Bring On August!!

As in my previous blog you may have remembered reading about the ‘Beef. Lobster and the $10,000.00 Bar Stool’, this was all about Oceania Cruise lines, and next month I have been invited to view two of there ships when they come in to Southampton and I can’t wait. I have been in the Cruise Industry for just over 5 years although I have been cruising from a very young age. I have always done the more mainstream cruise lines such as Ocean Village and Island Cruise, but also P&O, Cunard, Princess, MSC, Celebrity and Royal Caribbean.

My Favourite of all was the Celebrity Eclipse, she has everything you would expect from a luxury ship but on a grand scale, yet she manages to keep the Intimate feel, difficult to find on a larger ship, after doing Independence of the Seas I expected Celebrity to be similar lots of Big of open spaces and quite daunting when trying to get around, except Celebrity wasn’t, it had lots of lovely bars dotted around and there was a real feel of intimacy, the feel you get on the smaller more exclusive ships. The Colour scheme was light, lots of silvers and creams, where as the Independence of the Seas, was bright and bold.

Oceania offer 5 ships dived in to two difference sizes,

In the smaller sizes you have the,

Oceania Regatta

Oceania Insignia

Oceania Nautica

These ships were built in 1998 and 2000 but recently received major refurbishments, as recently as 2013 on the Nautica to give them the New Ship feel and to update those Ultra Luxurious features.

Each of the 3 ships are about 30,000 gross tonnage and can have a maximum of 684 guests, so it really does offer a intimate feel on-board.

Probaby more my style is the Oceania Marina and Riviera which are double the size at 66,000 gross tonnage, however these ships are home to 1,250 guest on each sailing.

Oceania Marina

Oceania Riviera

So in August I am off to see the Riviera and the Nautica both in Southampton so for all you cruise fans out there make a note as August brings many of the cruise lines that don’t normally offer cruises out of Southampton on a Regular Basis with Azamara, Silversea, Seabourn and Regent all calling in at Southampton over the next few months.

However Oceania are supposed to spend the most on food, so it will be interesting to see how they showcase this on board, so look out for news on this when I return….

[email protected] – www.tomstravels.co.uk – 0800 408 6143