We booked 2 back-to-back cruises. Boarding was a joke with only 2 lateral flow testing stations and registration (which itself took some 15 minutes) for 350+ passengers. What we didn't know was that the previous cruise had suffered a Covid outbreak, with all sorts of rumours about numbers circulating amongst those onboard. Thereafter, it soon became obvious that there were problems. 4 restaurants had to be closed, there was none of the usual stage entertainment apart from one magician/comedian, the cruise director was nowhere to be seen and eventually the ship provided some information justifying the lack of services by announcing that 10% of the crew had Covid. To keep things going, staff were reassigned with many clearly working out of their comfort zones - my breakfast order was only right once throughout the entire cruise! Towards the end, we received a note stating that we would be offered 50% of our money back for this first cruise. This was shortly followed by another note telling us that 2nd cruise was cancelled. This of course meant rearranging flights, cancelling hotel reservations and taxis both in the US and at home. That was it. No word of what we were to receive by way of compensation and despite repeated visits to guest relations onboard, nothing was forthcoming.

The last thing anyone wants when getting off a ship is further chaos but Silversea did not disappoint. We were supposed to have a trip on a boat in the Everglades - along with around 20 plus other people - in our case, to lessen the amount of time we would have to spend at Miami airport. Did the bus turn up? No it didn't - it had evidently(?) gone to the wrong terminal - or at least that was the bull story we were told. So the end result was what we had dreaded, namely having to wait at Miami for 8 hours before our plane was due. By that stage, it hardly mattered that it was over an hour late taking off.

This was not what you would expect from a supposedly 6 Star cruise line and we are dreading what lies in store for us on future cruises we have already booked with them.