My view of Azamara after recent cruise Athens to Istanbul

[uktog]

Well I understand a ship will sail at 50% capacity today. Last minute ex UK flights to Athens return from Venice over  £2000 economy for 2. Perhaps if Azamara recognised that in their cabin pricing and had a responsive service team a travel agent could engage with (the quote was £7k for a veranda) they might sail with a few more guests. 

[M109]

4 minutes ago, uktog said:

Fine if it happens- evolution in what direction?  I will wait to see what transpires. As their back office has not helped our agent they lose on all counts right now. 

Hopefully a little less pork loin that was another item seen at almost every lunch and evening meal.  I remember many years ago one particular lunch where they had a whole suckling pig in the buffet, now that was special.

[ChucktownSteve]

52 minutes ago, uktog said:

Well I understand a ship will sail at 50% capacity today. Last minute ex UK flights to Athens return from Venice over  £2000 economy for 2. Perhaps if Azamara recognised that in their cabin pricing and had a responsive service team a travel agent could engage with (the quote was £7k for a veranda) they might sail with a few more guests. 

 

As they say, an empty cabin is lost revenue forever!  I realize Azamara doesn't want to discount at the last minute because that sets up a pattern for some cruisers to always wait.  However how can they turn a profit with so many empty cabins?  If they furlough staff, they may not be available when needed. 

 

Supply and demand curve is real.  More people will book as the price declines.  There has to be a happy middle ground or sweet spot. I hope to see AZ get financially stronger, not weaker however not on the backs of much higher pricing.

[lisiamc]

2 hours ago, lisiamc said:

Yes they are on Quest too. I believe there are a couple of suites (possibly on Onward?) that have different light fittings and don’t have USB ports. When we go back to our cabin after lunch, I’ll take a photo of ours. We are on Pursuit, but the location is the same, where present.

These are the ones on Pursuit

. Red cable for easy visibility

 

[M109]

1 hour ago, lisiamc said:

These are the ones on Pursuit

. Red cable for easy visibility

 

Thanks Lisiamc but I am pretty certain that I checked under the lights and sides and top mof the lights which were slightly difference to the ones in your pics.  Does not matter now as we managed to keep it all going on the one socket we took with us.  But f we cruise again on quest I will certainly know where to have another look.  Thank you for the pics. 

[hamrag]

On 7/14/2023 at 1:48 PM, M109 said:

.....White night was put on as we were leaving a small Turkish port and was great fun although it was a bit of a bun fight to get to the food, dread to think what it would be like with a full ship, but great fun anyway and the combination of all the singers and bands on board played some great music that had us all up and dancing.

 

The not so good

Sadly as food lovers we were disappointed with the quality of the food. 

We cruised Onward in May, fabulous Croatia intensive itinerary being the main reason we chose Az.

 

Having cruised with them for the first time pre-Covid December 2019, with a very average culinary experience, we were hoping for better food. That was not the case, no worse or better than previous. We sailed Oceania a year ago for the first time, and agree their culinary offerings are much better than Az.

 

We found the white night, as far as food was concerned, to be somewhat chaotic in May. On our previous cruise it was unbelievably good, but on that occasion the HD was the famed lady whose name I forget (Heidi??)....by some distance, the most outstanding senior officer on all of our 55 cruises total. She was totally, and I mean totally, across everything and her organisation was superb.

 

For the right itinerary, we still wouldn't hesitate to book again. Or for convenience...we have booked the Quest repositioning cruise Lisbon to Barbados later this year in November. That is simply to facilitate our other cruise plans from Barbados, avoiding an outbound flight!

[tgg]

24 minutes ago, hamrag said:

On our previous cruise it was unbelievably good, but on that occasion the HD was the famed lady whose name I forget (Heidi??)....by some distance, the most outstanding senior officer on all of our 55 cruises total. She was totally, and I mean totally, across everything and her organization was superb.

Heike Berdos set a standard that few Hotel Directors can meet. She is missed.

[1985rz1]

On 7/14/2023 at 5:48 AM, M109 said:

A little bit of background for you all.  My wife and I have enjoyed cruising for 20 years now and have tried most of the favourite cruise lines, several times at least and we have completed about 22 cruises and 2 river cruises.

 

We were lucky enough to sail with Azamara twice in the first 2 years of it's existence which we both enjoyed immensely.  Loved the small ship, crew and the food.  In these early days the speciality restaurants were included in the price and were top notch.  Sadly prices increased significantly as Azamara became popular and of course you now had to pay for the speciality restaurants unless you paid up for the larger rooms.  So we were back to Celebrity and Holland America for a few years and then we decided to try Oceania on their new ships.  We really liked that experience and sailed with them for three trips before they became too expensive.  More recently we have river cruised in Europe which we were great fun.

 

So I was delighted earlier this year to find Azamara in range again and so we were off again to the Quest which we had sailed on the previous two cruises.

 

We joined in Athens after a rather arduous journey with the flight delayed out of Gatwick by 41/2 hours which meant arriving at 2 o'clock in the morning,  but we where still met by the hotels driver with no fuss about us being late. Lunch time it was a lift back to the airport to catch the metro to Athens port which was about a 45 minute ride followed by a walk around the edge of the port to the cruise terminal where the Quest sat basking in the sun.  Of interest also along side was one of the new Scenic cruise ships that looked amazing, rather like a super yacht.

 

Due to the shenanigans with the new website I had not booked in on line and I am glad I didn't as it took us no more 5 minutes to book in with the group of people who were stood waiting for us.  All done on an Ipad including the photo, very clever and quick I must say.  Had to wait 10 mina on the bus to travel the 100m to the ship which was a bit daft as we were happy to walk and there were no port restrictions as the crew were walking out.  Any how we were quickly on board and greeted with a glass of bubbly and quickly ushered off to the theatre where we were given the lifeboat drill talk and film which lasted about 5 mins and then we were free to go.  A couple of the Americans had to be told quite sternly by a ships officer that no they could not wander off and that this was compulsory.  Much better than the old days of putting on the lifejacket and then standing in the sun on the deck I can tell you!

 

Our room was a normal veranda on deck 7 which had been changed up since our last voyage with them and I thought it well done and as a whole I thought the room looked really good.  There were a few things that need sorting like the wall paper was starting to come away at the edges where they joined strips and I was surprised there were no charging points for all the electricals we all now carry, however all in all very nice, although we has forgotten how small the bathroom are and yes that shower with the curtain is definitely a squeeze.

 

I am not going to take you through all the ports visited but will go through some of the good and some of the not so good.

 

The good

The crew are still very good and a pleasure to be around.

The ship as a whole is still in good nick with just the odd bit of rust showing up but nothing big and of course kept immaculate.

The free drinks on board were absolutely fine and the wine I thought was of a perfectly drinkable standard and I like my wine so most should be fine without having to pay more. 

The special Azamara night was put on for us at Ephesus and we were given on arrival possibly one of the worst mugs of wine I have tasted for a while but it was supplied by the firm who put on the  night on for Azamara so difficult to blame the ship.  The small amphitheatre where we sat was a delight but I would imagine whoever did the risk assessment must have run a mile at seeing it.  Steep uneven steps with 20/30ft drops off to the side was asking for 70/80 year olds to fall and badly hurt themselves.  However, 70/80 year old are from a generation made of sterner stuff and they all made it safety even if it meant going down on their bum's.  The only person to have a fall was a 50 year old fellow who slipped down 4/5 stairs in front of the 450 people attending and once everybody realised he was fine got a good cheer.  The ensemble was not my type of music however the setting was superb.  Personally I would have loved to walk down the main street of Ephesus in the dark when the building were lit up but sadly that was not allowed.

White night was put on as we were leaving a small Turkish port and was great fun although it was a bit of a bun fight to get to the food, dread to think what it would be like with a full ship, but great fun anyway and the combination of all the singers and bands on board played some great music that had us all up and dancing.

 

The not so good

Sadly as food lovers we were disappointed with the quality of the food.  It was difficult not to remember back to when we first cruised with Azamara when we thought the food was amazing.  The main dining room was good, especially breakfast which was exceptional.  The buffet was, however,  not that good.  Luch everyday had a large selection of Asian and Indian curries etc.  Now as a Brit I like my curries but curried boiled egg for breakfast was a bit to much.  I strongly suspect that the curries were a way of using up left over food from previous meals, but I may be wrong but anyway there was to much curry going on throughout the cruise. I did mention this on the mid cruise survey and the head chef sought me out the next night at supper which whilst I appreciated he came to chat finding me a supper sat with others was an unusual time to discuss matters.  Not that anything changed but hopefully Azamara will at least have a think on matters (PS seafood salad with seafood sticks chopped into it is not really my idea of good quality food). We ate in both speciality restaurants and the steakhouse meal was poor, the quality of my steak just was not there (it was the same with the steak I had in the dining room).  The Italian restaurant was brilliant  and was miles better, so we booked another meal there.  The squid ink pasta with lobster and seafood was just sublime. I know food is subjective but having watched the argument between Azamara fans and Oceania fans as to who has the better food in our view it's not close at the moment and Oceania wins hands down.  Hopefully Azamara can raise it's game again and compete once more because we enjoyed the overall experience.

 

Shore excursions were extremely expensive $150 average I would say.

 

Worrying 

 

The ship was about two thirds full at about 500 passengers but the next cruise back to Athens it was going to be less than half full before being full at the start of school holidays.  This must be a worry as these small ships need to be full to make money.  Azamara need to work out a way to get these ships full whilst providing a good level of cruising. 

 

Conclusion

 

Loved returning to the small ship experience and level of service Azamara provide

Food not so good.

 

Happy to answer ant sensible questions.          

I don't think the degradation of food is unique to Azamara.  Complaints about food abound on the Oceania and Viking forums.  It may be a while (if ever), before the quality of food returns to pre-pandemic levels..

[wjfan417]

16 hours ago, M109 said:

Thanks Lisiamc but I am pretty certain that I checked under the lights and sides and top mof the lights which were slightly difference to the ones in your pics.  Does not matter now as we managed to keep it all going on the one socket we took with us.  But f we cruise again on quest I will certainly know where to have another look.  Thank you for the pics. 

We’re on the Quest now so I just looked under the lights next to our bed-there’s definitely a USB port there.

[sofietucker]

7 hours ago, wjfan417 said:

We’re on the Quest now so I just looked under the lights next to our bed-there’s definitely a USB port there.

In the photo, it appeared to be low on the outer leg of the nightstand?

[mchell810]

46 minutes ago, sofietucker said:

In the photo, it appeared to be low on the outer leg of the nightstand?

 

No, the USB port is on the underside of the bedside lamp that is mounted on the wall.  The 3rd photo lisiamc posted gives a good view (post #29 above)

[mchell810]

Another view showing the relationship to the light and the bed (there is one one each side of the bed)

 

 

 

 

Edited July 16, 2023 by mchell810

[sofietucker]

11 minutes ago, mchell810 said:

Another view showing the relationship to the light and the bed (there is one one each side of the bed)

I would never in a million years think to look there, lol.

[swigso]

Happy to answer any sensible questions.   
 

hello thanks for the review we are sailing on the Onward round trip Istanbul in October. Can you please tell me what time you docked and were able to leave the ship.

I am booking a car to pick us up after the cruise.

Many thanks

Edited July 24, 2023 by swigso

[M109]

On 7/24/2023 at 8:18 AM, swigso said:

Happy to answer any sensible questions.   
 

hello thanks for the review we are sailing on the Onward round trip Istanbul in October. Can you please tell me what time you docked and were able to leave the ship.

I am booking a car to pick us up after the cruise.

Many thanks

Hi Swigso our cruise ended in Istanbul and we overnighted on the ship but we arrived at about 0830 in the morning.  I would expect if the ship is arriving the day of the passengers departures they will aim to get there earlier.  Point to note the new Cruise Terminal is massive and can involve a long walk to immigration (like 15 mins).  It is all underground including bus pickups, (truly massive area)  You will need to get your taxi service to be very clear where they are intending to meet you otherwise it will involve another long walk.  Many of the older guests where late for their buses to the airport as they had not taken into account the long walk.  I have to say that the cruise port puts every other port I have been to to absolute shame as it's amazing.  Real night life with all the high quality shops and eating places. Enjoy your cruise.

[peyroutous]

On 7/24/2023 at 9:18 AM, swigso said:

Happy to answer any sensible questions.   
 

hello thanks for the review we are sailing on the Onward round trip Istanbul in October. Can you please tell me what time you docked and were able to leave the ship.

I am booking a car to pick us up after the cruise.

Many thanks

 

check that your  taxi can enter the Istanbul port to pick up. We boarded at Istanbul’s new cruise port in September ‘22 but our taxi ordered by our hotel the Radisson was not allowed into the underground drop off area for taxis and coaches. We had to exit the taxi outside the shopping mall put our luggage through X-ray machine at entrance to the mall. Walk through the mall descend the escalator to the car park put our luggage through another X-ray then finally found the entrance to the ship boarding and drop off area and X-ray again! High security in the cruise port.

Edited July 25, 2023 by peyroutous

[sofietucker]

On 7/25/2023 at 9:17 AM, peyroutous said:

 

check that your  taxi can enter the Istanbul port to pick up. We boarded at Istanbul’s new cruise port in September ‘22 but our taxi ordered by our hotel the Radisson was not allowed into the underground drop off area for taxis and coaches. We had to exit the taxi outside the shopping mall put our luggage through X-ray machine at entrance to the mall. Walk through the mall descend the escalator to the car park put our luggage through another X-ray then finally found the entrance to the ship boarding and drop off area and X-ray again! High security in the cruise port.

Important--thanks! Wonder how we can ensure that whatever taxi we take can enter the drop-off area? I've read there are 3 types of taxis in Istanbul... (A driver from the hotel is picking us up at the airport beforehand).