Woofa

From our cruise on Riviera last month.

We will certainly try but as we both still work, we push even for ten day out of a US port right now. In a few years we are hoping for sure. I knew my wife was hooked when she turned to me around day four and said "you know I can imagine a world cruise." Keeping our flights shorter also lets us keep our costs down. Since we really do not drink and did not pay for any shore excursions we were able to do our entire ten day trip, in an extended balcony including air and insurance for about $6500 and our next one should be about the same. (Our end of cruise bill was $33 for two Martini's my wife had throughout the cruise.) It helps that we have friends in Miami to stay with and give us rides. Honestly, I had been looking at an Alaskan one way for our next cruise and while my wife wanted to basically do the same again, I think that over the next few years we will do that one and a new England to Bermuda cruise. Loved the O size ships but would like to try an R and Vista as well. Hoping to work our way up to a European cruise and to be honest I think we would also like a TA. While our kids are now out of the house (most of the time,) we have still not been able together them off the payroll. When that happens we may be able to jump up to the next level.

I ordered both books off of ebay. Just put in Oceania cruises and a bunch of stuff came up. These were of course used but both in great condition and I got both for way less than even one would cost new. Fyi plenty of luggage tags available available and some other cool things. They were selling Jacques cookbooks on Riviera last month in the gift store but not this one.

Received the second book. This one is real nice And heavy with plenty of recipes. Plan to take a good look through this and maybe make some stuff. Also to plan some meals for our next cruise on Marina.

Earlier this month on Riviera we had asked our TA and gotten coke zero in our fridge. However, not all venues had easy access to this. As I can substitute diet coke if needed it was no big deal for me. I am pretty sure I also saw sprite zero at least once.

These guys beat me to it but here are some additional:

This just arrived. When we got home I found this on ebay. They have the same book in the Riviera library. I ordered one more Book as well, will post when I get it.

Well, we are now official again. Loved the first one so much we paid our deposit onboard and we just confirmed with our TA our second cruise is almost an exact copy of our first. 11/27/24 to 12/7/24. 10 day Caribbean on Marina this time. A few different ports including St. Lucia. Cabin 7121 extended B3 which my wife absolutely loved (we were in 7119 on Riviera.) I could not believe my wife was willing to cruise over Thanksgiving but she said we will just do Thanksgiving with the kids the weekend before. Not planning all too much different for this one except cutting back on our packing, we way over packed for the Caribbean. Good to be looking forward to the next one!!!

When we were on Riviera earlier this month we had reservations for a shared table in Jacques one night. We stopped in about 45 minutes early and asked if we could have a two top immediately instead and they were happy to seat us. Definitely pursue all of your options and I feel like they will make it happen if they can arrange it.

I never did order it that way sorry. I also never got it direct from any machines around the ship like in terrace. I think I read this might make a difference, something to try for next time.

Okay, so here is the big one you have been waiting for. Food. Once again let me preface this by saying that we have nothing cruise-wise to compare this to as this was our first cruise ever. Across the board we had great service but more importantly the type of service you would expect in a fine restaurant, they change up your silverware and your plates for every course, clean your crumbs when they get out of hand, fresh ground pepper or cheese is offered where needed, the bread on board was uniformly very good (except the bagels for breakfast and lets face it, the croissants were very good so I just had my smoked salmon and cream cheese on a croissant every morning!) and butter in most places was in a single serving dish or in the MDR in pats on a special tray with ice hidden below it. I am open to splenda but generally use stevia at home we had both at most venues. We had asked for Coke Zero in our cabin and we had plenty however most venues did not have it available. Luckily I can also drink diet coke so no big deal. I will start with Barista's even though this not technically a food venue. However as a coffee drinker, this quickly became my favorite part of the ship. The Americano with cream was as good a cup of coffee as I can remember. They will make it to go as well and I usually went here to get my coffee and then carried it into Terrace for my breakfast. I found the other coffee on the ship varied from okay to pretty horrible. As this was pretty much my biggest food complaint, first world problems as they say.. My wife had Cappuccino and the iced coffee made in their special machine and thought it was also great. A nice plus is that I have also started using their wood stirrers as book marks which will keep Oceania on my mind through the time until our next cruise. Baristas did have food and orange juice available although we did not eat much. It is okay for a small snack, some bread, cookies, mini sandwiches. Nothing we thought worth getting again. Waves (daytime) - This is where we had our first meal on the ship hamburgers after we got on board and we had a few meals here throughout the week. It is very convenient if you are spending time by the pool and just have to throw on a shirt and some shoes and walk 50 feet to grab a table. FYI, one day I asked and was actually served our food on the chaise lounges by the pool just let them know and they will deliver.. Burgers hot dogs, all the sandwiches, uniformly good. Fries also were very good for the most part. Waves (nightime) - This is the new pizza venue when waves closes and they have a combination of burrata type cheese salads and pizzas. Seating is the waves seating so still casual and comfortable., We found the pizza to be the best on the ship and very good overall compared to land restaurants. I am not sure if this venue will really excel however as it is very limited in menu. New ice cream, smoothie, shake venue by the pool. I think this was just moved over. I probably had a milk shake every day on board. (I ordered chocolate and asked them to throw in a banana.) very good and the portions are not super huge so you don’t feel too glutinous. I had a few smoothies as well, they were fine but the milkshakes… Terrace Café - This is where we ate the majority of our breakfasts and a few dinners. Breakfast was pretty inclusive and they always had fresh made eggs or choose your omelette. I was happy as they also always had smoked salmon. This can be a great venue to eat outside in the right weather. We mostly ate lunch in Waves. To me this venue for dinner is completely dependent upon the grill. They had the grill going most nights where they will make you Shrimp, lobster tails, steak, lamb chops, salmon etc, to order. Along with grilled vegetables this is actually a great way to have a low carb meal here and there. I soon found my favorites to be the Shrimp (large, probably U12 or so) and the lamb chops. On two days they had Caribbean night and the grill was not available. At that point it lost some luster for us. The rest of the buffet is solid but not what I would call exciting unless you happen to hit on an item you really like. Overall I would compare this to a very good buffet like The Bellagio in Vegas (although much smaller and without things like heaping bowls of shrimp or crab legs). Not quite as good as our favorite Vegas buffet at The Wynn which is now the only one we will go to and usually not for dinner. There were times that this was crowded and you might have to wait a few minutes for the grill or for them to serve you but it was usually pretty quick. This is also a great venue to connect to others you meet on the cruise and we sometimes shared tables here. This is also a great place to try the Humphrey Sloccam ice cream of the day although it is also available in the MDR. Truth is most of these were a miss for me but only because of the combination. You could taste it was quality. I tend to be a Chocolate/Vanilla type of person. My wife did have a Meyer lemon flavor in the MDR one night so much she ordered seconds. MDR - This is truly a beautiful venue and we enjoyed eating here. Only because of how much we liked the specialties was this second place. This was by far the most formal venue in our opinion. Menus were nice but we found the food to be hit or miss. Salmon overcooked one lunch, Risotto undercooked one dinner. On the other hand I had Beef Wellington with Caviar as an appetizer one night and I loved both. Similarly one day for lunch I had probably my favorite Club Sandwich ever (with hard-boiled egg, avocado and the edges of the bread cut off.) What made it better is that we sat by the window and had the entire section to ourselves. Felt like true pampering. Quick note on window seats. For our cruise, once it got dark, window seats were a waste, there was nothing to see. But if you had one during the day, let's say on a sea day while the boat was moving, well worth it. It is my impression from our cruise that overall the MDR skews a little older and certainly more formal than Terrace. More than once we were seated next to or near couples who were very dressed, very proper and to be honest put a slight damper on having a fun talkative dinner. The MDR does have a daily souffle which was good. We even had dinner one night in the Terrace and then walked over to the MDR just to order dessert and get the souffle. The specialties were in our opinion, well special. I can see why people do try to get more than their allotment when possible. But it is not just that food is very good, the restaurants are beautiful, the service was great and each is so different you have the ability to dine in four completely different high end restaurants on the same cruise, five if you include the MDR. Jacques: I would say our favorite of the four. Our escargot was perfect, we had lobster thermidor first the first time ever and loved it. Polo Grill: The filet I had for dinner along with my wife’s Rib Eye was very good. To compare I would say it was one notch below what we get when we go Del Friscos Double Eagle. (For a true comparison I actually had what I think was the best filet ever when we got back to Miami and had dinner with friends at Bourbon Steak. That was truly spectacular.) Appetizers, salads, all very good. Toscana: My favorite food to eat out is usually Italian and Toscana on our last night did not disappoint. My wife loved getting to choose her olive oil and balsamic and I was still able to get butter as that is my preference. The roasted garlic they put in with the bread was a nice touch. Calamari and Buffalo Mozzarella did not disappoint. I had veal scallopini with a side of capellini Bolognese. Perhaps my favorite meal. Veal was very good, again I would say a notch below the truly fine Italian restaurants I have eaten at in New York, Philadelphia, etc. Dessert, let’s take a minute to discuss dessert. I am usually a pretty plain jane dessert guy. I like cheesecake, I like bread pudding and a little else. The quintet of mini deserts was the best we had eaten all week and in particular, they had a peach tart that I wish I had asked for additional helpings. Red Ginger: We split the vegetable tempura and some sushi to start, both very good. I love the idea of picking your chopsticks depending upon your skill level. FYI, they had no problem bringing me a fork. I ended up with the lobster pad Thai and it was best pad Thai I have eaten (although that number is somewhat limited.) There were so many other dishes I would still like to try at the specialties for our next cruise. You can certainly push for more reservations and we did actually try on the second night (sea day) and was unable to get anything, then again on maybe day 5 or 6 when we were able to snag a Jacques reservation for 8:30 but around 6 that night my wife was hungry so we cancelled that reservation and just went to the Terrace. Looking back now that might have been a mistake. One of the gentleman I played bridge with aboard let me know on day nine that he had actually eaten in a specialty on 8 of the first nine nights. Of course I don’t know what level cabin he was in. So, overall, I can imagine that Oceania does have the finest cuisine at sea. Of course food is subjective and just recently on these boards I can see people having varied results on the different ships. We felt very good about the food on our cruise and that for our next cruise we will be able to zero in on what we now know we like to make that one even better. Was every meal 100 perfect, no, was any meal the best of its type we ever had, well not really as my Pad Thai experience is limited. But overall with a little research, and armed with the knowledge that you can always walk into the terrace, maybe even have an appetizer, then walk out and go to get Waves Pizza for a main course then head to the MDR for dessert, I think most people will find this a very pleasant dining experience. Happy to answer any additional question I can.

Glad I missed that...

Agreed, pool is cool. Maybe not so far as cold but lets call it refreshing. Apologies we don't have a pool so hard for me to estimate temperature. I did notice it warming up a little at the day went on. On the other hand we found the hot tubs to be quite hot.

Only in the evenings, when waves closes I think 6:30 to nine. Pizza was good, we would go back but I don't think many knew about it yet. The night we went, maybe two other couples.

So to continue. Unfortunately I have nothing much to add about the wifi. I literally turned of my phone for almost the entire cruise. Smoking areas. I did not see many people here but there is still no door in horizons. Honestly, it was not an issue for me and I barely noticed it throughout the cruise. I wanted to take a minute about service which in our opinion was exceptional. All staff were friendly and with a smile and there to help. Truth is we did not ask for much, a little extra ice one day was about all. But they constantly smiled and said hello in the hallways and I had the impression they would really try to help if something came up. Covid. I saw a few staff and cruisers wearing masks but it was minimal. We took notice of where the medical center was but did not see anyone. Other than the st barts tender getting on and of the ship at ports was easy. A quick facial recognition scan each way and if you a bag returning it was xrayed. Our boarding time was set for 2 but as we had never done this before and we were using uber for the first time we were about an hour early. There was a line and probably took us an hour or so but we were so excited we hardly noticed. We were able to grab a burger and shake at waves to get us through to dinner. Note on bringing wine, liquor aboard. We stopped the night before the cruise in Adventure where we were staying with friends and brought on a small box. Was wasted for us as we are not drinkers and we took most of it off and gave it to the friends we stayed with. However was no problem bringing it aboard. Note I tried to get one of those wine cardboard boxes at the total wine and they had no idea what I was talking about. We ended up with an old liquor box. No problems getting it on but it was a pain to carry. We saw people with rolling bags we think were for this and I highly suggest if you plan to bring aboard. The terminal people would not allow us to check this with our bags for fear of breakage. As some have said already, disembarkation was a little cluster. We were in absolutely no rush but for our group which was at the end there was a delay for a good 30 minutes or so. Luckily There were seats right there so no issues for us. Grabbing our luggage at that point was quick, just a few dozen bags left and we got in line for a taxi and waited maybe fifteen minutes. Dress. I know this is a big topic on the boards so here is what we saw. During the day shorts and bathing suits for all venues. Terrace and waves pizza at night also casual for shorts. Some people did dress for the MDR and specialties but just as many wore rocker type pants and polos it Hawaiian shirts. I brought a blazer and wore it the first night to red ginger and again when we went to the other specialties. I did not feel out of place but would not feel out of place without it. I did bring a tie and wore it for dinner at Jacques and while I may have been the only one, we like dressing a bit and the restaurant is fancy enough that we would dress equally at a local place at home of the same level. I honestly don't think I saw more than a few pair jeans and never in the MDR or a specialty. But really, I was not looking that close. We saw a few women wearing sparkly jewelry but I would say most did not. It kind of felt like, if you had it and this was a special vacation bring it/wear it but it was minimal enough that I noticed it. Let me take a moment to put peoples minds at ease if you are unsure about moving up to this "premium" or luxury type line. Don't worry. This was not, for the most part the type of crowd that screams money. Plenty of Ralph Lauren, not loro piana, plenty of lily Pulitzer not hermes. i am not saying none but mostly the minority. I saw a few rolexes or similar stuff but most were not. People were nice and accessible. We even met a nice couple while walking through the shop and they heard us mention it was our first cruise and they came over to talk. We connected with them and three or four others throughout the cruise and exchanged contact info for the future. We did not meet any snobby people. Of course I tend to very outgoing and struck up more than a few conversations while waiting for the elevator. True the cruise does skew a little older. We are 45 and 53 and I would guess were in the youngest five or ten percent. I saw a total of three children on board all I am guessing below 6 and all well behaved. It would have been easy to miss them completely. If I had to guess I would say the average was maybe late sixties and most of those were youngish at heart. True, there were some that were probably in their late eighties or nineties and a few with mobility issues but we never saw this as a problem. No getting run over by scooters or chairs left to block the hallways. Anyway, I will get to the food. Had to go back to work today so we are keeping busy but I will get there.

A few pics. Our room including the extended balcony. Riviera docked next to the RC wonder of the seas. That boat has about 6700 passengers!!! As soon as they started getting off we went back to the ship. It was unbelievable as they walked off in the thousands. Very happy to get back on board, although they ruined the view, or any sun, from our balcony.

Wanted to add two things. We did not eat in privee but when we ate in Toscana we asked if we could see it. As it was empty at the time they were happy to show us. Beautiful room and bigger in person than it looked in pictures. Plenty big for the maximum ten people. Also we did not eat in la reserve but viewed it numerous times including a quick walk by when the door was open during a dinner. Looked very nice and more intimate than anywhere else. It is basically a long set of tables like having ten two tops side by side with some spacing. When there was a dinner they close off the deck outside to stop everyone walking the deck from looking in.

We loved the MDR for lunch, was mostly empty our last sea day. Club sandwich was great. (they cut the crust off of the bread.). We also had dinner a few times in terrace then went for dessert in the mdr to get the soufle. And we also had the pizza one night in waves. Delicious, place was empty. We did not like terrace as much when they did not have the full grill option. Two nights in a row they did Caribbean in terrace and you could not get the grill items.

I actually have a picture including my new favorite books marks.

We are back home now and getting things back to normal. Today a little about the ship. Of course we did not see it before the refurbish but it was beautiful. I believe we were full but other than a few crowded spots it seemed relatively empty. We watched a video on board about the refurbish and this was an intensive redo. All public areas looked great, our room was spacious enough and we over packed for sure. Having the ability to place the open suitcases under our wonderful bed gave us plenty of options and that is where we stored dirty clothes. We did one load of laundry on day 9 and had no problem getting a washer and dryer. We did see someone utilizing the iron so that is available in all laundry rooms. Plenty of extra drawer room in the night tables, the desk and the bathroom. Fridge came stocked, as per our request with dr. Pepper and coke zero. However coke zero was not easily available in all venues. No problem, I can drink diet coke. I highly recommend you tour the ship to look at the art while you are on it. The collection is extensive, tasteful and varied. I never did the art contest but saw some who did. I was able to find a book in the library on the art for marina and Riviera and it is well worth a look. The library was a beautiful area, often with no seats available. One note, I guess I expected hundreds of what I would call vacation or resort books. Grisham, etc. This was not the case. This is a real library with plenty of non fiction, art books, etc. If you plan to read a few bestsellers by the pool, bring them yourself. I was able to finally read a copy of American Gods which I had wanted to read since seeing the first season on tv. Casino is small but nice. A friend of ours did some gambling and there were poker tournaments on sea days. We. Only went to the theatre once, to see the comedian which was fine. Seats are spacious and comfy. In fact every seat on the ship we tried was comfortable. Chaise lounges enough so to fall asleep (more than once.) Bars looked nice, we only bought two drinks the entire cruise both Martinis for my wife who felt they were excellent. Total spent on board, about $34. I will discuss the restaurants when I get to for but all beautiful, specialties more intimate. As I said pool deck was most crowded but you could always get a single chaise if you were willing to sit in the sun. I loved the pool. It is not large but rarely that crowded, most, like me hopped in for five or ten minutes at a time then back out. The pool itself is uniformly deep except for the stairs. Listed at 5'11" and that seemed about right as I am about 5'10" and it was slightly above my head. The water is extremely salty and I found this made you very bouyant. I was able to float freely and easily when there was room. My favorite part was when the boat is moving and the water swishes around over the inner pool but within the surrounding guard rail, which many people sat on and dipped their feet. It created almost a wave pool like experience which I very much enjoyed. Plenty of little sitting areas if you walked around the ship. Shops are limited but have the basics, stuff goes on sale as the cruise comes to an end. You can certainly spend some obc on Toblerone or some jewelry, a handbag or a watch, higher level included ORIS. We toured the gym and spa area on the first day (expect the spa deck) and while we did not use it the gym is nice and the open to everyone showers, sauna and quiet areas with the heated stone loungers looked comfortable. There is a nice game room nice to the barriers lounge and we saw people playing games, puzzles, etc. While I am at it Baristas is wonderful. Coffee is easily the best on the ship and we got to know the few guys working it quickly. I saw the artists loft and a friend of ours did utilize it and it is spacious. We took a cooking class and the space is large and they don't crowd it. More on that when I do food. Walked around the upper deck and saw the pickle ball court and the miniature golf. Not sure how much they were utilized but it seems a nice space. Horizons is beautiful and my wife went to tea five or six times. Also we did the new passenger happy hour there and our CC meet and greet. Back to our room we had the replacement full shower without tub and is is spacious. If you were over maybe 6'1" you might have a height issue. Shower had both the rain faucet and a detachable movable spray. Water was always warm enough. There was no bench as previously mentioned here and I don't think I saw handles so if mobility is an issue, it could affect you. As I think I mentioned previously the bed is super comfortable and the pillows, sheets, towels, etc, all high level. I can see why people buy their beds and sheets. Tv is large and easily viewable from the bed or the couch. Adequate programming including plenty of Oceania stuff and some movies, tv shows and news channels. Assuming you are not holed up in your room all week watching tv, it should be more than adequate for most. We did have to wait on elevators during the "rush hours" but we were fine using the stairways going down or if only up a few floors. Note about the elevators, the doors close fast. More than once we missed getting on an elevator with open space as a less mobile person was getting off slowly. Not a big issue for us. Still unpacking but more to come. Again, I will do my best to help with questions that I can.

I may take this in pieces as we work our way home. Regarding shore excursions I am afraid we did very little. New to cruising and to keep our costs down we did cruise only fair and had basically decided to just get off the ship at each port. However we were very fortunate to meet up with @CaptainR on our roll call and he and his wife invited us to spend our first stop, St Kitts, at a beautiful Hyatt resort. It was about a 30 minute cab ride and felt like a completely different island. We had a nice private cabana well shaded and access to the private beach and huge pool. Some food and drinks were included and the poolside bar was available for anything additional. It was a beautiful day and the resort was very private and quiet. We made good friends that day and they kept a good eye on us throughout our first cruise. Helping with the little things experienced cruisers learn. In fact we were fortunate to make numerous friends throughout our cruise and ended up exchanging contact information with multiple people. Regarding the five other stops we basically just walked off the ship into the local town for an hour or two and then back on the ship for lunch. Overall we found lots of jewelry stores, liquor stores and cheap souvenirs. St bars of course had much more expensive stores but even there we really did not find anything to buy like nice local art or crafts in a nice but reasonable price range (low hundreds of dollars.). Now this was partially our fault as we really did no research and did not feel like exploring too far. A note here on the tender for St Barts. This was by far the worst part of our trip. My guess is that we were very close to not being allowed to go to shore at all. I don't know exactly what I thought the tender process would be like but sitting in a cramped lifeboat with fifty other people was not fun or luxurious. Getting on and off was in my opinion dangerous as the step on/off often moved up or down by six or more inches as you took it. The crew was very good about getting everyone on and of safely but I would not be surprised if people get injured regularly. I don't have any easy solution for this and others let us know this is not always so difficult but we did let Oceania know our concerns. We docked everywhere else and getting on/off was quick and easy. Another quick note is that on this cruise at least, we found it difficult, if not impossible to get shaded chaise lounges by the Pool deck, even on port days. Very early on these were all taken and rarely emptied even when people went to lunch as they left their stuff. Now we were not in a bad spot as we had an extended balcony with our own private chaise lounges. Additionally I was not able to just sit in a direct sun lounger as I did not have enough of a tan. I also really don't have a great plan for this either except add some additional shade on deck 14 over looking the pool. this is probably not as big an issue on non Caribbean cruises. It would not surprise me if the majority of people never got off the ship which added to this being an issue. More to come...

I will post a full review soon but we just got off our first cruise ever (10 day Riviera) we had a great vacation. Hated to have to get off but we did put down a deposit for a future cruise to be named later. Flying back to Dallas tomorrow and I will do my best to answer any questions from this recent experience. Quick notes (remember we have no previous cruiser to make comparisons.) Service was exceptional. Boat was like new after recent refurb. Bed was amazingly comfy. Fellow passengers mostly very friendly, we made some friends for life. Food. Specialties were excellent. Waves, terrace and new waves pizzeria very good. We found main dining room beautiful and service excellent but we had a few misses here. When we did not have a specialty reservation we preferred the terrace, assuming, they had the grill going. Lamb chops and shrimp my favorite. Had smoked salmon every morning. Great milk shakes by the pool. My wife went to tea at least 5 times. Baristas coffee amazing, everywhere else hit or miss. More to come...

Amazing video, thanks for your work, everything looks amazing. We board Riviera Wednesday for our first cruise ever, getting pretty excited as we start packing.

Hi itzfitz, we are onboard with you a week from today and also first timers. If you have not already, check out our roll call. Informal meet and greet first night in Horizons I think at nine. We may be late as we are eating in Red Ginger at 8. Should be a great way to start our cruise. Can't wait to try that Miso glazed sea bass!!!

I had not known the reason why but my passport was set to expire within 6 months of our upcoming January cruise. I had it renewed early. Took about 6 weeks Without a rush.