Would you sail on the Seabourn Odyssey's final voyage?

[lesward]

We are considering the 22-night Farewell Voyage on Seabourn's Odyssey next Sept, from Seattle to Tokyo

(Yokohama). Lots of good Alaska ports, lots of days at sea, an unusual itinerary. We have sailed on the Seabourn Quest twice and where highly impressed. But this is their oldest ship, and the reviews on various forums are all over the map, from fabulous to terrible (for a luxury ship).  

 

 I'm not worried about the September Alaska/northern Pacific weather, which can be changeable; we rather like riding the high seas.  I am concerned about the level of service from a departing crew, and the condition of the ship. Should I be, based on your recent experience with this ship  or your experience with retired ships? I don't want to shell out $27,000 for two people and be disappointed.

 

  Many thanks for any helpful replies.

 

SLOLeslie

[Host Kat]

14 minutes ago, lesward said:

We are considering the 22-night Farewell Voyage on Seabourn's Odyssey next Sept, from Seattle to Tokyo

(Yokohama). Lots of good Alaska ports, lots of days at sea, an unusual itinerary. We have sailed on the Seabourn Quest twice and where highly impressed. But this is their oldest ship, and the reviews on various forums are all over the map, from fabulous to terrible (for a luxury ship).  

 

 I'm not worried about the September Alaska/northern Pacific weather, which can be changeable; we rather like riding the high seas.  I am concerned about the level of service from a departing crew, and the condition of the ship. Should I be, based on your recent experience with this ship  or your experience with retired ships? I don't want to shell out $27,000 for two people and be disappointed.

 

  Many thanks for any helpful replies.

 

SLOLeslie

 

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[Khareef]

9 hours ago, lesward said:

We are considering the 22-night Farewell Voyage on Seabourn's Odyssey next Sept, from Seattle to Tokyo

(Yokohama). Lots of good Alaska ports, lots of days at sea, an unusual itinerary. We have sailed on the Seabourn Quest twice and where highly impressed. But this is their oldest ship, and the reviews on various forums are all over the map, from fabulous to terrible (for a luxury ship).  

 

 I'm not worried about the September Alaska/northern Pacific weather, which can be changeable; we rather like riding the high seas.  I am concerned about the level of service from a departing crew, and the condition of the ship. Should I be, based on your recent experience with this ship  or your experience with retired ships? I don't want to shell out $27,000 for two people and be disappointed.

 

  Many thanks for any helpful replies.

 

SLOLeslie

Wait for the usual discounts and promos in January 🙂

[skybluewaters]

One thing for sure, don't worry about the condition of the ship itself.

It's just fine.  Odyssey underwent a significant refurbishment 4 years ago and was looking great when we were last on her five months ago. 

 

The final voyage should be special. We would gladly be going on it if not for our previous plans to be on the Quest at that time.

[cruiseej]

We sailed on the final voyage of a Regent (then called Radisson) ship (the Diamond) a number of years ago. It was fabulous. Everything was normal in terms of crew and service on this cruise, and upkeep on the ship; one would never have know they were handing the ship over to a buyer at the end of our cruise. But because they had to "empty the freezers", there were some fun perks. We will never forget the lunch where they were grilling lobster tails on the pool deck, and the F&B manager was encouraging everyone to eat as many as they wanted because they had to use them all up!

 

Seabourn will not likely let the quality of food, beverage or crew service decline because they want to keep their customers happy and have them come back for more cruises. 

[Shipless in Seattle]

We’re seriously considering this one too but it will come down to price and availability. I am not worried that the experience won’t be amazing as I’m sure there will be lots of senior management on board and that the staff will be at its best. I think though it may be more expensive since it is the farewell. Really like this ship so would be nice to join on the final goodbye. 

[TootyJane]

We were on the Odyssey in May (Honolulu to Vancouver). We arrived home and within a week received the invitation to join the Farewell Sailing. We’re booked and looking forward to seeing Alaska (again 😆) and Japan. We’re planning on meeting up with our son and visiting Kyoto. 

[philbob84]

yes if the ship holds a special place in your heart

[sfvoyage]

A bit OT, but various MOL delegates (exclusively Japanese except for a Filipina who speaks fluent English and Japanese and is the de facto interpreter for the entourage this week) has been on board Odyssey frequently the past few months.  They've been talking to staff, asking questions, and taking lots of videos, photos, and notes.

 

I chatted with a few of them today and found out that the Odyssey will be renamed Mitsui Ocean Fuji, sailing around Japan initially and then expanding to international voyages.  The ship will be bilingual, and so international guests are welcomed to book.  We are very interested to try them out after the full conversion, depending on how well they can cater to vegetarian (vegan ideally) guests.

Edited October 21, 2023 by sfvoyage

[notjaded]

We are on this cruise. My concern is the possibility of deferred maintenance issues, but Ms Notjaded thinks it will be a fun sail 🙂

[notjaded]

On 10/31/2023 at 11:09 AM, notjaded said:

We are on this cruise. My concern is the possibility of deferred maintenance issues, but Ms Notjaded thinks it will be a fun sail 🙂

Just cancelled this cruise. Decided to sail off in a different direction. 🙂

[Carolfay]

I'm booked on this one, as a solo.  It looks like a fun and unusual itinerary.  One of the attractions for me is the Seattle departure, as I live near Portland, OR.  It should be pretty simple for me to take the Amtrak ride to downtown Seattle and get a taxi to the pier.

[2SailingNomads]

If we didn't have booked other plans long before the sailing was announced we would have done it.  Odyssey was our 2nd cruise Sydney to LA and the ship we have the most days on and lots of fond memories from our times onboard.  I am sure it will be a special cruise 

[johng75370]

On 10/31/2023 at 2:09 PM, notjaded said:

My concern is the possibility of deferred maintenance issues

I just checked a detailed schedule of all Seabourn ships I got onboard, and it shows that Odyssey goes into dry dock on Aug 23rd before sailing on the farewell voyage Sept 2nd.  Hopefully that would address any maintenance issues ahead of the handover.  Odyssey was our first experience with Seabourn and also the one we’ve had most nights on; will be on one last time in Alaska this summer.  Will miss it. 

Edited June 1 by johng75370

[medroots]

We are booked on this, and I’m not at all concerned about maintenance as the ship has been owned by the new company for some time and Seabourn has been leasing it back. The contract requires SB to keep her properly maintained. We are, however, concerned about provisions. We’ve been told that the goal is to turn it over with as little inventory as possible. It’s easy to envision many popular foods and beverages being in short supply.

[skybluewaters]

19 minutes ago, medroots said:

We are, however, concerned about provisions. We’ve been told that the goal is to turn it over with as little inventory as possible. It’s easy to envision many popular foods and beverages being in short supply.

 

Or you may be force-fed caviar and lobster as you near the end of the cruise

Edited Sunday at 10:24 PM by skybluewaters

[wire]

We were on the Kobe to Vancouver segment ending early May. There was a huge sell off of their premium wines at heavily discounted prices. The included wines were pretty bad IMO, and I have pretty low standards in wine. The boat definitely had maintenance issues but the staff seemed to be dealing with the ones in their control, carpet, pool decking, hot tubes, etc, however there were some issues that required dry dock to fix. Overall, it was good. Some things could have been better,