Travel-and-See

I've been on both Virgin Ships in 2023 and I agree - service is VERY uneven. On Celebrity Ships you can't walk by an employee without a friendly greeting, on VV it is common for employees to completely ignore you. But then other VV employees are the nicest ever and are super genuine. Tip to the Original Poster - make sure to see Duel Reality - it's the best thing I've ever seen on Cruise Ship by far. It was produced by the same company that produced Ships in the Night. I'm not sure what the difficulty is in you understanding that a simple request should be honored by a "Luxury" cruise line. I would also prefer the papers be delivered to my room the night before like on Celebrity. It's a very simple and logical request.

YAY! I'm glad it got better! Have you seen Duel Reality yet? Don't miss it if you have the chance... it's the best show I've ever seen on a cruise ship by far! And I agree, the food is legit good on Virgin!

I've traveled solo on Virgin and have boarded at 3:00 / 3:30 and haven't had any issue booking the shows I want. And all of the shows have standby lines and from my limited experience LOTS of people usually get in from the standby line. For restaurants, as long as you are flexible just keep checking the app and all different restaurants will open up. Many times I'll make a reservation, and then cancel and rebook a new one as different restaurants open up. Razzle Dazzle seems to be available the most and has some of my favorite food. While they advertise the many vegan options - they also have steak, salmon, chicken etc. - and the Vegan Green Tea Cheesecake is the best dessert on the ship in my opinion! And of course you can always check to see if you can get in on standby, on my last night of the 2nd cruise I regretted that I still had not tried Test Kitchen so I stopped by and they got me right in.

I've taken 2 cruises with Virgin (one one each boat) and it's pretty inconsistent to be honest. I've had quick breakfasts at Razzle Dazzle and a painfully long one as well. Same with the Galley. Sometimes you sit down down and BOOM - here's a server ready to take your order and the food is out in about 5 minutes. Other times it can take painfully long. But to be honest, it's not very different than other lines... sometimes on Celebrity they have multiple egg/omlette stations and I can get my order in very fast, other times it seems to take forever. So while it's worth discussing as the inconsistency can be frustrating, it's not anything to worry about too much.

I had a similar situation... the servers have no clue what is or isn't available they just scroll through the app to see it. So saying something like "and I'd like beets" will result in the server staring at the screen for 30-60 seconds looking for beets. There also isn't any signage indicating if you can or cannot order directly from the counters. I think part of the issue is that Virgin still doesn't know the best way to handle the food hall and what works for 1/2 full sailings doesn't work when the boat fills up.

I've sailed twice on Virgin and on my last Voyage there was a day that my room did not get cleaned or attended to. It wasn't the end of the world but this certainly hasn't happened to me on any other lines. Service in the Galley and the Dockhouse has been VERY inconsistent for me on both cruises. Sometimes I'm greeted right away, sometimes it's a reasonable amount of time, and still other times it's an unreasonable amount of time and I watch as other guests are served before me, even though they arrived much later than me (and yes I raised the flag). So I can totally understand the OP's frustration. There are some wonderful things that Virgin does differently, but also some frustrating things as well.

The singer and band were quite good. The MC was VERY mediocre and was just talking through his lines. The specialty acts were VERY good. At my performance, they had 2 aerialists, a contortionist, a bow and arrow act, and a roller skating acrobatic duo. The food was fine but was more like typical hotel convention center food. Also they will seat you with fellow passengers. Honestly, I wish I could have enjoyed this show in the main theatre without the meal.