Marina on the way from South America to Barbados

[susiesan]

According to cruisemapper, Marina is enroute to Barbados, with an ETA of January 17. Are there any passengers onboard or is she sailing empty? Did Oceania offer any of the people already in Buenos Aries whose cruise was cancelled on them a free ride back home on the ship? I can see where the people who post on here that they don't care about stopping anywhere and are happy to just be at sea would find 9 straight days of sailing on an Oceania ship to be attractive, especially if it didn't cost them anything.

 

The people who booked on Sirena for Jan. + Feb. cruises lucked out with being switched to Marina for their cruises.

[floridatravelersforlife]

This vessel switch is an easy way to reduce occupancy in quick fashion.  Instant  improvement in case count.  Hope it doesn't forecast the demise of the R Ships.  I got deposits riding on the Insignia and Nautica.  

[edgee]

7 hours ago, floridatravelersforlife said:

This vessel switch is an easy way to reduce occupancy in quick fashion.  Instant  improvement in case count.  Hope it doesn't forecast the demise of the R Ships.  I got deposits riding on the Insignia and Nautica.  

With all the money spent on refurbishing R ships, you have no worries. Any substitution using an O class is a pandemic one off event. After two cruises on R ships I will always choose the newer ships, but for those who love them, can probably count on the "Rs" being around for quite a while.

[alcpa1]

We are sailing on the Sirena Feb. 1 and have not been informed that we will be moved to the Marina. You won't get any complaints from me if that were to happen!

[susiesan]

You probably won't be informed until the last minute which seems to be oceania's pattern these days. If it happens, count your blessings.

[ToxM]

Seen two or three reports from passengers who have been told by staff this will happen through til Sirena’s March 29th TA - which is the one I am on. Whilst it will be lovely to be on an Oceania ship, and certainly lovely for Sirena to be back in service, having travelled on a short QM2 restart cruise that was her first in nearly 2 years it wasn’t without teething trouble. 

 

I wont be complaining, I just hope they do a shakedown beforehand 🙂

 

I just NEED this cruise to go ahead.

[susiesan]

If so, since Marina is scheduled to sail TATL is March 19,  then March 5 Sirena sailing will have to be modified and March 17 cancelled. Hopefully O will give booked passengers time to alter their air arrangements or allow them to cancel with refund.

[HiFi43]

Let’s assume the rumor is true that Marina assumes the January, February schedule of Sirena.  I suspect the easiest solution is that Marina takes over the Sirena sailings through March 17 and then resumes it normal currently booked schedule March 19th in Miami. Then Sirena does it’s restart on March 17. Sirena is booked to complete its Caribbean schedule and then head to Barcelona in late March. Marina is scheduled March19 to do a crossing from a Miami to Rome.

[pinotlover]

7 hours ago, ToxM said:

Seen two or three reports from passengers who have been told by staff this will happen through til Sirena’s March 29th TA - which is the one I am on. Whilst it will be lovely to be on an Oceania ship, and certainly lovely for Sirena to be back in service, having travelled on a short QM2 restart cruise that was her first in nearly 2 years it wasn’t without teething trouble. 

 

I wont be complaining, I just hope they do a shakedown beforehand 🙂

 

I just NEED this cruise to go ahead.

I doubt that Oceania will sail the Sirena over empty from Europe to do a transA back to Europe. That cruise either gets cancelled or merged in with the Marina transA.

[ToxM]

25 minutes ago, pinotlover said:

I doubt that Oceania will sail the Sirena over empty from Europe to do a transA back to Europe. That cruise either gets cancelled or merged in with the Marina transA.

 

I am going to be really upset if this happens. My 50th birthday cruise!

[ToxM]

I really hope they let us know quickly as I have a lot of things to rearrange.

[shepherd really]

15 hours ago, ToxM said:

I really hope they let us know quickly as I have a lot of things to rearrange.

Based on how they cancelled my cruise last week 12 hours prior to boarding a plane to Buenos Aires and leaving a number of others already having traveled thousands of miles, don't expect Oceania to tell you anything until it suits them, not you.  

 

They will act in their corporate best interest, not yours. 

[ToxM]

1 hour ago, shepherd really said:

Based on how they cancelled my cruise last week 12 hours prior to boarding a plane to Buenos Aires and leaving a number of others already having traveled thousands of miles, don't expect Oceania to tell you anything until it suits them, not you.  

 

They will act in their corporate best interest, not yours. 

ive reached out to my TA this morning to see if they can find anything out. I’m travelling to Barbados for a week prior to the cruise. I’d like to know their plans so I can try and cancel that stay and resched the flights to Miami to join Riviera or Marina in Miami for their TA or book a flight back from Barbados at the end of our stay. 
 

if this was a short hop from the US I am sure it would be easier than trying to do this for a trip from the UK. 
 

funnily (! Not really) we’d just looked at all the excursions this weekend and I had booked car hire etc for our Barbados trip. The stay in Barbados is a package so it’s going to be a pain to reschedule. 
 

this trip has been planned since 2019, as a big trip for my 50th. Now I fee like I am just discarding it to the other ones that were cancelled. The logistics of it for Oceania make good business sense but the timing has almost put me in mind to not bother cruising again. The dream of this trip kept me going through covid. 
 

stupid thing is I only extended my trip in Barbados to make sure that if we did have an issue with covid in the plane we could almost guarantee being ok for the cruise. Now it’s all I have left. 
 

my therapist is going to make some money out of this mess. 

[willidc]

Just an FYI...about 15 miinutes ago I received an email from Oceania indicating that our Jan 22, 2022 sailing on Sirena is now going to be on Marina.  We will be receiving a new booking number and additional information in the coming days with our new stateroom assignment as well.

 

I have  no additional information as to future sailings beyond ours, but hope this provides an additional piece to the puzzle.

[HiFi43]

It looks like all the Sirena cruises for January through mid March have been switched to sail on the Marina according to Sirena Roll Call reports of notifications today.  The last Sirena switch to Marina is the March 5th Miami cruise which instead of ending in Aruba will return to Miami in time for the scheduled Marina Miami to Rome crossing. While this last piece of information has not yet been announced it is the only logical reason for returning Marina to Miami.

[susiesan]

Which means the Sirena TA is also cancelled since Sirena is staying in Europe.

[HiFi43]

Susiean…likely true that the Sirenia Trans Atlantic will be canceled. I suspect Sirenia Trans Atlantic passengers could chose to leave a bit earlier if they want a trans Atlantic and rebook on Marina on the crossing cruise on March 19th since their are cabins available.

[EasyGoingGuy]

To the original question... All Marina passengers were did-embarked Friday in Montevideo. We were told that Marina would then proceed, crew only to Miami. 

[Jancruz]

On 1/8/2022 at 12:37 PM, floridatravelersforlife said:

This vessel switch is an easy way to reduce occupancy in quick fashion.  Instant  improvement in case count.  Hope it doesn't forecast the demise of the R Ships.  I got deposits riding on the Insignia and Nautica.  

It does not..R ships are safe

Jancruz1

[Jockocruiser]

No, certainly not you or “crew member” they only know what they are being told from Miami.   But notice how fast there is a plan B despite prior denials.

 

 

 

[Jancruz]

On the 13th there is a Zoom call with Howard Sherman and Nikki or CCC  that should be giving all the updates..

Check after that..

Jancruz1

[HiFi43]

Jancruz..is that Zoom call only open to Travel Agents or is it open to others? If it is open how do you register for it?

[ToxM]

11 hours ago, Jancruz said:

On the 13th there is a Zoom call with Howard Sherman and Nikki or CCC  that should be giving all the updates..

Check after that..

Jancruz1

Please do let us know what you about this call. I notice that the 29th still is open for bookings, which is confusing and stressful for me as I am very close to final payment dates for other portions of my holiday around this cruise. 

[LesSails80435]

My wife and I boarded Marina 1-Dec-2021 in Miami. We disembarked in Montevideo 7-Jan-2022, not Buenos Aires as scheduled. Buenos Aires would not let anyone enter via sea, but air was ok-go figure. We had NO Covid cases the entire cruise crew or guests. She originally was sailing crew only to Barbados.  Marine Traffic tonight show her now arriving Miami 21-Jan. We’ll do a more complete post when time permits. Feel free to compare our experience with those on Viking Jupiter. We were safer onboard Marina than in Colorado. 

[ToxM]

Hearing from the bookofface O group that the 29th is a go!