vtgumby

Thanks for the information Stan and Hallasm!

Hallasm! My Hurtigruten expert! My control issues like for me to know for exactly that reason SO do you know where the Hurt cruise terminal is in Hamburg?? Relying on you my CC friend, you’ve been a wealth of information so far! 👏🏻

Brilliant thought, we have an awesome travel couple who do just this, clearly smart minds! 😉

Worst customer service? MSC hands down! Yet we still sail them cuz we love YC. Hope you enjoy your cruise! 😉

I thought the Pursuit shops were pathetic and why they were empty as compared to nice Journey shops (pre Covid) with decent merchandise. Very odd to not stock more than a few items for both men and women and I mean a few. People would buy their overpriced merch if they actually stocked some to buy, disappointing.

Uh, yeah and exactly why we DON’T do public hot tubs…anywhere. People are pigs, watch the buffets, it’s appalling how utensils aren’t used, just grabbing food with their hands. I guess a pandemic taught us so very little.

Yay. Time to cut back unneeded service and yes, just my opinion. I enjoy giving our steward the gift of ‘time off’ and we do zero night and once every three or four days and we still tip them regardless of not using them daily. We’re not pigs, it’s not that difficult to pull your bedsheets up and reuse towels so we’re happy they’re doing this. These guys and gals work like dogs although I imagine they’ll just be given more rooms with less stewards, the business way to squeeze labor as much as possible. Applauding this decision!

Never on the thirteen TAs we’ve done. Casino has a captive audience, they take your money gladly!

Apologies, you were totally right, SPANISH research station. Chilean was the next day, sorry!

They told us they were limited to one beer a day. Agreed on fresh fruit, send them more then a basket however and how about that leftover bread 🥖 ?! 😉

Awesome! I truly hope it was a one off situation!

Princess Sapphire looks like a much better itinerary then Azamara, changed or original.

We were on the ship and I would not recommend it because the captain decided to reverse the itinerary because of Drakes passage and due to that we were unable to enjoy Antarctica for a full day. A large chunk of the passengers felt that it was a wrong decision to reverse the itineraries but what are you gonna do? I personally would not go back on Azamara for Antarctica because I don’t think they’re built for it. 20-30’ waves are the norm and if that causes you to change itineraries then…our next trip will be on one of the expedition ships. Another negative of this trip was going to Deception Bay which is basically a volcano caldera, nothing to see and perhaps it was because we had a beautiful morning of scenery but all that is there is a Chilean research station and that’s it. They did come on board to give us a talk and Azamara’s big contribution back to them was T-shirts and a fruit basket, kind of embarrassing actually. they should’ve sent back a couple of cases of wine and beer along with all the leftover food from the Buffet but the Cruise Director was all excited because we gave them T-shirts. Sure, a valued gift.

Wait. No advantage to advance purchase and who knows what that day might bring…

Or better luck. I hope this was a one off situation, we are low key people who roll with stuff but there was a LOT of complaints swirling and we finally agreed, it wasn’t what it was in the past. Maybe nothing is post Covid but I can say Windstar the month before jumped far ahead of Azamara in terms of both quality and service. Way ahead. Hoping Azamara fixes the issues abound on this last Pursuit cruise.

Pursuit WAS full for the Antarctica cruise according to the cruise director on first night, 650 ppl We also found internet to be fast but we don’t stream, just email

AGREED! It’s disheartening to dress nicely for dinner and see people in their swampy clothes, certainly men have a button up shirt somewhere in their closet and if they don’t they should perhaps purchase one.Your trucker hat isn’t suitable for ANY cruise line DR. Stick with the buffet if you don’t feel like putting on decent attire…and flip flops, no one wants to see your icky feet at dinner. Azamara used to be an upscale line and Oceania definitely is and let me throw Windstar in there also, somehow cruising has become a low class affair.

We just got off the Pursuit and met quite a few Oceania cruisers and the overwhelming thoughts about Azamara versus Oceania was that Oceania won hands-down. We used to be loyal Azamara cruisers and our last cruise with them was January 2020, it was superb. However, the food has taken a big hit and the service has gone downhill also, it was actually quite disappointing and we thought what has happened? So much so that I don’t see us taking another cruise with them for some time. Three new couples to Azamara said never again and they raved about Oceania. I didn’t bother to ask if they had been on Oceania since Covid because like I mentioned, we used to be cheerleaders for Azamara, but no more after this last experience. I understand they’re trying to make money back after Covid but the food has become average, they ran out of items immediately such as bagels on day 2, escargot left a few days later, and that’s just bad provisioning for a 17 day cruise. A week into the cruise and the dining room had a whole list of things that were no longer available. Service is also taking a hit and we noticed in the Buffet that getting water and wine almost became a self service situation, servers would literally walk by people with empty trays and we just figured out to go up and get our own water and wine and then other people were asking us how we got our water and wine and we told them we helped ourselves. That isn’t the normal Azamara service we have become accustomed to, quite sad because we really did love this line but after this last cruise not so much. Looking forward to great (I hope) food and service on Oceania in April for 28 days!

We just got off Azamara Pursuit and found both service and food lacking from our last in January 2020. Dining room was hit or miss for dinner, we stopped going but we did do a lunch and it was much better. They slam their servers at dinner and some can handle it but our different array of servers just couldn’t…waiting thirty minutes for a cold app is crazy. Buffet has less items and frankly not as good. One guy at the carving station so on Greek and Mediterranean night he methodically put gyros together that took minimally three minutes per…why not have two guys doing this? Eggs in the morning were the same, one guy although at the end they DID add another person but what’s the thinking there? We DID have some standouts in buffet service (Indra and Pyeush) but truthfully we were often ignored despite smiling and patiently waiting and finally just getting up for our own water and wine, sometimes after we had eaten. Some servers would look at you, empty trays in hand, and just walk by, it was crazy but like I said, self service worked! Or waving your hand at them but that’s not amazing service by any means. Bar service was great, I was impressed with the Cabaret lounge servers, they definitely worked the crowd. We had early departure from Antarctica, a full day which was quite disappointing (a reason Azamara shouldn’t be doing this trip if they can’t handle Drakes 20-30’ waves) and then the SLOW 8 knots to the Falklands and the captain could have EASILY arrived an hour earlier and left an hour later but no, confined to a 3 pm last tender. Several people asked if that had been extended (after losing an hour out of their two hr excursion) but were told no, last tender is there, pointing at it at 3 pm. We STUPIDLY loaded up being rule followers and there were tender after tenders after…we watched from the ship as 74+/- 2 people got off a tender at 4:30 pm, 12% of the passenger load which was ridiculous. This should have been extended for EVERYONE so lucky 12% that didn’t follow the rules, the rest of us suckers got screwed. Quite disheartening. We feel Azamara has slid down quite a bit and I’m sure it’s happened to all of them post Covid as they try to make up their cash but running out of bagels on day 2 of a 17 day cruise isn’t a good sign. Btw, zero lobster despite offering it and then delivering giant butterflied prawns. I actually thought that was amusing but definitely a bait and switch. We honestly can’t be their cheerleader anymore, what they used to be isn’t close to today’s reality. It didn’t help that we just came off Windstar which I always considered the same class as Azamara but Windstar hands down kicked their butts. I will say they nailed their Azamazing evening however, day two of the cruise and we thought “this is going to be great” but quickly found out they started strong and ended up quite weak. I hope they get it back but our cruise dollars will go elsewhere for awhile.

Thanks for the information!

I wouldn’t say two hours (6-8 pm) is rushing through dinner, some of us just prefer to digest our meal before bedtime, healthier for our bodies so slap early bird nomenclature on us but not having heartburn at midnight, priceless.

We’ve brought on Port multiple times, zero issues except once when the guy actually looked at it, I said it’s fortified wine and that was it. They’re not sommeliers checking you in. 😉 Like you it was a delicious end to an evening so bring it along and enjoy!

Suddenly I’m glad for inside cabins!

We find the reserved seats to be less desirable and enjoy arriving as the show is starting for a better seat. Our experience only but I just don’t like those reserved suite guests seating areas and prefer choosing my own depending on the show. I also don’t like the escort service EXCEPT once during a port unloading that was backed up, big time, we so cut the line and while it was embarrassing it was also cool.

No Zumba on the GEM we disembarked from on Sunday.