather is scorching.( for a Brit). Leaving Newport now accompanied by a coast guard cutter with the gun manned! (3:00pm).

As far as Mariner is concerned, she looks pretty good both in the public areas and the suite although the balcony has some rust and peeling paint. Strangely, excessive vibration woke us up during the night, not something we have experienced before on this ship. We are midship as usual. There has been nothing like it since fortunately.

The Internet is terrible during the day, early morning or late at night is the only usable stable time. It's never been this bad before. I guess it's the free for all internet availability that's the cause. We are supposed to have two log ons but have not achieved that yet. I am writing these ramblings on Notes as we go along so apologies if they are a bit dysfunctional but that's the only way I will get them onto CC.

The service in the bars has been good so far. Minor point, but lack of attention to detail ...the tv channel showing the dinner menus is showing yesterday's at 5:30pm.

The hull seems to have taken some knocks and scrapes though and has not been repainted yet.

Returned from tour to find suite trimmed up for my birthday, I deliberately didn't tell anyone as I don't like fuss but I guess that they check! I will thank the stewardess. The cake and champagne duly arrived just as we were ready for dinner. Nice thought though.

We had the mid cruise questionnaire delivered tonight......24 hours after boarding!!?

Flossie, I Spoke to Lorraine tonight and she and the captain , Teo Srdelic will be on board on October21st.

Boston tomorrow.

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Have a great cruise looking forward to read what you write....We did this cruise a while back and had dinner in the suite on departing New York---see the Statue of Liberty and the city lights "great, what can you say".

The Internet is terrible during the day, early morning or late at night is the only usable stable time. It's never been this bad before. I guess it's the free for all internet availability that's the cause. We are supposed to have two log ons but have not achieved that yet.

 

Flossie, I Spoke to Lorraine tonight and she and the captain , Teo Srdelic will be on board on October21st.

Thanks for the info. We have sailed before with both Captain Teo and CD Lorraine

Sorry to hear about the internet. I wish Regent had thought this through properly and had made some proper investment before shouting about 'free internet for all'

Enjoy the rest of your cruise, despite the various niggles

Eagerly await your posts Swansong. Our best cruise ever was the Montreal to Miami trip, similar to your cruise. Such a glorious trip you have to look forward to.

Enjoy, and keep us posted on your journey. Have a wonderful cruise. Jean.

We've just booked the Montreal to Miami in 4 weeks so am delighted to read your enthusiasm. We've been to none of these ports so have a lot of homework ahead. I shall be following this thread with particular interest. Thank you!

Hope your cruise is as good as ours was. Very interesting ports and almost relaxing ports. From our point of view it was a very sociable cruise where everybody interacted very well. Enjoy the pre cruise packing and excitement. Jean.

We went to the show last night and were entertained by a great singer Lovena B Fox. A Whitney Houston type singer and she certainly got the crowd going.

A fine warm day in Boston. We chose the historic Boston and Harvard tour. 47 pax on the bus but it worked. The guide was excellent and well informed. We don't normally take tours as we usually cruise in the med and know the ports well. We have found that since they were included in the price ( not free!) generally the quality is not as good as it was. However the two we have taken so far here in the US have been excellent.

I have not been able to access the internet today with the first try at 6:45am. If I can post this it will be after 10:30pm. I live in hope!

It Prime 7 tonight. Not my wife's favourite nor mine but we have found the food in CR ok but lacking something. Food is subjective so I won't go into detail.

Posting at 01:10.....good night in the bar!!

Notwithstanding the above we had the best meal in Prime 7 we can remember.

The captain told us about 7:00pm that our departure from Boston was delayed as they were fitting a new satellite dome which might explain the internet issues .

The show, which was Broadway songs with the Jean Ryan group, was good, not brilliant . There was a new cast so they did well considering.

Tomorrow (or today as it happens) it's Bar Harbour. However the captain has asked ship wide that anyone prone to seasickness should take the tablets immediately. As I post everything is calm!

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Who is the GM on the trip? Thanks.

Peggy

It's Michael Coghlan who is GM

The internet is working fine today so I think yesterday's repairs must have fixed it although the telephone is not working.

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Thanks Swansong.

Michael is the best!

Peggy

Agreed! His efforts in getting an Anzac Day commemoration on our cruise in April (along with the HR manager Chris Houghton) was an unexpected event and was so appreciated.

A cool day in Bar Harbour. Last nights predicted rough seas didn't materialise.

There was a tender problem today with one out of action that delayed the tours.

We went on The grand tour of Bar Harbour which whilst good could have been 2 hours shorter, it was 6 hours and a pay extra tour. The scenery was superb but much the same everywhere we went. It included a lobster lunch which was well done. Another excellent guide. It would have been better to have allowed time to walk around the town which seemed lovely as viewed from a coach window.

I must comment on the age profile. It is significantly older than usual with many people with walking difficulties, due I guess to the fact no intercontinental flights are involved for US citizens. I worried about several during the tendering process but the crew, as usual, went the extra mile to help them.

Our meal in CR tonight was much better, the service can only be described as express! We were regularly called by name which is something I am not bothered about but it is nice if not a bit OTT. The staff obviously go to a lot of effort to do that. Some other posters had raised it as an issue both pro and con.

Tomorrow is Halifax, Nova Scotia. I was brought up and educated in Halifax , (Old )Yorkshire , so it will be good to compare. ( Actually there will be no comparison Halifax Nova Scotia will win hands down). ( and before someone tells me I know it wasn't named after that town but the Earl of Halifax.)

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Hope you enjoyed Halifax. It's a lovely area there as is Sydney Nova Scotia.

We were the youngest on our cruise at mid fifties, Jean.

Really enjoying your live trip report. We'll be sailing on the Mariner November 4th for our first Regent cruise. Have a wonderful remainder of your cruise!

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Very cold in Halifax. Take note those who follow......

We took the wrong tour, which was a double deck bus tour of Halifax. We did see the historic citadel which was relatively interesting but when the guide starts to point out Starbucks and the local supermarket you just know there isn't much else to see! Halifax Yorkshire has gone up in my estimation........

However we did learn that many souls from the Titanic are buried here and only as recently as 2008 were the remains of a 2 year old identified due to the wonder of DNA.

We had a great meal at Sette Mari this evening which I love. No queues either.

We then went to the Jean Ryan show which we had seen before but this was a new team and they did well.

Looking forward to a sea day tomorrow followed by dinner with the HR manager. We must be back in favour as a few years have passed by since we were last invited to dine with the crew!

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