Just back from 10 day Riviera. Our first cruise ever. We are hooked.

[ChicagoAlli]

18 hours ago, Riverroad said:

Thanks for your review of the ports. We have the same ones in March. Who did you use for your private San Juan tour?

https://www.viator.com/tours/Puerto-Rico/The-Old-The-New-and-the-Now-The-Updated-San-Juan-City-Tour/d36-164005P3

 

Cannot recommed highly enough. Angel and Annie were fantastic.

[ChicagoAlli]

15 hours ago, Mariastreby said:

@ChicagoAlli 
 

Glad to have the heads up about not getting to dock in the old town port in Puerto Rico. I haven’t been there since 2005, and I’d thought that was the only dock; it probably was back then. Do you remember about how often the shuttles run into the old town area? I guess you can get those schedules from someone the evening before. 

I had no idea we wouldn't be docking in the old town until I woke up and was staring at a large  container ship. No idea if this is where Oceania always docks but if so, that is quite disappointing as part of the fun of being in San Juan is the ability to wander into the old town right from your ship. I believe the shuttles were pretty frequent but I did hear from others that the experience was disappointing.

[ChicagoAlli]

3 hours ago, MEFIowa said:

Did these ports in Nov off Sirena. St. Vincent has Fort Charlotte with its magnificent views and the botanical gardens. St. Barts has the ruin of Fort Karl with its magnificent views that is right next to Shell Beach. AND Puerto Plata has the only CABLE CAR in the Caribbean that has the 1/2 replica of the Rio Jesus on the top of the mountain where there is a national park/forest.

It appeared none of the Oceania tours in Puerto Plata included the cable car. I looked into a private guide but there are only maybe 2 guides with strong positive reviews and both were already booked up. Would have loved to have done the cable car and surprised none of the Oceania tours included it.

[LakeRooseveltBrews]

On both www.cruisemapper.com and www.cruisetimetables.com, it shows only Oceania Riviera in port on 2/17/23, so hopefully that means we will be docking at Old Town?  It seemed surprising to me that there would only be one ship in port on any given day, but we can hope?

[MEFIowa]

53 minutes ago, ChicagoAlli said:

It appeared none of the Oceania tours in Puerto Plata included the cable car. I looked into a private guide but there are only maybe 2 guides with strong positive reviews and both were already booked up. Would have loved to have done the cable car and surprised none of the Oceania tours included it.

Wife and I may have been the only two that went there when Sirena docked. We didn't see anyone else and didn't hear anyone else mention it. Our tour van had room for say 12 and there were just 4 of us. The other two did the city tour then beach but not the cable car. We were the only ship docked there that day.

[halfapair]

On 1/15/2023 at 6:43 AM, Woofa said:

I may take this in pieces as we work our way home.  Regarding shore excursions I am afraid we did very little.  New to cruising and to keep our costs down we did cruise only fair and had basically decided to just get off the ship at each port.  However we were very fortunate to meet up with @CaptainR on our roll call and he and his wife invited us to spend our first stop, St Kitts, at a beautiful Hyatt resort.  It was about a 30 minute cab ride and felt like a completely different island.  We had a nice private cabana well shaded and access to the private beach and huge pool.  Some food and drinks were included and the poolside bar was available for anything additional.  It was a beautiful day and the resort was very private and quiet.  We made good friends that day and they kept a good eye on us throughout our first cruise.  Helping with the little things experienced cruisers learn.  In fact we were fortunate to make numerous friends throughout our cruise and ended up exchanging contact information with multiple people.  

Regarding the five other stops we basically just walked off the ship into the local town for an hour or two and then back on the ship for lunch.  Overall we found lots of jewelry stores, liquor stores and cheap souvenirs.  St bars of course had much more expensive stores but even there we really did not find anything to buy like nice local art or crafts in a nice but reasonable price range (low hundreds of dollars.). Now this was partially our fault as we really did no research and did not feel like exploring too far.

A note here on the tender for St Barts.  This was by far the worst part of our trip.  My guess is that we were very close to not being allowed to go to shore at all.  I don't know exactly what I thought the tender process would be like but sitting in a cramped lifeboat with fifty other people was not fun or luxurious.  Getting on and off was in my opinion dangerous as the step on/off often moved up or down by six or more inches as you took it.  The crew was very good about getting everyone on and of safely but I would not be surprised if people get injured regularly.  I don't have any easy solution for this and others let us know this is not always so difficult but we did let Oceania know our concerns.  

We docked everywhere else and getting on/off was quick and easy.

Another quick note is that on this cruise at least, we found it difficult, if not impossible to get shaded chaise lounges by the Pool deck, even on port days.  Very early on these were all taken and rarely emptied even when people went to lunch as they left their stuff.  Now we were not in a bad spot as we had an extended balcony with our own private chaise lounges.  Additionally I was not able to just sit in a direct sun lounger as I did not have enough of a tan.  I also really don't have a great plan for this either except add some additional shade on deck 14 over looking the pool.  this is probably not as big an issue on non Caribbean cruises.  It would not surprise me if the majority of people never got off the ship which added to this being an issue.

More to come...

One tip to solve the pool lounger problem is to book a Concierge level stateroom. You get access to the spa and the dedicated spa sun deck. It's pretty easy to get a lounger on the Spa deck, even on sea days. Also, the steam room and other spa areas area lovely.

[LHT28]

1 hour ago, ChicagoAlli said:

I had no idea we wouldn't be docking in the old town until I woke up and was staring at a large  container ship. No idea if this is where Oceania always docks but if so, that is quite disappointing as part of the fun of being in San Juan is the ability to wander into the old town right from your ship. I believe the shuttles were pretty frequent but I did hear from others that the experience was disappointing.

we have docked  at the main city pier  & friends were there in Dec  on Insignia & docked intown

 It is up to the port master where the ships dock

[halfapair]

On 1/17/2023 at 12:27 PM, Mariastreby said:

Woofa, how was the Wi-Fi? We’d been told by a relative who works for Norwegian Cruise Line in IT that it should have been greatly improved during the dry dock period. But he was only making an educated guess. It certainly needed improving.  We have our first Riviera cruise coming up on March 2, and are used to both having some use of Wi-Fi connectivity at the same time on Viking cruises. Recently got off their first ship, and the Wi-Fi was horrible, but took the maiden voyage on their Mars last May, and it usually worked pretty well. 
 

I know that O has the rule about just one device per cabin using Wi-Fi at a time, which is also a pain now that we can’t do that. Sometimes my husband and I would be in different parts of the ship, and I’d just need a little bit of connectivity to download something, like email. It seems as if all brands of newly built ships are really getting their wifi upgraded, but you’d think it would be a priority during refurbs too. Or do you think I’m asking too much?

100% this! We had some younger people on our cruise who were trying to work from the ship. I can only imagine their WiFi pain.

I would love to semi-retire and be able to work from the ship (any Oceania ship!). Hey, Oceania! Make this happen for me, OK? We need two WiFi accounts per cabin, and good connectivity.

Am I asking for the moon, here?

[LHT28]

5 minutes ago, halfapair said:

One tip to solve the pool lounger problem is to book a Concierge level stateroom. You get access to the spa and the dedicated spa sun deck. It's pretty easy to get a lounger on the Spa deck, even on sea days. Also, the steam room and other spa areas area lovely.

no shade  on the spa deck for those like me that burn quickly

 Steam room heated loungers  are open to all

[LHT28]

1 minute ago, halfapair said:

 Hey, Oceania! Make this happen for me, OK? We need two WiFi accounts per cabin, and good connectivity.

Am I asking for the moon, here?

book a top suite  ..half the problem solved 😄

[halfapair]

9 minutes ago, LHT28 said:

no shade  on the spa deck for those like me that burn quickly

 Steam room heated loungers  are open to all

It  might depend on the time of day and position of the ship. On the Insignia there were covered areas on the spa deck. I prefer sun, husband prefers shade. We were both happy up there.

[LHT28]

3 minutes ago, halfapair said:

It  might depend on the time of day and position of the ship. On the Insignia there were covered areas on the spa deck. I prefer sun, husband prefers shade. We were both happy up there.

Yes the R ships  have  shade  since this  was about Riviera   there is  limited or no shade  on the O  class ships

see  the link in post #17 for photos

[Riverroad]

For those of you just recently off Riviera, what was disembarkation like? I know earlier in this thread jonthomas said it was easy but Woofa had a lengthy wait. Trying to figure out if we can make a 12:15 flight from MIA.

[Woofa]

Okay, so here is the big one you have been waiting for.  Food.  Once again let me preface this by saying that we have nothing cruise-wise to compare this to as this was our first cruise ever.  Across the board we had great service but more importantly the type of service you would expect in a fine restaurant, they change up your silverware and your plates for every course, clean your crumbs when they get out of hand, fresh ground pepper or cheese is offered where needed, the bread on board was uniformly very good (except the bagels for breakfast and lets face it, the croissants were very good so I just had my smoked salmon and cream cheese on a croissant every morning!) and butter in most places was in a single serving dish or in the MDR in pats on a special tray with ice hidden below it.  I am open to splenda but generally use stevia at home we had both at most venues.  We had asked for Coke Zero in our cabin and we had plenty however most venues did not have it available.  Luckily I can also drink diet coke so no big deal. 

I will start with Barista's even though this not technically a food venue.  However as a coffee drinker, this quickly became my favorite part of the ship.  The Americano with cream was as good a cup of coffee as I can remember.  They will make it to go as well and I usually went here to get my coffee and then carried it into Terrace for my breakfast.  I found the other coffee on the ship varied from okay to pretty horrible.  As this was pretty much my biggest food complaint, first world problems as they say.. 

My wife had Cappuccino and the iced coffee made in their special machine and thought it was also great.  A nice plus is that I have also started using their wood stirrers as book marks which will keep Oceania on my mind through the time until our next cruise.  Baristas did have food and orange juice available although we did not eat much.  It is okay for a small snack, some bread, cookies, mini sandwiches.  Nothing we thought worth getting again.

Waves (daytime) - This is where we had our first meal on the ship hamburgers after we got on board and we had a few meals here throughout the week.  It is very convenient if you are spending time by the pool and just have to throw on a shirt and some shoes and walk 50 feet to grab a table.  FYI, one day I asked and was actually served our food on the chaise lounges by the pool just let them know and they will deliver.. Burgers hot dogs, all the sandwiches, uniformly good.  Fries also were very good for the most part. 

Waves (nightime) - This is the new pizza venue when waves closes and they have a combination of burrata type cheese salads and pizzas.  Seating is the waves seating so still casual and comfortable.,  We found the pizza to be the best on the ship and very good overall compared to land restaurants.  I am not sure if this venue will really excel however as it is very limited in menu.

New ice cream, smoothie, shake venue by the pool.  I think this was just moved over.  I probably had a milk shake every day on board.  (I ordered chocolate and asked them to throw in a banana.)  very good and the portions are not super huge so you don’t feel too glutinous.  I had a few smoothies as well, they were fine but the milkshakes…

Terrace Café - This is where we ate the majority of our breakfasts and a few dinners.  Breakfast was pretty inclusive and they always had fresh made eggs or choose your omelette.  I was happy as they also always had smoked salmon.  This can be a great venue to eat outside in the right weather.  We mostly ate lunch in Waves.  To me this venue for dinner is completely dependent upon the grill.  They had the grill going most nights where they will make you Shrimp, lobster tails, steak, lamb chops, salmon etc, to order.  Along with grilled vegetables this is actually a great way to have a low carb meal here and there.  I soon found my favorites to be the Shrimp (large, probably U12 or so) and the lamb chops.  On two days they had Caribbean night and the grill was not available.  At that point it lost some luster for us.  The rest of the buffet is solid but not what I would call exciting unless you happen to hit on an item you really like.  Overall I would compare this to a very good buffet like The Bellagio in Vegas (although much smaller and without things like heaping bowls of shrimp or crab legs).  Not quite as good as our favorite Vegas buffet at The Wynn which is now the only one we will go to and usually not for dinner.  There were times that this was crowded and you might have to wait a few minutes for the grill or for them to serve you but it was usually pretty quick.  This is also a great venue to connect to others you meet on the cruise and we sometimes shared tables here.  This is also a great place to try the Humphrey Sloccam ice cream of the day although it is also available in the MDR.  Truth is most of these were a miss for me but only because of the combination.  You could taste it was quality.  I tend to be a Chocolate/Vanilla type of person.  My wife did have a Meyer lemon flavor in the MDR one night so much she ordered seconds.

MDR - This is truly a beautiful venue and we enjoyed eating here.  Only because of how much we liked the specialties was this second place.  This was by far the most formal venue in our opinion.  Menus were nice but we found the food to be hit or miss.  Salmon overcooked one lunch, Risotto undercooked one dinner.  On the other hand I had Beef Wellington with Caviar as an appetizer one night and I loved both.  Similarly one day for lunch I had probably my favorite Club Sandwich ever (with hard-boiled egg, avocado and the edges of the bread cut off.)  What made it better is that we sat by the window and had the entire section to ourselves.  Felt like true pampering.  Quick note on window seats.  For our cruise, once it got dark, window seats were a waste, there was nothing to see.  But if you had one during the day, let's say on a sea day while the boat was moving, well worth it.  It is my impression from our cruise that overall the MDR skews a little older and certainly more formal than Terrace.  More than once we were seated next to or near couples who were very dressed, very proper and to be honest put a slight damper on having a fun talkative dinner.  The MDR does have a daily souffle which was good.  We even had dinner one night in the Terrace and then walked over to the MDR just to order dessert and get the souffle.

 

The specialties were in our opinion, well special.  I can see why people do try to get more than their allotment when possible.  But it is not just that food is very good, the restaurants are beautiful, the service was great and each is so different you have the ability to dine in four completely different high end restaurants on the same cruise, five if you include the MDR.  

Jacques:  I would say our favorite of the four.  Our escargot was perfect, we had lobster thermidor first the first time ever and loved it. 

Polo Grill:  The filet I had for dinner along with my wife’s Rib Eye was very good.  To compare I would say it was one notch below what we get when we go Del Friscos Double Eagle.  (For a true comparison I actually had what I think was the best filet ever when we got back to Miami and had dinner with friends at Bourbon Steak.  That was truly spectacular.)  Appetizers, salads, all very good.

Toscana:  My favorite food to eat out is usually Italian and Toscana on our last night did not disappoint.  My wife loved getting to choose her olive oil and balsamic and I was still able to get butter as that is my preference.  The roasted garlic they put in with the bread was a nice touch.  Calamari and Buffalo Mozzarella did not disappoint.  I had veal scallopini with a side of capellini Bolognese.  Perhaps my favorite meal.  Veal was very good, again I would say a notch below the truly fine Italian restaurants I have eaten at in New York, Philadelphia, etc.  Dessert, let’s take a minute to discuss dessert.  I am usually a pretty plain jane dessert guy.  I like cheesecake, I like bread pudding and a little else. The quintet of mini deserts was the best we had eaten all week and in particular, they had a peach tart that I wish I had asked for additional helpings. 

Red Ginger:  We split the vegetable tempura and some sushi to start, both very good.  I love the idea of picking your chopsticks depending upon your skill level.  FYI, they had no problem bringing me a fork.  I ended up with the lobster pad Thai and it was best pad Thai I have eaten (although that number is somewhat limited.)

 

There were so many other dishes I would still like to try at the specialties for our next cruise.  You can certainly push for more reservations and we did actually try on the second night (sea day) and was unable to get anything, then again on maybe day 5 or 6 when we were able to snag a Jacques reservation for 8:30 but around 6 that night my wife was hungry so we cancelled that reservation and just went to the Terrace. Looking back now that might have been a mistake.  One of the gentleman I played bridge with aboard let me know on day nine that he had actually eaten in a specialty on 8 of the first nine nights.  Of course I don’t know what level cabin he was in. 

 

So,  overall, I can imagine that Oceania does have the finest cuisine at sea.  Of course food is subjective and just recently on these boards I can see people having varied results on the different ships.  We felt very good about the food on our cruise and that for our next cruise we will be able to zero in on what we now know we like to make that one even better.  Was every meal 100 perfect, no, was any meal the best of its type we ever had, well not really as my Pad Thai experience is limited.  But overall with a little research, and armed with the knowledge that you can always walk into the terrace, maybe even have an appetizer, then walk out and go to get Waves Pizza for a main course then head to the MDR for dessert, I think most people will find this a very pleasant dining experience.

 

Happy to answer any additional question I can.

[LHT28]

1 hour ago, Riverroad said:

For those of you just recently off Riviera, what was disembarkation like? I know earlier in this thread jonthomas said it was easy but Woofa had a lengthy wait. Trying to figure out if we can make a 12:15 flight from MIA.

you should be OK  just  get off  about 8 to 8:30 am time slot

 

[pete_coach]

On 1/15/2023 at 3:18 PM, LHT28 said:

Have they put cabanas on the O ships??

They took them off the R ships  a while back

 Not really 'cabanas". Just loungers with a bit of a shade at the head.

Also, you need to be concierge or above to go there.

[Tyskie]

@Woofa

Thank you so much for your detailed experience. 

While we are seasoned cruisers we have not cruised with Oceania - yet!   

Looking forward to our trip this September on the Riviera.

[pete_coach]

19 hours ago, LHT28 said:

we have docked  at the main city pier  & friends were there in Dec  on Insignia & docked intown

 It is up to the port master where the ships dock

There is presently only 4 docks in the Old Town area. 2 more are being built.

There were 3 big ships in with Wonder of the Sea coming in later.

Those 4 big ships would not have been able to dock where Rivieria did.

In my opinion, the shuttle to the little square in town was a mess. There were lots of buses from other tours there and it was just full of people and guides and traffic making it a very crowded and confusing area..

[pete_coach]

15 hours ago, Riverroad said:

For those of you just recently off Riviera, what was disembarkation like? I know earlier in this thread jonthomas said it was easy but Woofa had a lengthy wait. Trying to figure out if we can make a 12:15 flight from MIA.

We took the last off for disembarking, 9 AM. We were not leaving Miami that day.

We got down to the area, found our bag and by 9:45 we were getting a taxi to the hotel.

 

[pete_coach]

15 hours ago, Woofa said:

Okay, so here is the big one you have been waiting for.  .....

 

Happy to answer any additional question I can.

Great review. I agree with all your points and comments. 

I was going to write a review of the same cruise but you have done such an admirable job I could not add any more and will just refer folks to yours.

Kudos on the review. Thank you.

Edited January 21, 2023 by pete_coach

[loriva]

15 hours ago, Woofa said:

I will start with Barista's even though this not technically a food venue.  However as a coffee drinker, this quickly became my favorite part of the ship.  The Americano with cream was as good a cup of coffee as I can remember.  They will make it to go as well and I usually went here to get my coffee and then carried it into Terrace for my breakfast.  I found the other coffee on the ship varied from okay to pretty horrible.  As this was pretty much my biggest food complaint, first world problems as they say.. 

My wife had Cappuccino and the iced coffee made in their special machine and thought it was also great.  A nice plus is that I have also started using their wood stirrers as book marks which will keep Oceania on my mind through the time until our next cruise.  Baristas did have food and orange juice available although we did not eat much.  It is okay for a small snack, some bread, cookies, mini sandwiches.  Nothing we thought worth getting again.

 

On coffee, did you ever order it through room service?  Will they bring an Americano or latte?  We've gotten spoiled by some cruise lines that offer individual coffee makers in the stateroom (like hotels do) so trying to figure out our "first cup of the day" options in advance of our first cruise with Oceania on the Riviera next month.

 

And second all the kudos for your review--very helpful!

[jonthomas]

16 hours ago, Riverroad said:

For those of you just recently off Riviera, what was disembarkation like? I know earlier in this thread jonthomas said it was easy but Woofa had a lengthy wait. Trying to figure out if we can make a 12:15 flight from MIA.

 

very easy disembark...our flight was 1;30...no problem....

 

we left the ship at 8 ....sat on the bus, had an O transfer....the bus driver was very slow....got to the airport by 9....the ride itself was only 20 min...but he took each piece of luggage off singly....

 

if you are in a hurry, I suggest an uber.....

[Woofa]

33 minutes ago, loriva said:

 

On coffee, did you ever order it through room service?  Will they bring an Americano or latte?  We've gotten spoiled by some cruise lines that offer individual coffee makers in the stateroom (like hotels do) so trying to figure out our "first cup of the day" options in advance of our first cruise with Oceania on the Riviera next month.

 

And second all the kudos for your review--very helpful!

I never did order it that way sorry. I also never got it direct from any machines around the ship like in terrace.  I think I read this might make a difference,  something to try for next time.

[Acrusa]

2 hours ago, loriva said:

 

On coffee, did you ever order it through room service?  Will they bring an Americano or latte?  We've gotten spoiled by some cruise lines that offer individual coffee makers in the stateroom (like hotels do) so trying to figure out our "first cup of the day" options in advance of our first cruise with Oceania on the Riviera next month.

 

And second all the kudos for your review--very helpful!

We put out the sign we go to bed for coffee pot and 2 o.j. delivery around 7 am

[LHT28]

3 hours ago, pete_coach said:

There is presently only 4 docks in the Old Town area. 2 more are being built.

There were 3 big ships in with Wonder of the Sea coming in later.

Those 4 big ships would not have been able to dock where Rivieria did.

In my opinion, the shuttle to the little square in town was a mess. There were lots of buses from other tours there and it was just full of people and guides and traffic making it a very crowded and confusing area..

Sometimes  the ships have to dock where the harbour master tells  them   or just skip the port

JMO