Limited food options. Not many restaurants on ship. Buffet closed early all of the time. It would close an hour and a half early at night. Food was marginal. Entertainment was horrible. Not much to do on the ship at all. Bring your own stuff to do. I have been on 8 other cruise ships. Never have I been on one like this. Usually there is so much stuff that is incredible going on and it is hard to decide which thing to do. Not this cruise. One show at night that did not have room for everyone. It was like watching high school kids in Las Vegas clothes. No thanks. No dueling pianos, concerts, comedians, or anything like that. Pool did not have water in it most of the time. Large screen by pool but no movie nights. Commercials only. Top deck was wasted space. Mini golf was ruined and not playable. Was only a look out or sitting deck. Should have had activities and sports for guests. There was just nothing to do. Too much time on a boring ship. We would only dock at each city for about 4 hours. Not enough time at port to see the countries. We were rushed and could not go far. Would much rather spend time on land. They cancelled Athens Greece so we did not get to go there at all. They were rude to Americans. It was obvious we were last off the ship for excursions and other things. Would never go on any ship again unless it was American. I was with a group of 15. We all feel the same about each of these items. Read Less

My wife and I chose this cruise for the destinations in the Middle East, and the fact that it was a new ship. Discovered after the absolutely shambolic 3.5hr embarkation in Trieste that the ship had already sailed from Mon to Fri that week ! Most of the crew were from other ships in the Costa line, but obviously the training was missed ! To be fair to the staff they tried - but cold food in the restaurants, and the fact that they clearly had never had to deal with the volume of passengers, many of whom were not used to cruising, having no cultural queuing skills at all, or were not interested in dressing in their finest, save 'trackie bottoms' put my wife especially, in a depressed cruising mood ! The muster was a complete disaster, and was called by many we spoke to [including a retired Norwegian cruise captain] as illegal. The getting off and on the ship for excursions was another complete shambles. The whole crew seemed not to have a clue, which ended up with passengers 'joining the queue [if that was what it was] by using the lifts to jump 20/25 mins of the rest of us waiting politely. The ship was built for the Chinese market, and that was where it was going, on a one way trip. We didn't know it was going to be filled with loads of Chinese nationals, who with no disrespect, did not have an idea about western eating etiquette. Several times we had to leave our dining table, especially in the buffet on Deck 10, as people spitting, coughing, and eating in a different style, causing my wife to feel unwell. The entertainment was of poor/average quality, and films were non existent, save for the endless looping of 3 after 2 weeks ! We asked the bar staff for Gordons Gin on night one - they didn't know what we meant ! Enough said ! Overall - great ship, great destinations - shame about the crew and many other rude passengers. We queued for many a long hour for customer services, to be told that there was nothing they could do about it. We will not be going on another Costa ship. Read Less

Maiden cruise - I think not. Ship was wonderful and the roof that opens onto the Lido Deck wonderful. Animation crew fantastic and they appeared to be the only ones on board the ship that seemed to welcome us English speaking passengers. They and the friends we made on the ship made the cruise bearable. 19 days of having people push and shove to get food, not waiting patiently in line, taking excessive amounts of food. The pushing and shoving was also apparent in the shore excursions. A lot of people cancel tours as we did to do our own thing. You would think that this was Costas first cruise as it was badly organized. No English programmers on tv - if you were Chinese you had the best choice. We had 3 movies on a loop for 19 days - how pathetic. Did I mention that we had Chinese film crew and actors on board blocking off access to different parts of the ship so they could do promotional film for the ship in Chinese. Did not know that this cruise was last for Europeans as the ship has been leased to the Chinese and will be based out of Shanghai. They seemed to forget about us already on this cruise and focusing on the Chinese market instead. Painting and maintenance constantly going on around us - had to prop open cabin door to get ride of paint fumes. No library - started up informal book swap. Cold food - meat you could not eat as it was tough. Sweets were fantastic - a highlight of any meal. Poor performance Costa - if you are looking for more new customers this is not the way to get them. You need to focus on the passengers you have onboard not future ones. Read Less

We chose this cruise to escape the late winter early spring weather and on price and the ships itinerary. The beginning, after being picked up at our Venice hotel we were dropped at Venice airport to wait around for two hours without any information before being herded on to a fleet of buses for a 90 minute journey to Trieste. This is where the confused disorderly nightmare got worse we where dumped with thousands of other passengers in a massive car park with no queuing system in place no queue marshals no Costa staff to organize fair queuing, it just became a very unpleasant fight to retain a place in the queue with many people just pushing in. It took us three and a half hours of queuing to check in without being offered a drink or toilets being available, we were lucky that it was not raining nor hot and sunny, otherwise the experience could have been much worse. When we did manage to board the ship the chaos continued, we were instructed to go to our muster stations at least 4 times only for the exercise to be repeatedly cancelled, eventually we tried to attend the evacuation procedure, however the stair wells were blocked with other passengers on each occasion and this made it impossible for many passengers to get to the correct muster stations. like many other passengers we missed the emergency drill completely. The Cabin, ours was internal with a big comfortable bed otherwise the cabin was small and lacked storage, one small wardrobe with 8 coat hangers , the shower was good plenty of hot water. Dining, Poor quality food mainly cold, plenty of Queuing. Entertainment, Second rate. Shore Excursions,poor and a total rip off. Service, our cabin steward was excellent (Berco), some of the bar staff were very good. Read Less

I totally agree with everything others on this site have written about the ship Costa Venezia - it was a terrible cruise. The food was poor - we were on the ship 53 days and only had salmon twice, it was low budget food every day. Always long lines everywhere. The embarkation in Trieste took 5 hours stranding in lines without water or food. And it continued with queue the whole cruise from the buffet to the pool area, sun beds, theater, excursions. Always kaos with poorly trained staff and a very bad logistics from Costa so butter, wine, glass, beer etc was missing for serveral days. There was something totally wrong on the ship - the staff was NOT smiling and we did not have the feeling off beeing on a vacation. The information onbord was NOT existing - we got No information about the port/city we were going to visit. We couldn't follow the sailing route for 3 weeks on the tvscreen - it went black and we didn't get any other information instead. We had to stay in lines 1,5 hour 3 times during the cruise to get a stamp in our pasport from the customs officers there were on board. Again totally kaos. The exit in Tokyo was dealyed 3 hours and we had to stand up becaused there were not seats enough. We missed a night i Hong Kong becaused the captain had a formel reception with the president of Asia Costa Cruises and the directory of the cruise terminal in Shenzhen, China. They did not care about the passengers, the only want the ship sailed to China where it is going to sail in the further as a casino ship for the chinese People. Never Costa Cruises again Read Less

Wow where do I start?? 7 family and friends first time cruisers. Flew into Venice and transferred to the amazing ship on the pre arranged bus..painless security and embarkation and a really friendly welcome to the ship from the great staff. Luggage handled by Costa and placed outside our cabins...obtained a costa card that would become our best friend for the next week...it goes everywhere with you..no getting on or off the ship without it or drinks from the bar. Having read numerous reviews was a little worried about the cabin size but no worries at all...premium balcony cabin had a queen size bed ,table and sofa,three single wardrobes with hangers (but did take some of my own hangers) set of storage shelves with the safe in and cupboards under a surface with a mirror above and hairdryer...a full length mirror was on the inside of the wardrobe door. Plenty of shelves in the bathroom and great power in the shower and plenty of hot water..dispenser of shower gel in the shower. The cabins were cleaned daily... you had a choice of morning or afternoon cleaning..lovely hard working professional Frankie looked after us well. There were 2chairs and a table on the balcony ideal for a quiet afternoon with a book and watch the scene changing in front of you The food...oh the food! Again after mixed reviews was a little worried but again no need to be! Hot and cold choices for breakfast...seated in the restaurant or at the buffet all hot if needed to be or cold if needed to be...lunch...3 courses seated in the restaurant or tremendous choice in the buffet meat fish and vegetarian and accompaniments at each sitting....afternoon tea...focaccia sandwiches or filled cobs always along with cake and fresh fruit..and of course tea or coffee dinner was an amazing 4 course affair seated at our own table each night...with differing dress codes which you found out on the daily diary sent to your room We had purchased a drinks package with meals and were very glad we did...I would purchase an all drinks next time...the only minus point was the seating at lunch if you wanted the buffet it was a scramble to get a seat. The entertainment was great..shows each night and days were packed with things to do if you wanted.Being an Italian ship and many different nationalities made listening to all the introductions in all the languages a bit monotonous We went on 3 costa excursions which were well organised and for first timers we felt safe. The tuk tuks in Dubrovnik were amazing with very informative guides...there were chances to do your own thing too Looking already at booking the next one...if you're looking to book...do! Read Less

Sadly this cruise was advertised as all inclusive, meaning water and food should be included. Water was at specific unclear times available on a different deck that we were not stationed on, the food during breakfast and lunch, which one could receive after standing in line with many unhappy customers was absolutely disgusting. Dinner was served at a specific time that was assigned to one by chance, if one failed to report to the dining hall within 15 minutes of the beginning of the dinner time one would have to deal with being locked out of the hall. Thus one had to resource to eating at a highly expensive other restaurant located on the ship, each restaurant service was unfriendly and in-comprehensive leading to food poisoning on two occasions. Upon asking for a manager or any person of sort we were greeted with unfriendly hostesses who would become defensive and aggressive. Bookings on the "Costa Card" were incorrect on occasion and additional charges were not removed upon request though many items were double booked. The swimming areas and showers were filthy as well as the deck being unkept and not taken care of. Staff appeared completely untrained in terms of hospitality as in acting aggressively towards simple questions, being completely unable to serve food, communicate with guests and responding politely. None of the people at any information desks were informed in any way about any of the procedures on board, as an experienced traveler who was accompanied by a person has been active in hospitality businesses for years both managing and leading restaurants and bars of well known names in Vienna, this whole vacation which ended up costing over 4.000 for eight days for two people, this was an organized rip off scheme planned by management that hid behind their staff. The major amounts of disinformation were widespread among guests on board leading to a very depressed and frustrated atmosphere. This was for us, and our friends the first and definetely last experience with costa. Read Less