Language on Med Cruises?

I was wondering if the main language on Mediterranean Cruises is English, Especially all of the shows and entertainers?

In my experience, yes, English is the main language. Announcements are made in other languages (after English) depending on the population demographic on that particular sailing. Pretty much all the staff and crew speak very good English. :)

Yes it was English, at least during our Oct 2013 Navigator cruise from Civitavecchia.

The announcements were long! First the Captain spoke in English and 'scandinavian' as he was from Norway and used the simplified norvegian-swedish language which all Scandinavian guests could follow. Then came the same in French, Germany and Spanish by Ivan the International Ambassador. Last spoke CD Simona in Italian.

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If sailing out of Barcelona you will find the majority of cruisers will be Spanish and so the introductions of shows, announcements etc will be mainly in Spanish and English.

We've sailed on many Mediterranean cruises, out of a number of different ports. The first language is always English and there may be other languages depending on the number of any particular nationality onboard. I believe there is a particular number (don't know what it is) at which it's decided whether that language is spoken.

We have sailed on a ship which sailed out of Italy where Italian wasn't spoken but German was (presumably because of the number of Germans onboard). We've also sailed on a cruise where, despite the fact that we were sailing from a non-English speaking country, English was the only language spoken. We've sailed on a cruise from Spain where the languages were English, Spanish and Norwegian, because of a large number of Norwegians onboard.

We've never sailed on a ship where more than 3 languages were regularly used for announcements so very surprised to see the post by Miryam which indicated 6 languages were spoken. The only time this has happened is when announcements are made relating to the muster drill at the start of the cruise, but certainly not for the general day-to-day announcements.

We sailed from Barcelona last year on one cruise where Spanish were the 8th most people onboard, after US, UK, Canada, Germany, Norway, France and Brazil- so just because you sail from a place that may not actually be the most spoken language onboard

Will the comedians and other entertainers be speaking English?

We've sailed on many Mediterranean cruises, out of a number of different ports. The first language is always English and there may be other languages depending on the number of any particular nationality onboard. I believe there is a particular number (don't know what it is) at which it's decided whether that language is spoken.

 

We have sailed on a ship which sailed out of Italy where Italian wasn't spoken but German was (presumably because of the number of Germans onboard). We've also sailed on a cruise where, despite the fact that we were sailing from a non-English speaking country, English was the only language spoken. We've sailed on a cruise from Spain where the languages were English, Spanish and Norwegian, because of a large number of Norwegians onboard.

 

We've never sailed on a ship where more than 3 languages were regularly used for announcements so very surprised to see the post by Miryam which indicated 6 languages were spoken. The only time this has happened is when announcements are made relating to the muster drill at the start of the cruise, but certainly not for the general day-to-day announcements.

 

We sailed from Barcelona last year on one cruise where Spanish were the 8th most people onboard, after US, UK, Canada, Germany, Norway, France and Brazil- so just because you sail from a place that may not actually be the most spoken language onboard

Yes, it was kind of funny with all the languages. I can understand all of them except Spanish, so If I did not hear properly the first one, I could always 'stay tuned' for the rest and get the information. I also sometimes checked if it actually WAS the same info with different language. Especially the Captain did use his native language speech more freely, by adding extra details for his countrymen.

The international ambassador spoke very very fast, like a machinegun! It was hilarious sometimes.

Will the comedians and other entertainers be speaking English?

We've found on Med cruises that they rarely have comedians - precisely because of language differences. The headliner acts tend to be visual acts (magicians/illusionists/jugglers) who speak English but whose show doesn't depend on understanding English or tribute bands/singers who appeal across different languages (eg Abba/Beatles)

For shows such as Quest they may hold a Spanish speaking Quest as well as an English one out of Barcelona and likewise with Love and Marriage show. In our experience, other than cruises out of Spain, they haven't held shows in other languages. On any cruises we've taken out of Italy (Civitavecchia or Venice) the number of Italians onboard has been far outweighed by English speakers.

Will the comedians and other entertainers be speaking English?

Yes, though they might book more "visual" type entertainers, such as jugglers, mimes, etc.

We've been on ten Med cruises sailing from Barcelona Rome and Southampton and English has always been the first language. The entertainment etc has also always been in English and as been previously stated the captains announcements and any other important ones are repeated in the next most popular language usually either Spanish or Italian .

If sailing out of Barcelona you will find the majority of cruisers will be Spanish and so the introductions of shows, announcements etc will be mainly in Spanish and English.

Sailed on RCI Liberty out of Barcelona to the western med and English was the first language spoken when it came to anything...Onboard everything was also priced in US $..other than adding several other languages to announcements we found not much difference when sailing to the caribbean.

Thank you everyone for your quick replies. My dd will be very happy to hear this. She is hoping to book one soon.

We did a B2B, Rome to Holy Lands to Rome to Ft. Lauderdale. The main language was always English, but they would repeat everything in several other languages.

We always laughed at the Captain's noon announcement, he would talk for a minute or two but by the time the last person was done repeating what he said in several other languages usually 15-20 minutes would have passed.:)

Sailed on RCI Liberty out of Barcelona to the western med and English was the first language spoken when it came to anything...Onboard everything was also priced in US $..other than adding several other languages to announcements we found not much difference when sailing to the caribbean.