cwisleman

Those of us boarding in Athens know which cruise is the Maiden voyage ;)

 

You may well get your name on a plaque - alternative arrangements have been made in the Able Seaman household :) but you will be the third set of guests sitting on the toilet, sleeping on the bed and standing in your underpants on the balcony. Or is that just me? We will also celebrate the first Christmas & New Year on board.

 

Don't be expecting much by way of food & drink. By the time we've finished you'll be hunting around for crackers & water from the lifeboats.......

 

Whether it's the 1st pre inaugural, the 2nd pre inaugural or the inaugural I'm sure we will all have a great time exploring our new surroundings. We have been Promised a Seabourn presentation case containing a screwdriver, a hammer, some gaffer (duct) tape, and a cordless drill. A selection screws, nails, glue and panel clips will be made available in Seabourn Square......

 

Henry :)

And you will no doubt have made a wonderful video for all of us to enjoy!

I used Luggage Forward on my recent Venice-to-Venice cruise on the Spirit, shipping my large bag with most of my clothes and shoes. The bag was delivered to my suite about an hour after I boarded, everything intact. I shipped the same bag back home. A Luggage Forward representative met me at the ship terminal after we disembarked and took the suitcase off my hands. It arrived at my home not much more than 24 hours after I got home -- good service.

We have been using Luggage Forward for about 5 years and have nothing but praise for them. Our neighbors used them based on our recommendation for their two past Siversea cruises with excellent results. We now use them for travel other than to cruises and will definitely use them for our two cruises on the Muse next year. We just returned from a Seabourn cruise and noticed that our bag was damaged. In the matter of a couple of hours I sent them photos of the damage and they offered a generous cash reimbursement to use for a new bag.

Note that they will be moving to the new Carnival terminal in Miami instead of Port Everglades.

I notice that they have announced the early 2018 itineraries for both Holland America and Princess ships, so expect they will now be able to finalize the Seabourn itineraries.

Now President of Windstar

http://media.windstarcruises.com/media/our_company/press-media/press-releases/2016/Windstar%20President%20Revised%207-7-16%20Final.pdf

I do think that Seabourn should have made an announcement of some kind by now as to whether or not they are changing the itineraries. Both UK and the USA have now updated their travel advice in the light of recent events. Nothing to definitely rule out Istanbul, but its not encouraging. We feel as though we have been left in limbo. It would help to have it confirmed that nothing has changed for them if that is the case. I don't really feel that this sort of event is one you can ignore.

June 29, 2016

After a very careful and thorough review, Seabourn has decided to replace the July 2, 2016 turn port of Istanbul with Piraeus (Athens). Seabourn is closely monitoring the situation in Istanbul. The company analyzes information regarding safety and security from many sources, which includes liaising with government intelligence agencies and on-the-ground port security assessments.

We are in the process of assessing other upcoming scheduled visits to Istanbul. We will provide an update in the next 24 hours.

The safety of our guests and crew is our top priority.

I can't imagine that the Encore is selling well with all those Turkish ports in 2017. I wonder if Seabourn will join the rest of the major cruise lines and cancel Turkey all together.

I suspect Carnival calls the shots. Carnival (Cunard, Holland America, Princess, and Seabourn) and Windstar are only Cruise Lines currently with schedules including Istanbul. http://www.cruisetimetables.com/cruises-to-istanbul-turkey.html

I believe the Sojourn was chartered to Marlboro who sponsors Ferrari at the Grand Prix.

Have been hoping someone would post a menu from the new TK Grill. It was supposed to open on May 21st. Delayed?

My husband and I are now looking at Silversea for cruising next year as we are hoping they will have an itinerary that appeals in December/January 2017/18. We already have cruises booked prior to that on Seabourn.

 

One thing that appeals to us about Silversea is the dress code and the feeling we won't be judged since we like to dress up. We are fit active people during the day in port and we like the contrast of coming back to the ship, showering and wearing something more elegant. If other people prefer a more casual approach that is fine with me and many ships cater for that. I hope Silversea keeps their dress codes.

 

Julie

We will be on the Muse Ft Lauderdale/Fort Lauderdale and are waiting to see where it will be off to on Jan 3rd, 2018. Hope you are doing well - see you in Dubai. Cliff

Will the Sojourn go into dry dock after being chartered out for the Monaco Grand Prix next month by Marlboro? I suspect there will be a whole lot of smoking going on!

Have they opened the TK Grill on the Quest?

Unfortunately another suicide bomber killed 5 people, including two Americans, in Istanbul today (Saturday March 19th) Most of the cruise lines have abandoned Istanbul. This latest incident may force Seabourn to do the same.

Didn't mean to upset you. Hopefully you are correct.

Cwisleman,

 

Re Encore, who told you about that 250 number? Who said anything about 2 sittings? And what are the capacities of the Colonnade, the TK restaurant and the sushi restaurant?

 

Who told you that the TK menus are "not going well"?

 

Do you happen to have insider information from Seattle head office, possibly John Delaney himself?

 

I look forward to these responses as clarifications to your post.

 

Thanks.

 

Happy sailing!

I would rather not tell you who told me this for fear of causing the person a problem. I think the comment on two seatings was more frustration than fact, but probably something that has been discussed. Delaney did tell us that the new ships would be doing short 1 to 2 week itineraries based in South Pacific, so they are probably assuming passengers will not want to pack much in the way of jackets and gowns. I just double checked my source and counted number of seats shown in the Seabourn deck plan for the Restaurant on the Encore. It is tedious, but I came up with 292, so I guess they figure some tables will not be totally occupied in real world. BTW the Patio Grill will be named the TK Grill as things now stand. You can ask Restaurant Manager how many TK meals they are serving. Not sure on size of new TK Restaurant, but Colonnade is being expanded to two decks. Restaurant 2 will now be a sushi restaurant.

Learned last night Restaurant on Encore will only seat 250 (current ships seat 400). Unfortunately the TK menus are not going over well. Staff concerned they may have to go to two seatings in Restaurant.

I am growing more sure they might be aiming at Chinese market. Was told a large number of Chinese on recent Quest cruise. Carnival has set up office in Shanghai. http://www.maritime-executive.com/features/the-dawn-of-the-chinese-cruise-market

Carnival stock might be smart investment.

Delaney gave them to the on-board cruise specialist. There are a couple of weeks that are still up in the air. In answer to a previous question the Odyssey will stay in the Caribbean for the winter.

I doubt it...

Mainland China’s luxury spending continued its decline

http://money.cnn.com/2015/10/14/news/economy/china-middle-class-growing/

http://money.cnn.com/2015/05/27/luxury/china-million-millionaires/index.html?iid=EL

I don't know what to make of these positioning and routing assertions either. I mean, does anyone think that Seabourn knows where to base ships needing 1200 passengers to fill them forever and/or before their competitors' intentions and changing demographics drive these decisions?

 

I am on Odyssey now and witnessed John Delaney come and go in Sydney. Unfortunately, he did not hold a Diamond level meeting that would have included us; we were about 25 days short of "double Diamond" 500, in fact. He did, though, host certain others to dinners including some who joined in Sydney whereas we had been here for 5 weeks. Surprising, odd and disappointing to me.

 

According to my friends who had a look into what he may have been discussing with them and others ther was no specific or tangible news about specific Encore layouts and design choices apart from no laundry room. Which begs the question of passengers bringing portable irons to spruce up wrinked shirts. Nor about the

tiresome and overdue questions about smoking in the Observation Bar and verandas. I deduce it was all about thanking these passengers for their patronage.

 

So I guess that we need to check th Seabourn website periodically for any updates on Encore and other policies. It can't be long when you think about it as the first Encore cruise is in 9 months.

 

Happy sailing!

Check with Warren Van Zyl - He has info on new itineraries at Destinations Services - Deck 7

WOW - what are the honchos thinking?

Mass market? Chinese?

According to John Delaney (came on board Odyssey) New ships will be based in New Zealand and Australia doing short one and two week cruises. Confirmed no washers, dryers, etc and no more World Cruises. Sojourn will be used for extended cruises, Odyssey will concentrate on Caribbean, and Quest to continue to concentrate on Antarctic, Alaska, etc. I could make some comments, but will leave it to others! I was taught if I can't say anything nice to keep my mouth shut. :(:(

Letters are apologies for fact they are unable to stop the message light on our phones from blinking and they are unable to deliver our full page newspapers because of technical problems.

Problems continue. Internet still unreliable and ship is showing its age. Handle broke off our sink and grill over cold air return fell off.

In this case I worry more about the parents traveling on a ship unsupervised by Emily!