cruiseej

So are you saying that all fish can be frozen and yet described as "fresh"? As apposed to what... fish which sat around for days before it was frozen? 😉

Well, if the dish is "Fresh Alaskan Black Cod" then they actually need to have just purchased fresh cod. Whereas you could potentially get "Alaskan Black Cod" (defrosted from the freezer) upon request. 😀

We were recently aboard the Sojourn for a 10-day cruise from Barcelona to Monte Carlo, May 27-June 6. It was my goal to try to pick up on @shark b8's excellent on-board commentary, but I was so busy enjoying the trip that I didn’t have time to post much while we were onboard — so I’m posting now to offer few reflections and random observations on the cruise. This post is aimed primarily at past Seabourn cruisers who, like me, read somewhat regular posts here or on the FB forums about various things which have declined or are slipping. I’m not going to do a detailed review of the ship, nor a daily travelogue, but I’d be happy to answer any questions. This was our third post-Covid cruise with Seabourn. The other two had been in the Caribbean, the first of which had only 130 passengers aboard, and the second with a half-full ship. This cruise was a completely sold-out. We had enjoyed immensely the “private yacht” cruise shortly after cruising began, but it didn’t quite feel like normal because the ship has been so empty. This cruise felt completely normal, and with one small exception, having a full ship didn’t cause any problems. All aboard. Our cruise began as the World Cruise travelers (mostly) departed in Barcelona. Seabourn had sent an email that boarding wouldn’t begin until 1 pm, undoubtedly due to the large turnover in passengers, luggage, crew, and supplies. We arrived at the cruise terminal — after passing a Disney ship where passengers were queued outside the terminal and wrapped around the outside of the building! — shortly after 1 pm and had our luggage promptly checked in and our boarding passes issued. No one asked to see our pre-printed boarding passes (which I continue to print on the off-chance that we’re asked to see them one day!) It couldn’t have been more than two minutes until we were on the escalator up to the waiting area. A staff member gave us a small paper boarding group number; we were group 8, and waited perhaps 10 minutes until called to board the ship. We stopped in our suite for a few seconds to drop our carry-ons and went to the Colonnade, where we secured two tables on the back deck and happily settled into cruise mode after several active days in Barcelona. We were traveling with 5 other couples, which we’ve never done before on a cruise, and I’m happy to say our large group was not an issue for any aspect of the cruise. (Well, some of our fellow passengers didn’t seem too happy with us when we won at trivia twice in a row, so we stayed away after that!) The captain came on the PA system to inform us we’d be departing an hour late because supply loading was taking a long time, but that it wouldn’t affect us arriving on time at our next port. We watched from Deck 9 as the local handlers worked to load pallet after pallet of supplies aboard. As the Hotel Director remarked while we were observing, the ship was “basically empty” after the World Cruise and its last segment sailing up from South Africa. As the clock advanced, more and more Seabourn crew members, from deck staff to senior officers, appeared on the dock to help with loading. We gasped a little when one of the manual pallet jacks got stuck — there were 50 cases of Prosecco at risk! — then we cheered when someone cut the shrink wrap and the crew members formed a bucket brigade to pass each case down the line and onto the ship. About two hours after our scheduled departure, the last pallet was loaded onboard and we finally slipped away from Barcelona. Fine dining it was. That first night in the Restaurant was our one meal where things didn’t go quite well. We were seated at two tables of 6 but then no one came to take our orders for a long time. Bread never arrived. Wine glasses ran empty (oh, the horror!). But we understood the turnover day was taxing on the staff and hoped things would calm down going forward — which they did. With some of our friends new to Seabourn, we hoped they wouldn’t form any negative impressions from the off-kilter service. As the restaurant manager said to me the next day, “the Restaurant staff was tested mightily, to the breaking point, the first night.” By Day 3, one of our friends said, “yup, we’re sold on Seabourn; everything is fantastic!” After that, things settled in and it was a Seabourn cruise with all the nice touches, excellent service, and incredibly friendly crew we’ve loved in the past. Our first day, I had gone with a few friends to the Thomas Keller Grill to see what they could do to get us in. We had tried booking online months ago, but the best we could cobble together was three tables of four on different nights. Within a few minutes, the manager was able to secure us the one table which can seat 8, and an adjoining table for 4 on the same night — better than I expected. For the Restaurant, although someone told me the first night that they didn’t hold tables, by Night 2, two adjoining tables of 6 had a small “reserved” sign on them, and a reservation showed up for us in The Source every day. Perfect! We played musical chairs each night to rotate who ate with whom, and by Night 3, the manager said those tables were ours and we didn’t even have to check in at the desk, we could just sit whenever we arrived. More perfect! Oh, and we had the pleasure of having Fabian serve us nightly; he was friendly, funny, knowledgeable about the food on offer, and on top of his game even on nights when the Restaurant was nearly full and it was clear the staff was hustling. One member of our group has significant food limitations, and each night he would quietly meet with her to go over how they could tailor that night’s food to meet her needs; she was delighted. Most perfect! I won’t go through each meal, but our food was uniformly great — and nothing I’d consider to be a step back from past cruises, pre- or post-Covid. Because the food and service was so rock-solid, we didn’t venture away from the Restaurant other than our one night the the TK Grill. Towards the end of the cruise, one night was the Chef’s dinner, with limited choices of a multi-course menu. I read the menu in advance and it didn’t wow me, but I have to say this was one of the best meals we’ve ever had on a ship; an unexpectedly excellent dinner experience. Oh, I know the subject of The Restaurant being open for breakfast and lunch is of interest to some… On our cruise it was closed 9 out of 10 days, and open for breakfast and lunch only on our one sea day. It was a port-intensive Mediterranean cruise, so I understand not opening the Restaurant to serve what is likely to be only a handful of people on days when many/most people are off the ship and/or want to eat outside. But I know this bothers some cruisers who do not like the Colonnade or Patio for breakfast and lunch. About those breadsticks… As others have reported, the breadsticks are not made the same as they used to be. They’re still good. Just not as addictively great as the old recipe. Also as previously reported, the much-loved Grandma’s Cake was absent from Seabourn Square. Nonetheless, I did not have any problem satisfying my sweet tooth on the occasions I wanted a snack. Several in our group went from lunch to the Square daily because they liked the baked goods in the Square more than the Colonnade or Patio selections. Ain’t it grand to have choices! A whine about wine. The one knock on the food & beverage service would be the included wines, and particularly the red wines. There was a preponderance of South African wines served (white and red); I don’t know if they were using up what they had purchased when the ship was in South Africa a few weeks earlier or because SA wines offer them best value at the moment. We’re all wine enthusiasts, but not to the degree that we bring our own wines or even buy nightly from the reserve list. We’ve always been able to find palatable wines on the included list. Most of the included wines seemed to be bottles we could buy in the US for $9-$15. This isn’t suddenly new; things have been trending this way for years. But it’s not good for a cruise line which touts its included “fine wines.” One of the two areas I’d most encourage Seabourn’s new president to improve is the level of included wines. Everyone in our group agreed that if there was a way to have a slightly better wine package — $20 wines instead of $10 wines — we’d jump at the chance to pay a little extra for that; more practically, if Seabourn increased the cost of its cruises by $5 to $10 per person per day and put that money into better included wines, it would make a marked difference. Hark the Herald… Seabourn has experimented with doing away with the printed Herald delivered to each room every evening. I guess they got enough complaints about it that the printed Herald was back, without any need to request it. It’s in a smaller format than before, so it’s half the paper it used to be, but that seems a fair compromise to me; it had the information we needed — daily activities and restaurant/bar hours — in a format I think most cruisers prefer to The Source app. (But the USA/England/Australia News flyers each morning are gone for good.) While I'm on communication, I should mention that Internet service seemed remarkably… not bad. While links to a few websites didn't work, overall speed in checking email and reading websites was quite acceptable, and better than many prior cruises. Some of our friends used WhatsApp and FaceTime for calls and didn't experience problems. I don't know if they have improved bandwidth, or if the Mediterranean is just a sweet spot for their Internet service, but it was a non-issue during this cruise even though the ship was full. Now if only they'd get rid of the one-device rule so I didn't have to click to connect each time I switched between my phone and my laptop, things would be grand. (Yes, I know you can buy this for a hefty fee.) We don’t need no stinking’ tickets. We did several Seabourn excursions, and several with private guides. Longtime Seabourn cruisers may recall that you used to get excursion tickets in your suite and/or at their Destinations desk. That went away a few years ago as they pushed everyone to use The Source app for up-to-date bar-coded electronic tickets. Some people complained about not wanting to carry or use their phones or tablets when going ashore, and I guess Seabourn adjusted, because we were never asked to see our tickets (in the app) on any of our tours. For the tendering ports, we checked in at the theater as in the past, and once our names were checked off the list, that was all that was needed. Even in one of the ports where we were docked, we just got on our assigned bus, the guide counted that we had the correct number of people, and off we went. (It may not be that way in every port for every excursion; I’m just reporting on our experience.) That’s entertainment? My second wish for the new Seabourn president would be to reverse the decision to eliminate the trio and replace them with a DJ. In the Club at night, and on deck for one or two events, we had a DJ where the trio would have once performed. No insult to any DJs out there, but I can listen to recorded music every day; when I come aboard a Seabourn ship, we love having live music, and this change has cut that down. To be sure, the Seabourn band is still alive and kicking, accompanying the shows by the staff singers and dancers as well as some guest performers, and performing in the Club late at night. Yay! We love listening to musicians perform live music. We just wish the change to DJ’s would be reversed, and they’d go back to a trio for additional music onboard. I understand the economics — it’s one person to pay and house and feed instead of three, and DJs might even get paid a little less — but this is a cutback we felt, and regret. That said, the singers and dancers and the live band were up to their usual excellent standards. I was pleased that two of the three production shows were new to us. (Yes, jolly old Sir Tim Rice is still kicking around, in a third version of the show of his music; we missed that show because it was packing night, so I can’t comment on whether it felt truly refreshed or not.) Oh captain, my captain! The senior staff onboard was uniformly great. Perhaps this was because of a carryover from the end of the World Cruise, or perhaps because Seabourn doesn’t have many duds. The captain was Hamish Elliott, who was personable and out-and-about quite a bit. The Hotel Director was Harry Ter Horst, and he seemed to be everything everywhere all at once. If we were leaving for an excursion, he was at the gangway; at events on deck, he was always present; at the theater before or after shows, there he was. And I could say the same for our Cruise, er, Entertainment Director Jan Stearman. (Yes, Seabourn inexplicably made a change at the start of this month to eliminate the titles of Cruise Director and Assistant Cruise Director and replace them with “Entertainment Director” and “Entertainment Manager”; why they considered this necessary/desirable/good thing is beyond me.) I know she’s a longtime Seabourn veteran who goes back to the beginning of the cruise line, but this was our first time sailing with her. Her somewhat loose and carefree style suited us nicely. And I don’t want to forget Executive chef Karl Duffel, who stopped by our table a few nights and led us on a galley tour; he seemed to have his staff humming at a very high level (which reminded me, in a lower-key way, of the long-departed Chef Jess, who impressed us on our first Seabourn cruise). “No member of a crew is praised for the rugged individuality of his rowing.” The crew of Sojourn, as is true of most Seabourn cruises, works like a well-oiled machine. A happy well-oiled machine. From the deck staff getting us on and off the tenders, to the unseen laundry workers who produce the most beautiful laundry at sea, to the ever-present always-cheerful and efficient room attendants, to the smiling front-of-house servers and bartenders, anyone who is a repeat Seabourn cruiser knows it’s the crew that makes Seabourn shine. I won’t list a bunch of names here (we did on our evaluation), but we had no disappointments on this cruise. Speaking of evaluations, I’d note that there seem to no longer be mid-cruise evaluations to fill out and return. Instead, there is a Feedback tab on The Source app, and passengers are encouraged to submit feedback (good or bad) contemporaneously during a cruise rather than waiting for a fixed point in time to seek feedback. That seems like a good idea, assuming people use it. We had no complaints or suggestions for in-cruise adjustments, so we never submitted any feedback except in our post-cruise survey. * * * * * To sum up, we had an excellent cruise. Our friends who have cruised with Seabourn before and those who were newbies were all happy. A few things have changed, but our three Seabourn experiences since summer 2021 don’t have us feeling that standards are significantly declining (except the two issues noted above). And we can’t wait to be back on our next Seabourn cruise. Well, we have a Regent cruise (first in a decade plus) coming up late summer, and a Silversea expedition cruise early next summer — but the onboard offer of 35% off any expedition cruise (!!) was too good to resist, so we added a booking late-summer next year to try to Venture in Greenland and Canada.

I understand why some people prefer to avoid the buffet in the Colonnade, but I find you miss out on a lot by doing so. For lunch, the meat (or fish) they are carving is often quite good, as are some of the daily pastas, and we enjoy getting a caesar salad (not TK Grille level 😉, but still made-to-order) — and none of those involve touching any serving utensils used by other guests. Even with a completely full ship (as was the case a week ago on Sojourn), the line is almost never long or slow moving. Eating outdoors, sipping wine or a cold beer just can't be beat. And it seems even just a little better on embarkation day (unless the ship is in a heavy industrial port, or it's cold/rainy) while adjusting from travel hustle to shipboard relaxing mode, 😀

@rallydave I wasn't suggesting that you don't have a roller carryon bag; I have one on every trip! 😀 I was only questioning whether you need to keep it with you between the charter flight and boarding the ship. We did a Greenland cruise a few years ago (on Silversea) and disembarked in Kangerlussuaq. We had a bus tour to the foot of a glacier and a lunch before the airport for the charter flight. I don't think I kept our roll-on with me during the transfer. Hopefully Seabourn will let you take the roll-on on the charter flight and then take it from you to transfer to the ship.

I guess my question is why you'd want to deal with a wheeled carry-on bag on a zodiac? This isn't like an airline flight from a large airport, where you need to keep some important items with you lest it not make it onto your flight.

Post-Covid, yes, it's normal. Don't worry about it at all. And if you show up a little early for your embarkation, you will likely be allowed to board early, but if there are other passengers who checked in before you, they will get to board first.

If you find them on a cruise, they will always be the frozen ones. King Crab season is in October-Janaury, when there are no cruise ships in Alaskan waters. (Golden King Crab can sometimes be caught from the middle of February to the early June.) Some major Red King Crab fisheries were closed this past winter due to stock being below the threshold set by the Alaskan Department of Fish and Game, so king crab is more scarce and more expensive than ever.

Hmmm, we've had wines from New Zealand, white and red, since boarding Sojourn on Saturday. Oyster Bay, a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, has been a pretty steady presence on Seabourn ships for some time, and there's certainly some on Sojourn right now. (I'm not saying that's a great wine; just that there are other alternative to South African wines and the list shown above.) Tonight with diner I drank Nine Hats Cabernet, a US (Washington) wine.

We boarded Sojourn Saturday, and our "cruise director" Jan informed us that Seabourn has changed the titles from "Cruise Director" to "Entertainment Director", and "Assistant Cruise Director" is now "Entertainment Manager", effective this week. I assume this is fleet-wide, or perhaps as these staff members rotate on for a new contract.

And this evening's replacement bottles are Aqua Panna, for the first time this cruise. I suppose if you have a favorite, and they have it on board, your cabin attendant can get it for you. And if you don't care which brand you get, you may get several, as we have. 😀

The refrigerator door holds the water bottles quite nicely. I always keep two chilled in the refrigerator. I agree. It's interesting how many people say they don't like the taste; we find it perfectly fine. Haven't experienced that, but I'm not doubting some of them do. I agree they are not great for that. I fill my Hydro Flask bottle with sport cap with water and ice from the refrigerator, to have bedside overnight. @SLSD Aboard the Sojourn now, we also got bottled water in our room. They're large (750 ml) glass bottles, so not really suitable for carrying ashore. One brand was Mountain Falls and I forget the other brand (they were sparkling and we only drink natural, so I had the room attendant take them away). On our prior cruise, I think we just had the Nordic bottles, but as others have said, bottles are available on request. The only issue you're therefore likely to have is if you dislike the Nordic water and there's not an alternative for shore excursions; for that, perhaps you should bring a small plastic/nalgene bottle you can fill from bottled water on the ship if you are concerned about this.

Probably along with everyone else on this cruise! 😀

@shark b8 Thanks for all your posts, pictures and videos taking us along on your adventure, and for your great sense of humor that shone in so many of your posts. I don't follow every travelogue on this site, but yours has been "must-read" entertainment. 😀 I hope you have smooth travels home through your many hours of airports and flying ahead! We'll try to take good care of Sojourn when we board a few hours after you depart.

The water system Seabourn uses is Nordaq. You'll probably find a wide variety of opinions here. We have found it to be perfectly fine — no brackish or off taste — while others have stated they don't like it. The plastic Nordaq water bottles have not leaked in our experiences with them. The original bottles — the ones they put in your suite — were heavy for short excursions, but they now have half-sized bottles which are lighter. I bring my own metal Hydro Flask water bottle when I travel, because I like to drink my water cold. A Hydro Flash (or other comparable double-wall metal bottle) keeps ice water icy all day. I fill my bottle from the provided bottle and water in our suite, and I'm a happy camper. But some would find a metal bottle like mine is heavy to carry of shore excursions. (I usually have a camera bag that I put the bottle in so I'm carrying the weight on my shoulder/neck.)

There is no new terminal. You check in at the longstanding Marittima Cruise Terminal in Venice, just as when the ships docked there. The only change is that after depositing your luggage and checking in, you hop on a shuttle bus which takes you across the causeway to the mainland and into the industrial docks where you board your ship.

One end of the Kangerlussuaq runway is sinking into the permafrost which is melting as a result of global warming. They may be limiting weight and/or use of the full length of the runway this summer due to that.

Will try! I honestly don't know how you find the time to do all the posting you do. (I usually don't even sift through all my photos until we're home.) We're doing this cruise with five other couples, so I'm figuring I won't have much downtime, but I'll see what I can manage. 😉 I'm sorry you're departing as we board; it would be a pleasure to meet you and cruise with you some day!

There are no formal nights of expedition cruises. It's not unique to your trip and charter flights. Just check about the luggage allowance. I have seen people post a letter from Seabourn stating the limit is 50 pounds of checked luggage (can be one bag or two) per person, not 50 pounds per bag with two bags per person.

I figured that was just to get you through the last week of your cruise! 😀 Hopefully we'll get more when we board in Barcelona on Saturday.

If the room attendants haven't finished preparing the room, there's potential for them to think a bag was left behind by the previous occupants, and to move it to a secure area.

I hope she's there to engage with passengers to find out why they choose Seabourn, what they think Seabourn does especially well, and where they think Seabourn has slipped. A new CEO on a true listening/learning tour is a hopeful sign for the future -- assuming the things Seabourn needs are within her control and financial limits.

We rented a car from Hertz in Seward, and returned it in Anchorage. It was crazy expensive, but they were the only game in town; the franchise also didn't honor Hertz coupons and discount codes. But it was worthwhile to be able to explore on our own.

The check-in process should not be a pain! You check in at the Marittima Cruise Terminal in Venice, as has been the process for many, many years. Your luggage is tagged and collected there; your boarding documents are checked there. The only change is that instead of then walking onto the ship, you walk onto a bus. The bus drive across the causeway to the industrial docks on the mainland and pulls up at the ship; you then walk off the bus and onto the ship. If disembarking in Venice, it's the same in reverse. If you are just stopping in Venice for a port date, then you'll still use the busses from and to the mainland, and any excursions will depart from the Marittima Cruise Terminal, or you can head into Venice on your own. The only downside is the extra shuttle bus coming and going.

Well, it's understandable that you might have missed this being busy in the first days after you boarded. Oh, wait… 🤣