Mumbling about Marina

[shepherd really]

35 minutes ago, LuAnn said:

i seriously thought at one point we were going to tip over sideways..and the driver said "Thank you for not screaming"!! We have always considered it our most favorite shore excursion!!! So glad you made it in...you were with Patrick Watson? 

Patrick retired but he turned it over to a fellow named Shawn. It’s in good hands

[SophieM]

52 minutes ago, LuAnn said:

i seriously thought at one point we were going to tip over sideways..and the driver said "Thank you for not screaming"!! We have always considered it our most favorite shore excursion!!! So glad you made it in...you were with Patrick Watson? 

Same here! Patrick has retired, but his assistant Shaun Jaffray took over. Shaun’s mom was our driver. It was quite the ride but so worth it!

[SophieM]

Just now, SophieM said:

Same here! Patrick has retired, but his assistant Shaun Jaffray took over. Shaun’s mom was our driver. It was quite the ride but so worth it!

Shaun’s company is Adventure Falklands.

[ORV]

1 hour ago, LuAnn said:

How can I figure out if I have one on the upcoming Marina T/A? I've had them before...seems like usually on a Sunday? 

If it's a TA you'll probably have one, but as Shepherd Really stated theirs was not on Sunday, so not always on a Sunday. It's quite the spread, we didn't go in there to eat, but it looked great. 

[clo]

4 hours ago, LuAnn said:

The article says it's 3 times the size of LA!!!! 

It's just incomprehensible!

[ak1004]

@ORVand @shepherd really please remind me, any cancelled ports, reduced port times or any other itinerary changes on your sailings?

[ORV]

43 minutes ago, ak1004 said:

@ORVand @shepherd really please remind me, any cancelled ports, reduced port times or any other itinerary changes on your sailings?

I could have sworn I posted asking SH the same thing. Maybe it was on another thread. 

 

At any rate, we had one port that was shortened by 2 hours, but this was done a couple of months before the cruise. We had one day cut off our Antartica portion in order to outrun the storm coming in the Drake Passage. We had an extra amount of time at Ushuaia. We didn't miss any ports. 

[shepherd really]

The Captain just announced that due to the poor weather conditions in Punte Del Este, the stop is cancelled since tendering would be unsafe and we will proceed to Buenos Aires where we will overnight.

 

That's fine with me, I was staying three nights in BA before flying home.  Now I get an extra day there.   

[shepherd really]

23 minutes ago, ORV said:

I could have sworn I posted asking SH the same thing. Maybe it was on another thread. 

 

At any rate, we had one port that was shortened by 2 hours, but this was done a couple of months before the cruise. We had one day cut off our Antartica portion in order to outrun the storm coming in the Drake Passage. We had an extra amount of time at Ushuaia. We didn't miss any ports. 

It was the shipboard credit thread.

[LuAnn]

22 hours ago, ORV said:

If it's a TA you'll probably have one, but as Shepherd Really stated theirs was not on Sunday, so not always on a Sunday. It's quite the spread, we didn't go in there to eat, but it looked great. 

The best one for me was the one on the East Bound T/A on Marina when she was brand new. HUGE tins of caviar!!!! That's pretty much all I ate at the brunch!! I've never seen them serve it since!! 😞

[osandomir]

10 minutes ago, LuAnn said:

The best one for me was the one on the East Bound T/A on Marina when she was brand new. HUGE tins of caviar!!!! That's pretty much all I ate at the brunch!! I've never seen them serve it since!! 😞

I remember that on the brand new Marina as well. Oceania still offers a tiny amount of the black caviar in the GDR on every cruise we have been taking with them. But it definitely not the same as that brunch’s offering.

[shepherd really]

30 minutes ago, LuAnn said:

The best one for me was the one on the East Bound T/A on Marina when she was brand new. HUGE tins of caviar!!!! That's pretty much all I ate at the brunch!! I've never seen them serve it since!! 😞

 

15 minutes ago, osandomir said:

I remember that on the brand new Marina as well. Oceania still offers a tiny amount of the black caviar in the GDR on every cruise we have been taking with them. But it definitely not the same as that brunch’s offering.

They are offering it tonight in the Grand Dining Room.

[clo]

5 hours ago, shepherd really said:

That's fine with me, I was staying three nights in BA before flying home.  Now I get an extra day there.   

Ooh, lucky you. We've had great times in BA. And, oh, the food is SO good.

[JYDCruise]

44 minutes ago, clo said:

Ooh, lucky you. We've had great times in BA. And, oh, the food is SO good.

Yes, but . . . too much! We just got back from dinner at a BA steakhouse. 2 entrees, 1 steak and 1 side was more than enough for 2 of us. We then decided to share the 1/2 portion of the dessert tasting. The HALF portion. HALF. It was enough to put a family of 8 into a week-long sugar coma.

Edited March 4 by JYDCruise

[clo]

4 minutes ago, JYDCruise said:

Yes, but . . . too much! We just got back from dinner at a BA steakhouse. 2 entrees, 1 steak and 1 side was more than enough for 2 of us. We then decided to share the 1/2 portion of the dessert tasting. The HALF portion. HALF. It was enough to put a family of 8 into a week-long sugar coma.

Well, we always share. Plus we were staying in an Airbnb so we had leftovers 🙂 Oh, and that big dinner was at an Italian place .(They are who settled BA. We had (shared again) a wonderful lunch with steak.

[coachma]

On 3/2/2024 at 5:26 AM, shepherd really said:

Compared to the $200 Falklands penguin tour I booked,

Thanks for posting about your experience - it's very helpful in planning our trip next February - lots of great info.

We are considering the Adventure Falklands tour. Is that the tour you booked? If not, who did you go with?

TIA -

[shepherd really]

23 minutes ago, coachma said:

Thanks for posting about your experience - it's very helpful in planning our trip next February - lots of great info.

We are considering the Adventure Falklands tour. Is that the tour you booked? If not, who did you go with?

TIA -

Yes, it was Falklands adventure 

[JYDCruise]

To help keep this topic/thread going, we are currently on the Marina, boarding yesterday in Buenos Aires and are now in Montevideo, Uruguay. Some of my comments will be newbie-ish, as this is our first cruise on Oceania (and only 4th overall).

 

Despite having to go to an alternative port location (Oceania fully informed us of this), boarding was efficient and quick. We were able to book an additional specialty at Toscana for 8:30 which was fine with us and then wandered the entire ship. To my inexperienced eye, the ship seems to be in fine condition. Is there a bit of minor wear here and there if you look specifically for it? Sure, ships are exposed to pretty rough environments, so of course it's not 100% just off the showroom floor, but really not that far off.

 

Dinner at Toscana was fine, if not particularly exciting. The dishes were all cooked properly, the pasta was quite nice and the lobster itself (risotto and tagliatelle) was good, just that none of the dishes are anything that we'll remember in a day or two. The service was good, though the olive oil introduction was done at light-speed and the concept, while interesting, falls flat. Note that the menu isn't exactly what is shown on the website, but that's doubtless due to seasonality and sourcing (though it wouldn't be hard for them to show the current menu, really) and it's probably 85-90% the same as online.

 

We stopped by the casino and watched for a bit - maybe 10 people playing table games, plus a few at the slots. People were having fun, though I don't know that this can really be much of a profit center for Oceania.

 

Montevideo was very nice, and the weather was absolutely perfect. We booked an independent walking tour and had a good guide. I'd be interested in coming back for a few days to see more of Uruguay.

[FetaCheese]

@JYDCruise

Thanks for continuing the topic.

 

Enjoy your 1st O cruise!

[JYDCruise]

Day 5 on the Buenos Aires - Rio cruise. Today is Balneario Camboriu . . . or rather, it was supposed to be. In what appears to be an Oceania tradition, though we are anchored in port, the Captain has determined that it is too choppy for the tenders to operate so today is "cancelled" and will become a second consecutive sea day. There are certainly some swells, but to my untrained eye it doesn't look too bad (no whitecaps, but more of a rolling wave, maybe 4 feet???) - but there's a reason that he is the captain, and I am not! The crew scrambled to change the day's activities, and we all had a revised schedule by 9:30 or so.

 

12:30 now, and we're still at anchor. The morning cancellation announcement indicated we'd be here for a couple of hours while the Brazil immigration was processed but perhaps it's going slower than anticipated. They have opened the GDR for lunch, since it's now a "sea day".

 

Sea day activities included gaming tournaments, slots, blackjack and poker. My son and I played in the Texas Hold'em tournament. There were 3 tables, top 3 places paid out 50/30/20. When we got to the final 4, there were two big stacks, two small (though given the huge blind increases, nobody really had that many chips) and we agreed that the 2 big stacks would split the first and second place prizes, and the 2 small stacks split third place. As my son had one of the big stacks, and I had one of the small, it worked out pretty well for us! 😁 

 

One bit of a surprise - as yesterday was a sea day, I thought the laundry room would be packed but I was able to jump right in and get a load done.

 

The entertainment last night was Fred Becker, a magician/comic, and I enjoyed his show. In my limited experience, the comics on board cruise ships are dated (Azamara comic kept referencing his time working on Benny Hill . . . ) with bland material and, well, just not that funny. Becker, however, interacted well with the audience, had a funny routine, good improv skills and decent magic tricks. He's doing another show on the last night, and I'll definitely go.

 

Our second go-round at Toscana was pretty much the same as the first - good if not great food, good if not great service (see: auctioneer-speed olive oil salesman). Viz-a-viz Azamara's Aqualina, I'd give Toscana the edge and of course there's no additional fee. Could Toscana make it as a land-based restaurant? I think if the food was reasonably priced (think mid-range/family restaurant), then yes, it could; it's certainly better than some of my local options. The food wouldn't justify luxury or high-end pricing, though.

 

Last night was Indian food in the Terrace Cafe, and it was pretty good, better than I had thought it might be (note that I come from the San Jose area, where we have a lot of Indian restaurants, and we eat Indian food on a regular basis), with the lamb surprisingly well spiced. Well done, Oceania!

[SophieM]

Idle curiosity question to anyone who is on this cruise or the last one. How is the new cruise director doing? She seemed a bit of an odd choice to me, but what do I know??

[Snaefell3]

1 hour ago, JYDCruise said:

the Captain has determined that it is too choppy for the tenders to operate so today is "cancelled" and will become a second consecutive sea day. There are certainly some swells, but to my untrained eye it doesn't look too bad (no whitecaps, but more of a rolling wave, maybe 4 feet???) - but there's a reason that he is the captain, and I am not!

The problem often is that if the forecast says conditions might kick up before the last tender of the day is scheduled to run and can't, he doesn't want pax stranded ashore.

[Jamietravelstheworld]

1 hour ago, SophieM said:

Idle curiosity question to anyone who is on this cruise or the last one. How is the new cruise director doing? She seemed a bit of an odd choice to me, but what do I know??

I think she’s doing a good job. She got a great full day schedule out very quickly today when port visit was cancelled. And she seems to listen to passenger concerns/requests when possible. 

[Jamietravelstheworld]

7 minutes ago, Snaefell3 said:

The problem often is that if the forecast says conditions might kick up before the last tender of the day is scheduled to run and can't, he doesn't want pax stranded ashore.

 

Just now, Jamietravelstheworld said:

I was talking with a crew member who said she saw when they dropped anchor and the swells were high then and the ship was struggling with staying steady for that. (I may not be explaining this right but that was my understanding of what she said.) If it was tough to drop anchor, imagine how hard it would be to line the tenders up next to the ship. 

[SophieM]

1 hour ago, Snaefell3 said:

The problem often is that if the forecast says conditions might kick up before the last tender of the day is scheduled to run and can't, he doesn't want pax stranded ashore.

We had that happen in February. It was fine going in, but it turned really rough in the afternoon. We were on one of the last tenders, and it was really rough. After a few passes, we were able to pull along side, but then the mooring rope broke, and it took several more. Several people were rather panicked. Not us, though. 🙂