Riviera Review

Outstanding first Oceania cruise

Review for the Caribbean Cruise on Riviera
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don731
10+ Cruises • Age 70s

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Additional details

Sail Date: Feb 2020
Cabin: Verandah Stateroom

As veteran cruisers, we had high expectations for our first cruises (2/4 and 2/14, back to back) on Oceania. Our expectations were exceeded. Outstanding staff, cuisine, and a beautiful ship. We found the food in all venues to be wonderful, from the pool grill to the four upscale speciality restaurants. Totally professional wait staff in all venues. The only negative issues we encountered during this cruise were a toilet that backed up several times (common problem on our deck, according to the engineer who serviced our unit), plus two issues on the pool deck. The pool deck smoking area is not enclosed, and the cigar smoke is noticeable on the entire starboard side of the deck. We also encountered on the first cruise many entitled chair hogs who “reserved” up to 8 chairs many hours in advance of actually getting to the pool deck. Many guests complained and the pool deck staff stepped up their efforts, per their stated policy. Not much of a problem on the second cruise.

We didn’t book any ship’s tours. Instead we did a few taxi tours on our own. Some of the ports (St. Bart, St. Maarten) were wonderful, others (St. Vincent, St. Lucia) were sad and poor.

We will strongly consider Oceania for our future cruising. We are veterans of Cunard, Azamara, and others. Oceania is definitely top tier.

Cabin Review

Verandah Stateroom

Very large cabin for this level. Wonderful bathroom and bed. Lots of storage.

Port Reviews

Miami

Downtown Miami is vibrant and alive! Enjoyed the night before boarding at the nearby Intercontinental Hotel.

Nassau

Just a quick walk around in Nassau.

St. Barts

Beautiful town, wonderful lunch!

Antigua

Not much to see, but we attended church at the Anglican Cathedral which was wonderful!

St. Lucia

On our second cruise, we stayed onboard.

St. Maarten

We did our own taxi out to Maho Beach, which was wonderful.

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