When English is the 2nd language on the cruise- questions!

[mlbcruiser]

We are considering an around the horn cruise in South America on which English will be the 2nd language. I am guessing Spanish and/or Brazilian will be most prevalent though the ship does not go to Brazil. Since RCI went to the trouble of notifying those already booked that this will be the situation, I am wondering if we will run into issues on tours? Especially independent tours? Although I speak a pretty good amount of tourist Spanish, I am certainly not fluent enough to understand everything a tour guide might explain. Since the ship will be a Royal Caribbean ship, I am hoping someone with experience with RCI on an around the horn itinerary will clue me in. Please do not hesitate to include info on any other aspect of this type of cruise.

 

Thanks for any replies.

Edited April 27, 2015 by mlbcruiser

[Kryssa]

Just FYI, Portuguese is the language spoken in Brazil ;)

[SausPud]

When you book excursions, you get a choice of language you want the tour to be in. We get alot of choice in Europe for Med trips. Been on a cruise where German was first, Italian second and English third. No biggy, just wait when an announcement is made for the English bit and listen to that.

I think we Brits are used to multiple languages and cruising with multiple cultures on board and just go with it.

[Stitchman]

When you book excursions, you get a choice of language you want the tour to be in. We get alot of choice in Europe for Med trips. Been on a cruise where German was first, Italian second and English third. No biggy, just wait when an announcement is made for the English bit and listen to that.

I think we Brits are used to multiple languages and cruising with multiple cultures on board and just go with it.

 

A quiz night on Costa takes about 4 hours ..... its like bloody eurovision !!

[MADflyer]

Even on the 'Spanish Immersion' sailings out of Colon, where Spanish and Portuguese might have surpassed English as the main language of the passengers, RCI still is an international company and English is the official language.

 

The officers, crew and staff remain about the same global mix as on other ships. Vision had a Captain's farewell 'Parade of Flags' and there were always 50+ nationalities present.

 

When the Cruise Director presents a show the main presentation is in English and then a recap is made in the secondary language.

 

RCI always print the daily Cruise Compass in multiple languages. If there is an event that is only presented in Spanish, Portuguese, Norwegian, Italian or German, it appears only in that languages schedule. The main Cruise Compass activities are almost always in English or bi-lingual English/Other.

[SausPud]

A quiz night on Costa takes about 4 hours ..... its like bloody eurovision !!

 

Love it, it gives me more thinking time before the next question.

Sometimes on Costa, you get an announcement in Italian, then German but no ENglish and you think are they being told something I'm not meant to know or be included in. But I know Italian, French and German, and most of the time these are about those languages having a event in just those languages and you get the English presentation later on.

[MADflyer]

A quiz night on Costa takes about 4 hours ..... its like bloody eurovision !!

 

MSC and Costa both do that and it is exceptionally aggravating when you know 4 or more of the languages.

 

I like RCI's 'recap' method better, where they do the presentation in English and then just summarize somewhat in one additional language.

[mlbcruiser]

Kryssa, yes. I do realize Portuguese is spoken in Brazil. However there are sometimes many Brazilians on south American cruises. The reason I asked the question is because my neighbors parents went on a South American Cruise about three or four years ago. Like Rhapsody is now, it was one of the older RCI ships at the time. Anyway, I recall that one of the things they did not like was finding that many of the shore excursions were in Spanish or Portuguese. They happen to speak Italian and English. As do we, they sometimes do independent excursions but that time they mostly did excursions through the ship. Often times the English explanation seemed much more brief and tour guides tended to speak in the local language for a much longer period of time. Therefore they felt they missed a lot of the explanations. From what some of you have written about English, that is encouraging. I don't mind the other languages as long as my own language is represented when instructions or information is given. I am glad some of you have done this type of cruise before and have found the language issue not to be a problem. Thanks for replying.

[MADflyer]

. Often times the English explanation seemed much more brief and tour guides tended to speak in the local language for a much longer period of time. Therefore they felt they missed a lot of the explanations. .

 

My experience with RCI has been that while they do have German, Norwegian, Spanish and other language tours, the tours tend to not be multi-lingual. I have experienced guides handling questions in other languages, but not managing the tour in that language.

[ColoradoGurl]

Deleted

Edited April 30, 2015 by ColoradoGurl