We normally cruise Celebrity, and sometimes Princess, but decided to celebrate my wife's retirement by upgrading to a higher end line. We were not disappointed. Although overall service was excellent and the stateroom was beautiful, it was the food onboard that really stood out. No matter the venue, the food was much better than any of the other 14 cruises we have taken. The crowd was older mostly 70+, but most were friendly and inviting. We had been to many of the ports on our Dec. Celebrity cruise, but Tortula and St. Barts were new for us. The cruise was a nice mixture of sea and port days.

While on a Stingray encounter in Antigua we were approached by one of the ships entertainers Jordan who asked if we would like to have dinner that night with her and two of her cast mates. That evening we had dinner with Jordan, Bethan and Dean in the main dinning room. It was a very nice experience and the first time we had eaten with members of the entertainment staff. What a nice group of young people who are a credit to the Oceania Riviera.

On the downside the tender into the St. Barts was very slow and our suggestion is they have more tenders available to get people to the island. Also disembarkation was confusing since they did not assign people to particular lounges and it was a mess by the elevators. We also like to walk off a ship with our own luggage, but were advised by Oceania that CBP would not allow, but this is not true. They need more wait staff in the pool area and getting a drink was slow. Read more