takemewithyou

Agree, Phil, and it is getting to be very concerning! It seems to be getting worse….or is that my imagination? Even the TA’s are having to spend so much time now trying to get things straightened out. Thankful to my travel agent for getting me through my last cruise this summer on Pursuit. None of my OBC showed and I was stressed about that but I was assured that my OBC would be correct and that my loyalty level was correct. Couldn’t check in but she did that way ahead for me and sent my docs and my luggage tags by email.

This kind of stuff is why you need a travel agent to take care of this for you! And NO, I am not a travel agent. I just wouldn’t book a cruise on Azamara without one right now. The frustrations are constant right now with that web site! Have you called Azamara for help?

Have to say…..that type of service would drive me nuts and we also experienced that on our single Viking cruise!

Thanks. I appreciated your honest review and I appreciate that you elaborated on Journey’s condition. Since that is our next booking on Azamara for late 2024, I am interested in when drydock is and what may be done. Hopefully others can comment if they have heard any specifics. I agree with you about the ultimate beverage package. I had it late 2021 on Quest and found that a lot of the wines mentioned on the web site that were supposed to be on the wine list weren’t there, either! It was disappointing but at that time everything was being blamed on supply chain issues and that cruise started in Miami. Second cruise, late 2022 I smartened up and did not purchase the package and brought some wines onboard and the wine issues were the same. This June on Pursuit, I did the same thing…..brought my own wines onboard with me and did also have some of the included wines being poured, which were just ok. I agree that the servers start to panic a bit when you go off script and want to order a bottle of wine and not have the wines automatically on offer. It does take awhile for the wine you ordered to appear!

I really like Azamara but some things have got to be done regarding customer service or lack there of currently. It’s been months since the website fiasco and things are still a mess. It’s essential to be represented by a travel agent when dealing with them and as this story illustrates, sometimes the best agencies can’t get errors corrected, even by escalating to the head office. The article mentions how capable the CEO is or should be, but I feel like she should have more communication and updates with her loyal customers and she should have made more progress is getting things back online by now.

Thank you for posting this.

Regarding the appearance of Journey……does anyone have any information on when the dry dock is scheduled and what work might be carried out?

@Bimmer09 I don’t know if HAL still features an Indonesian tea in the dining room (used to be offered one time on longer than 7 day voyages) but if they do, they are something very unique and special. The servers are in their Indonesian dress and the offerings are special. They used to offer a regular tea every afternoon that was also nice.

Noticing that the conversations here on this board have diminished significantly! Many people must have moved on to other cruiselines! It’s pretty concerning, although we hear nothing from Azamara , other than frequent sales emails and mailings. We are, however, reading here regularly about customers cancelling their cruises out of their frustrations dealing with Azamara’s management and web site issues. Sad !

Hi Norris, thanks for the reply and I appreciate your honest answer! We have sailed HAL quite a bit as well as X (last on in 2015) We were last on HAL in 2018. We always liked HAL. They have interesting itineraries. We found their food to be fine. Their Neptune Suites are large and very comfortable. We have not been on HAL post Covid. I did read their CC board intermittently post Covid and there were a lot of concerns over food quality. I haven’t keep up with their boards recently. I hope the food has improved. Again, it was always good Pre Covid. I would say the Pinnacle Grill was always better than Prime C on Azamara, The crew was always great and very friendly……similar to the crew on Azamara. Sounds like you have found a good replacement for your Azamara cruise. I will try to remember to read your review! have a great cruise!

How does the price compare? Just curious….. Aft suite on HAL compared to the accommodations that you had on Azamara?

Agree with @uktog. We saw the same show last year the cruise right after @uktog”s……we just missed each other 😀. We really enjoyed it and always liked Harry Belafonte’s music. We had seats pretty close to all the action. It was an easy, relaxing and fun Azamazing Evening. Note: If you didn’t want to leave the ship, you could just sit on the sunset veranda off of Windows Cafe and see and hear all the action from afar.

Let us know how it goes…..do you have dress in formal attire for Seabourn?

We have done those itineraries on Celebrity and Holland America and they were great cruises. I think Oceania has some nice itineraries with both Maine and PEI, but pricey. Azamara is the one I wanted to return on to this area. Boston is a great city. Great history. New York? Well, I could care less to go there. Sorry Host Jazzbeau. 😀

I was looking at their itineraries recently…..at least a few of their itineraries stop in Bar Harbor. Azamara is really losing out by not doing Canada / New England cruises!…..I know they added a Greenland to Canada cruise…..that itinerary doesn’t do it for me! Been to some of those places before and once was enough. There are quite a few of us who have been requesting these for quite a few years! One of the most beautiful areas for cruising on this side of the pond.

I am originally from New England (Maine] . Have done cruises there, too. Do you have an itinerary you are looking at? Does Viking even stop in Maine? Usual stops are Portland and Bar Harbor. In my opinion, you miss a lot if you don’t have at least Bar Harbor or Portland Maine on your itinerary.

How long will this go on for? I think you raise some good questions! We have no idea! As an Azamara cruiser since 2009, I have to say I am extremely disappointed with the lack of communication we are receiving from the President and the rest of the Azamara team regarding this question.

@tgg on my last sailing on Pursuit in June I happened to meet the beverage manager by chance before our meeting and she volunteered to have drinks ready for our meet and greet and the designated meeting spot in the Insider was the opposite side of the LR -that worked out much better! We were treated very well because of this chance meeting of the bev manager……trays of drinks circulated throughout the gathering! p.s. you are so kind!

I have done the same….organized roll calls and then brought name tags. It really helps people to find who they have been conversing with on the roll calls. Sometimes I have printed out all the names myself and other times, I just brought a pack of blank name tags for people to fill out themselves.

Maybe they did! He was working on it at that time and going from ship to ship to get the procedure manuals updated.

This past Christmas of 2022, when we were onboard Onward, Tony Markey had some question and answer sessions onboard with guests that I attended and that is one of things he said he had been tasked with and was working on at that time.

Over on the Oceania board, there was a long thread similar to this one about alternatives to Oceania! Looking for greener pastures. One of the lines mentioned was Seabourn. Has anyone tried them and have any comments?

I got it, too! Thought it was just another email trying to drum up business, but you are right….it is telling me to book my carnival tickets for a cruise I am not on! what next?!

Ask for a cafe americano?

And the brewed US stuff is what I like! Where can I get the closest thing to that? Edited to add….last O cruise was 8 yrs ago and the coffee in GDR was so dark and strong!