Following Royal Caribbean's acquisition of the Spanish cruise line, Pullmantur, seemingly to get its hands on the former R6 and R7, the group launched Azamara Cruises (more recently, Azamara Club Cruises) as a new brand to rival Oceania Cruises, which operates the former R1, R2 and R5. By the start of 2011, we had spent 86 nights aboard one or other of the ex-Renaissance Cruise Line 'R' Class ships, operated by three cruise lines. We were therefore interested to see how Azamara ran its ships and whether this would represent another string to our bow of cruise lines on which we would consider sailing. The coincidence of a 7-day Adriatic cruise at a very attractive fare on Azamara Quest fitted the bill perfectly, with the hope that a sail date of 6 August would not mean hordes of children, for which these 'R' Class ships were not designed.

Unusually for us these days, the Azamara offer was a fly-cruise, incorporating a one-night stay in Venice pre-cruise and all transfers. Of course Azamara can piggy-back on the presence of Royal Caribbean Group's other brands in Venice - Royal Caribbean and Celebrity - which has become a major turnaround cruise port in recent years. The day we set sail, Royal Caribbean's Voyager Of The Seas and the ex-Celebrity's Zenith now under Pullmantur's banner, were also in port. Arriving at Venice airport on the 5th, there was a significant Royal Caribbean meet-and-greet team, shepherding passengers to coaches for their transit to one or other hotel. Ours was the Crowne Plaza and a review will be posted later on Trip Advisor.

In our experience, no one beats Princess Cruises for slick embarkation, whereby you can get on board at noon and go straight to your cabin. We embarked the Quest a little before 12.00 but the cabins were not available until 13.30, almost exactly the same time as Oceania. We had chosen cabin 6072, a standard balcony configuration. Azamara has re-carpeted the floor, replaced the bed mattresses and put a proper dining table and two chairs on the balcony, the latter facilitating in-cabin dining without stooping over a low table "indoors"! Read more