CruisingWalter

It's not a large part of the experience, just the drinking game at the beginning. Ask for shots of water instead of sojou. Fortunately the game is a pretty quick one. 🙂

Yes you can pick a cabin by working with a travel advisor. They have full access to the deck plans and can place you in any specific available cabin. Gold Certified VV First Mates can offer additional sailor loot for Sea Terrace and above. Alternatively you can call Sailor Services yourself and work with them to get a cabin. On the website, it will automatically assign you a cabin, usually starting on Deck 14.

That should be lovely. They're on our list along with Hurtigruten Expeditions.

Oh man you're killing me. I will have to test out these variations, all in the name of science of course. 🙂

Thanks so much for a great overview! We've sailed 9 cruise lines so far over almost 20 years and will be sailing Oceania for the first time in December. Your observations and notes are really useful, I really appreciate the time you took to share. Have an awesome day!

Murano has been sporadic for us. We've had a few really good meals but our last experience was 'meh.' The restaurant we really miss is the original QSine concept with the tapas. That was an amazing culinary experience. We have not even tried the Le Petit Chef that replaced it, I really don't need an animated chef 'preparing my dinner.' I'll watch Ratatouille for that. 🙂 Of the 9 cruise lines we've sailed so far, Virgin Voyages and Disney have had the best overall food by far so we're excited to finally be trying Oceania in December. We've heard so many awesome things about the food and that surf and turf sandwich has been calling my name since we booked...

Just found the website. This is awesome sauce. Thank you so much for that tip!

Maybe with a little jazz trio in the background performed in William Shatner style? Dark stage, bar stool and one light from above, one spotlight. This could be comedy gold. Especially if we can see a re-enactment of the YouTube video complete with the vodka..... 🙂

Oh my word, do people still do this? I have not seen that on a cruise in I don't know how long... 🙂

That alone will make me so happy to be sailing Oceania for the first time in December. I hate the self serve buffet on every other cruise line. So excited, we will be sailing Serena on a 12 day Miami round trip to the southern Caribbean.

Welcome to the cruise family! My biggest advice is for you to find a local, trusted travel advisor. We cannot recommend TAs in these forums because that violates the rules. A good TA will help you navigate the ship, the cruise itself and help ensure you have the necessary accessible cabin to meet your needs. There are very few fully accessible cabins on any cruise ship, usually less than 10% of the cabins on any given ship. You generally have to book far in advance to get them. I have heard there are some TAs who can work with and sell VV globally, even in native currencies, no matter where their offices are located. As for the points conversion, I think @jon81uk gave a great example of points scenario. Good luck with everything and I really hope you're able to make this cruise work! 🙂

Room service is an excellent suggestion. And I noticed whatever coffee they bring to the rooms is better than the coffee they serve in The Galley. I have no idea what the difference is but that room service coffee is so much better. And they way they bring the food and drinks to your room is outstanding. Everything stays cold or hot.

Diner and Dash is your 24 hour breakfast option in The Galley. Your basic eggs, bacon, sausages and more. If you're going early to The Wake or Razzle Dazzle, say 7 to 7:30 ish or when the Wake opens at 8, you will most likely be able to walk up. Prime time is usually around 9:30 - Noon for The Wake and around 8:30 - 11 for Razzle Dazzle. Both are great breakfast/brunch options in addition to the many offerings up in The Galley. And don't forget the Sun Cafe up on Deck 16 for a poke bowl if you're closer to lunch time. It has irregular hours but makes a decent poke bowl when it's open.

This is one of my favorite things about the Bar Tab vs any other cruise line. No 'drink package jail' if you purchase a drink for someone else. And if it's easy enough for you to take bottles with you at the end of the cruise, you can purchase bottles (inventory permitting) from the bars to use up your leftover Tab. I've never asked if I can purchase coffee beans with the Bar Tab from Coffee Grounds. I guess I'll have to ask in November when I'm on Valiant.

Beds are very firm and the mattresses are thin compared to a normal bed. We were told no mattress toppers on our last sailing on Scarlet Lady. We will ask again in November on Valiant Lady. I can sleep ok on most anything, but my wife can have a hard time with the stiffness of the beds on VV. The Suites have absolutely lovely beds, we had a Cheeky Corner Suite for our first cruise and that was heaven. 🙂

Well except for the dozens of cameras all over the top deck of the ship, including one at both ends of the zipline. In general there are 900 - 1000+ cameras on a modern cruise ship that size. So much evidence.... 😅

Both Sailors should appear in each other's app if there were two sailors on the original booking. I've not had to add my wife to my bookings on the app, she's been there automatically when we booked our VV cruises.

Really the only big 'adult oriented' show any longer are the Diva shows. But if y'all are open minded and open to fun, you guys will have an amazing time together. We've met so many families traveling together. It's such a 'freeing' experience not being surrounded by younger kids. Think of it as Summer Camp for Adults and you get the idea of what it's like all day long on a VV ship. 🙂

Afternoon Tea is AWESOME. It's worth the extra charge. For what you described, Cheese pizza in the Pizza Place will be awesome, you have the burgers and tacos in the Galley. Fried Chicken Sandwich in Razzle Dazzle. While I don't really like the dinner all that much in The Wake, there are a bunch of side dishes that your partner could make a meal from plus a steak or something like that. Hot Dogs and Sausages in the Social Club Diner. The Meat wraps at The Dock are awesome as if they like shrimp, they might like the shrimp dish back there too. Lots of sandwich options at the Panini station in The Galley Basic breakfast, sausage and bacon in Diner and Dash in The Galley. And of course there's always ice cream, that's good all day long. 🙂

Definitely contact your TA, they will be able to get that straightened out. At the very least you're due a refund because the Lock It In rates are lower than the standard rates.

It could also be a similar issue to what we have with the Miami sailings and the suites. TAs who put down the minimum deposit to hold a bunch of cabins until final payment. That's why the suites are so hard to come by with the Miami sailings. With the prices so low for that October 2024 sailing, it's possible some TAs simply bought out a bunch of the cabins with the hopes to resell them. VV makes it very easy to do this because both Sailors in the cabin can be changed on any booking. Most cruise lines require you to keep at least one of the original guests on the booking. Now those TAs can advertise that they 'still have cabins available on a sold out cruise.' Final Payment will be due around June 13, 2024 so if cabins are going to open up for that sailing, it'll most likely be around that time.

Do you still have a cabin number? VV sends out a lot of unnecessary confirmations sometimes at random and other times if you made any sort of a purchase. Such as a Shore Thing. But if it did truly switch from an assigned cabin to now saying GTY on your booking, get with your travel advisor and have them correct it. You should still have the original booking confirmations with the cabin number.

That's interesting. I wonder which sailings they were asking for because there is a lot of inventory across the board on VV. I even have friends who got the Valiant Lady Ahoy New Year's this coming December. That's a bummer these folks are not getting their first or second options.

It's in the app and you do it close to the sailing. No more than 48 hours before the sailing.

Typical refunds from cruise lines take a minimum 7-10 business days. I've seen it take up to 2 months from other cruise lines.