It was not without some trepidation that we went ahead with this cruise, after reading some of the earlier reviews on Cruise Critic. In fact we came very close to cancelling our booking at one point as the barrage of bad news regarding earlier cruises piled up. I am so glad we did decide to go ahead. Voyages to Antiquity delivered a thoroughly enjoyable and memorable adventure that will live with us forever. We have hundreds of photos, some wonderful memories and a host of new friends as a result. This is a small ship adventure to ports less visited and, though not without some issues to be addressed, represents excellent value for the intrepid traveller.
The Ship
The ship has only recently been fitted out, so its decor is clean and fresh, there is plenty of light in internal areas and it has the feel of a new ship. Aegean Odyssey is a smaller ship than we were used to. Our only earlier experience of a cruise ship was HAL's Zuiderdam in 2008, which is a magnificent and exceptionally comfortable ship. The Aegean Odyssey is a much smaller vessel. This smallness in size has some positives and negatives. One negative is that it seemed sensitive to ocean swells. The sensation of rocking about was quite marked in relatively minor seas (sea sick pills are available free at reception!). There is less choice of open space. The swimming pool is small and the water sloshed about, sometimes with such energy, that it was usually not possible to swim on our voyage. The positives far outweighed the negatives in my mind. We got to know other passengers fairly quickly; we soon had our favourite spots on board. The ship is able to visit and dock at ports which are just not accessible to larger vessels. (Zuiderdam would not have been able to get anywhere near the dock area at Darnah - for Cyrene). Importantly there were only 260 passengers aboard. When visiting the historic sites on shore it was much more enjoyable to do so in relatively small groups. And in addition, we all got to know each other, passengers and crew, and I enjoyed that aspect very much.
Cabin 549: Close to funnel. Very noisy.
Cabin 730: Spacious, light filled, comfortable, reasonably quiet, easy access to external areas.