jondfk

Who me? You know I would only be in Colonnade if the Restaurant was closed. No tables available means no tables set for breakfast, laid out for dinner and the changeover is quite daunting if you have no staff on duty.

As it happens we met the F&B manager in the elevator yesterday, when he passed through the dining room at lunch I asked that he come over. We had a short conversation focused mainly on breakfast, he said he had been advised and discussed the food service with the chef, I told him in no uncertain terms that the food itself was fine it was the service that completely failed. An apology was offered, I suggested he might pass through either during dinner this evening or at breakfast to judge whether the service was to his expectations. Time shall tell. Distinctly different from Ovation where his equivalent was visible 3 meals a day.

Well, it pains me to write this report, but I’ve promised to share our actual experiences both good and bad. First, some good, we throughly enjoyed our first night at Observation, great, attentive and witty service, this carried over this morning to the Patio bar. As I mentioned my preferred drink wasn’t available but I was promised restock by tonight. Thinks skidded down hill when we moved to the restaurant. We were seated and a very attentive assistant waiter provided water bread and wine, he asked us to wait for his partner for guidance on the menu, the only problem was, the waiter never arrived, meanwhile more tables were seated, and the poor assistant was very quickly overwhelmed. Eventually he made it back around to take our order which was challenging since he had to compare the menu to the tablet to enter orders. The challenge intensified when food started to be ready and he had to leave to carry plates. Eventually a bar server was dispatched to assist and by the time dessert rolled around an assitant from the adjacent section started to fill in taking orders etc. Not a great experience. Breakfast offered a second chance and a second major fail. We arrived at 8:30 to find a substantial line waiting to be seated. No tables available we were told, the limited staff was trying to reset tables, a mad scramble for coffee cups, butter and side plates. Couples were seated slooowly as tables could be reset. Finally they gave up setting tables and just sat us at a bare table. The pastry tray arrived with 4 very tired looking donuts and nothing else. Water arrived, but oops, no water glasses. Coffee arrived but oops, no coffee cups. The comedy goes on and on. The waiter was visibly angry we had been seated “I have nothing for them” he remarked to the manager. I find myself angry and stunned at the level of service this first two meals. We experienced a few gaffs on Ovation in June but nothing remotely like to complete disarray of these first two meals surely it has to improve, at least one hopes.

Here’s the Herald for today which is a sea day en route to Ketchikan.

At times I’m really quite dim. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how we scored such an upgrade yesterday. This morning it’s so very clear, it’s a milestone anniversary for us, today in fact,. We had let SB know when booking and that, undoubtedly, explains the upgrade, the very same thing happened to us 10 years ago on Princess. In the case of Princess it was really quite clever since that first upgrade to a full suite led to us booking and paying for 9 more in the years that followed.

An update here, standard well mixers are Canada Dry. However, I saw a couple ask for and receive Fever Tree last night at Observation Bar, it did require a special trip to the store room, but the request was fulfilled. There was some debate amongst staff as to whether Fever Tree was currently on board. On the other hand my luck with the listed drinks from the menu continues to be poor. Asked for a glass of port, none available, “maybe tomorrow after the new stock is unpacked” heard that a lot on Ovation, though my favorites never managed to get unpacked.

No, a single immigration channel for (in our case) two ships. We were fortunate that the other ship was an older RCCL with max capacity of 2500, I’m told three ship days are very challenging. The split off occurs after immigration.

Well, all aboard now and settling in. Our plan to have lunch ashore and head toward the gangway about 1:00 worked perfectly. Zero queue for security check, likewise US immigration which we are told can be epic in Vancouver. 6 free agents to complete checkin with SB. Total elapsed time something like 10 minutes the vast majority of which was spent walking. The only glitch, and ahem, I expect no sympathy here, was that we were upgraded from our original V4 to a PH, but nobody told us. How did I figure it out? Well, the key didn’t have my name on it, looking at the paper slip I noticed the cabin number was up on deck 9, I knew there was little up there but PH. It’s going to be slightly more difficult to register displeasure elsewhere… Perhaps this is a bit of a nod from the gods balancing out experiences yesterday at the Pan Pacific. We arrived slightly after 4pm to find an epic line for checkin, an hour later we finally had a key and headed off to the bar for a bite and a drink, 90 minutes later our luggage still had not made it to the room, the luggage spent more time between the curb and our room than it had on the flight from San Francisco to Vancouver. As said perhaps some god took pity. That’s enough for this first afternoon.

We were new to Seabourn in June if you have any particular newbie questions my memory’s are still fresh enough to help, ask away. See you on the 18th!

Like SLSD we enjoyed a few nights at E&O in June in Norway, one evening I was dispatched for a heavy coat for my cool blooded Mrs, we were able to enjoy the remainder of the meal. Another night we changed tables to dodge the wind. All throughly enjoyable though some menus are much better than others imho. We look forward to enjoying again on Odyssey next week.

The damage to Lahaina appears to be terrible indeed but it is worth noting that Viking uses the pier in Kahului on the other side of the island. Visits to Lahaina will undoubtedly be affected burps Maui is quite a lot more than Lahaina alone.

Though I will point out that your onboard experience may be far more serene if you plan to arrive a bit later, we aim towards 2:00. Last two sailings we went from the curb to our cabin in something less than 20 minutes including the mandatory stop at our muster station. Piece of cake.

Well, packing is all done, if we don’t have it, we don’t need it (or more likely I’ll be dispatched to find it at the first port of Ketchikan), I know just where the Safeway is! Flight checkin starts in about two hours, fingers crossed all of the data entered works as intended and we manage TSA Pre. As it happens we will be celebrating our 35th anniversary early in the cruise, we’re hoping the menu from the current voyage repeats with veal piccata the second night, our big day, it’s just what we would have asked for if we had another day or two for the special request. We have a sense of what to expect as my Birthday landed during or June sail on Ovation. Its been just six weeks since we disembarked in Copenhagen too soon for DW but about right for me haha.

Nancy, it’s time to spill the beans as to your favorite restaurant service team(s). thanks,

I’ll keep an eye open. On Ovation mixers varied bar to bar and day to day. Mostly Canada Dry and Schweppes. If you’re hoping for something better, like, for example Fever Tree, I saw none.

I’ll snap a photo of the Club (and Horizon) menus while on board, I will caution you that the menus on Ovation were advisory, what was actually available varied considerably. An example, I routinely drink Jamison’s Irish, Ovation ran out early in the sailing. No problem I thought I have a mountain of onboard credit, the menu shows Green Spot Irish as an upgrade choice, but nope, not even the extra money could yield an Irish. Still, I’m happy to post whatever menus are in play.

Thanks for the tip, invaluable! We will ask about Cristo. I’ll return the favor, if still aboard in November, as for Lee from Scotland, a more responsive service team you won’t find. Jon

Okay, that's enough for now, barring any requests prior, expect my next report after we board on Friday.

I'll post daily or whenever something piques our interest and happy to answer any questions anyone has. I don't post food porn (I find it rude and distracting when the next table is taking photos of their food) or menus (since these are simple to see on Source). As I said we booked very early and watched for subsequent promotions. At some stage we were upgraded from a V5 suite to a V1 with no increase in price and a small bit of OBC. We are CCL shareholders and were impressed to have our shareholder credit applied the same day we sent the request by email. Finally, DW can't drink alcohol for medical reasons, I imbibe a bit the included cost of liquor seems quite steep given that only one enjoys. We were amazed a the shortages present on Ovation and quite disappointed at the quality and variety of included wines (and the absence of any sort of list of what was actually available). It's my hope that the scarcity problem has resolved with a more major home port and a few months more time. I'll admit that the "pandemic shortage", "short staff", "supply chain" excuses have all run a bit thin for me. Budweiser beer, Jamesons Irish, and Baileys are all available in the rather small mid-range grocery store nearest my house, there's no reason Seabourn (Ovation) should have run out of any of these - but they ran out of all. Expect a full report on this point as it's a sticky one for me. As said, any and all questions are welcome. The only thing I won't respond to are protest from Seabourn old-timers telling me how it's supposed to be, how it always was, or how they just can't possibly believe what I write. I'll attempt to be factual, but what I'll report will be our own experience, nothing more. I do have one reference point for SB and will note differences, improvements or deficiencies versus that baseline.

We fly to Vancouver from San Francisco a day ahead, as mentioned with air arranged by SB. We would have liked to have them do it all, we wanted a room at the Pan Pacific, but the SB block was sold out. Just as well, we booked it ourselves in an upgraded category for just a bit more than half what SB would have charged. Though SB booked our flights we don't get transfers since we don't have a hotel booking with them, a bit strange in my opinion, but hey, taxis leave on demand right? I wrote extensively describing our worst 60 minutes on Ovation as the first lunch in Colonnade just after boarding. Lesson learned, we don't plan to make our way towards the ship until after finding lunch with a goal to board closer to 2:00 than 12:00. Hopefully we will experience nothing but calm through the process. We are fortunate that rather than two mega ships joining us boarding that day we are joined by only one other ship at Canada Place an older RCCL ship with a pax count closer to 2500 rather than 5000. Lucky us. We are told to expect epic delays learning US customs, hopefully a late start allows the queue of early birds to wind down.

I hadn't intended to do another Live From after my posting my newbie experience on Ovation back in June sailing to Norway. However, there seems to be some interest in sharing my thoughts as an experienced, one sailing, Seabourn passenger. To save you looking up the details posted prior we are retired mid 60's experienced cruisers. Nearly 30 voyages on Princess including the one on Grand at the very start of the pandemic which landed us in quarantine at Travis AFB for 14 days. We haven't enjoyed the evolution of Princess towards larger and larger ships, with more and more people and more and more nickels an dimes (especially the changes announced this week). We don't say never again, but are focused on smaller ship brands. We sailed thrice last year with Oceania, a total of 34 days, all on Regatta. Loved them all. I promised on my Ovation thread to minimize direct comparisons, and I think I stayed true to that objective. Looking ahead we have a first Viking Oceans voyage booked in February '24 and additional voyages on Regatta in April and September. In January '25 we will sail Oceania's newest, Vista, through the panama canal. This was actually our first cruise booked with Seabourn back in the darkest days of the pandemic, booked in, I believe April of '21. At the time everything was being cancelled and we expected this likely would as well, but here we are. A bit later the Norway / Ovation sailing caught my eye and we slid that in front as our first SB experience. Unlike Norway we allowed SB to arrange air for us this time. RT with Air Canada from Vancouver. The flights, both ways, have changed twice since booking our SB agent has been right on all changes keeping surprised to a minimum. I know, we should be using your favorite travel agent, but thus far we have chosen to keep control of our travels for the most part which has been quite helpful through a period of maximum unpredictability. I do have recommendations for high end agents to assist when things settle down more fully - but - having flown a bit more than 5 million miles, and spent nearly 3000 nights in hotels over my professional life I'm quite comfortable with details that might stymie others.

Shall I do a second live from?

Perhaps, if we are very lucky, improved room service menus are being rolled out ship by ship, with no order announced. Does anyone know for a fact that the new menus have reached Odyssey? If not, I’ll be sure to provide and update. If relying on Source I’d have to say the old menus remain in use as of today.

Soooo, what then should we expect on Odyssey when we board next week? The sailing was sold as either a 14 day RT from Vancouver or two 7 day segments north and southbound. Actually, I know what to expect as I’ve been monitoring menus in Source. We have to expect a closed restaurant on port days, though breakfast does seem to be served daily (I’ll post to confirm once onboard). The Patio is going to be very repetitive for lunch but if that’s the only served option…

Okay, it’s official the thread has been hijacked, in part my fault. For work I travelled here, there and everywhere. Very little in South America but extensively around Europe, Middle East and Asia. Every stop in Hong Kong included a call at ‘my’ tailor. The fun bit was picking out fabrics from the bolt including colorful silk lining in my choice of canary yellow. All manner of Italian wools, patterns and yes seersucker. But as I’ve said I associate these duds with the millions of miles I flew to earn them. Nothing so much said work time is over than hanging that stuff up. I keep them though with the hope that I’ll one day open that closet and see style rather than structure…