oriana

[silver service]

she is getting near 20 years old. how long will pando keep her in service?

[Host Sharon]

Hopefully many more years. She was built with at least a 25 year service life and look at Artemis (now Artania) still going strong.

 

At any rate they are offering cruises up till 2014.

[jeanlyon]

One of my first cruises was on Athena with Travelscope. She was built in 1939. They had done a great job when they refurbished her and she was wonderful. 20 years is nothing for a ship.

[littlesteelo]

One of my first cruises was on Athena with Travelscope. She was built in 1939. They had done a great job when they refurbished her and she was wonderful. 20 years is nothing for a ship.

 

It depends how well P&O maintain her. While 20 years is only halfway for the ship itself, the fixtures and fittings have a much shorter life. There are good examples of refurbishment, as has been said Artania, ex Artemis looks unbelievable inside, really modern and almost like a new ship. It really put P&O's maintenance of her to shame. There are also examples of bad maintenance, eg. Thomson Dream. They did very little to the ship when they received it, and they paid the price of not maintaining a 24 year old ship properly.

 

Another point is the fact that a new cruiser, when faced with a choice between a 2/3 year old ship like Azura and a 20 year old ship, more often than not they will pick the newer ship. I had the choice between Grand Princess and Ventura, and I decided against Grand because of her age. Had I known then that she was going to have such a huge refit I may have chosen otherwise. However Oriana will always have her loyal passengers.

Oriana will not stay with P&O until she is 40/50 years old. I suspect another 8 years at least, then they will be thinking about selling.

[jeanlyon]

If I was offered Azura or Oriana for the same cruise, it would be Oriana and I haven't even sailed on her, but I would never sail on Azura again. Too big, too noisy and far too crowded.

[C at Sea]

I agree! Though sailing again on Azura cos was already booked, but don't think we will again unless the cruise goes somewhere we're desperate to go!

Didn't hate her, but prefer the other smaller ones. Each to their own!

Anyway, thought Oriana had a refit? She's adults only now - another attraction!

[littlesteelo]

If I was offered Azura or Oriana for the same cruise, it would be Oriana and I haven't even sailed on her, but I would never sail on Azura again. Too big, too noisy and far too crowded.

 

An interesting point to consider is that the gross tonnage/passenger ratio is very similar at regular capacity, with 37.2 GT/passenger on Azura and 37.9 on Oriana.

 

It really does show how cruising is very subjective, and how there is something for everyone. There are those, like yourself who prefer smaller ships, and those like myself who like huge ships.

I do agree with you to some extent about the Grand Class P&O ships. While I didn't find Ventura crowded overall, there were times where the venues couldn't cope. The buffet being the main culprit, which is far too small for the number of passengers. Also muster drill in the tamarind club was horrendously crowded. Not P&O's fault, since they didn't design the layout of the ship, but they accepted it nevertheless.

 

For that reason, along with the fact I found the ship pretty unimpressive I probably won't be cruising with P&O again, and I am back with RCI this year. P&O should take a leaf out of their book at how to design a buffet. Big 1000 seat buffet right at the back of the ship on Independence, no crowding whatsoever.

[Slow Foxtrot]

There's no doubt that Oriana has a very faithful following, mostly by experienced cruisers. We have done countless cruises on her (and many others including Cunard) and we have never been disappointed. The first half of the World Cruise this year was excellent - the food, service and facilities being well up to standard. And the dancing facilities, theatre and Crow's Nest are second to none. One only has to look at the big discounts being given on Ventura and Azura - that tells you a lot about popularity. Oriana was built to replace Canberra, and Canberra steamed over four million miles. So I don't think P & O would consider replacing Oriana while she retains her deserved popularity.

[unclewilson2]

Nice post thanks for sharing.

[C at Sea]

We have sailed on Oriana a couple of times and like her very much. But she'l always have a special place in our hearts, anyway, because my daughter met her husband on her!

[LibraLass41]

Oriana is actually 17 years old, its her birthday this week.... 3 years out, and 3 years is a lot in cruising terms, hopefully she'll be around for a while yet...after all Artemis entered service in 1984, (formally Royal Princess) and she has only recently left service...

 

I'm on her in 6 weeks time, for the 2nd time, and will be interested to see her after the adult-only refit, and new restaurant...I shall be armed with my camera lol!!:)

[tom_uk]

I think there might be a couple of strikes against Oriana in the bean-counters' minds:

a) she does't have many balcony cabins, and the prevailing wisdom is that these are what people want;

b) her propulsion system is different from all others in the fleet - she's got a mechanical drive, not an electric one. That might make long-term maintenance more expensive - they've got to maintain a separate pool of ship's engineers just for Oriana.

 

I wonder therefore if they might prefer Aurora as the long-term 'traditional' ship in the fleet? - she's different from Oriana on both of the above counts.

 

As regard the balcony issue: well, call me shallow if you like, but it's an important consideration for us. We're going on Oriana for the Grand Event, but that's only for four nights - we can put up with a window cabin for that long. If we were to do a longer cruise, we would definitely want a balcony, so unless we could afford one of her Staterooms, we'd almost certainly look at a different ship.

[littlesteelo]

I think there might be a couple of strikes against Oriana in the bean-counters' minds:

a) she does't have many balcony cabins, and the prevailing wisdom is that these are what people want;

b) her propulsion system is different from all others in the fleet - she's got a mechanical drive, not an electric one. That might make long-term maintenance more expensive - they've got to maintain a separate pool of ship's engineers just for Oriana.

 

I wonder therefore if they might prefer Aurora as the long-term 'traditional' ship in the fleet? - she's different from Oriana on both of the above counts.

 

As regard the balcony issue: well, call me shallow if you like, but it's an important consideration for us. We're going on Oriana for the Grand Event, but that's only for four nights - we can put up with a window cabin for that long. If we were to do a longer cruise, we would definitely want a balcony, so unless we could afford one of her Staterooms, we'd almost certainly look at a different ship.

 

You make some very good points, especially the propulsion. Regarding balconies, that isn't shallow at all. A lot of people hate modern cruise ships for having lots of balconies, and you always get 'it looks like a floating apartment block, not a ship' from those people. The thing is, the more balconies you have, the cheaper they are overall. And they still do look like ships. The design of them has simply changed, just like ships like QE2 and Canberra were nothing like the liners with multiple funnels. These people can't seem to accept that cruise ships do not look like and never will look like ocean liners anymore.

[Host Sharon]

I think there might be a couple of strikes against Oriana in the bean-counters' minds:

a) she does't have many balcony cabins, and the prevailing wisdom is that these are what people want;

b) her propulsion system is different from all others in the fleet - she's got a mechanical drive, not an electric one. That might make long-term maintenance more expensive - they've got to maintain a separate pool of ship's engineers just for Oriana.

 

 

I agree about the balcony issue, although it doesn't bother me, but that isn't correct about needing a separate pool of engineers. Any of the Carnival engineers can manage Oriana and, in fact actually like her as she can be more of a challenge which they like.

[DamianG]

Hi Tom

We generally prefer a balcony cabin too but have missed it less on Oriana as we enjoy sitting out on the tiered decks aft instead. In particular C260 was a great cabin for our Mediterranean cruise last year, slightly larger than a standard outside with a big picture window (and a window sill as well).

All the best

Damian

[fue-fue]

Just got off oriana on Tuesday after our 1st sailing on her. & she's looking fine.

 

Lack of balconies was an issue when we booked, as the price difference was huge & for the 1st time we chose an inside cabin, which was lovely! Would go for an inside again.

 

All food & staff were great with no complaints, at least from us!!!