Further reflections Azamara vs Viking

[uktog]

I did this thread when I came back from Viking at the end of March.  

 

Now I am back from Azamara at the end of April, a little update is due.  I had been on Quest in September and my thinking in March was based on that trip.

 

Now, having been back on Quest I have some changed views. Both ships were sailing at 66% capacity, but on Azamara you are regularly hearing words like we cannot do x until we have more guests onboard, never heard that on Viking.   I have to say the Azamara cruise was "fine"  not great or outstanding.  Us Brits use the word fine to mean it was OK not special.  A sort of 3 out of 5 score.

 

On reflection I would say Viking is now ahead of Azamara in terms of food.  Yes Azamara does have new menus and on Quest a new chef but the direction the food has been taken in does not work for us at all (though this is subjective, it may work for others.  We did always find something to eat, we were just not excited as we used to be).  There are far more asian/unusual dishes with much more emphasis on spice rather than herbs.  Very few sauces which might work for some but there were dishes that really needed them.  The soups were very disappointing, old favourites like some of the creamy soups were not offered.  I missed the main course salads and found the desserts very disappointing.  Many favourites had disappeared on the dessert menu (eg the chocolate trilogy or the apple trio).  Lunch again had much more spicy food but we were able to rely on the patio to satisfy us.  No lunch time pizza though could have had it in the room on room service.  Unfortunately the patio was not open at night.

 

In terms of service, we had commented that Viking had issues, well so too had Azamara and in quite a marked way.  Some waiters are very good others are poorly trained and not well supervised.  Whilst the maitre d does tour round the tables they get completely fazed if you tell them something did not work.  Our last night's dinner onboard was more like Fawlty Tours than a premium cruise line.  In the end I ate my steak it had already been back once and we were getting tired, wrong wines were used in the top up, couldn't get a water top up and there were long long delays.  Absolute worst of all TWO nights running my husband was served food with nuts in it.  Fortunately both times spotted by us (apologies to those around us the night he spat out a mouthful) but the attitude was appalling - oh sorry I forgot was the response from one and the other waiter said I did not know, the information was given to my assistant.  In neither instance did the maitre d show any real concern about what had happened.  So on balance neither has great service as it used to be on Azamara at present but on balance Viking was better. 

 

As reported elsewhere, it was very disappointing not to have breakfast outside when the weather would have allowed it in Seville and Malaga. The Hotel Director was unaware there was a sign up saying the Sunset verandah was closed due to weather conditions.  One of the Head Waiters said it was too cold for the staff to go out.  It was clear around the pool the staff were feeling the cold, they continued to wear heavy jackets when guests were sunbathing and diving for sun protection.  So I am not sure what the real reason for the closure was, but if it is that staff are cold, maybe get them thermals for morning service because for many guests the temperature to eat out was fine.

 

As regards the specialities,  we only tried Aqualina and our experience now is that Manfredi on Viking is light years ahead of Aqualina and is not an extra charge.  Our experience in Aqualina was impacted because they were serving a very reduced menu (not made entirely clear at booking).  The reason given, we are sailing with reduced numbers - Viking were sailing at the same % capacity and they offered a full menu.  What made it worse was everyone around us were eating the very dishes we would have ordered had they been on the menu - why - oh they did special orders.  Great, so if you dont know, you get the B menu but if you are in the know you can have other soups, pasta, fish and soufflés.  I suggest Azamara stop this two tier behaviour in the specialities immediately and either offer a full menu to everyone or cut out the special orders of the missing items.  Their response was completely inappropriate and missed the point - come back another night and we will do off menu specials for you - so someone else can sit and have the same negative feelings we did????? - no thank you.

 

I loved the no upselling on Viking. Upselling is alive and well on Azamara and now very targeted.  Having a lovely relaxing pot of tea in Mosaic and suddenly I am aware of a man in a white coat crouching beside me.  Boy did that freak me, I thought I had been identified  as a covid contact...... no he has targeted me (and no one else in Mosaic) to tell me how he can improve things for me with his services.  He left Mosaic after I stopped his speech in its tracks with a polite no thanks I am hear enjoying my tea.  I hope this practice is snuffed out as quick as it started.

 

The shops on Azamara have slipped back, nothing really exciting and no small gifts you can give others as had existed in September.  I did not find anything to buy on Viking so I would say they are equal.

 

Our stateroom attendants were great, the entertainment on Azamara was far better than Viking although as suspected the enrichment far less good.

 

The Captain is new and probably settling in still but was less visible than the Viking captain if that is relevant to you.  

 

Where does that leave us, we do have several more bookings on Azamara that will stay for now and one on Viking for 2023.  Now we have the rumour of the spa deck not being accessible unless you book a treatment or live in the biggest suites Vikings one class ships now start to become more and more attractive.  I hope what happened was we hit Quest at an off time (some staff are desperate to get home but their relief is still not there so they are probably burnt out) and in July we return to find an experience more like September 2021 and before.

[PirateWife]

After the cruise in November on the Quest, I could have made similar comments, particularly about the food and the dining areas' wait staffs. I had hoped things would improve. It doesn't sound like it.

[Mora_2022]

I would love to hear if this also reflects the experiences of other travelers who traveled on the Pursuit or the Journey or if this is Quest specific. 

[uktog]

4 minutes ago, Mora_2022 said:

I would love to hear if this also reflects the experiences of other travelers who traveled on the Pursuit or the Journey or if this is Quest specific. 

I think this is a very valid point, though Journey has been laid up for a while and Pursuit has only just started sailing.  I think Onward coming on stream has squeezed them as many of the more experienced staff have been taken over there

[oddjob16]

I think your last sailing must have been «special». I have never heard of the Sunset veranda being closed because of slightly chilly weather. That is a huge let down. We were on Journey in January and it was chilly some days, but never had that problem. The staff was as good as always and I never had any complaints about the food. We had some other issues caused by the need for nickle and diming. We never had the officers BBQ or the chocolate buffet and it was obvious that they were running a ship with reduced capacity. 
Sadly we are not Vikings focus customer so we haven’t found a way to book with them other than via their US or UK websites. We always use a TA and they are are not using any norwegian TAs so it seems Viking will be a pass for us.

[mchell810]

Thanks for this reflection.  The idea of being approached outside the shops for some sort of sales pitch is appalling.  I am really hoping this was one person going out of bounds and not a new feature of Azamara.  That, along with your other experiences (and some issues noted by others in other threads), leaves me nervous for my November cruise.  The failure to recognize the seriousness of food allergies is especially troubling; it could be life threatening for my traveling buddy.  We will have to be on extra alert. I am sailing with Silversea in June and was already thinking I may be done with Azamara; I guess I will find out in November.

Edited April 20, 2022 by mchell810

[les37b]

3 minutes ago, mchell810 said:

Thanks for this reflection.  The idea of being approached outside the shops for some sort of sales pitch is appalling.  I am really hoping this was one person going out of bounds and not a new feature of Azamara.  That, along with your other experiences (and some issues noted by others in other threads), leaves me nervous for my November cruise.  The failure to recognize the seriousness of food allergies is especially troubling; it could be life threatening for my traveling buddy.  We will have to be on extra alert. I am sailing with Silversea in June and was already thinking I may be done with Azamara; I guess I will find out in November.

 

You will notice a huge difference in June!

[lisiamc]

Thank you for your updated comparison! Did they have any brunches on this latest Quest cruise? I love brunch, and we didn’t have any on our last Azamara cruise, because of Covid worries. I hope we will have some on our Onward cruise.  Maybe they will push out the boat a little (sorry!) since it’s the inaugural cruise.  I also hope they will do dinner at the Patio Grill, since that’s another favourite of mine.

[mchell810]

4 minutes ago, les37b said:

 

You will notice a huge difference in June!

 

I have no doubt!  My Azamara cruise will sail directly into Seville which is what drew me to that itinerary and keeps me on it; otherwise, I'd probably cancel.

Edited April 20, 2022 by mchell810

[uktog]

15 minutes ago, lisiamc said:

Thank you for your updated comparison! Did they have any brunches on this latest Quest cruise? I love brunch, and we didn’t have any on our last Azamara cruise, because of Covid worries. I hope we will have some on our Onward cruise.  Maybe they will push out the boat a little (sorry!) since it’s the inaugural cruise.  I also hope they will do dinner at the Patio Grill, since that’s another favourite of mine.

They had one brunch and one "officers on deck lunch"  Obviously wasn't expecting chocolate buffet etc.  Talking to people who were on Journey they said Quest was not the same experience at all.  Disappointing and hope it is a one off

[lisiamc]

13 minutes ago, uktog said:

They had one brunch and one "officers on deck lunch"  Obviously wasn't expecting chocolate buffet etc.  Talking to people who were on Journey they said Quest was not the same experience at all.  Disappointing and hope it is a one off

Oh, me too!

[les37b]

41 minutes ago, mchell810 said:

 

I have no doubt!  My Azamara cruise will sail directly into Seville which is what drew me to that itinerary and keeps me on it; otherwise, I'd probably cancel.

 

My sailing on the Moon in January on South America, got us an extra 9 days sailing on a grand cruise. We were meant to disembark in Guayaquil, but my wife (we were both testing every other day) tested positive. Zero symptoms. We had a choice. We could get off and the 6 days she'd had in quarantine counted for nothing and she'd need to spend a further 15 days in a Guayaquil quarantine. This would have been covered by SS. So we took the option to stay on until Valparaiso. No charges for the extra or flight deviations we now had. Not only that, we got approx 50% of our fare back for our troubles.

 

I asked Azamara what would happen if that scenario played out on Pursuit in June and basically they would disembark you at the next port, leave you to fend for yourself and at your expense for quarantine and flight bookings and no compensation for missing your cruise. Viking are also very good at looking after their customers.

[Mackdogmolly]

So very disappointing to hear. Will be embarking Quest in 8 weeks and just hoping for a better experience, or our next cruise might be with Viking.

[takemewithyou]

@uktog very timely update on your comparison!  We are on Viking Orion, having boarded on Easter Sunday.  It has been interesting to compare with our Dec Quest cruise.  I think things were a bit better on Quest then than what you recently experienced, however…..not without some small issues!

 

There are some things we are VERY impressed with on Viking….the ship is gorgeous and the stateroom , a PV, is so so nice and spacious.  The bath is lovely with heated floors, clean and fresh. My DH describes the ship as one in which you took the best parts of all the cruises and different .cruise.lines and combined them all together into one ship!  If it just had the Azamara crew as we all knew, it would be fantastic!  
 

The food is a step above.  We have not had our evenings in Manfredis yet, but last night we did the Chefs Table with the halibut you mentioned and it was fantastic. Service was very good.  There is no extra charge for the Chefs Table.  Tonight there is chateaubriand in the restaurant and in the World Cafe.  The Restaurant was so slow the first night, beyond anything we have ever experienced and pretty bad the next morning with wait times and cold food, we have stopped going there.  We are relying on specialties and World cafe.

 

I will have more thoughts as the days go on.  We are missing the Azamara crew, the White Night, the destination evening.  Oh and we missed a port, Astoria OR, supposedly because we are trying to outrun a low pressure system.  We are now sitting 70 miles off of San Francisco, our stop tomorrow so not sure why we couldn’t have stopped in Astoria?  I guess one should never second guess the Captain! 
 

so there have been some good and some not so good things.  Time will tell how we feel.  

[takemewithyou]

Oh and another thing!  There are so many comfortable seating areas on Viking.  They are everywhere!  Always a quiet spot to sit, if you want one.  That’s one thing we were hoping for!  The Viking Explorers Lounge is fantastic….two levels of glass at the bow.  
 

Trivia, which, sorry, we are not a fan of, is held in the show lounge so all the seating areas are not taken up by that.  An improvement to us.  

[excitedofharpenden]

Thanks for your further thoughts Ann. I value your balanced opinion. As you know, our mutual friends currently on Quest are experiencing a similar less than stellar time with many small frustrations. This concerns me for my two cruises on the ship in June.

 

I think you made a very valid observation that the crew seem to be running the ship rather than the management. Maybe some of those in charge are burnt out. Or they lack training and experience. Azamara need to get a handle on this as soon as possible because some of the failings you have highlighted are not acceptable. The situation regarding your husband's nut allergy incident is shocking. So unlike Azamara. What's going on?

 

Phil 

Edited April 20, 2022 by excitedofharpenden

[PirateWife]

1 hour ago, takemewithyou said:

@uktog very timely update on your comparison!  We are on Viking Orion, having boarded on Easter Sunday.  It has been interesting to compare with our Dec Quest cruise.  I think things were a bit better on Quest then than what you recently experienced, however…..not without some small issues!

 

There are some things we are VERY impressed with on Viking….the ship is gorgeous and the stateroom , a PV, is so so nice and spacious.  The bath is lovely with heated floors, clean and fresh. My DH describes the ship as one in which you took the best parts of all the cruises and different .cruise.lines and combined them all together into one ship!  If it just had the Azamara crew as we all knew, it would be fantastic!  
 

The food is a step above.  We have not had our evenings in Manfredis yet, but last night we did the Chefs Table with the halibut you mentioned and it was fantastic. Service was very good.  There is no extra charge for the Chefs Table.  Tonight there is chateaubriand in the restaurant and in the World Cafe.  The Restaurant was so slow the first night, beyond anything we have ever experienced and pretty bad the next morning with wait times and cold food, we have stopped going there.  We are relying on specialties and World cafe.

 

I will have more thoughts as the days go on.  We are missing the Azamara crew, the White Night, the destination evening.  Oh and we missed a port, Astoria OR, supposedly because we are trying to outrun a low pressure system.  We are now sitting 70 miles off of San Francisco, our stop tomorrow so not sure why we couldn’t have stopped in Astoria?  I guess one should never second guess the Captain! 
 

so there have been some good and some not so good things.  Time will tell how we feel.  

Trust me, you wouldn't have wanted to go in over the bar to get to Astoria. Living a few miles south, it has been cold, wet, hailed and snowed in the last 36 hours. Add on to that very strong winds.

[takemewithyou]

1 hour ago, PirateWife said:

Trust me, you wouldn't have wanted to go in over the bar to get to Astoria. Living a few miles south, it has been cold, wet, hailed and snowed in the last 36 hours. Add on to that very strong winds.

Thanks for that info.  I knew not to really question a Captains decision!    
 

Plus we were 2 hrs late leaving Vancouver.  Probably because  they were waiting for people like us who were just barely getting boarded due to airline delays!

[Kitekat]

This is such disappointing news that the service is slipping so badly. Although we travelled on Regent Voyager freshly out of dry dock when they had just launched Seven Seas Explorer and had similar service issues for a few days as experienced staff had been pulled off the existing ships to staff up the new ship. 

They pulled the stops out and fixed everything within three days!

 

I think we will enjoy the new food on Azamara as we are big Asian food fans and found the food on Viking to be of excellent quality but very bland. But Manfredi's was generally awful - stale fat used for frying and very bland pasta, although the steak tartare was fantastic!

 

The bathrooms on Viking for a cruise line are almost perfect - and would be if they could sort out that pesky leak from the shower in our cabin. Although small they are perfectly formed and on those cooler days the heated floor is wonderful.

 

Oh well, at the moment we are not back on board any Azamara ship until the end of next year... hopefully things will have sorted themselves out by then! 

[ddpe]

I was on the same sailing as UKtog and actually had a meal with UKtog (I remember your comment about spices and the nut allergy). It was a pleasure meeting you.

 

I felt the crew seemed nervous and a little unhappy.  It didn't feel typical Azamara.  For the first time I had a crew member tell me "no" that something wasn't allowed - I wanted to stay in my suite while they did the morning cleaning as I was dealing with an emergency issue at work with my large laptop and associated papers.  A suite is a large room and he had plenty of room to maneuver.  We constantly felt like we had to strictly vacate the room at specified times so it could be made up. I do not fault the attendant who seemed like he had way too many cabins to deal with and was continuously rushing and working very hard. 

 

The suite had a number of issues - I could not open the sliding balcony doors as they were stuck tight.  The room attendant demonstrated leaning hard on the glass and pushing out while pushing back.  I still could not do it.  He left.  My husband went down to guest services and they sent someone up immediately to lubricate the tracks which worked for about 7 days.  The immediate service was appreciated.  We also had a very vinegary smell in the bathroom that permeated the whole suite.  I poured water down the different drains to see if that was the issue, but it did not help.  It seemed keeping the toilet lid down helped a little.

 

The white night was cold (not their fault), but the music selection was horrible (just pick some 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, etc, Top 40 please that you can dance to).  The food selection was lacking (no lobster on the grill and lack luster veggies).  I should have gone to the restaurant that night instead. 

With no Azamazing evenings - it takes something away; although, the Flamenco on the ship was wonderful. 
 

The food was fine, but nothing wowed me including the chef's table.  The included chardonnay was not drinkable and I switched to the Pinot Grigio.  I was disappointed in the lack of souffles at Aqualina - that was always the reason for booking.  The lobster bisque was outstanding . The food felt on par with current Celebrity offerings in the specialty, Blu, and suite dining.  In the past, Azamara exceeded Celebrity.

 

I would still select Azamara over Viking as I felt Viking was an assisted living facility on the ocean and treated guests as such.  Although, I hope Azamara gets rid of the guy running around in a white coat asking how we all were. That action starts having shades of the assisted living facility again.  He was very friendly - actually the only one with a real smile, but I don't want to be reminded of illness on my vacation. 

 

My feeling is if you like to eat and sit, Viking is for you - yes the ships are beautiful and food very, very good.  I always find Azamara guests intelligent, lively, and well-traveled which is a draw for me.  The destinations and the late nights in port are an extreme plus as well.  My statement has always been that I have fun on Azamara. I did not have fun on Viking - I found it dull with disappointing excursions and entertainment.   Bottom line is we booked another cruise on board with the expectation of Azamara getting its groove again.  The two year down time is certain to cause issues which can be remedied.  

[uktog]

Yes lovely to meet you DDPE.  A very good and fair assessment.  I think we struck lucky with a younger crowd on Viking but can understand why you would think you had the assisted living view you had if there was an older group.  Dont mention Dr Death as my husband then called him!!!

 

You are right, the crew just did not come over as being happy and we heard some of them being spoken to by a manager in the buffet in a way that was not how previous managers would have spoken to them - why challenge the server about the content of the individual berry bowls when they were prepared in the kitchen.  The young lady was genuinely upset whilst serving me after so reassured her it did not matter to me whether there were sprigs of mint on top or not.

 

I really do hope they remedy issues, they are going to have to recruit managers and supervisors of the right calibre and with the right leadership skills to motivate the staff to do what we know they can do given the right support and guidance.  We too have several more cruises booked and just hope it all shapes up better soon.

[wjfan417]

My husband and I actually enjoyed our 4/5 Quest cruise with a couple exceptions. We had a premium drink package included in the special when we booked. It didn’t include any additional wines which is what we primarily drink, and we thought the included wines were pretty low quality. After 5 days, we upgraded to the ultimate package based on the wines they said were included, only to find that most of those had been replaced with something else. They were only slightly better than the included wines. We also were not happy with the white-coated guy asking how we were doing and offering us acupuncture. Our transfer from Tarragona to Barcelona the last day was cancelled because there weren’t enough bookings, so we lost money for our La Sagrada Familia tour and Picasso Museum tickets. 

[uktog]

13 minutes ago, wjfan417 said:

My husband and I actually enjoyed our 4/5 Quest cruise with a couple exceptions. We had a premium drink package included in the special when we booked. It didn’t include any additional wines which is what we primarily drink, and we thought the included wines were pretty low quality. After 5 days, we upgraded to the ultimate package based on the wines they said were included, only to find that most of those had been replaced with something else. They were only slightly better than the included wines. We also were not happy with the white-coated guy asking how we were doing and offering us acupuncture. Our transfer from Tarragona to Barcelona the last day was cancelled because there weren’t enough bookings, so we lost money for our La Sagrada Familia tour and Picasso Museum tickets. 

Agree re the Ultimate Package wines, also the poor service experience in the main dining room was in part caused by the fact the staff could not get/find the wines or kept topping up our glasses with the included wines when we were drinking package wine.  Thank goodness Whispering Anger was still there or I would have gone crazy!

 

So sorry to hear you lost the transfer and your Barcelona experiences as a result, I did hear of a lot of trips cancelled due to low numbers but other trips people could not get on due to lack of buses and guides.

[lisiamc]

12 minutes ago, uktog said:

Agree re the Ultimate Package wines, also the poor service experience in the main dining room was in part caused by the fact the staff could not get/find the wines or kept topping up our glasses with the included wines when we were drinking package wine.  Thank goodness Whispering Anger was still there or I would have gone crazy!

 

So sorry to hear you lost the transfer and your Barcelona experiences as a result, I did hear of a lot of trips cancelled due to low numbers but other trips people could not get on due to lack of buses and guides.

I’m so glad to hear that they still have Whispering Angel!  I look forward to having a glass as soon as possible.

[oddjob16]

1 hour ago, lisiamc said:

I’m so glad to hear that they still have Whispering Angel!  I look forward to having a glass as soon as possible.

No Whispering Angel on Journey in january. They were empty of many other wines in the package as well.