Our First Azamara Cruise - Impressions

[SandJCruiser]

We took the Croatia Intensive 9 day cruise round trip out of Venice from 7/26 to 8/4.  We booked through a TA and she dealt with most of the website-related annoyances.  I was unable to book shore excursions on the website using OBC, but she got this done with phone calls.  I have to say that everyone was right who said that everything would be smooth on arrival at the ship.  Check in and embarkation were easy and fast and our cabin was already available upon our arrival.  The only issue I had was that my TA’s contributed OBC did not show up on our account at first, but one visit to Guest Relations fixed that and all worked out from then on.

 

It is unfortunate that the cruise ship ban in Venice creates such logistical problems with people getting from the airport to hotels to ship, etc.  I think in general that cruise lines are going to have to take a more active role in this situation.  Although transfers could be bought for airport to ship and vice versa, those who stayed in Venice or Chioggia pre- and/or post-cruise were on their own for transport, which could be difficult and expensive.  We booked a private transfer from the airport to our hotel in Chioggia and took a cab to the pier next day.  On return, we took the Azamara excursion to Padua, with a drop-off at VCE, and then took a cab to our local hotel by the airport for our return flight the next morning.  Padua was a great tour, incidentally, and added a little bit of a bonus to our trip.

Having not sailed Azamara before, I was looking forward to the experience, based on the mostly positive reviews on CC.  It turned out that while overall the cruise was grood, there were some small low points as well as some high points that we experienced.  As I mentioned earlier, the check-in process was extremely fast and easy.  We went immediately to our room, and I left to make dining reservations, and by the time I got back, the luggage had arrived.  While we were unpacking, our room attendant, Tess, arrived and went over the usual details.  The safety talk was held in the Cabaret Lounge for all passengers, and we were good to go.

 

We had a Veranda Plus cabin, which is the same as a standard Veranda with a couple of perks attached, but physically the same.  Everything you may have read about cabin size, and especially bathroom size is true, and yes, the showers are really tiny.  About 22 inches across and 33 long, but with a couple of angles at one end that reduce the length a bit.  I’m not a small guy, and I managed to make do, but, not gonna lie, it’s really small.  Storage space is adequate, just, for a short cruise, but for a longer one, especially one with a variety of weather conditions expected, it would be pretty cramped.  If we were ever to book Azamara again, I think I would not book a veranda, but would look for a Club Concierge cabin, which is notably larger.  However, they are also significantly higher in price, and I would have to see if the value for the price was there in comparison to other lines.

We got 120 minutes of free internet included with our cabin and used it up just before the last day.  It worked pretty well, but for more intensive applications we waited until we were in or near a port, as our phones from T-Mobile worked for text and data in all the countries we were in, so we didn’t need much separate internet.

 

The highlight of the cruise was the crew.  Everyone says how wonderful the crew is on Azamara and they are right.  Everyone we encountered greeted us with a smile and service was uniformly excellent.  I was particularly impressed with management responsiveness.  Early on I had a couple of EXTREMELY minor issues having to do with coffee and breakfast service, but I brought them to the attention of Guest Relations, more as an observation than a complaint.  I had not one, but two, restaurant and beverage managers approach me when I was out and about on the ship, call me by name, and inquire about my issue and what they were doing to correct it.  They must have some kind of system that allows them to find you by your picture that they take at check-in, because they would have had no way to otherwise ID me.  So that was impressive.

 

The ship overall was comfortable, clean, and well maintained.  We were about 65% capacity, so there were never big lines, and tables and chairs were always available.  Even the elevators responded pretty quickly, and one of the four was out of order the entire cruise.  There was no long wait for tenders at the ports that needed them.  If the ship had been completely full, it might have felt a little more cramped.

 

Now for the nits that require picking:  We found, overall, that the food was OK, but not fabulous.  The specialty restaurants, Acqualina, and Prime C, were very good, and we also did the Chef’s Table, which was Italian and it was excellent as well.  Dinners in the MDR, Discoveries, were nicely presented, but somewhat unimaginative and most of the time, severely under seasoned.  It wasn’t that the food was bad; it wasn’t.  It just wasn’t anything to write home about.  It had no WOW factor.  Most notably, the breads were so-so.  And there were some glaring faults that I found particularly worrisome on what’s supposed to be a high-end cruise line.  For example, although there was some fresh fruit offered in the buffet, a lot of other fruit offerings were canned.  And the onion rings in the Patio Grill were of the bagged and frozen variety.  Muffins were identical to what you would buy in your local supermarket bakery.  Pizza was not impressive.  Desserts were attractive enough but all pretty much tasted the same – sweet but no particular flavor of what it was supposed to be.  I.E. lemon cake, raspberry cake, and orange cake all pretty much tasted the same.  Again, you just didn’t get any of the, “Wow, you’ve got to try this!” moments.

The Entertainment offerings were, again, OK, but with a couple of exceptions, fairly ordinary.  There was a lounge pianist whom I didn’t care for the little bit I heard him.  The other ship act was a quartet from the Philippines who did pop and rock covers.  They were OK, but I had to cringe when they announced,  “Here’s our version of a Guns n’ Roses song,” and proceeded to play an uptempo, jazzy version of (Bob Dylan’s) ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’.  Respect the music, people.

As to the main show room entertainment, there were 4 juke box presentations by the 6 person singing and dancing team.  They were enthusiastic and reasonably talented, but there was little to get excited about.  The Cruise Director did her own show one night, and was spectacular.  I didn’t see the ACD’s show.  One night, the “Destination Entertainment” (read on-ship AzAmazing Evening) was a dancing and singing of traditional and modern Croatian music, which was well recieved.  And the last night in Italy, they brought on two opera singers who were very good.  But overall, I can’t give the entertainment more than a B.  Notably, every show was basically singing and dancing.  No comedian, magician, ventriloquist, or the like to break up the music shows.  A little more variety would have been nice.     

                                                                           

We did not upgrade past the standard beverage package.  We found a white and a red wine we liked on the complimentary list the first night and stuck with them the rest of the cruise.

 

Would I book Azamara again?  Maybe, if the itinerary was attractive or unique enough.  That is what caused us to book this one.  But overall, we found the experience just OK, and for our cruise dollar, we want to be blown away, and Azamara just didn’t do it.

[Host Jazzbeau]

Thanks for this review, and its balance and honesty.  I will just make two comments:  (1) Azamara is a premium line, not luxury, although the prices may sometimes stray up to that level – bigger ships have better entertainment, Oceania has better food, so you are right that other lines may appeal more to you in the future ... but (2) once you get hooked on Azamara's intensive itineraries you will find that there is very little competition at this price point.  Bigger ships can't go to many of the small ports that Azamara docks in (or would overwhelm the small piazzas if they tried), and Oceania's itineraries are IMHO much less interesting than Azamara's (and Oceania is notorious for dropping ports).  

 

There are three other cruise lines that I consider equal to Azamara for itineraries:  Windstar (nice prices, but their ships have severe limitations – almost no veranda cabins), Ponant (very expensive and French luxury) and Noble Caledonia (also very expensive and not luxury, but nevertheless our favorite because it feels like 'welcome home' – maybe that's why we also like Azamara so much).

[Cruise Junky]

Thanks for taking the time to do a review. We have our first Azamara cruise booked and of course a few worries about all the current issues.  Fingers crossed they find their feet.  

[uktog]

Thanks for your very fair assessment. Your experience with the dining very much reflects our more recent dining onboard, something is just not right with the depth of flavours and seasoning across all the ships. 
The crew are indeed wonderful but not everyone wants to bank solely on that when choosing what line they go on. 

[GUSGB]

Great review. We are on our 2nd Azamara cruise in November, so the experience is catching!

[hamrag]

SandJC, I couldn't agree more with your food/dining and entertainment assessment. I also agree with JazzB re Oceania where the culinary experience is much better.

 

Interesting also his assessment re Windstar whom we have booked (first time) for November from Barbados. We are content with inside or outside cabins, and the Windstar balcony limitations matter not to us. From what I read, even the lowest grade cabins on the motor yachts are huge at 277 square feet. With just over 300 passenger capacity I expect Windstar entertainment to be no better than Az, at best.

 

The rest of your review mostly reflected our recent Croatia intensive Az experience from Chioggia 3 months ago. Very balanced, and well written.

[mj_holiday]

Thank you for taking to time to give us your impressions and experiences.  We have taken 2 Azamara cruises and both were because of the itinerary we could not find anyplace else.  For the second cruise we upgraded to a club continent suite and felt it was worth it.  There are several nits about Azamara that we do not care for, but with the itinerary that is great we can put up with/ignore the things we do not care for.

[SandJCruiser]

Thanks to all of you for your kind acknowledgements.  

Host Jazzbeau - I don't believe that I used the term "luxury"; I said "high-end".  I wasn't expecting Crystal or Regent or the like.  We had our expectations set, I believe, about where they should have been.  And you're right - itinerary is key with Azamara, and as I stated, it was the reason we booked this cruise and would be the reason we might book with Azamara again.  I just feel that if a line is serving frozen pre-formed hash browns patties for breakfast, even in the MDR, that it shouldn't tout itself as having "fresh ingredients, careful preparation" in its dining venues.  Am I nit-picking? Maybe.  But these things are easily fixed and don't present a picture of a cruise line that is really premium.

BTW, I also missed having any kind of enrichment or port lecturers on board.  Granted, time was limited as it was a port-intensive cruise with no sea days, but a historian, maybe speaking a couple of times in the late afternoon, would have significantly enhanced our experience of the area visited.

[Mackdogmolly]

12 minutes ago, SandJCruiser said:

Granted, time was limited as it was a port-intensive cruise with no sea days, but a historian, maybe speaking a couple of times in the late afternoon, would have significantly enhanced our experience of the area visited.

This is one of the reasons I am hesitant to book a port intensive itinerary. I really like the sea days, when there are the opportunities for lectures, special brunches, and other onboard events.

[lisiamc]

59 minutes ago, SandJCruiser said:

Thanks to all of you for your kind acknowledgements.  

Host Jazzbeau - I don't believe that I used the term "luxury"; I said "high-end".  I wasn't expecting Crystal or Regent or the like.  We had our expectations set, I believe, about where they should have been.  And you're right - itinerary is key with Azamara, and as I stated, it was the reason we booked this cruise and would be the reason we might book with Azamara again.  I just feel that if a line is serving frozen pre-formed hash browns patties for breakfast, even in the MDR, that it shouldn't tout itself as having "fresh ingredients, careful preparation" in its dining venues.  Am I nit-picking? Maybe.  But these things are easily fixed and don't present a picture of a cruise line that is really premium.

BTW, I also missed having any kind of enrichment or port lecturers on board.  Granted, time was limited as it was a port-intensive cruise with no sea days, but a historian, maybe speaking a couple of times in the late afternoon, would have significantly enhanced our experience of the area visited.

I’m surprised that there was no lecturer on board. Even on port-intensive itineraries, there has been at least one on our cruises. I can sympathise with your disappointment!

Edited August 7, 2023 by lisiamc

[TeaBag]

Thank you for your great review SandJ.  I am so glad to see that someone else thinks the food is under seasoned.  Maitre'D told me that if they put much garlic in the food, people complain. Garlic is not the only seasoning!!  We found the food bland.

However, we love the size of the ship and the fact that they can get into places the big cruise ships can't.

[aliaschief]

Thanks for sharing your cruise experience.

[1985rz1]

22 hours ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

Thanks for this review, and its balance and honesty.  I will just make two comments:  (1) Azamara is a premium line, not luxury, although the prices may sometimes stray up to that level – bigger ships have better entertainment, Oceania has better food, so you are right that other lines may appeal more to you in the future ... but (2) once you get hooked on Azamara's intensive itineraries you will find that there is very little competition at this price point.  Bigger ships can't go to many of the small ports that Azamara docks in (or would overwhelm the small piazzas if they tried), and Oceania's itineraries are IMHO much less interesting than Azamara's (and Oceania is notorious for dropping ports).  

 

There are three other cruise lines that I consider equal to Azamara for itineraries:  Windstar (nice prices, but their ships have severe limitations – almost no veranda cabins), Ponant (very expensive and French luxury) and Noble Caledonia (also very expensive and not luxury, but nevertheless our favorite because it feels like 'welcome home' – maybe that's why we also like Azamara so much).

Was the ship the Onward?

[Host Jazzbeau]

7 hours ago, SandJCruiser said:

Host Jazzbeau - I don't believe that I used the term "luxury"; I said "high-end".

I wasn't reacting to any particular word you used, but my overall impression was that you were measuring Azamara against luxury cruise line standards.  Perhaps I misjudged.

[Host Jazzbeau]

6 minutes ago, 1985rz1 said:

Was the ship the Onward?

Are you asking me or OP?  I have sailed on Quest (twice, pre-Covid) and Journey (last October).  Thankfully none of the Onward itineraries have appealed, so I haven't had to decide whether to avoid that ship [I think I would, based on what I read here]

[1985rz1]

43 minutes ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

Are you asking me or OP?  I have sailed on Quest (twice, pre-Covid) and Journey (last October).  Thankfully none of the Onward itineraries have appealed, so I haven't had to decide whether to avoid that ship [I think I would, based on what I read here]

OOPS...I thought I quoted to OP.  I try again ☺️

Edited August 8, 2023 by 1985rz1

[1985rz1]

@SandJCruiser Which ship were you on?

[SandJCruiser]

Quest.

[shootingstar07]

On 8/6/2023 at 7:05 PM, SandJCruiser said:

 Even the elevators responded pretty quickly, and one of the four was out of order the entire cruise.  There was no long wait for tenders at the ports that needed them.  If the ship had been completely full, it might have felt a little more cramped.

 

 

I haven’t been on Azamara.  I am planning my first cruise next July. 
 

But I did recently get off HAL. Unfortunately, I had reason to be taken to medical in a wheelchair.  I was surprised to see the RN pull out a key and open the “broken” elevator. He proceeded to tell me there is always a blocked elevator for medical emergencies! 
 

I wonder if that applies to the elevator on your cruise. 

[Grandma Cruising]

4 hours ago, shootingstar07 said:

I haven’t been on Azamara.  I am planning my first cruise next July. 
 

But I did recently get off HAL. Unfortunately, I had reason to be taken to medical in a wheelchair.  I was surprised to see the RN pull out a key and open the “broken” elevator. He proceeded to tell me there is always a blocked elevator for medical emergencies! 
 

I wonder if that applies to the elevator on your cruise. 

Generally speaking all 4 work all the time on Azamara. 

[Belfastman]

On 8/8/2023 at 2:21 AM, Host Jazzbeau said:

Are you asking me or OP?  I have sailed on Quest (twice, pre-Covid) and Journey (last October).  Thankfully none of the Onward itineraries have appealed, so I haven't had to decide whether to avoid that ship [I think I would, based on what I read here]

No reason to avoid Onward. Having sailed twice on Onward and on Pursuit since Covid there is no difference and if anything I prefer Onward both for the staff and facilities.

[lisiamc]

On 8/8/2023 at 12:21 AM, Host Jazzbeau said:

Are you asking me or OP?  I have sailed on Quest (twice, pre-Covid) and Journey (last October).  Thankfully none of the Onward itineraries have appealed, so I haven't had to decide whether to avoid that ship [I think I would, based on what I read here]

Onward is great! We’ve taken four cruises on her, and were thinking about two more for this autumn, but went for three on Quest next summer instead. 

[Rosroz]

I was on the Onward in Jan this year , the food in the buffet and dining room was pretty good, not bland, when we eat out  we often find the food is over salted to our taste , I know many older people of which we arelike to add lots of salt to their meal as tastebuds are the first senses to go , the food is not as outstanding as Oceania although many Oceania customers are moaning also. My husband and I are foodies but we do not go on Azamara for the just the food or the cabins but enjoy the ambience and friendliness , small ship experience.

am looking to try Windstar in Feb next year, but will be on Journey this Sept and Pursuit next Sept .

[MamaFej]

On 8/6/2023 at 4:05 PM, SandJCruiser said:

The other ship act was a quartet from the Philippines who did pop and rock covers.  They were OK, but I had to cringe when they announced,  “Here’s our version of a Guns n’ Roses song,” and proceeded to play an uptempo, jazzy version of (Bob Dylan’s) ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’.  Respect the music, people.

I would have been clenching my fists so tightly that I'd leave deep nail impressions. I'd probably break a tooth or two from the jaw clench, as well. 

 

I love Guns N' Roses, but c'mon, if you're covering a cover, say so. Don't take credit away from the orginal artist!

---------

 

We now return you to your regularly scheduled thread. 

[lisiamc]

10 hours ago, MamaFej said:

I would have been clenching my fists so tightly that I'd leave deep nail impressions. I'd probably break a tooth or two from the jaw clench, as well. 

 

I love Guns N' Roses, but c'mon, if you're covering a cover, say so. Don't take credit away from the orginal artist!

---------

 

We now return you to your regularly scheduled thread. 

I think knowledge of musical artists and composers from decades (and especially longer) ago goes by the wayside sometimes. At a recent trivia session, the young singer who was hosting the trivia did not know how to pronounce Beethoven, or really have any idea who he was. I’m not surprised the band on your cruise were not very familiar with Bob Dylan.

Edited August 14, 2023 by lisiamc