Vineyards and Castles on the Oceania Marina
9/17/19 to 9/29/19

Click on the above link buttons that will take you directly to a particular page or area of the review; or you can just click through to the next page at the bottom of each page.

Page 1 - Pre-Cruise in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Embarkation, Ship
Page 2 - Ship (Continued), Cabin, Dining, Entertainment, Activities
Page 3 - Ports of Call: Dover, England; LeHavre, France, St. Malo, France
Page 4 - Ports of Call: Brest, France; La Rochelle, France; Bordeaux, France - Day 1
Page 5 - Ports of Call: Bordeaux, France - Day 2; Bilbao, Spain
Page 6 - Ports of Call: Ferrol, Spain; Oporto, Portugal; Post-Cruise in Lisbon, Portugal - Day 1
Page 7 - Post-Cruise in Lisbon, Portugal - Days 2 & 3

Ship Continued

Other

Riviera Lounge – My main complaint about Oceania’s smaller ships is that the theater seating made it difficult to see the performers on the floor level stage. Some people do prefer the intimacy of that ship class theater; but the Marina has stadium seating. It allowed for much better viewing of the shows.

I was particularly pleased with seat spacing which provided a lot of leg room. In fact, I didn’t even need to stand up if someone wanted to walk in front of me to another seat in our aisle.

Most of the seats had a very good view of the stage; but those people sitting in the very back of the theater did have somewhat of a problem. Although there was stadium seating, it was a very gradual incline. Then it leveled off at the entrance ramp, with another separate section in the very back. The farther back you sat, the harder it was to see over the other people.

Pool Area – I really liked the pool area on the Riviera. It feels like one that you would find in a fancy hotel. The pool itself is very pretty with the large shallow area surrounding it. The two hot tubs weren’t used as much for this cruise due to the cooler weather in the earlier part of the cruise; but they got more popular in the warmer southern waters.

There was plenty of seating and it was very comfortable with the plush towels on the padded lounge chairs and beds.

Sanctuary – In the front part of the pool area on the port side is a very nice shaded area called the Sanctuary. It contains quite a few padded lounge chairs and beds.

Patio - In the front part of the pool area on the starboard side, just across from the Sanctuary, is another shaded area called the Patio. It contains tables and chairs and can be used for dining or game playing.

Sun Deck – The sun deck on deck 14 above the pool was popular for those that didn’t want any shading while sunning themselves. There were lots of padded lounge chairs available at all times up there.

Fitness Track - There was a small walking/jogging track that went around the smokestack on deck 15. It was really short for a jogging track; but it was an area that didn’t have a lot of traffic to get in the way of those that used it. Which also made it nice for the sitting and lounge areas on that deck.

Also, on deck 15 was a croquet court and a shuffleboard area.

Casino - When I first walked into the casino, I thought that it was rather small for this size ship. Then I realized that there was another section on the other side of the Casino Bar.

Culinary Center – A very popular activity on the Riviera was the cooking classes in the Culinary Center. During the cruise there were several different classes. Reservations needed to be booked as soon as possible, since the classes filled up quickly. The room is set up very nicely so that each person has their own cooking area. There is a charge for the classes and most of the classes were sold out online well before the cruise date.

Artist Loft – This is the area where various free classes are held to teach you how to paint. They also taught other arts and crafts that the artists specialized in.

Golf Putting Green – At the top of the ship on deck 16, which could not be accessed by elevator, was a very nice putting green. A small driving cage adjoined it.

Paddle Tennis – Next to putting green was a paddle tennis court. It takes up a lot less room than a full sized tennis court.

Boutiques – The shops on the Riviera are all located in one area on deck 5. They had a nice selection of items and the shops had an attractive upscale appearance.

Atrium – As in the smaller Oceania ships, the grand staircase is the focal point. It is such a lovely area to see as you enter the ship for the first time.

On either side of the atrium are nice sitting areas along the windows.

Reception – On one side of the atrium was the reception desk. I was most impressed with the friendly attitude and efficient handling of any questions or issues.

Destination Services – Since we had pre-booked the 3 OLife ship excursions we each received with our booking and had independent excursions in the other ports, I never worked with the destinations people.

Upper Hall – From deck 6, the view of the staircase and looking down to deck 5 was also quite nice.

Promenade – There is no promenade deck on the Marina. But that brings up the question of how one would get to the lifeboats if needed. There actually is a very narrow deck just outside deck 6 that provides access to the lifeboats. The view from the promenade is quite nice. It is a shame there isn't a real promenade deck on this class ship.

Board Room – I thought it was clever to call the card room the Board Room; although when I saw the name on the deck plan during my first Oceania cruise, I thought it was a meeting room rather than for gaming.

Oceania@Sea – The Riviera has a very nice sized internet area with lots of terminals. It was very easy to set up our iPhones and iPads within the comfort of our cabin, without any assistance from their help desk.

Our cruise included free internet for one guest. Since only one person in the cabin can use the internet at a time, each guest in a cabin would need to use the same sign on. With the internet being terribly slow, probably due to the large number of passengers with free internet, I felt sorry for those that had purchased packages based on minutes of usage. Oceania really needs to catch up with the other cruise lines that are upgrading to a much faster internet speed. I was very disappointed when they sent out a notice to sign on to the internet to fill out the survey form. I tried multiple times to no avail to be able to pull it up. It is a shame, since I would have like to compliment some of outstanding crew we really appreciated. Since they never followed up with an email survey form, they lost my opinions on the cruise.

Library – Between the internet café and Baristas is a curved hallway. Along that hallway is the library broken down into several separate cozy rooms. With the large bookshelves, fireplaces, paintings and comfortable chairs, each room had the feel of a library in a stately manor.

Laundry Rooms - There are laundry rooms on decks 7, 8, 9, and 10. They have stacked washers and dryers that are free. This is a great improvement over our previous Oceania cruises where we would have to pay $2.00 for tokens to use them. Thank you, Oceania. A detergent dispenser is mounted on the wall. When you push the button a liquid detergent already mixed with water is dispensed and almost fills the cup. You then pour it into a receptacle on the washer. A refrigerator with cold water, a very comfortable couch and a TV are provided if you need them while waiting for a load to finish.

Below is the official laundry hours notification on the laundry room door. The laundry rooms got very busy toward the last half of the cruise.

Concierge – The concierge desk is located in the atrium. We had no need for his services on this cruise. There is a similar desk on the other side of the atrium that is used during the day for making dinner reservations at the specialty restaurants. With their being no sea days and us being on full day tours most days I didn’t get to use this service and was not able to get additional specialty restaurant reservations.

Canyon Ranch Spa Club – This is a very lovely area of the ship that is dedicated to pampering the passengers and providing various salon type services. It has a definite upscale feel to it.

There is also a shop in the spa.

Spa Terrace – Just outside the spa is a terrace that is provided for the Concierge Class and suite guests.

Fitness Center – The fitness center located next to the spa is available to all. It is well appointed with lots of well-maintained equipment.

Cabin

When I booked the cruise almost 2 years before sailing, I had booked a handicapped oceanview cabin, since it would make it easier for Carol to use her scooter and benefit by the handicapped bathroom. When she died in March, the oceanview cabins were sold out, so they couldn’t move me to a different one. I must say that I am glad they weren’t able to move me. This cabin was really nice. It was much bigger than the normal oceanview.

The closet had two full-length sides to it as well as two drawers under the safe. There were also drawers on either side of the desk.

The bathroom was very large for a non-suite cruise ship cabin. The shower was especially large to accommodate a wheel chair.

One thing that is always important to me is the number of available electric outlets in a cabin.
I always bring an adapter to be able to utilize the British outlets on the ship. The desk had two US and one British outlet; but the US were so close together, I couldn’t use the other one when using my 10W Apple charger.

There was a US outlet below the TV and a British outlet on either side of the bed.

With this class oceanview cabins having floor to ceiling windows, it was similar to the view that we would have had with a veranda, except the windows didn’t open. There was a nice view to the lifeboats looking straight out, as well as when looking right or left.

One new thing that Oceania has started is to use glass bottles for water in the room, rather than plastic ones. I thought it was a nice idea, but I would have preferred to have two bottles rather than just one since both Craig and I are both big water fans. It is possible that we could have gotten another one, but I never thought about asking our attendants.

We had two great cabin attendants, Melissa from Peru and Herschel from Honduras. I never understand how the housekeeping staff, who work so hard, are always so helpful and happy.

Dining (Link to Menus)

I have included copies of the menus for the main dining room along with photos of some of the food items at the Menus link just above and at the top of each page of the review.

Since I discussed the dining in previous Riviera review, I won’t repeat myself. Once again, all the restaurants were very good. We were able to go to all the specialty restaurants once. We ate all but one of our breakfasts in the Terrace Café, since the Grand Dining Room takes so much longer and there are less food items to choose from. We also had early tours to get to most days. We also did not go to the Grand Dining Room for lunch for the same reasons.

My only complaint is about lunch in the Terrace Café. It is the same issue I have had on other Oceania cruises. The food is quite good; but because they have so many fancy types of items, there aren’t any plainer choices when I just wanted a simple lunch. Granted, Waves does have some of those choices, but it would be nice to be able to have some tuna, chicken or egg salad to make a simple sandwich or salad plate with.

Many people prefer to go to the Terrace Café for dinner.   We tried it once this cruise and it was quite nice. But at night, I still prefer to be served and spoiled. Plus, with the nightly shows starting at 9:45 PM, there was plenty of time to enjoy the slower pace and chat with table mates.

Entertainment

Our Cruise Director was Peter Roberts from England. Craig and I just loved him. He had so much energy, was so involved in everything and just a pleasure to have as a Cruise Director. He has one very distinguishing feature, a high-pitched voice. That coupled with his British accent got everyone’s attention when he made announcements or when speaking in a crowd. Him and his unique voice really grew on us. We looked forward to seeing and hearing him. He did have a collection of unique outfits that he would wear at some of the shows, as shown below. Craig and I both hope to be able to cruise with him again. He is a winner!

There were several performers around the ship including the Panache String Quartet, Andrea Fontana at the Piano and the Light & Rhythm Band. They were all enjoyable, except we didn’t care for the female lead singer of the Light & Rhythm Band. She had issues hitting the right notes. Our favorite group was the Marina Show Band, who played during the shows, as well as in Horizons for late night entertainment a few nights.

Performers –

Filip Wojciechowski – Filip is an outstanding pianist. He has been named Entertainer of the Year twice by two of the world’s top cruise lines. He also plays in a trio, but not on this cruise. I enjoyed the performance but would have liked seeing more of his personality. Some cruise line pianists are more entertaining between pieces. He performed two separate evening shows.

Oli Nez – I had seen this saxophonist on a 2016 transatlantic cruise. I thoroughly enjoyed him then and did just as much this time. The first time I saw him he played several different types of wind instruments. This time he stuck to his saxophone, which he did an outstanding job with. The man does get a workout on stage, since he does move around a lot while playing. Oli did two evening shows.

Peter Cutler – He is a vocalist who also plays the piano and does a little comedy. He is good at what he does, and the audience liked him; but for some reason his show just didn’t appeal to me that much. Peter did two evening shows.

Katerina Rossa – Katerina is an outstanding violinist. I had previously seen her twice before. The first time was on a 2016 Holy Land cruise; and the second time was a few days after it on the same 2016 transatlantic cruise that I saw Oli Nez on. I was so glad that I was going to see her again. She comes out in a very full dress. Midway during the performance she removes part of the dress and she is in tights, which is a surprise to the audience. I am a big Katerina fan.

Production Shows – The four singers did a very good job on most songs, which does make a big difference for production shows. The dancers seemed to really enjoy what they were doing, which makes for better performances also. Shows on most cruise lines these days seem to be reducing stage sets and going for more of the video background to change the scenes. This makes for colorful backgrounds, but when I think back at the shows, it makes them all blend together for me. As a result, it is harder for me to differentiate one show from the other. I still enjoyed them.

Welcome Aboard Showtime – This wasn’t a production show per se, but it had the full cast entertain us. Each cast member introduced themselves and told where they were from. Two of the singers sang some solo songs and the dancers performed for us. It was a nice way to do a first show of a cruise.

Magical Moments – This show was mostly 1950-60’s music. I love that music genre, but the show was just OK to me.

The Songs of Peggy Lee - As the title suggests, the cast sang to and danced to Peggy Lee’s music. The show was well done.

Broadway in Concert – This show was described as “A dazzling array of classic and contemporary songs.” Obviously, the songs were from Broadway shows, which was fine for me. I enjoy these tunes, especially since they were sung very well. It was unusual to not have any dancing in a show; but it was a good one.

Dancin’ Fool – This show was a celebration of different types of dance music. It was a very entertaining show.

When it ended, Captain Luca Manzi came on the sage with the General Manager and other officers to thank us and wish us well. He also brought most other crew on the stage with him, so they could clap for us and us for them. At the very end Peter led the group singing YMCA. OMG, almost everyone in the audience was singing and dancing to it in place. The audience would sign out the letters along with those on the stage, as is normally done. Peter would add some funny words into the song. It never seemed to end. It was a hoot! I wish I had videoed it, or at least taken a photo.

Activities

Oceania isn’t known for having a lot of activities, but with this cruise not having any sea days, they had even less. They did have one enrichment speaker who did four talks. I went to one of them that was later in the day after a port visit. I didn’t care for her lecture style and left before it ended. I normally look forward to enrichment speakers on a cruise; but with so little ship time, it was probably just as well. Below are activities I attended.

Cruise Critic Meet and Greet (www.cruisecritic.com) – This really wasn’t an official Cruise Critic Meet and Greet, since Oceania doesn’t support the program. But since we had a Cruise Critic roll call that ended up having 163 participants on it, it was a large Cruise Critic group, especially for Oceania. I had contacted Oceania before the cruise to set up a meeting for a large group on the first day of the cruise before the muster drill. This type meeting is normally done on the first sea day, but since we didn’t have any, this would be the best time for it. The meeting was held at 3:30 PM in Horizons and we had a huge group show up. I was very surprised. Oceania groups are usually pretty small and I thought having it on embarkation day would discourage a lot of people, but it didn’t.

Even with Oceania we have normally had someone from the staff show up and thank us for cruising with them. We have frequently had the Captain and the Cruise Director show up with the CD being a master of ceremonies. No one showed up, so we just enjoyed meeting everyone and had a most enjoyable time.

Captain’s Reception for Returning Guests – It’s always nice to go to a party with free drinks, especially when it is hosted by the Captain. With the large number of returning guests, it had to be broken out into two different groups. The Captain and General Manager both spoke to the group.

Jacques Pépin Activities – This was a very special cruise since Master Chef Jacques Pépin, who serves as Oceania’s Executive Culinary Director was on board. When we booked the cruise, it was just a regular cruise. A few months later it was announced that he would be onboard, and the ship sold out quicker than normal. He had three official activities during the cruise and one that was unplanned. For those that weren’t familiar with Jacqes, a documentary of his life was showing on the TV in a continuous stream. It was very interesting.

Jacques Pépin Art Exhibit and Champagne – Jacques is an artist. Many of his works were set up in Horizons and were available for sale. He was also available for having photos taken with him; but the line was very long. Horizons was packed. Everyone wanted to see the celebrity chef. At the end of the time for the show, he walked up to the dance floor and spoke for a few minutes. It was very nice of him to be so available to the cruisers.

Cooking Demonstration with Master Chef Jacques Pépin - This was a real treat. Jacques and his wife Gloria gave a cooking demonstration for the ship in the Lounge. As we entered the theater, we received a pamphlet with some recipes he was going to prepare. Jacques and his wife were on the stage to prepare the three items. Gloria was a real character. It was the first time that we had seen her personality. She was giving Jacques a controlled amount of grief; and it was quite cute.

Jacques did get a bit frustrated by some technical difficulties. One of the burners on the stove wasn’t working and they tried to fix it. Then later a food processor wouldn’t work. The ship’s Chef came out to try to fix it, but they had to just use a different one. It was an awesome experience to be able to watch this cooking legend do his thing. He does seem like such a sweet person.

Book signing with Master Chef Jacques Pépin - One afternoon, while we were still on a tour in Ferrol, Spain, Jacques was set up in the Atrium to sell and sign his cookbooks. I hate that we missed it. I would have bought one for me and for Craig.

Group Photo with the Chefs – On the last day of the cruise after we explored Porto, we were walking around deck 14 looking at the sights . We heard a commotion, so we went over to where it was coming from. We saw a bunch of people in white uniforms posing for a photo. As we got closer, we could see that it was chefs of the ship. In the middle of the group was Jacques Pepin. He was posing with the staff. What a lovely gesture! It is a photo that they will all treasure.