Majesty my thoughts

We have now been back from our cruise for a week having sailed on the Majesty for the Aegean Delights and Adriatic Adventure and thought I would give you my perception of this ship.

We travelled with another couple primarily to celebrate our 30th Wedding Anniversary, this was our 3rd cruise having sailed on the Spirit and with P&O.

FLIGHT: Although we live in the Midlands we decided to travel from Manchester as we could then meet up with our friends, unfortunately the flight was delayed by 2 hours, when we eventually boarded the plane it was a First Choice aircraft which provided plenty of legroom even in the cheap seats. My only comment would be that each seat has an inbuilt entertainment system which you could not use apart from the safety video so no in flight movie or radio for the 3.5 hour flight.

CHECK IN: On arrival we were obviously lucky and our baggage was straight off the aircraft and we were meet and on a coach for the short drive to the port in double quick time, check in was just as smooth and very quick as we were the last ones to board. Even then by the time we found our rooms our baggage was already there.

CABIN: Having read on this site the many comments regarding the cabin size I expected the worst, we never bother with a suite or balcony as we rarely spend any time in the cabin apart from sleep and getting changed. The inside cabins on Majesty are small but perfectly adequate my only minor complaint would be the size of the wardrobe which is fairly tight, we kept our suitcases under the bed and used them to store t shirts, shorts etc. An added bonus was that all cabins now have tea & coffee making facilities which I believe was new for our cruise. The bathroom was ok and had good water pressure.

SHIP: The ship is certainly much nicer than the spirit (and no judder) and has recently had a complete carpet refit (as well as having balconies built) whilst it is a nice ship I struggled with the layout especially in the evenings when you had to walk from one end of the ship to the other to see entertainment, I would also agree with the comments about the pillars in the Main Theatre which are very annoying. The Dining facilities (Four Seasons, Seven Seas and both buffet dining rooms on deck 10 are perfectly adequate as are the other public areas.

FOOD: We tended to eat in the buffet at lunchtime and in The Seven Seas Restaurant in the evening, the food was ok, generally hot and plenty of it. I would say that it was better that P&O BUT was not as good as the Spirit, our evening meal was always nice with a good choice but was no more than that, I found this slightly disappointing as we had what I could only call a fine dining experience on the Spirit. First time cruisers would probably be impressed by the food. I am still amazed by the amount of people to make packed lunches on the ship to take ashore, I always love to try the local delicacies which are usually very cheap and means we can help with the local economy.

DRINKS PACKAGE: We were lucky to get an early bird drinks package at £68 per person per week, we certainly had our monies worth! There is plenty to choose from and the House Wines are palatable, there is a good selection of cocktails which are included in the package, we made the mistake of thinking they were not very strong and found this to be completely wrong after 5 or 6! An added bonus is that coffee i.e. Latte and cappuccino are included in the package as well as fruit juices.

STAFF: My overriding memory of the Spirit was the staff, who were primarily Filipino or Indian and were fantastic, whilst the staff on board Majesty were generally excellent there are a lot of Eastern Europeans who from my experience can be surly by nature, I think this proved the case on the Majesty. The waiters in the Seven Seas were excellent, we used the same table for 4 every night and our every need was met by our waiters Ricky and Matt and the Wine Waiter Allen ensured a glasses were full all through dinner.

ENTERTAINMENT: There are shows in the main theatre most evenings, again using the Spirit as a gauge I was slightly disappointed. On the Spirit the shows were generally based around West End productions (not all but most) where as the Majesty show team tended to concentrate on artists or themes. If I am brutally honest the guys were very good and harmonised nicely but the girls were average at best, I have to admit that I even walked out of one performance during the Michael Jackson tribute as it was so bloody awful! The quizzes and shows in Royal Fireworks were well run and generally great fun. There are a number of supporting groups which include Music Unlimited (excellent) and Rhythm of Three who were ok depending on what they were singing.

GIMMICKS: This is the only way I can describe them, Thomson sell lottery tickets which are drawn by using the roulette table each week all I would say is read the small print, there is also a Jackpot on the Stud Poker table again read the small print, additionally each week a draw is made for a free trip to Vegas, again this is not what it seems as you only win an entry into another draw, again read the small print!!!

DESTINATIONS: This was a busy cruise (back to back for us) with only 2 sea days, whilst all the destinations are excellent our highlights would have to be Venice (get in early and out before the crowds start) Kusadsi for Ephesus (worth doing the trip) and Kotor in Montenegro (do your own thing the town is next to the port and is stunning), Piraeus for Athens (the acropolis is amazing). All the other locations including Bodrum (shopping), Corfu, Koper, Zadar etc are all absolutely stunning and well worth visiting, most can be explored on your own as the ship is docked very near to the sites of interest.

RETURN: Unfortunately we had an evening flight out of Corfu which meant we were hanging around all day, we paid £35 to keep a room until 5pm which I believe was well worth it, there is an option to use a room provided by the ship for a shower and to get changed. Now comes my biggest gripe Corfu airport, when we arrived there were 3 queues the longest (ours) was 300 yards long outside the airport on the pavement. The only saving grace was that it was early evening and slightly cooler I dread to think what it would be like during the day. There was a complete lack of information from the Thomson staff and for me the biggest travesty was that there were a significant number of old people who were left to stand and queue for more than 2 hours - bloody disgusting.

SUMMARY: Quality destinations, OK Ship. We had a nice holiday but it was not the most memorable. Would we sail with Thomson again? Probably not in the foreseeable future and certainly not if it involves Corfu Airport.

This is my thoughts, experience and opinion from this cruise and obviously I fully respect that other cruisers may have a completely different perspective on the same journey.:)

Thanks for review, interesting for me as I have been on Majesty 2 years ago, my first cruise and am booked on Spirit next month so was good to read your comparisons of the two. I enjoyed Majesty and hope Spirit will be just as good. Thanks.

We had our first Majesty cruise in May and loved her. Pretty much the same as your review really, but we didn't do the casino. I didn't find any problems with the ordinary inside cabin for space with the cases under the bed. Will be on Spirit for the first time on Tuesday, so can see how they compare. Loved both Dream and Island Escape. They are different, but love them all the same. Maybe we are smitten with the cruising bug now we have discovered how good it is.

Good review thanks..

I'm a bit confused regarding your comment about having to walk the length of the ship to see the entertainment as the majority of dining, the restaurants and largest buffet are at the stern as is the main Jubilee Lounge?

Thankyou for the interesting review.It was lovely to read your comments.

I have been on both ships and I too found the East European staff surly, and stroppy!- it comes as a shock after the happy and cheerful Philipino gems!

The fiasco at Corfu airport is well known- the airport is just too small for the amount of traffic passing through and the way they get you to check in and then give your luggage back to you, to queue again then to haul your cases onto the scanner, adds to the time it takes to get through to the departure lounge! I try to avoid the place and opt for cruises starting elsewhere!

Flopsy

Thankyou for the interesting review.It was lovely to read your comments.

 

I have been on both ships and I too found the East European staff surly, and stroppy!- it comes as a shock after the happy and cheerful Philipino gems!

 

The fiasco at Corfu airport is well known- the airport is just too small for the amount of traffic passing through and the way they get you to check in and then give your luggage back to you, to queue again then to haul your cases onto the scanner, adds to the time it takes to get through to the departure lounge! I try to avoid the place and opt for cruises starting elsewhere!

 

Flopsy

I have just been on Majesty and found no problem at all with the East European staff :confused::confused::confused:

I have just been on Majesty and found no problem at all with the East European staff :confused::confused::confused:

Similar dave.Found the east european staff on the Maj equally as happy and as cheerful as the non european staff on the maj or the dream for that matter

I do agree with Flopsy regards Corfu airport though,utter shambles.Thought Heraklion was bad but Corfu tops it

I have just been on Majesty and found no problem at all with the East European staff :confused::confused::confused:

Nor did we! Our cabin steward Tatiana was joy and everyone else spoke and smiled.

We found the Eastern European staff much friendlier this year than two years ago. Agree about the airport although again this time we were lucky and went through very quickly. My son tells me the check in system is the same at some of the huge American airports. I think it was LAX where he came across it this year!

I have just been on Majesty and found no problem at all with the East European staff :confused::confused::confused:

same as that......all the crew are first rate...excellent :cool: in my experience

Majesty not in the same league as the Spirit,which is far nicer, we have on Majesty once and we have only had one issue with a crew bartender on any Thomson ship, this was the Majesty, sorry but it,s not for us, they should replace the Island Escape with it.

Just my bad experience with the East European staff then.

On one occasion I signed a bar slip and the East European girl gave it back to me and said I must sign it exactly on the line! I felt ticked off!

On another day in San Marco restaurant I ordered a glass of wine, which was brought in a plastic 'glass' which I thought looked unclean. I remarked 'this glass looks a bit dirty' and the East European girl said 'No, its not dirty its just old' and walked off but stood watching me to see if I mentioned it to my husband who had just joined me- but I didn't. I wasn't on the open deck so I don't see why I had to have the wine in a scratched old plastic 'glass'. She must have had second thoughts because ten minutes later she came back with another two glasses, in a proper glasses not plastic. My husband who knew nothing of the previous conversation said 'oh sorry,it's not ours, we haven't ordered this'. She said 'it's on the house' which really puzzled him lol. We were on all inclusive!

Flopsy

Flopsy, now you mention it I saw a similar episode in San Marco although I didn't hear what was actually said. You weren't on the last week in June were you?:)

its not really fair to taint an entire nation just because one girl brought you an old glass once:confused::confused:

its not really fair to taint an entire nation just because one girl brought you an old glass once:confused::confused:

Especially as she then brought you 2 glasses by way of apology?

I was point blank ignored on more than one occasion by the two Eastern European waitresses in the Royal Observatory! Sat with empty glasses for ages whilst they walked past our table. Tried a polite "excuse me" as one walked past and was ignored completely, tried louder, same response. Happened on different days with different waitresses.

Flopsy, now you mention it I saw a similar episode in San Marco although I didn't hear what was actually said. You weren't on the last week in June were you?:)

No, I was on at the beginning of May.

Flopsy

its not really fair to taint an entire nation just because one girl brought you an old glass once:confused::confused:

I wasn't tainting 'an entire nation'! Please don't label me with that! But I've not seen any adverse comments about waitresses before.

I know of a few Philipino staff who didn't get their contracts renewed after years on board, and they have no idea why not, which seems a shame.

Flopsy

Especially as she then brought you 2 glasses by way of apology?

Yes it was of some comfort to me that my objection to the grotty and grubby looking plastic glass was acknowledged.

But I would rather not have had the altercation at all.

Perhaps when the waitress is fetching wine for someone in the restaurant she should ask the barman to put it in a proper glass.

Flopsy

I haven't really had issues with waiting staff. My fun thing with them is having drinks without ice as I hate ice in drinks. Getting spirit drinks without ice is not really a problem, but it is fun trying to have cocktails without it. I hated getting halfway down a cocktail to find a watery fruity liquid in the bottom, but did manage to get ice free in the end. I stood at the bar once and saw a glass three quarter full of ice before any liquid went in for the cocktail and thought there was no way I wanted that kind of mix for my cocktails. They are so good at remembering little quirky things like that though, and get to know quickly how you like your drinks.

I haven't really had issues with waiting staff. My fun thing with them is having drinks without ice as I hate ice in drinks. Getting spirit drinks without ice is not really a problem, but it is fun trying to have cocktails without it. I hated getting halfway down a cocktail to find a watery fruity liquid in the bottom, but did manage to get ice free in the end. I stood at the bar once and saw a glass three quarter full of ice before any liquid went in for the cocktail and thought there was no way I wanted that kind of mix for my cocktails. They are so good at remembering little quirky things like that though, and get to know quickly how you like your drinks.

:D:D I can identify with that! Also taking note of advice not to have ice in drinks off the ship, when we were in Grenada once I asked if they could make me a pina colada in a great bar on stilts overlooking the Carenage. They did! And boy, was it memorable!!!! ;) We did remember to go and tip the girl who mixed it before we left though. One of our best memories of the wonderful Caribbean! (Sorry bit off topic - but you do have a like minded soul here gillhalfpint!)

yes..i think the problem with some of the cocktails is that they are made up of half a glass of crushed ice a couple of shots of spirit and topped off with some sort of premixed syrup

if you dont have the ice then they top it off with water or maybe soda?...so sometimes you can end up with a syrupy or watery cocktail

the margarita or mojito style cocktails are topped with soda rather than syrup and taste a little better if you dont like too much ice

the waitresses on the spirit got used to use with drinks with no ice, always remembered

Good review - Thanks

We were on the Majesty for the first time March this year - our only complaint would be that the food was not very hot in either of the self service buffets - hope this has been sorted as we have just booked to go again in Feb