Rare lorimay Posted July 23 #1 Share Posted July 23 This post was recognized by LauraS! "And another from lorimay! Thank you for generously sharing your time at sea with everyone at Cruise Critic!" lorimay was awarded the badge '"Live from...."' and 5 points. Hello from the beautiful Vista. We boarded today after a few days in Athens before the cruise. We traveled on Friday and luckily did not have any airline delays, but made the mistake of having a transfer at London Heathrow. This was discussed recently in a different thread and please read it if you are considering a transfer that requires going to another terminal at Heathrow. We had a 90 minute timeframe which was barely enough, but the the hassle of the whole thing made us decided to never do it again. The ordeal includes very long walks, a bus transfer, many, many escalators, multiple security screenings if you aren't lucky (I got screened three times and had a major issue over a very small bottle of hand sanitizer I forgot was in my suitcase), then a train ride and many more escalators. We had been on the Marina and Riviera but this is our first time on the Vista. It is stunning and very reminiscent of the Regent Grandeur, which we sailed in December. I love the cool colors. Embarkation was the easist we have had on Oceania, although we did have to take a shuttle bus to the ship. But they had lots of staff doing checkin and it probably only took 20 minutes from luggage drop off to getting on the ship. We arrived early because our check out time at the hotel was 11, so our A2 stateroom wasn't ready. Ate a light lunch in Terrace Grill, did our muster check in, then spent a little time in Martinis waiting for the room. Since we don't drink alcohol, this is probably the only time we will be there. The string quartet was playing and they were very good. The ship seems very well staffed and everyone is very happy. Great service everywhere. The food at the buffet was good, but my Oceania complaint is that they have almost no ingredients at the salad bar. I noticed that on our other cruises and clearly nothing has changed. Concierge staterooms opened at 1:30. We have an extended balcony cabin on deck 8. I really like the cabin, but feel that there the storage was not very well thought out. Not enough deep drawers. Most of them are so shallow you can't fit much in them. Another minor complaint - the hangers in the closet do not have grooves to hold shirts on them. All of my stretchy shirts keep sliding off. I know, first world complaint, but I just can't understand why no one thought about that. Our room steward Luka seems wonderful. The cabin is very clean and we like the deep balcony. We had a penthouse on the Marina with a horrible butler experience, so we have gone for veranda cabins since then. However, I don't know if I could do a long cruise in this cabin. Maybe I'm spoiled after the Regent cruise, where the standard veranda cabin we had was full of storage and lots of space - probably the same size as a Vista penthouse. We were offered an upgrade to a PH for $1000 each this week, but didn't feel like spending the extra. I decided to do a load of laundry since we sweated through our clothes in Athens. If you aren't aware, they are having a heat wave and the temperature has been in the high 90's and above. Sightseeing was miserable. First time in Athens and probably the last as I was not impressed. We love history and the ruins are great, but the rest of the city looks like it was bombed out with lots of abandoned buildings and graffiti everywhere. The laundry was hopping but I got a washer and put my clothes in. I was delayed by our room steward so was about five minutes late to get my washing and someone had already taken it out of the machine. I got dirty looks when I started putting it into the dryer. I have previously had some weird encounters in the Oceania laundry room, so I wasn't surprised. The passengers are a very international group. Have heard a lot of non-English language. It's fun to try and guess what language they are speaking in the elevator.. I think Americans may be in the minority. It is also a much younger crowd than on our other Oceania cruises and we have seen quite a few well-behaved children. We ate dinner in the Terrace. I just couldn't face a long sit down meal in the GDR, which is not our favorite place anyway. The sushi station is excellent and I think a great addition. I had lamb chops and lobster tail from the grill - what can be better than that? We went to the show at 9:30. Did I forget to mention that the cruise director is Julie? I am not enjoying her at all. My husband told me not to be mean so I won't say anything else about her. The entertainment staff seems very talented, much more talented than the staff on the Regent cruise, and put on a nice show. The show band is great. Apparently there have been a lot of issues with the excursions and the heat. We received advisories about three of our booked excursions. One was changed from moderate to strenuous activity, and the the other two had heat advisories. We are rethinking some of our choices. We found the heat so oppressive in Athens that it is dangerous, even drinking a lot of water. Tomorrow is Santorini. We plan to get off the ship late afternoon since there are supposed to be a lot of other ships in port and we're hoping the cable car line will be shorter. I'm happy to answer questions if I can. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
basor Posted July 23 #2 Share Posted July 23 27 minutes ago, lorimay said: Hello from the beautiful Vista. We boarded today after a few days in Athens before the cruise. We traveled on Friday and luckily did not have any airline delays, but made the mistake of having a transfer at London Heathrow. This was discussed recently in a different thread and please read it if you are considering a transfer that requires going to another terminal at Heathrow. We had a 90 minute timeframe which was barely enough, but the the hassle of the whole thing made us decided to never do it again. The ordeal includes very long walks, a bus transfer, many, many escalators, multiple security screenings if you aren't lucky (I got screened three times and had a major issue over a very small bottle of hand sanitizer I forgot was in my suitcase), then a train ride and many more escalators. We had been on the Marina and Riviera but this is our first time on the Vista. It is stunning and very reminiscent of the Regent Grandeur, which we sailed in December. I love the cool colors. Embarkation was the easist we have had on Oceania, although we did have to take a shuttle bus to the ship. But they had lots of staff doing checkin and it probably only took 20 minutes from luggage drop off to getting on the ship. We arrived early because our check out time at the hotel was 11, so our A2 stateroom wasn't ready. Ate a light lunch in Terrace Grill, did our muster check in, then spent a little time in Martinis waiting for the room. Since we don't drink alcohol, this is probably the only time we will be there. The string quartet was playing and they were very good. The ship seems very well staffed and everyone is very happy. Great service everywhere. The food at the buffet was good, but my Oceania complaint is that they have almost no ingredients at the salad bar. I noticed that on our other cruises and clearly nothing has changed. Concierge staterooms opened at 1:30. We have an extended balcony cabin on deck 8. I really like the cabin, but feel that there the storage was not very well thought out. Not enough deep drawers. Most of them are so shallow you can't fit much in them. Another minor complaint - the hangers in the closet do not have grooves to hold shirts on them. All of my stretchy shirts keep sliding off. I know, first world complaint, but I just can't understand why no one thought about that. Our room steward Luka seems wonderful. The cabin is very clean and we like the deep balcony. We had a penthouse on the Marina with a horrible butler experience, so we have gone for veranda cabins since then. However, I don't know if I could do a long cruise in this cabin. Maybe I'm spoiled after the Regent cruise, where the standard veranda cabin we had was full of storage and lots of space - probably the same size as a Vista penthouse. We were offered an upgrade to a PH for $1000 each this week, but didn't feel like spending the extra. I decided to do a load of laundry since we sweated through our clothes in Athens. If you aren't aware, they are having a heat wave and the temperature has been in the high 90's and above. Sightseeing was miserable. First time in Athens and probably the last as I was not impressed. We love history and the ruins are great, but the rest of the city looks like it was bombed out with lots of abandoned buildings and graffiti everywhere. The laundry was hopping but I got a washer and put my clothes in. I was delayed by our room steward so was about five minutes late to get my washing and someone had already taken it out of the machine. I got dirty looks when I started putting it into the dryer. I have previously had some weird encounters in the Oceania laundry room, so I wasn't surprised. The passengers are a very international group. Have heard a lot of non-English language. It's fun to try and guess what language they are speaking in the elevator.. I think Americans may be in the minority. It is also a much younger crowd than on our other Oceania cruises and we have seen quite a few well-behaved children. We ate dinner in the Terrace. I just couldn't face a long sit down meal in the GDR, which is not our favorite place anyway. The sushi station is excellent and I think a great addition. I had lamb chops and lobster tail from the grill - what can be better than that? We went to the show at 9:30. Did I forget to mention that the cruise director is Julie? I am not enjoying her at all. My husband told me not to be mean so I won't say anything else about her. The entertainment staff seems very talented, much more talented than the staff on the Regent cruise, and put on a nice show. The show band is great. Apparently there have been a lot of issues with the excursions and the heat. We received advisories about three of our booked excursions. One was changed from moderate to strenuous activity, and the the other two had heat advisories. We are rethinking some of our choices. We found the heat so oppressive in Athens that it is dangerous, even drinking a lot of water. Tomorrow is Santorini. We plan to get off the ship late afternoon since there are supposed to be a lot of other ships in port and we're hoping the cable car line will be shorter. I'm happy to answer questions if I can. We are boarding in Athens and taking a similar itinerary on Riviera mid Oct....hopefully the weather will be cooler and fewer crowds. Looking forward to your blog and appreciate all your insights. We sailed on Vista last Fall and it is beautiful!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhD-iva Posted July 24 #3 Share Posted July 24 Thx for your posts! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vertygo Posted July 24 #4 Share Posted July 24 Thank you for your post. I’ll be on the Istanbul to Athens leg next week & am looking forward to your further updates to get me more excited than I already am. I’m also on an extended balcony on 8-8120. Let me know how noise level is in your cabin please. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare lorimay Posted July 24 Author #5 Share Posted July 24 We’re just a few doors away from your cabin. I was concerned about the crew door across from us but no noise at all from that direction. We could hear talking from the cabin next door but it wasn’t loud and didn’t last long. I am a light sleeper and sensitive to noise and it was silent last night. I will say it’s a long walk to the other end of the ship and up one floor to the concierge lounge. We don’t hang out there but checked it out. Snacks are nothing special and it’s a windowless room. Furniture was comfortable. Not a perk we will be using much. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
janieb1962 Posted July 24 #6 Share Posted July 24 9 hours ago, Vertygo said: Thank you for your post. I’ll be on the Istanbul to Athens leg next week & am looking forward to your further updates to get me more excited than I already am. I’m also on an extended balcony on 8-8120. Let me know how noise level is in your cabin please. Us too… hoping it will be fantastic… our first time with Oceania 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vertygo Posted July 24 #7 Share Posted July 24 22 minutes ago, janieb1962 said: Us too… hoping it will be fantastic… our first time with Oceania I think you’ll find many things to like about O. This is only my 3rd cruise, but I’m back because the 1st 2 (pre-Covid) were wonderful. Looking forward to Vista! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare ronrick1943 Posted July 24 #8 Share Posted July 24 Thanks so much for your detailed post and taking the time from your trip. Looking forward to reading more. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare asnaleah Posted July 24 #9 Share Posted July 24 Thanks for posting! We sail Vista in January, so I’ll be following along for all your tips about the ship. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Queen of DaNile Posted July 24 #10 Share Posted July 24 20 hours ago, lorimay said: Apparently there have been a lot of issues with the excursions and the heat. We received advisories about three of our booked excursions. One was changed from moderate to strenuous activity, and the the other two had heat advisories. We are rethinking some of our choices. We found the heat so oppressive in Athens that it is dangerous, even drinking a lot of water. We disembarked Riviera last week in Istanbul and the heat was oppressive. We had anticipated the heat (and the crowds) and used our SM credits to book excursions that involved going out on small boats in several ports. If you're interested and there is still availability, the Gulet sail around Bodrum might be a possibility when you're there. That, and the private catamaran in Santorini were the best Oceania excursions we've ever experienced. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dock Posted July 24 #11 Share Posted July 24 On Vista at present. Will do a review once I’m back home. @Queen of DaNile, did the Gulet have some shade? We are booked on the tour, but am a bit ambivalent . Thank you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare lorimay Posted July 24 Author #12 Share Posted July 24 Today we were in Santorini, along with at least eight other ships. We were planning to get off in the afternoon, but after hearing the announcements in the morning of the port being so crowded that they could only assign one tender to the Vista, then shutting down tender service due to overcrowding in the port, plus the heat, we made the decision to stay on board. We'lll have to come back another time. I just couldn't face a long wait in the sun for the cable car. I think the Vista is a huge step up in design from the Marina and Riviera. What I like about the Vista so far: -The decor -The layout of the Grand Dining Room. I think they layout with dividers and separate "rooms" makes dining more intimate. One of the things that has turned me off on the older Celebrity ships (the cruise line we have mostly traveled with) is those large banquet style dining rooms. -Terrace Grill layout - once again some separation between eating areas -Pool deck. I absolutely love the little "cabana" areas in the shade on the side. We spent the morning there with beautiful views and a breeze from the open window and actually had a little privacy. -The bakery area and the enlarged Baristas seating area with more comfortable seating -The beautiful, larger, more private library -Enlarged Waves with table service (and expanded menu) -There is an enclosed smoking room on the pool deck and not open air smoking What I don't like: -The silly layout so that the aft elevator doesn't go down below deck 6. So stupid. - lack of usable storage in the cabin -noise from other cabins. Today we can clearly hear the tv and conversation from the next cabin. It seems to come from behind the tv. Service continues to be excellent. The food has been good, although we have only had pretty standard items from the menu. Ate breakfast in the GDR and the food was good. Nothing outstanding. Ate at Waves for lunch and had a good Philly cheesesteak, which wasn't authentic but tasted good. Dinner in the GDR where we had excellent prime rib and wonderful conversation with the couple at the next table. Continue to not enjoy Julie, the cruise director. She handled trivia today and really did not seem to be enjoying herself - it was more like a chore. I found other people are also not enjoying her. She seems nice but somehow grates on my nerves. The show tonight was Martin Kaye, who energetically sang and played the piano. We left part way through - not my kind of entertainment but he seemed very talented. Tomorrow we will be in Heraklion. Came back to the room after the show at about 10pm to find a letter from Destination Services that our tour to Palace of Knossos had been canceled by the operator because of a strike. No alternative given. I think we will take a taxi into town and do a walking tour. We switched our tour in Bodrum to the gulet boat I was glad to hear someone post that it's a good excursion. Tomorrow night we have a reservation in Polo Grill. So far it's been a very relaxing cruise with no major snags, good food and very nice people. 7 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Queen of DaNile Posted July 24 #13 Share Posted July 24 4 hours ago, dock said: On Vista at present. Will do a review once I’m back home. @Queen of DaNile, did the Gulet have some shade? We are booked on the tour, but am a bit ambivalent . Thank you. Lots of shade. There was a large covered area in the rear and they lowered some sun awnings from the mast if you wanted to lounge in the front. Daria was an excellent guide and the whole experience was lovely. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Queen of DaNile Posted July 24 #14 Share Posted July 24 3 hours ago, lorimay said: Tomorrow we will be in Heraklion. Came back to the room after the show at about 10pm to find a letter from Destination Services that our tour to Palace of Knossos had been canceled by the operator because of a strike. No alternative given. I think we will take a taxi into town and do a walking tour. We switched our tour in Bodrum to the gulet boat I was glad to hear someone post that it's a good excursion. The Greek tour guides were on strike (sometimes) earlier this month. Riviera switched ports and went to Bodrum and then Crete to work around the problem. Knossos is easy enough to do on your own but NO shade. Agree with you that the aft elevator arrangement on Vista is ridiculous. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare mauibabes Posted July 25 #15 Share Posted July 25 Aft elevator story. This issue was brought up over a year ago May with FDR and here is the answer. The elevator could NOT continue down to 5 because it would be in the middle of the Ember kitchen. While this is a definite inconvenience for passengers, that is the “Rest of the Story”. I can only guess it will be the same situation on Allura. Mauibabes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edgee Posted July 25 #16 Share Posted July 25 23 hours ago, lorimay said: Today we can clearly hear the tv and conversation from the next cabin. It seems to come from behind the tv. After two cruises totalling 27 nights on Vista, highly unlikely we will cruise on her again. The noise between the cabins issue is pervasive. Those who have not had a problem are lucky. Period. Does not matter location or type of cabin, according to my conversations with the General Manager. One's ability to enjoy the cruise, based on luck of having quiet neighbors is unacceptable. Understand that Regent Grandeur (built in same shipyard shortly after Vista) has the same issue. 8 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare lorimay Posted July 25 Author #17 Share Posted July 25 I can confirm the Regent Grandeur has the same issue. We were on it in December and had the same issue. No noise today from the next cabin so I guess we are lucky. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tranquility Base Posted July 26 #18 Share Posted July 26 7 hours ago, edgee said: Does not matter location or type of cabin, according to my conversations with the General Manager. Was any short term or long term fix mentioned ? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edgee Posted July 26 #19 Share Posted July 26 4 hours ago, Tranquility Base said: Was any short term or long term fix mentioned ? No mention to me, but a frequent reviewer posted that he was told Oceania would be addressing the problem. I have seen no specifics about whether it will have to wait until dry dock or can be done during ongoing operations. One very partial, but easy fix IMHO would be to install forward facing sound bars on tvs to eliminate sound from back of tvs pointing directly toward poorly insulated wall. Lots of discussion of that on other threads. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare lorimay Posted July 26 Author #20 Share Posted July 26 Yesterday we were in Heraklion. Because our excursion was canceled the night before, we didn't have plans. If we had known how small the old city is we would have just walked arountd, but since we didn't know the area we took the hop on hop off bus. Got off and walked up the main road to the fountain. I tried to buy a pair of shoes from one of the many shops, but apparently I offended the shopkeeper because I didn't know my European shoe size and she couldn't convert it. After telling me they didn't have a pair in my size, she didn't want to sell me anything and turned her back on me. Heraklion is a nice city. The bus took us out to the Palace of Knossos entrance. Our excursion was canceled because the tour guides were supposedly on strike, but the place was mobbed and we heard someone say the line to get in was very long. Got back to the ship in time for lunch at Waves, A nice basic lunch, as always. At 4pm we went to trivia. There's not a huge crowd at trivia on this cruise. We have a very port intensive tinerary and a very international crowd so that might be the reason. Once again, Julie said she had to hurry to get to a cocktail party. I do wish that Oceania had a few more activities. I'm not talking belly flop contests, but a couple more interactive things throughout the day would be nice besides putting and baggo. A round of name that tune or another quiz would be welcome. This has been my complaint since our first Oceania cruise - it's all about the food and not much else. The crowd on this ship is much younger, which may be the trend, and Oceania is going to have to adapt. I asked a crew member this morning and found out the ship is at basically full capacity - about 1180 passengers. The way Vista is designed it never feels crowded except in the Terrace in the mornings. We ate at Polo for dinner last night. The food was very good and of course service was excellent. My husband's steak was delivered medium well instead of medium, but he had already complained about the ketchip/honey salad dressing for the BLT salad, so he didn't want to send it back. It was still very tasty and well prepared. I had the lobster wellington which was well prepared but very rich. Overall, a good meal but I wasn't wowed. The show was "Into the Night" by the production cast. We had seen this show on the Regent Grandeur, but this cast was much more talented. I'm continuing to love the Vista despite a few quirks. I'm sitting at the AquaMar Spa Terrace now and it's absolutely stunning. A great place to spend a quiet morning. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dock Posted July 26 #21 Share Posted July 26 (edited) We’re heading ashore soon. Our Gulet tour was cancelled for later today. Found out about an hour ago so will just amble. Bit frustrating lol . Now that I can’t do it, I want to! We must have great neighbours. No noise at all. Edited July 26 by dock Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare lorimay Posted July 26 Author #22 Share Posted July 26 3 hours ago, dock said: We’re heading ashore soon. Our Gulet tour was cancelled for later today. Found out about an hour ago so will just amble. Bit frustrating lol . Now that I can’t do it, I want to! We must have great neighbours. No noise at all. We were on the same tour and found out last minute too. Destination services was already closed. Very frustrating because out tour yesterday was canceled too. When we got outside we realized they weren’t lying that it was too windy. We were blown down the pier. It will be interesting to see how the money works out. We had $300 in simply more credits. Took a sixth excursion so got the discount for all of them. Now we are below the threshold for the discount. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WildWanderers Posted July 26 #23 Share Posted July 26 Hi All, We are at the end of a corridor with only one neighbour, but can hear our neighbours when we are in the bathroom, as if they were standing next to us. We do not hear them in the bedroom though, so are able to sleep. We have seen more children on this cruise than we have in the total of our previous 12. Might there be 50 or so? Most of them are adorable and polite. Last night however there was a group with 4 adults and 5 children who sat several tables away from us on the Terrace Café for the special Greek dinner. They were referred to by our sommelière as "that Portuguese family". The children screamed in high pitch, yelled at one another, and ran around. The parents were oblivious. We tried to move as far away as we could from them, and even then they were deafening. We moved inside where it was cooler and quiet. We would have preferred the panoramic view from the Terrace but tranquility trumped view. A weird experience for us on Oceania, one we moved to Oceania to avoid. Later we noticed that there was a periphery of at least 3 empty tables surrounding "that Portuguese family", still making quite a racket. Our culinary experience was cancelled on day 2. Our excursion on day 3 was moved to the lunch hour so we just skipped it. Another tour later on has been pushed to the lunch-hour so we will likely skip it too. We try hard to avoid tours over the lunch hour so are surprise to have had two switched to the lunch hour at the last minute. The operative phrase has been "for operational reason". The cancellation on day three we think had something to do with a strike of museum-type workers which was certainly out of the control of Oceania. The Vista is out-of-this-world gorgeous. We really enjoyed our dinner in Ember. The food, service and ambience were outstanding. It is fun to be able to see into the working kitchen. It is not what I had expected having read so many negative reviews. We were seated next to a window, and I did notice that it was quite loud in the middle of the restaurant. Everyone has a different experience. In case this is useful, Greg from the WildWanderers. 4 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare lorimay Posted July 26 Author #24 Share Posted July 26 We have Ember tonight. I’m looking forward to it. The menu is different than I expected. i think your estimate of the number of children is about right. So far we have not seen any bad behavior. One family even brought their nanny (she was wearing a uniform). We ate in the Terrace the first night near the family you are talking about. The staff wanted to move us because the baby was shrieking. Luckily it didn’t last long. I think they try to keep everyone away from their table. I’m beginning to think this cruise is fundamentally different. I’m not sure how Oceania marketed it, but there are tons of Aussies on this cruise, an equal number of Brits, and a large contingent speaking Spanish or Portuguese. Americans are definitely in the minority. Also quite a few groups of Asians. Many large family groups overall. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Queen of DaNile Posted July 26 #25 Share Posted July 26 1 hour ago, lorimay said: We were on the same tour and found out last minute too. Destination services was already closed. Very frustrating because out tour yesterday was canceled too. When we got outside we realized they weren’t lying that it was too windy. We were blown down the pier. It will be interesting to see how the money works out. We had $300 in simply more credits. Took a sixth excursion so got the discount for all of them. Now we are below the threshold for the discount. I believe they'll still honor the discount. I used some non-refundable(different from the SM excursion credit) to get the discount and when that excursion was cancelled, they put it back on my account and the other excursions still reflected the discounted amount. Hope that makes sense? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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