Costa Atlantica November 14th 2009- Chumley's Bear Cruise

[JerseyGuys]

I was on last year's and I know the GROUP is terrific and would have fun on any ship...but am interested in review of COSTA

[bbenson]

Thoughts about costa Brian? We're very happy with Princess so thats why I asked,....

 

 

Let me see, where to start on Costa... well, the food, if you can call it that, was slightly below 1990's airline food.... the bread could have been used by the NHL for pucks. Seafood, except fish, was consistently bad, Steaks were always over or under cooked and fairly tasteless. Creme Brulee was not brulee'd and as more like a burned egg custard. Buffett was the same every single day and the speciality restauraunt was likened to "Sizzler" not outback, not applebee's but Sizzler. Anyway on the food scale Costa gets an F-

 

I did not see any shows but I'm told the shows were consistently entertaining. The casino was small and nothing special. the singers / lounge acts were mediocre at best. Ok, small aside here, if you can't hit the notes, don't sing the song...it's that simple!

 

My Cabin attendant and Butler were almost annoying they were so attentive. But they apparently didn't talk to each other because I noticed things I had asked for were being left undone if I didn't ask the right person.

 

The spa was small and not a very welcoming atmosphere and the woman that gave me my mani/pedi seemed blah and just ready to get it done with. It sapped some of my enjoyment.

 

The decor of the ship was carnivalesque... but not as eye gouging as Norwegian.

 

General Staff: the Italian staff was consistently foul tempered, rude, and condescending to the point of being unhelpful. There were several instances of them snapping at other staff right in front of guests. The non Italian staff was friendly and accomidating but as soon as Italian would walk by they would clam up and look scared. I have an example here, a new friend I made on the ship accidentally left his ID/credit cards in some pants he sent for laundry. He did not realize his mistake immediately but when he did he set about getting his stuff back since we were in port that day. Ok, so he calls the front desk, who tells him to come down in person. So he does and waits in line, when he gets there the woman behind the desk from Romania is very sweet and calls the laundry but no answer, so she leaves to go to the laundry. She comes back and before she can say anything to him the other woman at the desk, an italian, starts berating her for leaving her post. The woman tries to explain but the Italian lady is just tearing into her, promising to report her and that she should have sent my friend away until they had time to deal with the problem. Finally, my friend comes to her rescue and interrupts to find out about his stuff. The italian shoots him a dirty look and turns back to her customer. Now all this happened in front of 10-20 people in the MAIN lobby and no, it was not a quiet exchange. Finally, the flustered Romanian woman says yes they had found the stuff but it was in the landry manager's safe and he won't be back on the ship till 3:30. 3:30 rolls around and only the Italian is on duty now. He goes back and she tells him that she doesn't have time to go get his stuff that he should come back during dinner when the line is shorter, there were 4 people in line by the way. Finally at dinner he leaves his meal and goes to the desk and his property is returned, by the Romanian woman.

 

Bar Service: The bar service was consistently slow EXCEPT by the aft pool. They were slow at first but having 300 thirsty bears staring at you will speed you up in a hurry. I still miss my two a day happy hours! Also, and I have to point this out, when you have 100+ bears drinking and dancing and having a good time, interrupting them with shows/contests etc is a bad idea. Getting on the PA and telling them to put their shirts back on is an even worse idea. Now, I understand the need to respect other people but there really weren't any other people in the bar AND it was their little polynesian go-go boy dancer that took his shirt off first! I went in the disco one night before we sort of took it over and I'm willing to bet there weren't 15 people in there at the time, and this was like midnight. Costa needs to learn where it's bread is buttered. I will say I liked the DJ.

 

One last pet peeve and this won't apply to everyone and some will feel totally opposite but I found it very ironic that there were smoking sections in every bar on the ship EXCEPT the OUTSIDE bar. Can anyone explain that to me?

 

And one last note. Embarkation and debarkation, easiest I've ever done, hands down. 10 minutes from taxi to room and vice versa.

 

I can understand, in this economy, Paul and Chumley trying to find cheaper lines so more people can afford to experience the cruise and I had an awesome time, but it was because of the company, not the cruise line.

[phillycruiserbear]

I haven't chatted with anyone from my 411 list yet about the cruise. The 2 buddies I asked about it didn't respond. I guess that old saying, better to not say anything if you can't say something nice applies, though I never knew that to apply to gays now does it?

 

On inlet cam.com a person I was chatting with there said that they had been on like 40 cruises and that hands down their worst ever experience was with Costa and the food.

 

Guess you get what you pay for, with the deep discounting on this cruise, I was on a site where a few weeks ago you could book an inside cabin for $299 and a balcony for $499 on the same cruise as Chumley's.

 

Does Paul always deal only with lines in the Carnival family, e.g. Princess, Holland Amerika, Costa? Why don't they ever book on Royal Caribbean or Celebrity?

 

Just wondering

[bbenson]

 

Does Paul always deal only with lines in the Carnival family, e.g. Princess, Holland Amerika, Costa? Why don't they ever book on Royal Caribbean or Celebrity?

 

Just wondering

 

Well, and I could be completely totally wrong here but I remember hearing that the group Bear Voyage had gotten banned from Royal Caribbean after one of their cruises and did a blanket ban on "Bear Cruises." Again, I could be completely totally wrong but I think you have Bear Voyage to blame for that one.. can someone else confirm /deny?

[bbenson]

Oh and please, no one misunderstand. I was hard on Costa but please don't take that to mean in any way shape or form that I had a bad cruise. I didn't... I had an incredibly awesome cruise and hated to leave but that was 1000% because of the great guys I met onboard.

[CrusingJoe]

Oh and please, no one misunderstand. I was hard on Costa but please don't take that to mean in any way shape or form that I had a bad cruise. I didn't... I had an incredibly awesome cruise and hated to leave but that was 1000% because of the great guys I met onboard.

 

Oh no, were booked for Christmas. I guss a bad day on a ship beats a good day at home. Can you tell me more about the ships bars, best place to hang out, how's the gym, steam and sauna. Anyway glad you had a good time.

[bbenson]

Oh no, were booked for Christmas. I guss a bad day on a ship beats a good day at home. Can you tell me more about the ships bars, best place to hang out, how's the gym, steam and sauna. Anyway glad you had a good time.

 

Well hopefully your experience will be better than mine. I will say that as the cruise went on they seemed to finally be getting the hang of things.

 

Bars....well, the only bar I spent a lot of time in was Dante's which is the nightclub. And it's ok...nice design but kind of a pain to go upstairs everytime you wanted a drink. The bar outside the main dinning room on deck 2 was decent... nice place for a cocktail and listen to Kareoke....I mean the ship singer... I did enjoy a cocktail on deck 3 in the Florentine (I think that was the name, its the bar near the library) while a a duo of piano and violin played show tunes...go figure. And the bar service in the casino was pretty good too. Really the bar service on the ship wasn't horrible except when they ran out of a particular alcohol and didn't replace it. Then it got annoying. At one point I was down to my fourth or fifth choice drink because they were out of so many things.

 

Given that by your signature you seem to have spent a lot of time on RCCL ships and Celebrity I don't think you're going to be impressed.

Edited December 3, 2009 by bbenson

[CrusingJoe]

Well hopefully your experience will be better than mine. I will say that as the cruise went on they seemed to finally be getting the hang of things.

 

Bars....well, the only bar I spent a lot of time in was Dante's which is the nightclub. And it's ok...nice design but kind of a pain to go upstairs everytime you wanted a drink. The bar outside the main dinning room on deck 2 was decent... nice place for a cocktail and listen to Kareoke....I mean the ship singer... I did enjoy a cocktail on deck 3 in the Florentine (I think that was the name, its the bar near the library) while a a duo of piano and violin played show tunes...go figure. And the bar service in the casino was pretty good too. Really the bar service on the ship wasn't horrible except when they ran out of a particular alcohol and didn't replace it. Then it got annoying. At one point I was down to my fourth or fifth choice drink because they were out of so many things.

 

Given that by your signature you seem to have spent a lot of time on RCCL ships and Celebrity I don't think you're going to be impressed.

 

Thanks for the info, i should be OK, the price as right.

[bearinmind]

Guys,

This was only my second cruise. My first was on the Serenade of the Seas of RCL. That is what I have for comparison. Costa was disorganized. They did make efforts to fix issues after they were notified there were problems. The fixes were not always successful but they were responsive.

Specifically, there were food issues. Pasta was almost always terrible, shrimp was almost always over cooked. In the main dining room my servings of beef were almost always cooked perfectly to my specification and that was a surprise. After they were informed of there being no free drink options besides water at the tables they started offering ice tea and offering concluding coffee after the meals. The place settings didn't always have all of the correct parts for the meals. Lunch and breakfast were interesting affairs with items not available where they should have been and some equipment (ice cream dispensers) not working either.

The cabin (obstructed view) was good and well taken care of.

The ship was garish but was actually a pretty good ship.

The pools and outdoor spas were salt water and the spas were NOT very warm.

The men's locker room has a sauna (coolish for a sauna) with a glass door and very bright so it was easy to see the entire room from the hall, steam room (very hot for steam) with a glass door and bright as well, and the showers which are individual with a lockable anti-room!

Costa was very good about getting everyone off the ship in a timely manner.

Overall, I'd rate Costa as a poor choice with some good highlights but too many negatives to recommend for the future.

 

Other than that, I would strongly recommend Chumley's Bear Cruises for future cruising with great guys and strong friendly organization...

[Clay Clayton]

My review has been posted. You can find it here:

http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=60208.

[bbenson]

Excellent review Clay...had me chuckling the whole way through since I remembered things I had already forgotten.

[CrusingJoe]

Did the ship offer a GLBT or FOD?

[bbenson]

Honestly no idea. I think I read the daily bulletin thing like one day and that was it.

[CrusingJoe]

Honestly no idea. I think I read the daily bulletin thing like one day and that was it.

 

Thanks

[Clay Clayton]

There were FOD's everyday...times changed..some were afternoon in the coffee spot, others in the evening between dinner sittings.

[djzack67]

My Review is posted

[djzack67]

I miss all those cocktail happy hours

 

 

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