Voyager Review - NYE cruise Fiji & NZ

I don't think people take offence at these negative reviews, I think it's more of a case of, some of the things you read are pretty silly. It seems to me that overcrowding is most CERTAINLY an issue on board VOTS. It seems like this $80m refurb was just a clever marketing ploy to cram more rooms on board. That's a bit disappointing.

 

I am boarding on the 5th Feb and I really am not looking forward to lining up for 20 minutes for a coffee, especially after paying $400 odd for the premium (non Alcoholic) drinks package. However I'm not going to let this ruin my holiday. I go on board not expecting a lot, and hopefully I am surprised.

 

And I also agree that about 5% of cruisers are professional wingers. On board and off. So considering out of some 3500 passengers on each voyage there's only a few who log on to complain and gripe, that's not too bad.

 

;)

Yes, negative issues are certainly a personal thing. For me - a non coffee drinker - I never felt crowded on VOS anymore than any other ship.

Some people in reviews have stated they couldn't find a quiet spot to read - yet when I was on board I found loads of spots.:)

In reviews of all the ships I have read people not finding spots in the windjammer for breakfast - yet we never have this issue - probably because we are there around 8am before it peaks at 9am.

Negative issues I think can arise more often if your personal daily schedule places you smack in the middle of peak time for everything. If that occurs for me I adjust my schedule to avoid the rush hour, I arrive early at the theatre so I have a good choice of seats, if the activity I'm interested in has a largish queue I just do something else & try again later etc - quite often a little flexibility & planning of your day can alleviate quite a few of those annoying issues that gets everyone's blood boiling! :D

For the coffee lovers out there, can you order specialty coffees from room service? If so that would be a way to avoid the queues?

Yes, negative issues are certainly a personal thing. For me - a non coffee drinker - I never felt crowded on VOS anymore than any other ship.

Some people in reviews have stated they couldn't find a quiet spot to read - yet when I was on board I found loads of spots.:)

 

In reviews of all the ships I have read people not finding spots in the windjammer for breakfast - yet we never have this issue - probably because we are there around 8am before it peaks at 9am.

 

Negative issues I think can arise more often if your personal daily schedule places you smack in the middle of peak time for everything. If that occurs for me I adjust my schedule to avoid the rush hour, I arrive early at the theatre so I have a good choice of seats, if the activity I'm interested in has a largish queue I just do something else & try again later etc - quite often a little flexibility & planning of your day can alleviate quite a few of those annoying issues that gets everyone's blood boiling! :D

 

For the coffee lovers out there, can you order specialty coffees from room service? If so that would be a way to avoid the queues?

I totally agree ! We experienced most of the issues that have been raised in the reviews but organised our day so that they did not impact so much on our holiday. We had a great stateroom and an amazing stateroom attendant and this made our cruise.

My point remains that there are issues on the Voyager that need to be resolved and that would not be tolerated outside the Australian market. We will be on her again in April so look forward to seeing if there are any improvements.

When VOS first came to Australia there were similar issues raised, but by the time we sailed on here a few months later it seemed most of those issues had been resolved.

It sounds to me many of the current negatives about VOS stem from the lack of staff & teething problems relating to the immediate cruise/s after the dry dock.

I see people on these boards from all around the world complain about similar issues so I don't think it's that the Australian market is the only one experiencing these particular negatives on cruise ships.

I never go on a ship as it's transitioning from a vastly different culture (like VOS does from Asia) or after a refit, as it's like series 1 of a car - it always has teething issues that get resolved in series 2 or in the case of cruising - a few months down the track. :)

I would suspect that the repo cruise from Sydney to Singapore sees very little of the issues you get coming the other way. The repo to Australia has staff that need to transition to the Australian cruisers expectations after having spent 6 months catering to the Asian market mindset.

What a great review - thank you.

We booked Voyager for the 3 night sampler over 12 months ago, after hearing good things about the ship. I booked the 11 nighter a couple of weeks ago - before I read the CC reviews. I was really worried that I'd made a monumental stuff up. Your review has removed all my concerns about Voyager, we will have a great time.

Could you tell me what cabin number you had please?

Again Thanks. Diane

Thank you. I hope you enjoy your upcoming cruises on the Voyager. I haven't been on a 3-nighter but I would imagine the experience will be a little different to the experience you will have on the 11-nighter. I would prefer not to say the exact cabin I booked but it was in a midship location on Deck 7 (for some reason my official CC review states I was on Deck 6 not sure how that happened and they gave a extra star for my review - I took one off for the MTD experience)

Thank you. I hope you enjoy your upcoming cruises on the Voyager. I haven't been on a 3-nighter but I would imagine the experience will be a little different to the experience you will have on the 11-nighter. I would prefer not to say the exact cabin I booked but it was in a midship location on Deck 7 (for some reason my official CC review states I was on Deck 6 not sure how that happened and they gave a extra star for my review - I took one off for the MTD experience)

That's ok. We have deck 7 midship starboard for the 3 nighter and deck 6 aft port side for the 11 nighter. Trying a variety of cabins. Diane

I was wondering if there were port talks and if so were they any good?

Thanks again. Diane

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I was wondering if there were port talks and if so were they any good?

Thanks again. Diane

 

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Yes- they did on day 2 (Fiji), day 3 (no topic given) assume it would have been New Zealand.

They also had several Culture & History Enrichment lectures in La Scala

Topics were:

Colonies, cults & cannibals

New Zealand Celebrities

Intrigued with Islands

South Pacific, the Musical

Reluctant Convict Pioneers

Middle Earth New Zealand

and Enrichment lectures around 4pm in the afternoon in the star lounge:

Marine Pests & Threats - Hikers of our seas

Marine creatures

Shipwrecks from around the world

Living together in the sea

Marine Communications

Learn the Art of Navigation

The Weird and Wonderful world of the deep sea

Sorry, cant give any feedback on any of these because we were too busy relaxing by the pools:)

I decided to read some of the newer reviews on CC. I really wonder if you were on the same cruise.!

I do have a question about the children on board, and I apologise if you've already answered. Did you feel overrun by kids? A few people made comments about the kids. We're booked on Explorer in march 2016, which happens to be Easter and therefore school holidays. Thanks again. Diane

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I decided to read some of the newer reviews on CC. I really wonder if you were on the same cruise.!

I do have a question about the children on board, and I apologise if you've already answered. Did you feel overrun by kids? A few people made comments about the kids. We're booked on Explorer in march 2016, which happens to be Easter and therefore school holidays. Thanks again. Diane

 

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Honestly, no. The only day it was noticeable was the day before we arrived in Wellington. The top deck was very cold and windy that day so not many people were on the pool deck. That day we had a lot of teens hanging around the stairwells and the elevators. Even then it wasn't a problem, it was just that you suddenly became aware of how many kids were on board.

Both our cruises were in school holidays and kids have not been an issue.

Thanks so much for the wonderful review!

Thanks so much for the wonderful review!

Glad you enjoyed it:)