Odyssey Carribean Tapestry 12/10-12/22

[JaneBP]

Everybody packed and ready? I have written to alert the 'O' about our terrific 'Meet & Greet' on the 11th, Friday, at 4:30 at the SkyBar. Hope you all will stop by.

[floridaphilly]

We are looking forward to meeting everyone and putting faces to all of the posts that are made. How nice to have a party where we don't have to clean up or cook. As the song says "ours bags are packed and we're ready to go..."

Phyllis

[pvgal]

Not packed yet but clothes all set aside and ready to go. Hope the bad weather that is in the midwest doesn't mess up anyone's plans. See you all on board.

 

Eileen

[HotRoot]

We are all aboard and had a successful meet and greet. Everything is going great. FYI, you can pick up free wifi in Grand Turk from the Pirate Cove Restaurant from the ship. In Barbados (which is where we are), 30 minutes at the cruise port is only $5. The ship is huge, beautiful, and service is great. We went on the galley tour and learned a new chef was brought in 5 weeks ago to organize the kitchen. They were averaging 45 minutes from order to receiving your food. That is now cut to 12 minutes.

[JaneBP]

Hear YE! Hear YE! This is to announce that the CruiseCritic Team shared a first at Liars' Club and won new tote bags!!!!!

 

The

Meet & Greet was lots of tun, while not everyone attended, we had a great crowd and got to know each other a bit better. Guenter and Barry Hopkins also attended.

We'll be home soon. Right now it's pouring in Antigua and many are here at the Square chatting or on-line. Best to share the day's rate with friends, becomes much more economical.

(BTW, never received the dining room order in 12 minutes, not even at lunch with 12 people in the dining room.)

And the snorkeling equipmentis available to all guests. If one is going on a scheduled trip for snorkeling, the tour provider has the equipment. 'Caviar in the Surf' was a big hit, even if it was quite choppy!

[Host Dan]

I'm glad your having fun Jane! Too bad about the weather. Hopefully you will have clear skies and calm seas for the duration of the cruise!

 

Host Dan

[highcbob]

We went on the galley tour and learned a new chef was brought in 5 weeks ago to organize the kitchen. They were averaging 45 minutes from order to receiving your food. That is now cut to 12 minutes.

 

I may be confused but I thought Chef Cockburn was fairly new on Odyssey - after all that hype and now he's gone? What happened to him? Who is the 'new' chef?

 

... and 45 minutes to receive your order? That was not good.

[Roxburgh]

When we were on (Nov 14 - Nov 28) the chef was Chef Udo Wischniewski. We experienced no problems with the service.

[Host Dan]

When we were on (Nov 14 - Nov 28) the chef was Chef Udo Wischniewski. We experienced no problems with the service.

Other than Thanksgiving! ;) :D

 

Host Dan

[Roxburgh]

Other than Thanksgiving! ;) :D

 

Host Dan

 

Our Thanksgiving dinner was great :D:cool:

[JaneBP]

We're leaving on some jet planes.... have not yet seen the heabvy metal chains for staying aboard, however. There are 6 from this cruise in transit and the Holiday cruise is filled. Bustling and mo0re bustling, but it's time to say Good-Bye to old and new friends. I hope other CC cruisers will post their experiences, too!

 

Happy Holidays!

[LaPaloma]

I am not aware of Seabourn lending snorkeling equipment. Usually the tour companies have it for the participants. See you soon!

 

Well Jane, all good things come to an end..but...Christmas is here and you can enjoy that. We had our early one, and I was spoiled totally. We are leaving in a couple of hours for the pre-op. Have to head to the real production at 5:30 am tomorrow. The Dr. arrives at 8:55 precisely I was told. Had to chuckle at that. Don has you on his "contact" list. Lola

[pvgal]

Well we just got home from a wonderful cruise. This was the best. And yes Jane, the CCers took all prizes at the Liars Club. Glad to be on your team. Looking forward now to sailing once again on the Odyssey. Loved everything about it.

 

Eileen

[HotRoot]

When we were on (Nov 14 - Nov 28) the chef was Chef Udo Wischniewski. We experienced no problems with the service.

 

He is still aboard. And his "12 minute time" was from when the order was turned in. It is not turned in until after you have enjoyed your soup, salad, etc. We really had no service issues. But, then never ate a table for more than 4.

[MARIANH]

He is still aboard. And his "12 minute time" was from when the order was turned in. It is not turned in until after you have enjoyed your soup, salad, etc. We really had no service issues. But, then never ate a table for more than 4.

 

Back in the UK ( plenty of snow and ice) courtesy of BA ( thanks for not striking).

 

We sat on tables for four, six and eight with never any problems with service delays at dinner. In fact, I would rate it good to excellent. However breakfast service was patchy, particularly in the Collonade - they are seriously understaffed and some demotivation was evident. I will post a summary of our experience after Christmas - lots of shopping to do and not much time!

 

Suffice to say for the present that Odyssey is a spectacular ship, excellent in many respects but surprisingly imperfect in a few others - a curates egg! And there is great reluctance to recognise the "elephant in the room" - vibration. More to follow.

 

Happy Holidays

[highcbob]

However breakfast service was patchy, particularly in the Collonade - they are seriously understaffed and some demotivation was evident. Odyssey is a spectacular ship, excellent in many respects but surprisingly imperfect in a few others - a curates egg! And there is great reluctance to recognise the "elephant in the room" - vibration. More to follow.

 

 

Friends have advised me although dinner in Colonnade was very good, at breakfast repeatedly having to request coffee and also being told over and over that "toast is on it's way" when it finally shows up after you've finished your eggs, obviously shows a serious lack of training. I would not expect this on Carnival let alone Seabourn.

 

I also like the posters wording of Odyssey's vibration issue calling it "the elephant in the room".

[floridaphilly]

We had a wonderful cruise and enjoyed exploring the new ship and finding many many places to relax, hide or just have fun. I do belive that the vibration issue is no longer "hiding in the room". I believe everyone from the captain down to the room stewards are wll aware of the problem. They brought engineers on board while we were cruising to try to get a handle ont he problem. I believe they will look at it more closely when the ship does into dry dock. There are other functional issues that need to be addressed as well. Our shower lacked proper seals and consequently leaked all over the bathroom. We were told there were still 20 or so rooms that had to be fixed. It is a shame this has taken over 6 months to accomplish, but it will be fixed in dry dock.

We did feel that the service was not as expected at the Colonnade, in fact one night at dinner we just got up and left and went to have dessert elsewhere. We did miss the feeling of developing a relationship with staff members. We felt like very few knew who we were by the end of the cruise. Staff from previous cruises greeted us warmly but we felt like we did not add any "new friends" amongst the staff.

The ship is beautiful and once the issues are resolved things should be back to "seabourn standards",

It was fun to meet all of the CC'ers and we look forward to our next sailing.

[Harvey2442]

I am getting increasingly concerned about continuing reports of less than Seaborn standards of service and of hardware problems on the Odysssey. The latter appear due to a ship being rushed into service ahead of full completion to meet a scheduled maiden voyage when the correct way of handling would have been either to have postponed it or to have scheduled a two week return to the shipyard/drydock after the first two/three months of service to iron out the snagging list. As to patchy levels of service what has happen to all the cadets trained in the first part of the year either they were not satisfactory, or the staff turnover has risen or either of these coupled with a tightening of staffing numbers - whatever it appears far from satisfactory however good other aspects of the ship may be. I was looking forward to sailing on Odyssey now I am not so sure.

[seapenarth]

I am getting increasingly concerned about continuing reports of less than Seaborn standards of service and of hardware problems on the Odysssey. The latter appear due to a ship being rushed into service ahead of full completion to meet a scheduled maiden voyage when the correct way of handling would have been either to have postponed it or to have scheduled a two week return to the shipyard/drydock after the first two/three months of service to iron out the snagging list. As to patchy levels of service what has happen to all the cadets trained in the first part of the year either they were not satisfactory, or the staff turnover has risen or either of these coupled with a tightening of staffing numbers - whatever it appears far from satisfactory however good other aspects of the ship may be. I was looking forward to sailing on Odyssey now I am not so sure.

 

I still await my first cruise, but now with a little concern. Compared with the excellent service we were used to on the sisters there would appear to be some large holes forming in the performance of the Odyssey. It will take time and trained personnel to sort out service problems and other experts to get rid of the "do`nt mention the vibrations" Of course it will all be OK one day but I hope sooner than later.

[HotRoot]

Our opinion on service. Maybe it wasn't quite as good as on the sisters but it was not a make it or break it for us. Our understanding is that in the beginning, restaurants were by reservation. This allowed them to know exactly how many people to expect at each restaurant. Guests didn't like that so now all but Restaurant 2 are no reservations. It is now a guessing game for the staff as to which restaurant is going to get the most people. We saw them move waiters between restaurants in the middle of the meal. The chef told us they were averaging 20 people for breakfast in the Restaurant on previous cruises. On our cruise they were averaging 100. It does make scheduling difficult.

 

We did leave one restaurant to have dessert at another but that was because we liked what was on the menu at the other restaurant, not because of service.

 

We had a bigger problem with the menus. In real life we eat gourmet food about twice a year. Every night was too much for us. I am sure many people love the gourmet food, but I was ready for meat loaf, pbj, blt, Pizza Hut pizza, etc.

 

We agree, the only crew who knew our names were crew we knew from previous cruises. But, the couple we were with had never sailed Seabourn before and crew did know their names. Maybe because their name was easier to pronounce than ours.

 

All in all, service was acceptable. The vibration is another story. We would never do a long cruise on the Odyssey while she is shaking like that. Everyone seems to be aware of the problem but has no idea exactly what the problem is or how to fix it.

 

We heard rumors people were cancelling their World Cruise reservations. We would too.

[shefinch]

Maybe we have just been lucky but having done two cruises on the Odyssey, the Maiden and the first crossing,we have had a wonderful time on both occasions and any complaints we have had have been minor. In fact we wouldn't do another crossing on one of the small ships and have booked the Sojourn crossing for next year. We are soon to depart on the World Cruise and are really looking forward to it. We consider ourselves to be very quick to find fault with regard to service in restaurants and still think we get the best service on Seabourn (including the Odyssey)of anywhere in the world!!

[jafbrad]

We are now settling in after returning from from our first experience with Seabourn, on the Odyssey, and, except for a couple of minor food issues, we had a thoroughly enjoyable experience. We were aware that there is an ongoing vibration problem, but we never felt the effects; perhaps we did not frequent the locations where it was most prevalent. We had no issues with the quality of service; in fact, we returned to the same area each night in the restaurant because we so enjoyed the wait staff we met there. The personnel in the Club where we found oursleves every day for tea and a pre-dinner cocktail could not have been any more attentive or friendlier. There was never a problem in the Colonnade at breakfast with the timeliness of our orders, including coffee refills; admittedly we were there early with relatively few diners. Our cabin stewardess, Angelica from Stockholm, was abundantly charming and never missed a beat in fulfilling her duties. We never saw a staff member who did not greet us with genuine friendliness.

 

This was our fourteenth cruise, which include stints on Regent, Silver Sea and Oceania, and I can enthusiastically say that we have not had a better cruising experience; maybe comparable but not better. If we had the tolerance for extended sea travel, we would not hesitate to return to Odyssey for the World Cruise, and we would heartily recommend her to anyone looking for a rewarding and memorable travel experience.

 

Fred

[bamadave]

We're booked into cabin 701- far forward. Anyone have any "vibration" issues that far forward. Anything else in terms of a "heads up" would be greatly appreciated. We've been on Seabourn a couple of times and always been good- we're looking to start easing away from the Royal "cattle car" mentality. Happy holidays and thanks for any thoughts. All my contact info is on my profile. Dave :>

[piatty73]

We enjoyed the cruise as much as any of out 25 previous cruises. The vibration issue was noticed in the Colonnade and elevator. We were on deck 5 and had no vibration but some others on upper decks mentioned it. I found Restaurant 2 worth going to a couple of times but preferred the Restaurant. We did not like the Thai evening in the Colonnade. There are some bubbles on a few walls but the ship is beautiful and we have recommended it to everyone we know. I would not be concerned about the service or the ship.

[JaneBP]

We were in 710 and rarely felt the vibration there, but certainly heard the anchor being lowered and raised. Enjoy!