Sea Day in the Adriatic
Our time in Greece has come to an end. What a great time we had visiting so many different places.
Today we have time to rest up our feet for our stay in Venice where will be doing a lot more walking.
Our cruise ship, the Azamara Quest is fairly small, holding fewer than 800 passengers. We were told there are about 575 passengers on this cruise. One of the good things about traveling on a small ship is that it can go into ports that the larger ships cannot. We really enjoyed some of these small ports. Besides having few ships in port, they were less touristy. Another advantage is that the smaller ships can more easily manage changes in itinerary such as when we could not get into Milos. There were excursions set up in Spyros within a fe hours.
The ship itself is very comfortable and our room is very spacious with plenty of storage and a very nice bathroom with a large glass enclosed shower. We upgraded to the category above a standard veranda so so we had a larger room, more storage and a larger balcony, plus a few other amenities. Someone I talked to who was staying in a standard veranda cabin said her room was comfortable and they enjoyed it except for having a clingy shower curtain in the small shower.
It is also easy and quick to get around the ship. The restaurants are all at the back of the ship and the entertainment, such as it is, is in the front.
With that said, there is not a huge amount to do on the ship if you are spending a lot of time on board while in port. There is a pool with hot tubs, shuffleboard, a pingpong table and a jogging track. For our one sea day there are a few more activities but things are limited because of the space. There are only 2 shops on the ship, one with handbags, a few articles of clothing and some essentials, and the other with very expensive jewelry. They had a watch that was on sale for 5500 euro marked down from 8900 euro , and with the current exchange rate a euro is just about the same as a US dollar. We passed.
This morning was a sea day and the Hotel Director, Ryszard had a very interesting talk about the Azamara Journey, one of the other 3 Azamara ships. It got stuck in limbo at sea in South America with no port to take them during the beginning of the Covid epidemic. One of the things we found most interesting is that because they couldn’t dock and had insufficient fuel and food they were stuck off shore of Argentina for a number of days. They ended up getting fuel and at another port were able to get food but had to pay for it in cash. To get the cash they had to break into the ATMs and a safe. The delays added almost a week onto the journey before passengers could disembark except for the 8 or 9 passengers from Argentina who were stuck on the ship for 2 months with the crew.
Captain Jonas did a Q&A following the Hotel Director’s talk. He explained what happened with the ship last evening. During an extra cleaning in preparation for the ship’s journey to Australia a hole was discovered in the hull. It was patched by 1AM but it took another 4 hours to get approval from the Greek government to leave the port. We should still be in port tomorrow on time but, the ship needs to travel at maximum speed with no stabilizers, making it a bit bumpy and more importantly using a lot more fuel.
There was a very nice brunch today in the main dining room which we took advantage of and we understood they do this brunch at least one time during each cruise on a sea day.
Entertainment is a mixed bag on the ship. Evening entertainment is pretty limited. There is one theater area called the Cabaret Lounge with a small stage. Comfortable chairs are set up with pretty wooden tables between them. We went to a few shows which were pretty good considering the size of the stage. After the show a band called the Lucky Boys played. They were quite good and played outdoors the one evening of the White Night party. There is also a DJ in the lounge later in the evening. We never stayed up that late but a few people who did said he was not very good. In the main bar was a very nice piano player names Jose who played every evening for a number of hours. He was pretty mediocre at the keys and pretty bad singing but it gave the lounge some ambiance, and he was super nice.
Pretty much every staff member we came in contact with on the ship is outstanding. They are all freindly, helpful and attentive to the needs to each guest. From maintenance to food service, room attendantands and the senior officers, they were fantastic, These are a few of our favorites, Christian, the bartendier in the specialty restaurant who was attentive, quick, and super nice. He misses his mom but is exceted to be going home soon. Mark, our assitant room attendant who is always working but always stops to say hi and ask how you are doing. He is so excited that he will be home with his kids for Christmas this year, Dwight who is always smiling and waved at me whenever he would see me. And he makes a great Cosmo. He is excited to see his kids for Christmas this year and watch them open presents. He has missed a number of Christmases with them. And then there is Robert, our super delightful butler who was on top of everything and loved to make jokes. He said he will miss briniging me tea and scones. He said life on the ship is good and Azamara treats their staff really well. He gets to facetime with his family often and said it ialmost feels like he is home. Everyone we talked to is working to make the lives better for their families. One of my favorite things to do on a cruise is talk to people who work on the ship about their home and family.
One thing we didn’t care for at all was the Cruise Director, Amanda and the assistant cruise director. I don’t think I ever heard his name. We rarely saw Amanda except on the TV talking about the day’s port and some activities on board, and she was not very knowledgable about many of the ports. We saw the assistant cruise director in person only once, today eating lunch with some of the ship’s officers. We rarely saw Amanda interacting with guests and when we did it was not having conversation, just brief greetings. She introduced the evening entertainment in a nice evening gown and then disappeared. We never saw her on the pool deck. One evening she was the evening entertainment and another she participated in it on stage which she seemed to really enjoy. I found her voice grating and could not listen to her for more than a few minutes. Someone told me that she had been a cruise entertainer at one time. Maybe she should go back. Despite being a small ship there is a lot more she could do with entertainment, and both cruise directors should be much more visible.
The only other major negative we encountered was the internet. Saying it was dreadfully slow is being kind. Everyone we talked to complained about it. In his Q&A the captain said the internet will be changing in the near future.
I can’t end on a down note. It was a spectacular cruise and we had a beautiful sunset to end it. We look forward to sailing again on Azamara.
