This is our 3rd Regent cruise, and 2nd on the Mariner. Happy on the 1st & 2nd cruises, but not so on this one. Let's start with the good points: * Excursions: Wide choice and well executed. * Drinks: Good variety, and quality. Wines range is excellent. Bar staff are great, and very flexible. Shout-out to Maya in Observation lounge for her great mixing skills. * Rooms/Ship: Nothing to complain about here. Very quiet (no noise from corridor or rooms next door). Matched expectations and the brochure promises. * Entertainment: Standard fare. Not what we come on a cruise for. * Lecturers: Up there with the best we have seen. * Main Dining Room (MDR): Never denied a table. Good food & varied nightly, but a bit unimaginative. A few small hiccups with a lunch that took 90 mins to arrive, but not a show stopper. But the elephant in the room is the fiasco that is the congested La Veranda/Sette Mare. BREAKFAST (La Veranda) * The congestion is horrible. One example: Toast is made by 1 staff member, and the numerous guests waiting for their toast block the already narrow passage. * The limited space makes some guests pushy and rude; especially if time is short before an excursion. * Saw one guest served under-cooked fried eggs; she did not eat them. * Never went a 2nd time. LUNCH (La Veranda) * Best described as an unpleasant bun-fight on busy days. Continuously running out of things (Main dishes, butter, cheese, etc). When asked, staff would replenish but it just adds to the crazy congestion, frustration, and delays. * Staff will take orders and deliver - which is great is you want your food cold. DINNER (Sette Mare) * 4 nights in a row: Denied a table for 4 between 19:30 ~ 20:15. Usually told the wait was 45 mins. Or told: "Suggest you come at 18:30 tomorrow". So we went to MDR each time. * 5th time lucky, but underwhelming food. So what is the problem? As we were on the same ship just 3 months ago, and did not have the same issues, I concluded it is simply that when full (as it is on this cruise) the La Veranda/Sette Mare simply can not cater properly for the guests on board. This is especially acute if the weather means the pool grill is unpopular that day/night. Once we realised all our frustrations centred on La Veranda/Sette Mare, we simply stopped going there. The little frustrations vanished and we really enjoyed the rest of the ship & cruise. Read Less

I would like to give a bit of back ground info on myself so that when reading this review you can judge if it is relevant to what you deem important in your cruise experience.  My husband and I are in our late 50's early 60's we have over 250 days on Seabourn, 150 days on Silversea and 60 days on Regent.  We sailed the Navigator for a month and loved that ship (even though I felt it was a little crowded at times).  We sailed on the Mariner in Nov/Dec 2018 and enjoyed the cruise experience very much.  We would sail on either of the three lines mentioned but the itinerary comes first for us.  In fact we have a Silversea cruise booked in June 2019, I will be taking my mother on the Voyager in August and we have a Seabourn cruise booked in February 2020.  In this review I won't go into the ports because there have been live blogs done of this cruise so I feel that is redundant.  What I will do is talk about the on board cruise experience.  I'm a positive person and I'm aware how fortunate we are to be able to vacation in such a luxurious way but want to give both the positive and negative views of our latest cruise so it may help others in selecting a cruise line that suits their needs whilst also giving a realistic view of what to expect and not what the glossy brochures portray. The good: Cruise director: John Baron is probably my favourite cruise director.  We sailed with him on Seabourn (his first actually) and then again on both Mariner cruises we have taken.  He is friendly, approachable a good entertainer (his show was really enjoyable) and a great trivia host.  We have also sailed with Marla (his assistant) on Seabourn many times and it is always nice to catch up with her. Compass Rose and both specialty restaurants.  Food was very good at all three of these restaurants. Wine: I feel Regent along with Silversea offer the best wines on any cruise line we have been on.  I also really appreciate the wine tasting of non revenue wines that Regent does.  I wish other cruise lines did this.  The selection of beer and spirits is very good. Cocktails:  The best of all three lines as mentioned above.  Yes, Seabourn has this new mixology cocktail menu.  Very trendy but honestly IMO not as good as Regents offerings.   Shore excursions:  I know a lot of guest really enjoy having the all included shore excursions.  I'm not a fan really as I like to do a bit of both and I know I could do that on Regent but I feel in some way I have already paid for these so I may as well take them.  I find I'm far more adventurous when sailing Seabourn or Silversea as I do a bit of both the cruise lines excursions an independent excursions.  Having said that I can not fault both the organization and the tours themselves.  They are as good as anything that you would pay for on either Silversea or Seabourn.   We did two tours that included lunch and both were a highlight of the trip. Room Service:  I really like the way Regent handles room service.  You place your order and then they call you just before it arrives to your room.  We often have breakfast in our room and it is so nice to get this call and be ready for when it arrives.  Seabourn and Silversea call you after to ask how your food was and inform you that they are going to pick up the tray.  Every time! This gets annoying and feels somewhat disingenuous.  Also when you ask for a glass of Champagne from room service they bring you a bottle.  Seabourn will bring you a glass.  So kudos to Regent for that. Quietness and stability of the Mariner:  This ship rides so smoothly in rough seas and we had a couple of days of those.  The noise insulation is very good.  Never heard our neighbour or any guests in the passage ways.  No vibration that we felt. Breads:  My husband loves bread (french bread in particular) and I will agree with him that Regent has the best bread of the three cruise lines.  Crusty French bread and great artisan breads. Internet: My husband is Tech person and he finds it very important to have good internet access so he can keep in touch with his business.  He appreciates that you can have multiple devices connected in your room.  The not so good: Waiting two hours to be served lunch in Compass Rose.  I later spoke with Ricky (Food and Beverage Manager) and he explained they were implementing a new ordering system and had some teething  problems. This did get better as the cruise went along.  We did get numerous apologies for the wait. He also let know that on our last cruise there were only 500 passengers on board and that this cruise they was at capacity with a full ship. La Veranda:  I can not tell you how disappointed we were in this venue.  Crowded beyond acceptable.  Extra tables were put in the walkway on both side of the buffet and whilst this was appreciated by guests trying to find a table it made the buffet even more crowded.  A full ship with early spring weather (some sunshine but mostly cool) and the Veranda could not handle the passenger numbers.  Management needs to have a good look at this problem.  Perhaps offering a special menu in Compass Rose for lunch to entice more passengers to dine there at lunch would help.  We just avoided going there as it was a disaster.  People bumping into one another.  Dishes running out (seafood platter) and people waiting in queues for 10 minutes to get a portion.  They just did not cope with the amount of guests trying to dine here.  People couldn't find a table, food running out, long waits for it to be replenished.  I also found the food here to be unimaginative.  This is where Regent falls down.  Seabourn's buffet is so much better in variety and quality.  I will say the pizza was good but honestly that was about it. Regent makes the best burger as sea I have ever tasted.  That is where the good ends.  Look at what Seabourn and Silversea do at night on their pool deck.  A real alternative dinning option.  The buffet on the Mariner for lunch is not great at the pool deck.  They had a Mexican buffet and Greek one day and that was just okay but they could really improve on the food offerings here. Afternoon Tea:  Again this is an area where Regent falls behind the other two lines.  Chocolate afternoon tea.  Same tea bags that you can get in any venue and a couple of the cakes were still frozen.  If it is not a special afternoon tea event, you get a small buffet and an offering of tea bags.  Both Seabourn and Silversea have a tea selection which is served at your table and on Silversea a tower of afternoon tea snacks.  Some times we like to skip lunch and just do afternoon tea but we did not do this on Regent. Entertainment:   Some good and some not so good.  The pianist Nicky was fantastic.  The Duo at the bar at the back of the ship are great in the disco but not really suited to pre- evening dance music.  An example of this is that we had a full ship and only 4 or 5 couples dancing.  They are not great and we had them on the last Mariner cruise as well.  Seabourn wins out in this regard as they have a trio and a guitarist and also a pianist so you have much more choice.  Silversea is about the same as Regent.  The guests entertainers were also a mixed bag.  The Australian entertainer was very good.  The Filipino vocalist who won The Voice (or something similar) was good the first night but not so good the second night.  The entertainment is not the most important part of a cruise for me but I do like to dance before and after dinner and we did not do much of this on this cruise as the Duo was really not good.  Summary: As you can see there are more positives than negatives and we really did enjoy this cruise.  Having said that we have never experienced so many little hiccups on one cruise before.  Yes, no cruise is ever going to be perfect or perfect for every guest on board but there were a lot of little hiccups that I have not mentioned. These hiccups happen on all cruise lines but on this cruise there were more than usual.  I have tried to be honest and balanced in my review as I think this helps perspective guests set their expectations and helps them to select a cruise lines that works for them.  I usually like to end my review with would I cruise on this ship again.  Well, yes and no.  I would not cruise Mariner on a cold weather cruise where there was a possibility of a full ship.  I would probably cruise Mariner again a hot weather cruise if the itinerary was right but it may not be my first choice. Read Less

A great itinerary in Southeast Asia. This was my fifth Regent cruise, and found the overall experience very good, but slipped from past Regent Cruises. Ship recently refurbished and very attractive. Would have rated it excellent, but for the dining experience, which I found to have slipped compared to previous Regent cruises. Menu in the Compass Rose was adaquate, not particularly creative. Service was inconsistent for both food and wine. I understand that a major staff change was made in port, an explanation, not an excuse. Dinner in Prime 7 a big failure. Ordered a filet, medium. Received a filet well done on outside, red raw on the inside. Not certain how they did that, other than cooking meat not completely thawed.Other dining options Dining in Chartreuse a beautiful experience. An imaginative menu, perfect excecusion. Have always enjoyed Regent, bot there were enough stumbles to suggest looking at other cruise lines Read Less

We chose this cruise Because of the following factors 1.Itinerary 2.cruise line 3.offer of 3 day pre-cruise in Singapore This was our fourth cruise on Regent and our second on Mariner. Regent had raised their game since our last cruise with them in December 2014. In the MDR the “always available” section read like that of a high class Steak and Seafood restaurant with lobster ,scallops ,Alaskan king crab,Dover sole and a myriad of steak choices The included wines were a little ordinary but the pay for list was interesting and reasonably priced eg Cloudy Bay usd 60 Ray the cruise director was very visible and never seemed to have time off. The officers were friendly and we had great service from the efficient and engaging crew. The included shore excursions gave a good choice for the able bodied but less choice for anyone with mobility problems. This was not helped by the poor infrastructure in some ports. We enjoyed the enrichment lectures and watched a few of the shows. Overall a great holiday. The recent refit had greatly improved Mariner . The Singapore pre-cruise was based at The Swissotel the Stamford a five star hotel and the program of tours was well organised and of a high standard Read Less

We selected this cruise initially because of the advertised stop at Papua New Guinea. Otherwise, we had previously visited almost all the other ports. The day before we boarded, we were advised by our travel agent that Regent had canceled the stop at Papua New Guinea. There were 3 or 4 different reasons going around among passengers as to why, although we never learned. The ship was very nice, the service generally excellent. The staterooms (they called them "suites") were a bit small when compared with other ships or cruise lines in this category. We were on for 36 days, and storage was a bit tight. There was no chair in the stateroom, but there was a somewhat uncomfortable two person couch, with a large high table in front. It just made things even tighter. The bed was moderately comfortable. We were offered a choice of either a firm mattress, which was like a board, or a too soft mattress with no edge support. If you sat at the edge of the bed while getting dressed or putting on shoes, you would slide right off. The cabin decor was pleasant, but neutral. The bathrooms were somewhat small, with a large walk-in shower with good water pressure, and a single sink, not a double as one might expect on a ship of this category. Re food, breakfast was most often on the Verandah deck with a large selection buffet and table service offering most anything you might want. The French restaurant had spotty food, excellent foie gras appetizer. Most of the dishes were French in name only. The service was excellent. Prime Seven was the steak restaurant, with lots of steak and non-steak choices. We thought it consistently had the best food on the ship. The main dining room, the Compass Rose had a relatively large rotating selection, changing every night, plus a large choice of "standards", always available. The service there was spotty, some waiters very attentive and quick, others not so. The food here was good to average. We felt the food of Oceania, owned by the same company, NCL, was quite a bit better. Overall, the food ranged from bland to the point of tasteless to very salty. I recall that the veal medallions were actually thick chunks of veal. The tours were average, no better than the standard tours offered by most other cruise lines. The few that were more interesting, were available at an extra charge. The entertainment was typical of mid-size ships. There was the standard group of shipboard singers and dancers, although there were more of them than on other ships. The "stars" which were brought on in various ports, performing twice in their visit, were not any better than other lesser-rated cruise lines. The cruise director was very good and an excellent entertainer in his own right. The enrichment lectures were topical and generally very good. One lecturer, who was only on the ship for the earlier segment, was the best I have ever heard, and could even make a laundry-list sound exciting. The ship's common areas where typical of ships in this category, with the usual number of cocktail lounges, a coffee-shop, and a nice theater was evening shows. Overall, it was nice, but not exceptional. Other than the few extra cost port excursions, and better grade wines, everything is included. It is very nice not to be nickel-dimed as on many other lines. Our big complaint was the price. It was considerably more than other cruises lines, but the product which was delivered was no better than many other less expensive lines, even if you include the cost of alcohol and tours. Read Less

Had a wonderful time on the Mariner in Australia. The ship is just the right size and Regent treated us to a spectacular New Year’s Eve party in Bali. We also were treated to a magical evening at the Australian Open tennis tournament. We had great seats in Rod Laver Stadium for two night matches. The crew and officers on Regent are friendly, efficient, and helpful. Since most Regent passengers are return guests, you usually meet up with people you have cruised with previously. After we returned home, we automatically scheduled ourselves to be available at 4:30 pm for Team Trivia. The competition and camaraderie was a “look forward to every day event”. The food could be upgraded a bit. The menu is great though with many offerings available every day. It is also good to be able to order from the dining room menu for room service. We will be staying with Regent. We already have a booking on the new ship, Splendor. Read Less

Nov. 27, 2018 Mariner Papeete to Auckland The following experience optimizes what makes a Regent Cruise so wonderful. It's the exceptional, sincere, and kind individuals that work together to create for guests a once in a lifetime celebration and memories. We chose this trip because we vowed to return after 20 years to the places where we honeymooned. I mentioned to Sunil, our butler how my husband John was my hero and superman for when he married me, a widow, he took on the responsibilites of two greiving  teenagers and ill and declining parents. I wanted to thank him with a surprise German themed evening of food and music. It brings back his happy memories of his parents of German descent. I thought we might have dinner in our suite and perhaps hear a couple German tunes where the musicians were playing that evening. Here's the amazing evening that Sunil flawlessly executed with the help of Marius, Chef Wesley, Kasha, Anyje, Boogie, Zach and their fellow performers. When we returned from our shore excursion, Gretchen and Deborah who kept our room always tidy, had beautifully decorated our suite. Towels were creatively transformed into swans forming a heart messaging I ♡ YOU on the confetti strewn bed. Red and white ballons with ribbon streamers were everywhere. We were then invited to the Mariner Lounge where Kasia and Antje greeted us in their German durndl dresses. They had planned a unique and upbeat show of beer toasting, music, song and dance. The girls wisked my joyful husband to the dance floor where he joined the dance and returned misty eyed. I am amazed how they came up with such a professional costumed show with such short notice. Brendon and Nathan said they had just finished learning their parts that afternoon. You would never suspect as it was executed with  perfection and all in attendance throughly enjoyed the upbeat energy of their performance. We then returned to our suite for dinner where Marius and Chef Wesley wished us a happy anniversary and presented all of John's favorite German dishes: his mother's Sauerbraten, schnitzel, spaetzley, pretzels and Asparagus soup served with a nice Reisling wine. I had mentioned to Sunil that John enjoyed a cigar and whiskey after dinner. He suggested that a taste of Louis XIII Cognac would make a nice gift from me. I agreed so we surprised John once again with a stroll to the cigar lounge were Sunil made a white gloved ceremonial presentation of this special indugence. We then caught John, the cruise director's excellent show. When we returned to our room there was yet one more surprise: a black forest cake topped with a fondant sculpture of Superman carrying me reminiscent of our original wedding cake. John's dad was a master baker and played trumpet in a German folk band and he would have been impressed. We were never charged for any of this. Regent doesn't nickle and dime you. They just treat you special all the time. We love that you never put your hand in your pocket once on board. You just sit back enjoy and let them pamper you So you see all of these wonderful individuals went over board to gift us an evening we will forever cherish. They make a Regent cruise special. Read Less

My father and I had always wanted to go to Tahiti, he was turning 80 and I was wondering if we would ever get a chance to travel together since his health had suddenly deteriorated. Regent was the perfect cruise line. We were tired of the up charging for this and that. Wanted a cruise that we didn’t have to check our receipts for the day or worry about the extras. Everything was taken care of! This was a truly all inclusive trip. Of course there were crazy expensive drinks and cigars were extra ( which should be). Being people who enjoy finer scotches and Bourbons we were still satisfied with the selection on the ship. The staff went above and beyond to make our vacation unforgettable. The Crew even arranged to get us on a tour that had already left! It was the first time my mom was in the ocean with stingrays and sharks. Amazing! We got to know some wonderful passengers and staff which I know our paths will cross again. The entertainment was not like the mega ships, but we didn’t care. The craft sessions far surpassed anything on the mega ships! Unfortunately, I can’t remember names since I am writing so late. Broke my back riding horseback in Nuka Hiva. Do the Le Truck! Don’t go off and make your own plans there. My husband and I went diving and though the cruise line did not offer any assistance, some of the crew were very helpful in assisting us with getting some dives in and communicating with the dive shops for us, as well as making sure we got out on the first tender if needed. Definitely a trip of a lifetime! Read Less

We chose this 28 day back to back cruise as we had not been to Alaska in many years and all we had to do is fly one way as we live in Florida. We flew to Vancouver and since we had a penthouse we received a free night at the Four Seasons Hotel. Embarkation was easy and after a small lunch in the Veranda our luggage had been delivered and our cabin was ready. Service and food on the ship were superb. We really enjoyed the Veranda for breakfast and lunch and had most of our dinners in Compass Rose. The menu selections were huge and it was always hard to decide on an entree so we usually shared between the two of us. Chartreuse was not our favorite but we enjoyed Prime Seven (especially the whole Maine lobster) several times. The excursions in Alaska were exceptional. We went whale watching (saw hundreds), and loved watching the dolphins play and the bald eagles who were spotted in the trees by our guide. We had a dungeness crab feast in Ketchican (all you can eat)! Two ports were cancelled (Nicaragua because of unrest and Grand Cayman because of Hurricane Michael). Would not want to go back to Acapulco or Guatemala. Mostly life on the ship was great. There was good weather and we enjoyed just sitting by the pool reading or going to lectures and playing duplicate bridge (there was an excellent bridge director (Joyce from Saskatchuan) . Looking forward to our next Regent cruise (Tahiti to Singapore 2020) Read Less

Last time we cruised on Regent was four years ago and it was on the Mariner. This, over three week, voyage gave us about three months total on that ship. Soon after we boarded we checked out the Main Dining Room, The Compass Rose, and wondered if we were on the right ship. We weren't aware that the Mariner went through an extensive refurbishment last March. Quite a change in the MDR, not just in the general decor but with wait staff and cuisine. Special shout out for the wine pairing sommeliers. Now, don't get me wrong, the Mariner was always great, but it was now super. For years now we have listed Regent as our favorite line and the Voyager as our favorite ship. Sure wish we could scratch up the simoleons to book them more often and for longer durations. Cruise lines love to give romantic titles to their cruises, this one was "Havana Dreams, Panama Scenes". I suggest that it should have been the "Hurricane Dodger", LOL. When we left Anchorage, AK we were keeping an eye on a dying hurricane out in the Pacific off the Baja Peninsula in Mexico which had doubled back toward the mainland. Then we heard about Hurricane Michael moving into the Gulf of Mexico, which was likely to prevent us from visiting Cuba. Survived those okay and had an enjoyable visit in Cuba and the countryside there, a great transit of the canal on a beautiful day all the way but then, five days after the canal, we returned to the ship after touring Acapulco, Mexico and found a letter from the captain on our bed explaining that a big, already Cat 5, hurricane was dead ahead of us, Hurricane Willa, and another smaller one coming up from the south toward our present position at the time. In order to put some distance between us and Willa we turned southwest for a day or so then northwest. Eight days sailing non-stop between North America and Maui, 3800 miles, instead of the scheduled six days to cross from San Diego. Our captain had chosen the most prudent course of action which was to bypass the planned ports of Cabo San Lucas, Mexico on Tuesday and San Diego on Thursday and instead spend those days at sea navigating our course far away from the storm systems, with a new arrival into Kahului, Maui one day early for an overnight stay. On the way across the Pacific we learned of Typhoon Yutu, which was the largest yet in 2018, it had just hit Saipan and Tinian on the other side of the Pacific from our location. At that time the Accumulated Cyclone Energy, or "ACE," was by far the highest ever recorded, or using that criterion, it was the worst hurricane season on record since records began early in the 19th century. Our extra sea days were due to weather situations, the longest number of those we have experienced was nine and that was also due to an accident, a lady compound fractured her ankle so we had to turn back in order to get her off the ship for medical attention. All total we canceled two port visits due Willa, Cabo San Lucas, Mexico and San Diego, Ca, plus one port canceled at the last minute due to political unrest, Nicaragua. Out of that we gained two more "At Sea Days" and another day and a night in Kahului, Maui. Hey, I saw more flying fish that voyage than I've seen in years. But it was all good for us since we love sea days and life on board was exquisite due to Regent's fine service, cuisine quality and on board activities such as that involved with one of my favorite aspects of cruising, the enrichment lectures, particularly those addressing the theme of the voyage or aspects of the area of the world the cruise is taking place in like history, naturalism and geography. On this voyage we had two lecturers, Michael Scott, a botanist and historian and Lt. Colonel Bill Rothschild a NASA Rocket Scientist and engineer. Scott's presentations fit perfectly into the area of the world we voyaged but Rothschild's were very interesting as well. I think they spoke a dozen times each and I attended every single lecture, perfect attendance. Not to mention my sometimes twice daily hot tubs and the wonderful service from the ships pool bar. In a way this was a strange voyage, smooth seas and nice warm days all the way, yet we have were surrounded by hurricanes most of the distance. But all voyages can't be absolutely perfect. We did experience a few glitches, minor as they were. We planned on three formal nights which somehow got changed to two. But the last one they scheduled on the last night of the voyage, which was a port day preceded by six sea days. Nobody plans like that. Neither did they, toward the end they rescheduled the formal night to the last sea day, hurray. We almost always purchase pre-cruise and post-cruise hotel and transfer packages and so we did this time as well. On the pre-cruise hotel, which was part of the cruise package, they changed the hotel on us a few months before sailing, no big deal. But then a few weeks before sailing, after we had received the nice final formal cruise packet in the US mail, they flip flopped again and changed the hotel back to the original. Somehow we missed the email notice of the second change. So ended up in the wrong hotel. By the time we figured out there was something wrong we had already booked into a very fine room in the wrong hotel. Regent determine it was all our fault, so gave us a choice, stay in the wrong hotel and pay for it yourself or move over to the other one which we are paying for. We moved. On the post cruise hotel, the Royal Hawaiian in Honolulu, Regent was right on top of this and changed hotels for us when they discovered Waikiki hotels were just hit with a massive labor strike and the Royal was included. They got us into a very nice waterfront hotel that was not on strike. Good on them. In summation, I realize Regent's prices are pretty steep and going up, so are the other line's prices that we frequent. But you have to say this about Frank Del Rio (FDR)'s lines. The other lines seem to not only be increasing prices but also engaging in a commensurate ratcheting down of overall cruise quality. While at the same time, Regent is enhancing over all cruise quality. Read Less