Villa Vie Residences

[PG_traveller]

1 hour ago, rebeccalouiseagain said:

Where did Midlife Cruising say that?

On their last video on Youtube.

[CanadianKate]

12 hours ago, PG_traveller said:

On their last video on Youtube.

 

Let's be fair, the exact quote was "I've even jokingly looked at flights more than once..." 

She's never done a crossing in such a small ship and she's sharing she's a bit nervous. There's nothing wrong with that. Assuming the ship doesn't have any mechanical issues and the captain steers clear of major weather (and this one can do that as it isn't on a strict schedule), she'll soon learn that size doesn't necessarily make a big difference. 

I have done trans Ocean crossings: one TA on the pre-stretch Windstar Motor Yachts (13,000GT) and Atlantic and Pacific on the Silver Shadow/Whisper (28,000GT)  and all were fine. The longer Indian Ocean crossing was on the Crystal Serenity (68K) and the only difference size made was offering more activities for the day after days at sea.  Even so, it was after that cruise that we took the Windstar TA which had virtually no activities and we did that by choice because, by then, we had learned it was the rhythm of living on the ship, not a whole lot of distractions, that we enjoyed. 

Here's the link at the time stamp. 
 

 

[www3traveler]

Prayers for Captain Jurac, his Team, the staff and all the passengers as this wonderful adventure continues.

[rebeccalouiseagain]

5 hours ago, CanadianKate said:

 

Let's be fair, the exact quote was "I've even jokingly looked at flights more than once..." 

She's never done a crossing in such a small ship and she's sharing she's a bit nervous. There's nothing wrong with that. Assuming the ship doesn't have any mechanical issues and the captain steers clear of major weather (and this one can do that as it isn't on a strict schedule), she'll soon learn that size doesn't necessarily make a big difference. 

I have done trans Ocean crossings: one TA on the pre-stretch Windstar Motor Yachts (13,000GT) and Atlantic and Pacific on the Silver Shadow/Whisper (28,000GT)  and all were fine. The longer Indian Ocean crossing was on the Crystal Serenity (68K) and the only difference size made was offering more activities for the day after days at sea.  Even so, it was after that cruise that we took the Windstar TA which had virtually no activities and we did that by choice because, by then, we had learned it was the rhythm of living on the ship, not a whole lot of distractions, that we enjoyed. 

Here's the link at the time stamp. 
 

 

Yeah- it was taken a little out of context.  I don't think she is terrified.  Truth is- unless they get the RO up and running, they can't sail for seven days without the water.  The potable water they are filling up with in ports won't last for seven days.  They were having to conserve with five days at sea and only 125 passengers.  Now they have closer to 200 passengers.  They also have to have their ballast water treatment in place or their certificate expires on 10/30/24.  So we shall sea...

[gkbiiii]

10 hours ago, rebeccalouiseagain said:

Yeah- it was taken a little out of context.  I don't think she is terrified.  Truth is- unless they get the RO up and running, they can't sail for seven days without the water.  The potable water they are filling up with in ports won't last for seven days.  They were having to conserve with five days at sea and only 125 passengers.  Now they have closer to 200 passengers.  They also have to have their ballast water treatment in place or their certificate expires on 10/30/24.  So we shall sea...

VV seems to claim they are nearly sold out, do you believe them? 

[chengkp75]

12 hours ago, rebeccalouiseagain said:

They also have to have their ballast water treatment in place or their certificate expires on 10/30/24.

Did some looking, and as I thought, this ship, being as old as it is, does not have to meet all of the Ballast Water Management standards.  The certificate is for the BWM "treatment method", which means a ballast water management plan, not an installation of a system, which would not be possible given the short term certificate only gave them 30 days to complete.  What this means is that the ship has to come up with a plan to either use fresh water for ballast (cruise ships don't load and discharge ballast much, unlike cargo ships), or always to "exchange" ballast water (discharge it all, and refill the tanks) while outside of 200 miles from shore.

[rebeccalouiseagain]

Thanks for clarifying.  I wonder what plan they have in place.  

[rebeccalouiseagain]

2 hours ago, gkbiiii said:

VV seems to claim they are nearly sold out, do you believe them? 

No way.  There are only 182 passengers as of Friday.  There may be more getting on in the Caribbean or booked for later segments, but no they are not sold out and have never been sold out.  300 people originally showed up for the inaugural sailing.  Mike was saying then that it was 90% sold out, but that was not true either.  For instance- all of deck three has been used for crew since May.  Only recently (in the past few days) did they move the crew down to deck 2.  The passenger who purchased cabins on Deck three- were relocated to Deck 4.  So what does that tell you?  Deck 4 obviously was not sold out if they could move the passengers there.  They moved 100 passengers to different cabins on the ship and all of deck 3 (passenger cabins) was used by crew- not passengers.  There are some more passengers booked (approximately 100-200) more.  That would bring the total up to 382.  The capacity is 900.

Edited Monday at 11:18 AM by rebeccalouiseagain

[Lee Jones Jnr]

Is the capacity still 900? Some cabins have been made two into one.

I don't expect for a moment that it is more than maybe 50% sold but are there credible details about the current layout?

[UKCruiseJeff]

1 hour ago, chengkp75 said:

Did some looking, and as I thought, this ship, being as old as it is, does not have to meet all of the Ballast Water Management standards.  The certificate is for the BWM "treatment method", which means a ballast water management plan, not an installation of a system, which would not be possible given the short term certificate only gave them 30 days to complete.  What this means is that the ship has to come up with a plan to either use fresh water for ballast (cruise ships don't load and discharge ballast much, unlike cargo ships), or always to "exchange" ballast water (discharge it all, and refill the tanks) while outside of 200 miles from shore.

 

Isn’t robust BWM plans particularly essential for an older smaller ship with less effective stabilisation when contemplating the safety of transatlantic crossings?  

 

Jeff

[UKCruiseJeff]

49 minutes ago, Lee Jones Jnr said:

Is the capacity still 900? Some cabins have been made two into one.

I don't expect for a moment that it is more than maybe 50% sold but are there credible details about the current layout?

 

Against the background of the “creative thinking” we have repeatedly observed one needs to be careful about not just whether anything is “90%” but what that % might actually be ie is it 30% or even less and does that % whatever it really is actually misleadingly include all segments aggregated into one misleading figure.  

 

What I’m saying in a long-winded way is that one thing you can be certain of is that 90% of the cabins are not “sold” to new owners.

 

Jeff

[chengkp75]

52 minutes ago, UKCruiseJeff said:

 

Isn’t robust BWM plans particularly essential for an older smaller ship with less effective stabilisation when contemplating the safety of transatlantic crossings?  

 

Jeff

BWM really doesn't have much to do with stability, particularly for cruise ships that don't change their deadweight much.  I'm not sure whether the "overflow" method is still allowed (pump water into the ballast tanks, and allow the "old" ballast water to overflow out the vents until a complete "change" of water has been accomplished), as this will definitely not affect stability.  An "empty and refill" plan would take time.  And, as long as they don't discharge ballast in a port, they don't need to make an exchange during the crossing.  Ballast water is a much smaller percentage of the ship's deadweight for a cruise ship, where fuel, and fresh water makes up a larger percentage.

[UKCruiseJeff]

42 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

BWM really doesn't have much to do with stability, particularly for cruise ships that don't change their deadweight much.  I'm not sure whether the "overflow" method is still allowed (pump water into the ballast tanks, and allow the "old" ballast water to overflow out the vents until a complete "change" of water has been accomplished), as this will definitely not affect stability.  An "empty and refill" plan would take time.  And, as long as they don't discharge ballast in a port, they don't need to make an exchange during the crossing.  Ballast water is a much smaller percentage of the ship's deadweight for a cruise ship, where fuel, and fresh water makes up a larger percentage.

 

Thanks,

 

I guess it occurred to me that however little the impact on stability there is sometimes a small “tipping point” when a small difference can tip into a serious outcome.  

 

There’s also the potential for penny cutting ie every litre of additional ballast has a fuel consequence. 

 

Jeff

[Travel_Around_The_World]

10 hours ago, gkbiiii said:

VV seems to claim they are nearly sold out, do you believe them? 

Of course not. Mike is well known to lie about numbers. That's how he scuttled the LAS project. 

 

I think i linked a court document here in which Mike in an email to Victoria Cruises claimed that they are nearly sold out and are looking for a second ship and are willing to send all the extra balcony reservation to Victoria.

[gkbiiii]

7 hours ago, UKCruiseJeff said:

 

Against the background of the “creative thinking” we have repeatedly observed one needs to be careful about not just whether anything is “90%” but what that % might actually be ie is it 30% or even less and does that % whatever it really is actually misleadingly include all segments aggregated into one misleading figure.  

 

What I’m saying in a long-winded way is that one thing you can be certain of is that 90% of the cabins are not “sold” to new owners.

 

Jeff

If you go to the website and look under the deck plans for available cabins; VV makes it look like their 80%+ sold out.  It's like a "three-card monte scam."

[UKCruiseJeff]

12 minutes ago, gkbiiii said:

If you go to the website and look under the deck plans for available cabins; VV makes it look like their 80%+ sold out.  It's like a "three-card monte scam."

 

There is no coding for sold cabins.

[gkbiiii]

1 hour ago, UKCruiseJeff said:

 

There is no coding for sold cabins.

The ones in "RED" are sold, "Yellow" are segments, "Green" are for sale.  If you click on them, they show pricing and pictures. 

[rebeccalouiseagain]

9 hours ago, Lee Jones Jnr said:

Is the capacity still 900? Some cabins have been made two into one.

I don't expect for a moment that it is more than maybe 50% sold but are there credible details about the current layout?

The only passengers that I'm aware that bought 3 cabins and combined them were the Hennessees.  Holly, a different passenger with a similar last name, spelled Hennessey, has a cabin that was at one time made into a suite (combining 2 cabins) that was not recent and was done years ago- nothing to do with VVR.  As for the number of cabins- it's somewhere in the range of 485 cabins.  Some are solo, some double, and some have upper berths so you can have three or four to a cabin if necessary.  Realistically- there are 40% solo passengers (according to VVR). So there will probably never be 900 passengers onboard. 

Edited Monday at 09:30 PM by rebeccalouiseagain

[WorldTraveler1020]

Interesting article

[Leither]

15 minutes ago, gkbiiii said:

The ones in "RED" are sold, "Yellow" are segments, "Green" are for sale.  If you click on them, they show pricing and pictures. 

Strictly speaking, the RED cabins are described as reserved, not sold.

[MacMadame]

On 10/19/2024 at 2:09 AM, UKCruiseJeff said:

The first TA is a landmark event and I hope we see the CEO and COO on board. 

I had no expectation that the C-suite would be onboard at all. They need to be off doing C-suite things including finding and talking up investors.

[UKCruiseJeff]

1 hour ago, gkbiiii said:

The ones in "RED" are sold, "Yellow" are segments, "Green" are for sale.  If you click on them, they show pricing and pictures. 

 

They are “reserved”.  

[gkbiiii]

2 hours ago, rebeccalouiseagain said:

The only passengers that I'm aware that bought 3 cabins and combined them were the Hennessees.  Holly, a different passenger with a similar last name, spelled Hennessey, has a cabin that was at one time made into a suite (combining 2 cabins) that was not recent and was done years ago- nothing to do with VVR.  As for the number of cabins- it's somewhere in the range of 485 cabins.  Some are solo, some double, and some have upper berths so you can have three or four to a cabin if necessary.  Realistically- there are 40% solo passengers (according to VVR). So there will probably never be 900 passengers onboard. 

Who bought the Royal Suite & for how much?

[Travel_Around_The_World]

3 hours ago, WorldTraveler1020 said:

Interesting article

Paywall....

[CanadianKate]

17 hours ago, gkbiiii said:

I've wondered, would Star Legend make a good semi-residential vessel?  It is all suites and with a more affluent clientele, it would seem ideal.

Perhaps but it wouldn't be ideal. It is too small a ship to have corners to sit in where others won't see you. It is too hard on a ship to get away from everyone, be it crew or fellow passengers. 

One of the things I've thought about when delving into this whole VVR debacle is the idea that there isn't a place one can go to be alone if traveling with a partner. Watching one of the 'life on board' videos reinforced that as well, as he crossed the reception area and was greeted while heading for coffee in the morning. It reminded me of why I used to have breakfast in my suite each morning on Silver Sea. I just wasn't up to being social for as many hours as cruising requires, 

This is totally a personality trait I have; I recognize many others don't feel this way at all. Even at home, there are times I resent the risk of crossing paths with others when I go from my apartment to put garbage down the chute, empty my recycling, or pick up the mail.  These interactions require being a bit social in order to be polite. Most days I don't mind and I do get energy from interacting with others. But some times I get 'done' with social interactions. A neighbour texted me once that there was a parcel outside my door that had been there for a few days and did I want her to hold it for me until I got home. I was home, I just hadn't stepped out of my apartment for 3 days because I didn't feel like seeing people. 
 

Being on a ship with staff increases the number of daily interactions dramatically and makes a day with NO interactions impossible. 

On a regular cruise, hiding out for day(s) in one's cabin is impossible due to cleaning and eating logistics. On a residential cruise it might be slightly more possible, especially if one has a kettle and fridge to help feed oneself. but a desire for a change of view means leaving one's cabin. 

Just thinking all this through, I know my personality makes me a terrible candidate to live on board, unless on board The World, where hiding out for days on end in my home is a possibility. But my bank account eliminates me as a candidate for that option!