pappy1022

I second what mj_holiday is saying. Although we picked a time online that we wanted to board it had no bearing on the time we boarded the transfer bus from the hotel to the ship. We were in a concierge cabin. The bus assignments and times were based on when you picked up your bus ticket at the hotel. The process was slow as far as boarding the bus but it wasn’t crowded when we arrived at the cruise terminal. On our cruise, Regent included a pre hotel stay for everyone so it may have been more crowded than usual. In fact, I think they had to reserve multiple hotels in Copenhagen to accommodate everyone.

As a percentage of the cruise fare, what is the typical OBC amount that one could expect from a travel agent for a Paul Gauguin cruise? What can you use these onboard credits for? Laundry services, SPA, shore excursions, etc.? I just booked an 11 day cruise for 2025 and this will be my first time cruising with Paul Gauguin and my first time to the French Polynesia. In the past, I have cruised with Oceania, Crystal and Regent. What should I expect as far as service, food, ship shore excursions, and the overall experience?

Second the Landmark in London where we stayed post cruise. Regent included hotel for concierge level cabin. Very nice hotel.

The included laundry service is better than I expected. Take advantage of it daily and you will have to pack fewer clothes. Pay very close attention to the details and the exertion levels of shore excursions. Be prepared for some blips in service and food but tell someone about it and it will normally be corrected. If you are on a port intensive cruise, make time to relax onboard and don’t make your excursion days so full that it exhausts you. Consider private tours for the port(s) that are of special interest to you. Most Regent tours are fine but they are limited to what you will see and experience vs a private tour.

Please go back and read my detailed trip reports from our September cruise this past September. The good and the not so good are noted. In summary, I experienced poor service from Destination Services and the food quality & preparation had several blips. Restaurant service was extremely slow at times. The bottom line, other than Destination Services, is that it was inconsistent and that’s what I have never experienced on Regent in the past (albeit pre COVID). As I said in my report, overall it was a great trip but there were things that Regent has to work on. Then to be called entitled just because I wasn’t glowing in my comments shows no tolerance for other’s opinions.

Certainly, we all have the right to interpret the comments from other people and we can choose to ignore any of them. Jumping to the conclusion that a person is entitled because they reported some issues they personally experienced with Regent is ludicrous and ignorant. I think it is wise to read all of the comments and form one’s opinion based on the totality of what ALL people are saying. Regent is a very good product but it’s clear from many on this discussion board, even some “cheerleaders”, that the product isn’t the same as it was prior to COVID. That doesn’t make it a bad product. All it means is that there are opportunities for improvement. IMHO, Regent is still the class of the cruise industry and will improve if they listen to ALL customers and fine tune what can get better.

I had similar experiences at multiple restaurants where the service and food was great one day and not so much another day. The inconsistency is something that Regent needs to work on.

We were on Splendor in September and got to eat at Prime 7 twice, Pacific Rim twice, Chartreuse once, Sette Marie twice with the remaining nights at Compass Rose. My favorite was Pacific Rim and surprisingly we had better steak and lobster in Compass Rose than we did in Prime 7. I thought that overall the service and food was inconsistent, 3 times sending back food that was not cooked to specifications and/or just not up to standards, specifically the lobster. It was over cooked and rubbery. Overall the food was very good but we had some blips in both quality and service.

We were on Splendor in September and I would agree that restaurant and bar service was slow at times and I would say on multiple occasions the food was not cooked correctly to our order and/or wasn’t as good as expected. It was difficult to get good lobster tails (rubbery at times) and the steaks were OK but not what I expected. Oddly enough, the steak & lobster was better in Compass Rose than at Prime 7. If I had to use 1 word to describe the food and service, it is inconsistent. Sometimes great but sometimes not what you expect from a high end cruise line like Regent.

Regent does offer several tours per port. An additional benefit of getting a concierge suite is that you get to choose your excursions and specialty dining reservations earlier than the lesser cost suites. Excursions can get sold out and your chances of getting hat you want are better with a concierge suite. I choose concierge suites because Regent will get you form the airport to the hotel to the ship and then back to the airport. Yes you can save a few dollars by doing this yourself but for a first time Regent cruiser it may give you peace of mind that Regent is taking care of all that for you. Regent excursions can range from poor to very good depending on the guide. Look at the descriptions of each excursion is detail. I would recommend a private tour at a couple of sites where you really want to explore in detail and/or it is a port where you have a strong interest in seeing. Yes, it will cost you more but private tours provide so much more. We did a private tour in Belfast in September and it was by far the best tour we were on. There were 6 of us in our group so the cost was very manageable. Enjoy Regent, they are the best but certainly not perfect.

Really? Hasn’t been my recent experience and many others have commented that the food & service has degraded in the last couple of years. The food is OK to very good at times but is inconsistent. The service is also inconsistent with pockets of great service and in the case of Destination Services downright poor. I would agree with others that I don’t get any value out of expensive paintings and statues and would rather Regent spend their money to improve services and food and/or pay down their outrageous debt incurred during COVID. BUT, to each his own.

Let me say that in totality I did very much enjoy my recent cruise to the British Isles on Regent. There will always be some things that don’t go as well as we expect, especially for the bar we have all set for Regent cruises and the money we pay to sail with them. I will agree that Regent isn’t what it once was, as far service, food, etc. but it is still a very good experience. There were some examples of the exemplary service and food mixed in, to let us know what is possible and what it used to be. The inconsistency is what has changed. And I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t mention again that Destination Services is the Achilles heel for Regent. They didn’t seem to care and they would never accept responsibility for issues that they directly caused. I guess I would say that they were consistent throughout our cruise and that went from the manager throughout the entire team.

Yes, I would temper your expectations especially with the steaks and lobsters. For those items, Compass Rose was far superior to Prime. Go figure. I would assume they use the same steak and lobster. Given all the COVID excuses given for Regent failures at service, maybe that’s the reason for these issues as well. The food is very good in general and we enjoyed most of our meals but definitely not 5+ star and certainly not comparable to higher end steak houses on land. But they do have expensive plates to serve their food on.

What does that matter. Are we now comparing Regent to the lesser cruise lines? Is that now the bar for Regent? If so, maybe they are performing to the new expectations some people have for Regent.

Quote from a previous post: “Tours can be good or bad on any cruise line at any time. It has been hard for all segments of the travel industry to recover from Covid. Given that and what we experience daily in the service industry at home, I feel your statements are a bit harsh” Come on, enough of the COVID excuses.

When will Regent acknowledge that Destination Services is the weak link and do something about it? Even multiple Regent Cheerleaders on this site have called out this team. If nothing else rename the team to Destination We Don’t Care.

Do yourself a favor and check out the deviation process through your TA. It is well worth it.

Agree. The time in the system doesn’t matter. We had the included bus transfer to the ship for 11:30 AM in the system. We were assigned a time for the bus transfer when we got to the hotel. We were late getting to the hotel because of a medical emergency onboard the plane. My 11:30 “reservation” time I chose when originally checking in on the Regent website meant nothing. Getting an assigned transfer time was based on what time you showed up at the Regent desk in the hotel. No big deal. I don’t know why Regent even bothers with giving the illusion of an assigned time to board.

How generous ….. not

I agree with your assessment of Prime 7. We were on the Splendor and got to eat at Prime 7 twice and both times the meals weren’t good, especially the lobster tails that were overcooked and rubbery. The steak and lobster at Compass Rose was far superior to Prime 7. Go figure.

I did get the sales pitch after my massage but I immediately told the person that I was not interested in any products and she quickly gave up on the sales pitch. Her exact quote was “ you aren’t interested in any products are you?” My answer: nope and she said alright then. 😀 I definitely wouldn’t spend real money on massages but it is a way to use up the shipboard credits.

Not sure what are you are saying. The people I spoke to were all onboard the ship, the manager with a dedicated office on the ship.

No, dark hair.

Hope there is some left after our Splendor cruise. 😂 It’s a $13 bottle of wine retail so it’s not up there with the good one’s but this is what you get included with Regent. We liked it over any of the Cabernet’s or blends they offered but to each his own. Try all you can and settle on what works best for you.

Don’t sell Compass Rose short. We had better steak and lobster in Compass Rose than we did in the specialty steak restaurant. The lobster in the steak restaurant was like rubber (overcooked) and the steaks were not cooked as ordered on 2 occasions. The Asian restaurant was by far our favorite but I would rate Compass Rose as our second favorite.