P&O's 5 Ship Spectacular out of Sydney Harbour on the 24th of Nov was supposed to mark a new age in luxury cruising to Australian 'cruiselings'. It was a disaster with one of the 'new' ships, The Aria, not even making it out of the harbour that night as planned and its other 'new' ship, The Eden, plagued with problems for its whole cruise.
Let me just start by saying these aren't new ships. I was on The Eden and it is 23 years old. It was built in 1992 and a former Holland-American line cruise ship called the MS Statendam.
My partner and i had constant problems on this cruise. It started with bags being lost and just continued from there. The line at reception was always at least a ten minute wait for the entire cruise as people needed to get daily printouts of what they were being charged for as alot of stuff ups where made on the first night. we had drinks charges on ours we never bought from the first night of the cruise.
Our room was small. Our double bed was 2 singles pushed together. there is no fridge in the room like you get in similar rooms on The Dawn and The Jewel. The climate control did not work for the first 30 hours of the cruise and our room was boiling. Our toilet broke 4 times. The tv was terrible particularly its sound not picture. Bag did not even fit under the bed for my girlfriend (the only space available for it too as the cupboard were too tiny). shower was good. no rust in our bathroom but did hear about and see it in other rooms on board.